| Description | Sign, and seal of Daniell Parlmer. (dorso) Hum. Burton, Will Burton.
With these deeds we enter upon the resign of Charles I. Horwell and Asthull (DR0429/160) have now disappeared, but Hearsall has its modern spelling in contrast to the `Hethsale' of earlier deeds. I do not recognise `Middlewood.' Robert, Earl of Leicester, is, of course, Elizabeth's favourite, whose father's gift is commemorated in the brass tablets in St. Mary's Hall. Leicester appears to have stood well with the citizens. Sharp gives a letter of his (Antiquities, p. 121) relating to the Government Commission for digging for saltpetre, a great source of annoyance in Elizabethan times when nitre was much needed for the manufacture of gunpowder. `It was discovered that the top soil of farmyards ... and other places exposed to the vapours of putrefying matter, afforded, when mixed with ashes, a considerable supply of nitre. Hence these substances were claimed by the Crown, and granted to individuals or companies for the making of saltpetre. The rigour of these saltpetre men became most burdensome, as they insisted on the right of entering stables and even houses in search of material.' (Cox, Churchwarden's Accounts, DR0429/334). Humphrey Burton (DR0429/157) is the long-lived and diligent town clerk to whose pen is owing the preservation of so much interesting matter relating to Coventry history
Dated: 10 Oct, 21 Jas.I. (1623) |