Family History

Notes for a family history.

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Copyright Oggbashan October 2019

The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

This is a work of fiction. The events described here are imaginary; the settings and characters are fictitious and are not intended to represent specific places or living persons.

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Introduction

About a decade ago my uncle James was thrown from his horse. Although not seriously injured, he was bruised and temporarily using crutches. While recovering he spent many hours in the family's archives intending to write a family history. He never did finish the history but he collected and transcribed several stories that might have been used. Recently I too was temporarily incapacitated after a motorcycle accident and I spent some time trying to sort out the archives. That is where I found James' notes. I decided to word process them to help anyone who might use them later.

They are disjointed, in no particular order or date, and need much more work but they might be of interest to future researchers. I will give each separate piece of text a chapter number and my title.

I have omitted the references to the particular sections of the archives. They are in another document listing my 'chapters' and the archive location if you want to look at the original texts. The 'author' of each chapter will be found in the references.

If I have any introductory remarks they will be signed with my initials D E R.

This is the second part of my finds.

Chapter 05 Burgesses' Complaint

This roll of documents was interesting and old. There was a large parchment in Latin with many seals. Enclosed with it was a contemporary translation into English and a commentary by one of our distant ancestors who had been a Burgess of the Cinque Port of Sandwich in Kent. His signature and seal was on the parchment and on the translation. The parchment was addressed to the Prior of St Augustine's at Canterbury and to the Lord Lieutenant of Kent. I have modernised some of the language and abbreviated or omitted some of the formal salutations and endings. D E R

My Lord Lieutenant and My Lord Prior, we, the Burgesses of the Cinque Port of Sandwich, have difficulty this year in paying your normal imposts for goods arriving in our port. We plead for time to pay and for assistance in mitigating the nuisance that is impeding our legitimate collection of tolls. Apart from the loss of revenue to you, as you are aware a tenth of the imposts are reserved for maintenance and improvement of our port and haven. We are embarrassed at the cause and financially distressed by our lack of income.

Our custom house is on the Town Quay. We expect all trading vessels to moor at the quay to pay the tolls on goods imported through our port. If vessels fail to stop at the quay, our Town's artillery batteries located downstream and upstream are the ultimate means of enforcement of the requirement to pay the tolls. Both batteries are equipped with two sakers and manned by townsfolk paid a retainer to defend our rights.

For several years the townsfolk recruited to man the batteries have been seduced from their duties by the actions of one of our own. Richard Jones has been a victualler and Burgess of the borough for over a decade but his revenues had reduced, as had those of many of us, because of reduced maritime traffic during recent wars. He entered into a compact with merchants from France and Holland to import and export goods into and out of England while avoiding the legitimate tolls due to yourselves and the King. He persuaded those merchants to enter our haven whenever a high tide coincides with a period of darkness and assured them that if they sailed past our Town Quay our batteries would not challenge them and not fire their sakers. He provided them with skilled pilots to navigate The Great Stour to accept and discharge cargo close to the old Roman Fort further upstream. He had the return loads waiting there, and carts to remove the imported goods, protected by a large assemblage of armed rapscallions to assail any interference from our Town's authorities.

To our shame we had not been initially aware that the said Richard Jones had, through nominees, been operating several whorehouses in our Town. Whenever his foreign confederates signalled that they wished to enter The Great Stour, he sent numbers of his skilled and attractive whores to both batteries to seduce our artillerymen from their duties. The whores arrived at each battery with a kilderkin of Richard Jones' best strong ale. No matter how numerous our artillerymen, the whores outnumbered them. After each man had been assailed and seduced by a number of women proffering many pints of good ale they were in no state to man the sakers and usually so drunk or preoccupied that they would not have noticed the passing of an invading army, and certainly not a darkened ship.

The profits of Richard Jones' smuggling enterprises have been so great that his ruffianly henchmen and even his whores now pretend to be personages of consequence in our Town, purchasing desirable messuages for themselves.

Ten years ago the imposts for the Haven of Sandwich raised five hundred pounds or more each year to the benefit of your Lordships and our port. Over the last few years almost wholly caused by the activities of the said Richard Jones, those revenues have dropped to a third of their previous amounts. This last year the revenue was only one tenth of what it had been a decade ago.

From our own resources we are too aware that we no longer have the force or authority to prevent the continued activities of Richard Jones and his foreign adventurers. The ships that navigated The Great Stour during the hours of darkness this year were heavily armed with cannon, demi-cannon and other gonnes. Even if our four sakers were competently manned they would be no match for a single intruding ship of the size and power that frequently pass our Town. But our four sakers are unmanned, made useless by whores and ale. Even if we were to acquire more and heavier gonnes, we cannot man them. Those menfolk of our Town who are young and fit enough to serve artillery mock us. They prefer to serve Richard Jones' whores and drink his ale. No matter what recompense we might offer, the attractions of free women and copious amounts of ale have seduced the men from their duties.

We, the Burgesses of Sandwich, appeal to your Lordships to petition His Majesty to send armed forces to assist us to defend our Town, to prevent the continued villainy perpetrated by the said Richard Jones, and to apprend the ships that enter and leave the Realm unhindered. So far all that has occurred has been evasion of imposts, duties and custom fees but the ships could easily convey a considerable number of His Majesty's enemies who could land unopposed and unobserved. This could become a real danger to the security of His Majesty's Realm which would be of greater concern than the continued reduction of revenue for yourselves and His Majesty.

[The parchment continues with reiterated pleas for help and is signed by twenty-three Burgesses of Sandwich including our ancestor. (all of them except Richard Jones!) - D E R]

[There is another document in the roll. Our ancestor tried another way as well as the appeal to the authorities - D E R]

This record was made from the verbal account of one Thomas Ogden, labourer of the Town of Sandwich. It is authenticated by his mark, witnessed by me, Town Clerk Samuel Stevens, and the Beadle.

"I, Tom Ogden, resident and working labourer of the Town of Sandwich, give this true account of my nocturnal visitation to the downstream battery on Michaelmas Eve. That particular night had been suggested to me because the flood tide would reach the Town Quay at about one o'clock in the morning.

On the previous Sunday after morning service I had visited the battery and found everything as it should be. The sakers were well positioned. One faced upstream. The other faced downstream pointed at the curve in the river. Both had elevation marks for differing ranges, marked with white paint on a black scale. They would be easy to see by the light of a lantern. The balls were in good shape, protected from rain in a recess in the bastion. The gunpowder was in a locked cupboard. The corporal had the key to the padlock attached to his belt. There was a brick-built guardhouse with an extended roof so that the artillerymen could stand protected from the rain.

I had asked the corporal how he knew when to load the sakers. He had replied that a signal shot would be given from the mouth of The Great Stour if an unknown vessel was entering.

"Who gives the signal?" I asked.

"Old Reuben. The fisherman's hut where he lives is at the mouth of the Great Stour. He is paid to watch during all suitable tides during the hours of darkness. If there is more than one ship, say a raid by the French, he can also light a beacon. He won't, unless he is very sure it is a raid, because that beacon would be repeated all the way along the coast, even to London."

Only after hearing the shot would the sakers be loaded because it was a considerable nuisance to withdraw ball and powder if there had been no need to give fire.

I was asked by a Burgess of the Town to accompany the artillerymen when they changed their night guard at the sakers defending the port and haven. I had been an artilleryman in His Majesty's armed forces when younger. I pretended to the designated men that I wanted to see how different artillery work was in a fixed battery from the mobile batteries I had worked in the past. They didn't seem averse to my company but one jested that I might not see much.

Another interrupted saying "Of course Tom won't see much. It is a dark moonless night."

One said "You're an old man, Tom. Are you sure you are still capable?"

I answered "I may be old but I can still give fire."

"Give fire? That's one way of putting it."

For some reason that amused them.

The guard changed at midnight. The night guard would be on duty until eight o'clock in the morning but most would be sleeping in the guard house. They only needed two to listen out for the signal shot. Between the sound of the shot and the need to have the sakers ready to discharge would be at least twenty minutes for the fastest vessel likely to enter The Great Stour. If they didn't have a local pilot and had to navigate using casts of the lead line? It would take at least forty minutes.

That night the tide had changed about eleven o'clock. The Great Stour would be navigable on a rising tide from about two in the morning. I was watching with the two guards who were awake. Shortly after one o'clock I was aware of a group of people approaching from the town. I asked one of the guards about them.

"No need to worry, Tom," he replied. "It's only the wenches."

It was. There were at least two or three wenches for each member of the night guard. I was greeted by Anne, Ethel and Leah. I knew all three as older employees of one of Richard Jones' brothels.

"We've come to keep you company, Tom," Ethel announced. "We don't want you to be cold during the night."

The three of them laid hands on me and dragged me, not resisting, into the guard house. They pulled me on to a pile of palliasses in a corner. In the darkness they stripped me and I was swamped by naked female bodies. Leah rode me as Anne and Ethel surrounded my head with their breasts. Any word I might have said was stifled by a breast. I relaxed and enjoyed their attentions. If any vessel had passed the battery during the night, I wouldn't have known. The women's breasts obscured my hearing. Even if I had been able to hear I was otherwise occupied. The women made it very clear that they wouldn't let me free from them until they were satisfied. They are mistresses of their trade. I managed to give fire three times, one for each whore. I think I exceeded their expectations of an older man but eventually I was exhausted and asleep, tightly hugged by the three women.

By dawn all the women had gone.

"Did you enjoy the wenches,Tom?" The battery commander asked.

"They were more than I could handle at my age," I responded. "One, or perhaps two, would have been ample."

"Thank Burgess Jones for them," He said.

"I will," I said. "Artillery duty seems much more pleasant than it was in my day."

I learned from another artilleryman that Old Reuben has two resident wenches, retired from the brothels. They look after him almost as a pair of housewives. They take him to bed but not when the night tide is right. Old Reuben is the pilot for the smugglers' vessels. He gets the vessels past the Town Quay in darkness. He may be old but his eyesight is keen and his seamanship undiminished. He would fire the signal shot if an unidentified vessel approached the mouth of the river but the tides the smugglers will use are known a week in advance. Reuben and the sakers would be genuinely ready for any unknown vessel except for the smugglers. The wenches only attend the batteries when a smuggler's vessel is due, about three or four times a month.

The battery commander made it clear to me that I would not be welcome again at night. I could visit freely in daylight hours. If I mentioned Burgess Jones' name I might get a discount at the brothels, but I should not talk about what had occurred. I did not give him my promise. I couldn't. I had been requested to observe and report. This I have done."

Attached to this account is a note from our ancestor. Tom was paid three guineas for his report. Two years later Anne, Ethel and Leah had bought themselves out from the brothel. Tom married Leah. They lived a quiet retired life for a decade until their deaths within a week of each other.

There was a further note in our ancestor's hand. D E R

The response to the Burgesses' petition was unexpected. They were given ten years freedom from the requirement to pay any sums to the Lord Lieutenant and Prior. All imposts could be retained by the Town. Burgess Richard Jones was given a knighthood. As Sir Richard, he later became Mayor of Sandwich. The explanation? Richard's smuggling exploits were bringing goods into the country that were banned from export from France. By not landing at Sandwich's Town Quay, the King, the Lord Lieutenant and the Prior could deny that they were breaking France's laws - but they got their share of the profits anyway. Sir Richard added a battery of demi-cannon on the point by Old Reuben's hut. They fired in anger once, when England was at war with France. The French ship retreated.

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End of the Second Part of the transcribed archives.