Great Harwood 1379

The loss of dominions in France during the 1360s and 1370s (The Hundred Years War 1336 - 1453

) meant more and more of the costs of continued hostilities fell upon the English. To extract even more money from England a Poll Tax was levied three times, 1377, 1379 and 1381, each time the basis being slightly different. Although there are questions over the extent of evasion almost 60% of the population was liable to pay these taxes, far more than had been liable for taxes until then. In 1377 everyone over the age of 14 and not exempt had to pay a groat (4d) to the Crown, married couples were charged the single rate. By 1379 it was graded by social class and the lower limit rose to 16.

The levy in 1381 included all over 15 and was particularly unpopular as each person had to pay one shilling, which was a large amount then,

and helped provoke the Peasants' Revolt.

Only the 1379 list of taxpayers for Great Harwood survives but provides a snapshot of the population at that time.

The Domesday Book commissioners, 1086, stressed that much of Lancashire and Cheshire was wholly waste or depopulated. William the Conqueror's "Harrying of the North" could account for some of this but the previous hundred years had seen much conflict in the region: 980 a Norse raid on Chester and the beginning of the second Viking Age; 1016 the north west Midlands ravaged by Edmund Ironside and Earl Uhtred of Northumbria in their struggle with Canute; 1050s north Lancashire severely affected by Scottish incursions; Earl Leofric of Mercia recruits the help of King Griffith of Wales and Norsemen against Harold Godwinson culminating with the burning of Hereford in 1055; 1061 raids by Scots in Lancashire; 1062 - 3 Harold and his brother Tostig attack and lay waste north east Wales; 1070 the Scots return with devastating raids in north and central Lancashire. Even if Great Harwood (if it existed at this time) wasn't an active participant in any of these events the disruption caused would surely have reached even this isolated spot. The population on England in 1086 has been estimated as low as 1.1 million and as high as 2.25 million but, unsurprisingly, that of Lancashire was only 2 - 4000 and even though this is thought to be well understated (they were probably very good at hiding by now) there is no doubt that compared to southern and central England the population density was very low.

The next 200 years saw a steady and fairly rapid rise in the population of England to between 4 and 6 million by 1300.

Although urban populations grew the vast majority of people still lived on the land so more land was needed. Some of this could be achieved by clearing uncultivated land (waste) and draining marshes around existing settlements but in already populous areas this seems not to have been sufficient and new land was made from sea marshes and by emigration to less populous areas Lancashire and Cheshire becoming "the nearest thing to a "Wild West" available to the medieval community in England". While the demand for land strengthened the lords' feudal position elsewhere in England these new lands were nearly all farmed by freemen owing little to the landowner other than rent, this was perhaps an inducement to attract the "better sort" of tenant as clearing heavily wooded land, assarting, was arduous, time consuming work and maybe they were expected to have the means to support themselves until the first harvest.

Famine and plague, however, were a constant check on the population even in these times of growth and it's thought that after 1300 England's population stagnated or even began to fall. There was widespread famine 1316 - 22 that is thought to have killed 10% - 15% of the national population, widespread cattle murrain (disease) 1319 - 20 which must have affected the economy of the East Lancashire uplands disproportionately and more raids by the Scots in 1323. Just how badly affected Great Harwood might have been is difficult to assess. There appears to have been no reduction in assarting in the North West as a whole suggesting the population was already high but some contemporary records of other East Lancashire manors show land falling out of use. Then in 1348 the Black Death struck southern England spreading throughout the country. Estimates of its effects vary from killing 20% to 50% of the population but it wasn't just the effects of the terrible 'first wave' that afflicted the country but further outbreaks which “initiated a period of declining population which lasted until about 1430”. By the time of the 1379 Poll Tax the population of Lancashire is estimated at 35,000 but in 1300 it's thought to have been 60,000 or even higher. For the survivors, however, the hundred years to 1450 were times of great opportunity.

Unlike vast swathes of the Midlands and south which were farmed in large open, arable fields

the open or common fields in Lancashire were relatively small. Whereas the open fields of a Midland village could cover thousands of acres Lancashire villages tended to have a few hundred acres and often less. These open fields, like their counterparts elsewhere, would have been held as adjacent long, narrow strips, especially if under the plough to ease the work of the ox-teams, but there would usually be only a few tenants in each field rather than the jig-saw ownership of the Midland open field. The early consolidation of any scattered holdings by tenants exchanging land and then enclosing these strips further emphasised the differences between the Midland and Lancashire common fields.

Field boundaries indicative of this type of farming can be seen in the narrow fields around Pendleton (Pendle Hill not Manchester)

and there is some evidence that they existed in Great Harwood.
A map of 1603

shows that most of the farmed land in Great Harwood was held in severalty, that is enclosed fields worked by individuals or one family. This enclosure would have taken place much earlier as it was the usual form of land holding where assarting was taking place

but the map also shows an area (edged in red and bounded by Blackburn Road-Church Street, Park Lane-Harwood Lane, Whalley Road and the Hyndburn-Norden Brook-Lidgett Brook) apparently not held in severalty. This area is where Churchfield, Townfield and Bean Flatt (names indicative of open field farming

) are known to have been. Parts of the earlier (deer) Park

and possibly the Great Heie are thought to have been in the east of this area too (left on the map).

The long narrow fields south of St Bartholomew's Church are similar in size to those still existing around Pendleton, 400m x 40m, shown on the map opposite.

Open field farming in Lancashire may not have been on the scale seen in other areas but presumably there was some cooperation of effort in the early days of the manor of Great Harwood or, possibly, it was a left over from even earlier Saxon times.

A distinctive type of farming in the uplands of western England including the Pennine fringes of eastern Lancashire was the vaccary: cattle farm.

Much of the area was covered by hunting forests (not necessarily wooded); Bowland was a royal forest but the Forests of Pendle, Trawden, Accrington and Rossendale (strictly chases) and Ramsgreave Chase

were all in the Hundred of Blackburnshire, which was held of the crown by the de Lacys, Earls of Lincoln. Although deer were kept for "the chase" these forests were carefully managed and the grazing of cattle was just as important, if not more so, for the cash income they provided; Accrington had a breeding herd of up to 250 cows which was exceptional. Horses might also be grazed in these areas

but the primary product of the vaccaries was oxen for use as draught animals in the much more intensively cultivated areas to the east and south, animals sold for beef were mainly older, fattened cows.

When the Manor of Martholme and Great Harwood was granted by Henry de Lacey (1146 - 1177) to Richard de Fitton (confirmed by Robert de Lacy about 1180

) the trend to pastoral farming may already have been set. Certainly by c1289 when the manor was partitioned between the three daughters of William de Fitton, and their husbands, assarts, meadows and gardens are mentioned. Also mentioned are the Park and Great Heie; the three couples were to share the profits of the latter.

The Park suggests deer and, by association in this part of Lancashire, cattle while hays (Great Heie) were woodland enclosures for livestock or deer

and the profits possibly included payments for the grazing of cattle. Although there's no suggestion of large-scale cattle rearing in Great Harwood pastoral farming was being encouraged in the region as the soil and climate were not so suited to arable.

Later, in 1338, Adam Nowell, owner of the Lower Town, was granted the right to hold a weekly market and annual fair. The market may have been an outlet for whatever small surpluses the locals had but the fair grew over the centuries to attract dealers and animals from as far away as Scotland perhaps starting, again, with just the locals' stock, maybe a few oxen and any animals that they couldn't over winter. It may also have become an outlet for the nearby de Lacy vaccaries that had mainly used the markets at Bolton and Pontefract.

Perhaps of greater significance the market appears to have attracted tradesmen to the town.

Family names, or surnames as we know them, weren't commonplace at this time, except among the gentry, so as people often had the same Christian name other ways were found to differentiate between them. These are the people of Great Harwood who paid the 1379 tax from Carolyn Fenwick's "The Poll Taxes of 1377, 1379, and 1381" (1998-2005). Suggestions for the origins of the names are found in "A Dictionary of British Surnames." P. H. Reaney and / or " The Oxford Names Companion." Oxford University Press.

If, as is thought, the Poll Tax included around 60% of the population then there would have been about 50 people living in Great Harwood in 1379 but national trends suggest that the population in 1300 may have been twice that of 1379.

However if, as suggested, Great Harwood was a pastoral community requiring little labour then it is possible that the national trends may not have applied and the number of inhabitants was similar to or even lower than 50 in 1300 the attraction of the market and fair after 1338 perhaps accounting for any rise. Unfortunately the partition of 1289 gives no clues to the numbers resident at that time as it only mentions 5 tenants by name but whether these were the only tenants is impossible to say as they were mentioned only in so far as their lands were additional to or excluded from any one partition.

Apart from the number of people over the age of 16 in 1379 there is little the list can tell us for certain about Great Harwood. A man and wife were counted as one for the tax but the collectors for Blackburnshire don't appear to have shown any wives as some others did but it is striking that there are only two females in the list, Alicia le Colvile, widow, and Margareta del Moreton. This could mean any available girls married young or this was a community of young males, some married but their families were too young to register for the tax, or it is evidence of later plague outbreaks affecting the young in particular.

This phenomenon wasn't peculiar to Great Harwood though; lists for surrounding areas mostly show the same imbalance (Table 1). Why Billington, Oswaldtwistle and Rishton have a higher proportion of females listed is not within the scope of this study but the similarities between Great Harwood and Chipping, a decidedly pastoral community, and the chases, especially neighbouring Pendleton Chase, seem significant.

A sign of continuity of a family in one place can be a patronymic name or occasionally a metronymic name, if someone moved to another place the inhabitants there would be more likely to name them by their place of origin than by the name of their parents. There are six patronyms in the list for Great Harwood: Willelmo Foukeson, Rogero Brightson, Thoma Daweson, Hugone Hanson, Willelmo Kynning and Willelmo Dobson. This isn't a great proportion of the male population and its significance for continuity, without other evidence, may have been even less if a surname had been inherited but some if not all could have been born and raised in Great Harwood.

There is clear evidence of immigration though with seven names denoting origins outside Great Harwood. (Table 2)

It's possible, again, that some of these names were inherited even so they still point to people moving to the area in the not too distant past.

There are other possible incomers.
(Table 3)

Supposing that all the people in Tables 2 and 3 were new comers to Great Harwood then a third of the adult males had found something so attractive about the place that some travelled many miles to be here when one would imagine in this time of high mortality there would have been more fertile land available elsewhere. Of course, if the surnames in Table 3 were of a local nature the proportion of new comers falls to around a sixth, still quite high, but with the tradesmen still to be considered and the others whose origin can only be surmised as being local then immigration could actually have been greater.

As we do not know whether William Foukeson, or others, was a weaver, miller or farmer Table 4 may not list all craftsmen in Great Harwood. Likewise the fact that no one is known by name as following these crafts in surrounding districts does not mean that they were not practised there. However these are not the sorts of trade that would be well supported by a small peasant community and is perhaps the reason they don't seem to occur outside Great Harwood. It then seems reasonable to suggest that these men are plying their trades in Great Harwood because they had access to a much wider, more prosperous clientele through the markets and fair and may well have been attracted from elsewhere because of this.

Any conclusions to be taken from the 1379 Poll Tax list must be qualified through lack of other evidence but it does appear that the population of the Manor of Martholme and Great Harwood had been growing through immigration, this is apparent in the surrounding districts too. Whether this migration was to replace lost population or because there was previously underutilised land, though, isn't clear. Where Great Harwood does appear to differ from neighbouring manors is in its ability to attract or retain a variety of "luxury" trades through its markets and fair which must also have been a lure to farmers by providing a local outlet for their produce and may too have stimulated other services such as carriage and hospitality.

Hundred Years War
2

Subsidy Rolls - Malhamdale
3

Public records: Subsidies and other taxes

Middle Ages Poll Tax

The History of the Peasants' Revolt by Jeff Hobbs
5

An Economic & Social History of Britain 1066 – 1939. M. W. Flynn 1970 (1 st Edition 1961). Page 3: A Frontier Landscape. The North West in the Middle Ages. N. J. Higham. Pages 1 - 45, 72: A History of the English Public House. H A Monkton 1969. Page 18: An Historical Geography of England and Wales. 2nd Edition Edited by R A Dodgshon & R A Butlin 1995. Page 70, 75.
6

An Economic & Social History of Britain 1066 – 1939. M. W. Flynn. Page 5: An Historical Geography of England and Wales. R A Dodgshon & R A Butlin 1995. Page 70 - 71.
7

A Frontier Landscape. Page 77: An Economic & Social History of Britain 1066 – 1939. Page 17: An Historical Geography of England and Wales. Page 73, 93.
8

A Frontier Landscape. Pages 71 - 75 and 88

De Lacy Estate (Accrington) c1300 Page 1

An Economic & Social History of Britain 1066 – 1939. Page 20.
9

Laxton, Nottinghamshire.
10

Transactions of the Historic Society of Lancashire and Cheshire for 1961. The Common Fields of Lancashire. G. Youd M.A. Pages 34 - 39
11

A Frontier Landscape. Pages 55, 61.
12

LRO: DDKE/2/15/2
13

A Frontier Landscape. Pages 56, 62 and 68.
14

LRO: DDLX 8/3. LRO: DDLX 8/7. LRO: DDLX 8/28. Clayton Estate Farm Rent Ledger. See also Churchfield House
15

Field names
16

British History Online
17

LRO: DDLX 8/28 -- part of Town Field (2,003 sq. yds) -- site for St. John's Church.
18