Chapter 13

The early town

Although ‘Ureby’ suggests a pre-Norman settlement, the first written record of the town occurred in c. 1150 when COKYRMOTH appeared in the Register of the Priory of St. Bees. In charters, rolls, etc., of the 13th century there appeared KOKERMUE, COKERMUA, COCREMUTH, COKIRMOWTH and KOKERMUTH. These and other variations continued to be used until the present spelling became generally accepted, but in every case the same three elements of COCK-ER MOUTH occur. The first two syllables come from either the Welsh ‘cock-or’ for a red mountain (heather on Grassmoor?) or the British ‘kukra’ or ‘cucdi’ meaning crooked. The name ends with ‘mot’ for the meeting of waters or rivers, as also found in Becker-met and Egre-mont. The river was referred to as the KOKER in Holm Cultram records of c. 1170, as KOK in the 1195 Feet of Fines, as COKER in the Patent Rolls of 1305 and COCKAR in Camden’s ‘Britannia’ of 1610.

Whatever the origin of its name, the present town began near the meeting of the two rivers. it is not, as Britton and Brayley described it in their ‘Topographical and Historical Description of the County of Cumberland’, ‘a large sea-port town’!

A deed of about] 195-1200 mentions a fulling mill and house and land at Cockermouth [1] so there must have been some settlement by AD 1200.

Cockermouth has the two essential features of a medieval town a market place, the focus of the local community where goods were sold or exchanged and business done; and a castle, the seat of power. Authority could be exerted from either a castle or a cathedral, sometimes both, usually, as in Cockermouth, situated in an enclosure slightly apart from the rest of the town. Cockermouth would develop as a centre for the surrounding countryside and the lord of the manor doubtless encouraged its growth as the base for the administration of his land and for dispensation of justice.

In addition to the market, the town had a further attraction in the freedom enjoyed by some of its citizens, which we will briefly explain.

William I insisted on homage and regular military service from his tenants-in-chief and his successors continued this system. The tenant had to provide an agreed number of armed horsemen for 40 days service a year. In return, as Henry I stated,

• “To knights who hold their land by military service, I grant as my own gift that their land shall be quit of all gelds and all labour requirements, so that, relieved of so heavy a burden, they may equip themselves well with horses and arms ready and able to serve me and to defend my realm.” [2]

Henry still imposed a fine on change of tenancy

• “If any baron or earl of mine or anyone else who holds from me directly shall die, his heir shall not redeem his land as he would have done in my brother’s day, but he will redeem it by a just and lawful payment.” [3]

Within the town were burgesses, custory (or customary) tenants, and villeins or serfs. The first, usually farmers, craftsmen or traders, rented burgages in the heart of the town. They fanned strips in the town’s fields and were allowed to sell in the market without paying the tolls charged to outsiders. They elected the town officials and were excused fines on change of bur gage tenancy, as distinct from the customary tenants who paid fines on a change of ownership. The burgesses were free men, able to travel and to trade.

On the other hand, the villeins were a class of peasant occupier or cultivator entirely subject to the lord. Serfs were only distinguished from full slavery by certain limits placed by law or custom on service to their master.

From the beginning of the 13th century Cockermouth was consistently referred to as a borough, until comparatively recent times, and enjoyed borough status. In 1829, for example, there were within Cumberland one city (Carlisle), one parliamentary borough (Cockermouth) and 17 market towns (Maryport, Workington, Whitehaven, Penrith, etc.) [4] Although no original charter has been found, that such a grant of borough status had been made was implied by a charter issued by Alice de Rumelli before she died in 1215:

• “Alice de Rumeli daughter of William Fitz Duncan to all who shall see and hear this charter, greeting. Know that I have granted and by this charter confirmed to my free men who reside in the viii of Cockemouth and to all their heirs that they are quit of all services to me and my heirs for ever. That is I free them from bearing witness with serfs and from all suit and from all servitude and things which are prejudicial to the liberty and free custom which are held to belong to the free men. (There follow regulations regarding disputes and debts.) …… I also grant to them all their easements and customary liberties and commons in wood and plain, in the viii and outside it within their right and proper boundaries. Rendering annually to me and my heirs for each whole toft four pence, half at Pentecost and half at Martinmas for all service except foreign service and customary pannage and mill tolL All these things I and my heirs grant and will warrant to them and their heirs for ever. And for the grant of these liberties the vill of Cockertnouth will give me in acknowledgement eight pounds of wax annually at the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.”[5]

An inventory of the Honour of Cockermouth made in 1260 (following the death of William de Fortibus III the previous year) gives a picture of an active and growing town. In addition to the castle, demesne land and park there were the rents of 177% tofts, totalling 59s-3d. at the standard national rate of 4d. per toft; two water mills valued at £13-6s-8d, a year; a fulling mill at £11-6s-8d; a dye works (tinctorie) at 20s,; three ‘fabricae’ or workshops, probably smithies as each of the tenants had the name ‘Faber’ (a worker in metal, wood or stone), rented at 3s., 2s-6d. and 2s.; market tolls of £6-13s-4d.; a malt kiln; and the castle fishery worth 106s-8d. per year. The total value of the borough was put at £55-5s-1OY2d. and the whole honour valued at £1 55-6s-2d. [6]

Surnames of burgesses indicate even at this early date the importance of wool and animal products in the life of the town, names which translated meant skinner, tanner, weaver, fuller, dyer and smith. The accounts of rents collected in the period 1266-1318 tell something of life in the town. In 1267/8 the fulling mill rent was £3 greater than ten years later [7], the drop being explained in the records as due to an outbreak of sheep murrain. This is known to have swept the country in the late 1270s and Cockermouth did not escape. In 1289/90 6s. 2Y2d. is given as “decayed rent of certain burgages, burnt and wasted”, so a major fire had apparently destroyed 18 burgages at a time before the Scottish raids.

This was not the end of the downward trend. In 1310 the fulling mill was worth only £3-6s-8d. and by 1316-8 it lay derelict and without a tenant. The dye works too fell in value, from 20s. in 1267/8 to 6s-8d. in 1310. Rents from burgages rose until 1310 (possibly because of an expansion of the town) but were down to 52s. by 1316-8, where the entry “propter guerram Scotorum” (because of Scots wars) gives the clue to this general falling off in values. By 1368, 44s-4d. was received from 133 burgages, but an additional explanation to Scottish raids may be that as properties became vacant and reverted to the lord he was at this time re-letting them to tenants at will or customary tenants.

Conditions began to improve in the 15th century. In his accounts for 1437/8 the bailiff mentioned four shops “under the Tolbothe“, the Flesh-shamels and the Fish-shamels, with rents respectively of 26s-8d.(£1-34p) for the four, 8s.(40p) and 3s.(15p) The fulling mill was back in action and worth 13s-4d.(68p), while the corn mill tolls brought £17 and fishing in the Derwent and the herbage of the Park each £13-6s-8d. [9]

By 1478 some new names appear ‘Carhon Close’, rented at 4d.; a burgage described as being next to ‘Sketirbek’; a parcel of land called ‘Kirkbank’ and another beside the Cocker named ‘Lymepitts’. ‘Tenturholme’ occurs and Laytheld has been divided into ‘Highleytheld’ and ‘Lawleytheld’. R. Norman repaired the chapel of St. Helen and was rewarded with a close in Urebyfeld called Seynt Elynclose.[IO] It seems that the tenancy of this Part of Urebyfeld was the payment for keeping the chapel in repair (Fig. 34).

Moving into the next century there is little change. Mills, fishing and herbage remain the same in value, but there are various ‘improvements’, areas of land newly brought under cultivation. ‘Middynsted’ is one of these, the four-acre ‘Scrawlesymyes’ an improvement on the moor and there was one often acres next to ‘Slatestonefall’. By 1518-20 one of the fulling mills was again untenanted, the other with its parcel of land being rented at 8s 10d. [11] In 1541-3, when Thomas Wharton had acquired part of the estate, values were. the Park £ 13-6s-8d, fishing £7 -6s-8d, corn mill with tolls £ 13 6s-8d, mill5s-4d., garden called Applygarth 12d., and Seynt Elyn close 13s-4d. [12]

The town had certainly spread to the west of the Cocker by this time. ‘Spitelhowse (hospital) was mentioned in 1260 and St. Leonard’s Close (calella sancti leonardi) about 1280, the latter probably a triangle of land between the river, the road westwards and the town boundary, later to be the station site and for a time occupied by Thomas Armstrong Ltd (building contractors). Excavation in 1980, before the restoration of Strickett’s Court and 75-85 Main Street, revealed that this end of the town was inhabited by 1300 AD or earlier. In 1270 AD there were 163 burgage properties, which must have stretched a considerable distance from the Castle Market Place area. In the early 1500s there were references to burgages “on the west side of Cocker Bridge”, “in the west part of the town” and “in a street called Ketywent“, this last indicating that side streets were developing off Main Street.

The bailiffs accounts for 1578-80 show Wharton still held the herbage of the Park, the mills and their tolls, and the Derwent fishing, of total value £34-8s-10d. Three mills are recorded -.the new water corn mill (40s. [£2] rent), the water corn mill near the close called Langcrofts (20s, [£1]) and a fulling mill near Moorclose (22d.). The shambles are listed at 14d. [6p] and six shops at 4d., 8d., 3s-4d., 4s., 4s. and 6s-8d.-a wide range in rent value.

This was the time of the great Percy Survey. There were then (1578) 108 burgages, but many would have been divided and there may have been as many as 200 units with street frontage. In addition there were 19 messuages and at least 13 shops, mostly in the Market Place. Allowing an average of 4Y2 persons to each dwelling, the population of the town at this time would be about a thousand.

Before leaving the 1578 survey some of the entries are worth examining in more detail. A number of closes of land and a walk mill were situated at Moor Close, but this is not the Moorclose of Fletcher Christian’s family, since it is described as “otherwise High Lathelds“, an area to the north of and below the present Fitz Road, extending beyond the later railway line. A new mill referred to in the accounts of the bailiff was “recently erected at Casbay on the water of Cocker” and was probably Rubby Banks Mill, although Cocker Lane has been described as leading down to Casbay. The name may have been a general term for this stretch of river and possibly have a derivation other than our present ‘bay’. The corn mill on the lord’s waste near Long Crofts was mentioned as formerly a fulling mill and, since it was a water mill, must have been on Tom Rudd Beck.

By now a number of enclosures had been formed further out on the waste – Strawberry Howe (ON haugr for hill or OE hOh for a projecting ridge) of seven acres of arable, meadow and pasture was described as situated on the common or moor; Graystone Close, in the angle between the present Lorton and Strawberry Howe roads, was some eight acres and Symonskell (Simescales, Simonscales, Sunscales) had 18 acres. Other closes were located at Badskine (between Simonscales Lane and the Cocker), Moor Hills, High Close, Sowter Closes, St. Helen’s, the Crofts and Galla Burgh. There was a kiln on the lord’s waste at Long Crofts and somewhere a smithy. Many of our present names are thus 400 years old, several of them much older.

Galla Burgh Close is said to be under Milne Hill, so there must have been a mill in the area. There is no water in the Gallowbarrow area (the present Moor). Was the Parkside Avenue and Cocker Brows rise once known as Milne Hill because of its proximity to Double Mills?

Mawkyn Close in the 1578 survey is the same as Carlton Close mentioned in 1453, a block of fields at the upper end of St. Aelen’s Street which intrudes on to the demesne enclosure Wheat Close. ‘Carlton’ occurs within a mile or so of the centre of several Cumbrian towns and probably signified the settlement of the peasants who tilled the lord’s demesne, the name coming from ‘ceorls ton’, the town of the peasants. Winchester suggests that this settlement was on Bitter Beck, possibly the forerunner of the Market Place settlement. If this is so then Ureby, an earlier settlement, was probably on Tom Rudd Beck, supporting evidence being a reference in 1547 to land in Urebyfeld in Langcroft, suggesting that it lay between Bitter and Tom Rudd Becks, and references in 1619 and 1778 to Tom Rudd as Ureby Beck. [13]

In addition to the detailed knowledge gained from records of the routine management of the manor lands we can form general impressions of the town from the accounts left by those who visited it. One of the first was William Camden, the headmaster of Westminster School but also an antiquarian and historian, who in his ‘Britannia’ wrote of Cockermouth in 1582

• “From hence (the Keswick area) sometimes within a narrow channell, other whiles with a broader streame speedeth him (the River Derwent) very fast Northward to entertain Cockar. Which when they doe meete doe incompasse, almost round about, Cockarmouth a mercate town of good welth, and a castle of the Earles of Northumberland. The town is built fair enough, but standeth somewhat with the lowest betweene two hills; upon one of which the Church is seated, and upon the other right over against it, a very strong Castle.”[14]

In 1665 the Herald’s Visitation, a nation-wide enquiry, found in Cockermouth five families of sufficient standing to have coats-of-arms. Comparing this number with Carlisle’s two and Penrith’s and Kendal’s one each, we see how important Cockermouth had become in the 17th century. In the Fleming-Senhouse papers of 1671 we find

• “Cokermouth, ye best Market Towne in this part of ye county wch being adorned with a stately Castle (belonging heretofore to ye Ear/es of Northumberland), a Fair Church, two good stone bridges, a fair house (belonging unto Sir Geo. Fletcher of Hutton in this county, Baronet, being ye ancient seat of that Family) and many other fine buildings doth give it small reputation.” [15]

Bishop Nicholson gave a more detailed description of the town as it was shortly before the end of the century (1685).

• “The houses are built of stone and slated mostly with blue slates; they comprise two streets, one above the River Cocker in which is the Moot Hall, Market House, Corn Market and Shambles; and in the other is the Beast Market.” [16]

Between 1325 and 1350 a map of Great Britain was produced which shows most of the principal castles and abbeys, known as the Gough or Bodleian Map. Cockermouth is not named, but a building shown east of Working ton may represent it.

Early maps showing details of the town are few. That of about 1620 (plate 1) has houses along both sides of Main Street, Market Place and St. Helen’s Street from Sullart Street to Waste Lane, with Castlegate also built up. The only other development extends for short distances along Sullart Street, Challoner Street, Market Street and Kirkgate, to use the modem names.

By 1587 the number of burgages had risen again to 135. Then in 1665 the hearth tax returns show a considerable number of houses of an appreciable size -10 had 5 hearths or more (the old hall headed the list with 16), 7 had 4 hearths, 21 had 3, 56 had 2 and 62 had 1. Much of Kirkgate was built in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. A map of 1739 shows little change – a few houses nearer Derwent Bridge on the river side of the street and perhaps a slight extension up St. Helen’s Street. It shows clearly, however, the Moot Hall and the gate closing the upper end of Castlegate and leading to the Castle Green. During the middle years of the 18th century there was considerable expansion of the town. Hodkinson and Donald’s map of 1775 shows more houses at the western end, expansion in St. Helen’s Street beyond the turnpike, and further growth along Sullart Street, Challoner Street and Kirkgate. These three side streets were linked up by Cocker Lane and Back Lane (or Cross Went, later South Street) and houses were scattered right along this link, the level part of Cocker Lane being completely built up. The most notable growth was in Kirkgate, where houses stretched from its upper end beyond Longcroft (now Windmill Lane) and into Skinner Street and Scaw Brow.

Note: Excavations in the summer of 1980 revealed that there was some development at the western end of Main Street (present nos. 75-85 near Sullart Street) as early as AD 1300.