The struggle for power

This appeared in the Hull Daily Mail on 30 October 1901.  The timing is strange; but it sums up a battle which had been going on for years, and which was, at that point, already lost.

Throughout the 19th century the respective roles of the Master and the City Council, embodied in the committee of Advisers, had not been clearly defined.  The Council hired the Master and theoretically had the power to fire him.  But some Masters had been in the habit of by-passing the committee on matters as important as property transactions.  As early as 1879 the committee had put forward a proposal to downgrade the role to that of Chaplain, reducing the salary and turfing him out of the Master's house.  They argued that the job of Master should be part-time, a pastoral post only.  They agreed to put this scheme off until the current Master, Henry Kemp, died, which he did in 1888.  However, the Council had to get the agreement of the Charity Commissioners, and this was not forthcoming.  A new Master, J T Lewis, was appointed under the old terms and for ten years no response from the Charity Commissioners is recorded.  When Lewis died, in 1898, the Council tried again.  They advertised the job on the same terms as 10 years earlier, and all candidates had to agree to use their “best efforts to effect alterations in the government of the charity and the stipend of the Master” as they had set out. The new Master was William Hay Fea.  In December the Committee was still trying to get an answer from the Charity Commission. The following July the Town Clerk reported that he had sent another application to them, signed by the Master, Fea, and the Mayor and Aldermen.

It was more than a year before they received the Charity Commission’s response, which agreed that a new scheme was desirable and enclosed copies of a draft scheme of their own.  At this point Fea, told that he would have to support whatever the Council decided to do, fell out with the Advisers and no longer attended their meetings.  In November 1900 it was reported that the Commission intended to give "more power to the clergy".  Early in 1901 a detailed scheme was put forward by the Commission.  It proposed that a group of trustees would manage the property and “be the ultimate authority in matters of discipline affecting the inmates”. The Master’s stipend would be reduced by £50. The Town Clerk expressed the Council’s objections; the Master would have more powers, not fewer, because he would be able, for example, to appoint the doctor, matron, nurse and porter; the £50 they would save on his stipend would not cover the cost of employing a clerk and a surveyor. If there had to be trustees, he said, they should all be members of the Council.

It is difficult now to understand why the Council was so opposed to the scheme.  Perhaps they felt that it should follow the same model as the Hull Municipal Charities.  This was (and is) an amalgamation of a number of smaller almshouse charities which were no longer viable and were brought together under one roof in a new building.  This was run entirely by the Council.  

At a meeting of the Committee on 27 July 1901 the Council was still refusing to accept the proposed scheme, and claiming that they had the support of bodies such as the Hull Board of Guardians and the Hull Co-operative Society. At this point the minutes of the Charterhouse (Special) Committee end.  By October, as we see from the cutting, Councillors were still maintaining their opposition and arguing that the charity would be better managed by them.  However, the Charity Commissioners got their way, as the local paper reported.  The new scheme came into effect on 5 November.  

The lengthy document setting out the new "scheme" shows that the Council still had most of the power.  These are the main points:

• The Charterhouse would be run by 9 trustees, 5 of them appointed by the City Council, one by the Archdeacon of the East Riding of Yorkshire, and 3 co-optees, who had to live or work in or near Hull. One of these co-optees had to be a woman. It was stated that the first co-opted member had to be the Rev. Joseph Malet Lambert, because he was first on the council’s list of potential members of committee.  
• The Master had to be a Church of England clergyman aged over 30. He would be appointed by the City Council from a list of 3 submitted by the Trustees. He could be removed by the Trustees for misconduct or infirmity, subject to appeal to the Archbishop of York. The Master would get £250 p.a., a free house and £15 p.a. fuel allowance.
• The Master’s duties were: to perform divine service in the Chapel on Sundays and at least twice during the week; to look after the interests of the inmates, including paying their allowances and enforcing discipline; and to appoint the doctor, matron, nurse and porter.
• Vacancies in the hospital would be filled by the City Council from a list of six submitted by the Trustees. A detailed procedure for selecting the six was laid down.

The scope of the Master's work was now clear.  The Trustees were to handle the property and the money, but inevitably they delegated this, and much else, to the Clerk to the Trustees, who was also the Town Clerk.  It was to be many years before the power of the Council was relinquished.

Cook and Wildridge; History and Art

My first step in researching the history of the Hull Charterhouse was to read a borrowed copy of a book by John Cook, The History of God's House of Hull, commonly called the Charterhouse, published in Hull in 1882.  It remains the only published book on the subject, and a few copies are still to be found.  John Cook was a Hull solicitor, born in 1850.  He tried his hand at writing fiction, not very successfully, and then turned to the story of the institution (for which he was retained as solicitor).
The book is very important, but there are problems with it.  At times, particularly when dealing with the earliest period, it relies on documents which Cook obviously had access to but which have now disappeared.  We have to take Cook's word for it, which is never satisfactory.  More important is what he misses out.  He has little or no interest in the inmates, so we learn nothing about the conditions in which people lived, or even how they came to be awarded a place.  In his defence, he was reliant on many of the same records which the modern historian has, and they tell us very little; but he shows no curiosity about the residents even of his own day.  The Masters are the important people.
The main problem, however, is Cook's focus on piety.  The Charterhouse is a Christian institution, and its Masters are all well-intentioned men of God.  It was a common approach at the time; there are many locally-published books about individuals which read like hagiographies.  But it leads to distortions.  This is most obvious when we consider the corruption which set in over the awarding of places in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.  Cook clearly knew about it; but he chose to swerve around it.

John Cook had an admirer in Thomas Tindall Wildridge.  Two years after Cook published his History, Wildridge published Old and New Hull, containing short articles about the city's people ("Local Worthies" in his subtitle) and its institutions.  He is fulsome about Cook's work:

"This work, in the first place, is on absolutely reliable authority, and while preserving scrupulous accuracy, is rich in well-conceived argument and conjecture; in addition, it is written with such power and endearing picturesqueness as to be the model of a topographical book. Under the fierce light which his patient investigation caused to beat upon the little Kingdom of the Charter House, errors in the accounts of all previous historians are plainly seen."

There is more in the same vein.
Wildridge includes his own article on the Charterhouse in his book.  He gives a complete transcript of a long document from 1451, an agreement between the Prior and the Mayor; but he does not modernise the spelling so it is hard to follow, and not very rewarding.  Wildridge was an archivist and so he demonstrates his access to documents by giving us a good deal of financial information.
More interesting, however, is a drawing, his "Bird's-Eye View of the Charterhouse".  Wildridge had ambitions to be an artist.  His few surviving paintings show little talent, and when he makes drawings from portraits to illustrate his book they are not particularly good copies.  But he was a good draughtsman and his picture is accurate.

However, a mystery surrounds another print. one which is displayed inside the entrance of the Charterhouse today.  It purports to be the ruins of the entrance to the old priory, and bears the signature "TTW".  The assumption has been that it's by Wildridge, although it doesn't appear in his book.  If it is by Wildridge, or even if it isn't, it's a deceit.  We know that such an archway existed at least up to the end of the 18th century.  Tickell's book on the history of Hull shows a picture, dated 1796, of the 1780 Charterhouse building and the ruin is there in the background, roughly where Charterhouse Lane now becomes Sykes Street.  Not only does the "TTW" drawing look nothing like it; 
it is actually a meticulous copy of a 1776 engraving of the ruined archway of Coverham Abbey.

“An Inventory of Areloms”

On 2 September 1768 an official called John Yeoman, a Notary Public, drew up an inventory of the “Areloms [heirlooms] belong the Master's House comonly call'd Charterhouse, or God's House”. A new Master, John Bourne, had been announced and was to formally take up his appointment on 30 September, so it was a chance to take stock of the contents of the house which belonged to the foundation. The spelling of the document is eccentric, to say the least, but it gives us a picture of the furnishings and equipment of a large house of the time. It starts:

         

          In the Kitchen

1 Large Dressor , with 4 Cubberts – 1 other Dressor of white fir with 3 Drawers

1 large kitchen Range, with a fender, shovle. Tongs & Poaker – 1 iron Crane & Stretcher

1 pair of Clamps

2 sets of frames & Pullies, and a small weight for a Jack

1 Chafering Dish

1 scallopt fender with Shovle Tongs and Poaker

1 small ditto

a lead Ceasteron [cistern?] with Brass Cock

a little fir table leafe to cover a stone Slabb

14 iron Hooks, Top of Cealing

The living rooms and bedrooms were bare in comparison:

In the Chambers & Garrotts

5 iron Grates fixt in the Chimneys

1 old Stove ditto moveable as occasion requires

1 new ditto low dining room and

1 ovel Table

Had the relatives of the previous Master, John Clarke, removed all the beds and other furnishings apart from a couple of tables?

The study fared better; Clarke had even left some books:

In the Studdy

1 Writeing Desk and Shelves for Books with 3 Cubberts on the South

of ditto

1 Cloath press, 1 ditto Chest & [illegible] for Writings

3 folio Books, W. Parkins, 4 Octavo: 1 pr & 1 Bible

The “Cellor” contained “3 Oak Ganteries for casks”. These casks would contain the products of the:

Brewhouse

1 Fire Grate & Clamps

1 Cope & Grate, Mash fatt, Gile-fatt, Tap-Tubb, a wood hoop'd Bucket, Scoupe & Piggin, a funnel, Strum, Stirer, a Trugon, Poaker & a Peel

3 Iron Bound Bear Tubbs, a Henhope & a bottle Crate

1 Iron Furnice Pott & Grate – 1 Heater Stove & 2 old [illegible] a Iron Rake, a Howe, Edging iron & 2 pair of old Hedge Shears

A “fatt” was surely a vat, but the rest needs explaining by an expert.

Yeoman ventured into the Yard & Stable, where there were:

4 old Sythes

1 Large Lead Ceasteron, Slab & Corn Chest

1 Broad Step Ladder – Paddock 4 Ladders

Finally, in the Chappel, were:

1 Large Bible

1 ditto octavo

1 Large prayer Book

                                            2 ditto in Sculcoates Church.

There is no mention of any hymn books or prayer books for the use of the inmates, but perhaps Yeoman was only listing items for the Master's use. There is a last note:

N.B. there is some Pewter Dishes in the Hospital which I believe are for the Use of the Master Occasionally.

A TALE FROM THE 17TH CENTURY

For most of the history of the Charterhouse the people who lived there are simply names, only recorded when they are given a place, or if they disgrace themselves in some way. However, a story emerges in some detail of two men who were part of turbulent times in the life of the hospital. Three Bench Book entries frame the tale but some detail is added by Transactions of the Congregational Historical Society, Vol VIII.  According to the latter source, on 28 October 1629 Joshua Marsh, a blind man,
      "was found vagrant and wandering in Hull streets.  In accordance with the cruel custom of the time he was whipped as a 'vagrant rogue' and sent to Marfleet, the place of his birth, with the pass which every beggar or wanderer had to have given him, as stated in the Statute.  A controversy arose as to which place should maintain him, for he had evidently resided in Hull for some time (the qualifying period, according to the Act, was three years).  It was referred to Sir Thomas Craven, Justice of the Assize, who ordered Hull to pay 12d. per week and Marfleet to maintain him, or vice versa.  Hull decided to pay the money, with 6d. per week awarded before, and Marfleet to keep him."

In 1635 another blind man, Ellerker Potts, was admitted to the Charterhouse. In March of that year the Bench Book records that “Ellerker Potts a blynd man shall have a place on the Olde mens hospital.” Potts was admitted at about the same time.

The two men would have been part of the exodus from the hospital in 1642. The siege of Hull by Royalist forces made the site not only dangerous but desirable to the Governor, John Hotham, as a place for a gun battery. So the inmates moved to a building owned by the foundation on Silver Street in the city, and the Charterhouse was demolished. We may assume that the residents attended Holy Trinity Church for their Sunday worship; and it was here that Potts and Ellerker came into contact with a new dissenting congregation, one of the many independent, nonconformist churches which were springing up all over the country and which later became part of the Congregationalist movement. The pair joined this church, a move which probably did not go down well with the new Master of the Charterhouse, William Stiles. A year later, in 1643, they both became Deacons in the church.

By 1649 the King had been deposed and executed and the Charterhouse was partially rebuilt. Perhaps it was the move back which prompted Potts and Marsh to indulge in matrimony. Their wives were apparently members of the same congregation. But this could not be tolerated. Only single or widowed people were admitted to the hospital. The Bench Book records that,

“Whereas Ellerker Potts & Joshua Marsh have each of them married a wife contrary to the orders of the God [sic] house hospitall whereof they are Brothers and have otherwise carried uncivily to this bench, it is this day ordered that their weekly allowance shall be no longer continued to them but from hence shall be suspended and Mr.Hoxley who payeth them is to have notes hereof given him from Mr. Maior.”

It is interesting to note that the Master did not at this time have the responsibility of paying the allowances. It must also be said that nothing further is recorded about the wives, although presumably they stayed with their husbands. But life with no money for food etc was not tenable, and Potts and Marsh were clearly not the type to take this lying down. They petitioned the Council of State, the executive arm of government set up by Cromwell. The dates are then confused by our two sources, but it appears to be in 1651 rather than 1657, as Transactions would have it, that a senior Alderman, Maccabeus Hollis, came to the Bench with a request that the allowances be re-instated, since they were both sorry for their offence. They were forgiven; but an order was issued making it clear that inmates of the Charterhouse were forbidden to marry.

Potts and Marsh were still recorded as members of their church in 1669, but died soon after.

WHO FOUNDED THE CHARTERHOUSE?

There was a time when the name of William de la Pole was familiar to most Hull people. They knew that he was the first Mayor of Hull, if nothing else. A statue of him, a fanciful Victorian image of a medieval gentleman, stood in the old Town Hall. In September 1901 the building was due to be demolished, so the statue was moved to a spot on King Edward Street. The Hull Daily Mail reported the move, and quoted from the inscription on the base the “fact” that William was the founder of the Charterhouse. That sparked several letters pointing out that this was inaccurate; the founder was William’s son Michael. The letter-writers were correct; but there is some truth in that inscription.

There appears to have been an almshouse or hospital in Hull by the 1340s; a document in the National Archives dated 17 Edward III (1343-4) gives James de Kyngestone, the king's clerk, permission “to grant a messuage in Hull to the warden of God's House there”. Nothing else is known about this. When William de la Pole retired from active business he received a royal licence, in 1354, to found a hospital for poor people. Its income was to come from the rent of lands in Myton and properties in Hull. The hospital was apparently founded, but in 1365, the year before his death, William decided to change his plan. He wanted it to be a convent for nuns of the order of St. Clare. The change was not implemented. The source for this is the 1378 document drawn up by William's son Michael on his foundation of a Carthusian Priory.

Whilst we continually revolve in our Mind, how our most dear Father and Lord William de la Pole, Knight, (now deceased) whilst he lived, by the Inspiration of the Holy Spirit, first founded an Hospital for the Poor; and afterwards, out of greater Devotion, altering this, his Purpose, was resolved to erect at Kingston-upon-Hull, a certain Religious House of Nuns, or Poor Sisters Minoresses Regular, of the Order of St. Clare, for the Enlargement and Honour of the Church of England, and to the Intent that he might make Christ his Heir: And seeing our said Father left this World, when he had not yet completed what he intended to have endow'd; and having, before his Death, most strictly charg'd us, that we should take such Order concerning the said Building, as might tend both to its greater Security, and better promote the Ends of Piety, according to our own Will and Discretion.

This is already somewhat confusing. William founded a hospital then changed his mind, preferring a convent of Poor Clares, which he didn't live to see built. But was the hospital itself ever actually built? Michael decided that a Carthusian Priory was more to his taste than a convent, and it was to be “in one of our Messuages, without the Walls of the said Town of Kingston-upon-Hull”. He goes on to describe the exact situation.

...the said Messuage, with the Appurtenances, containing 7 Acres of Land, which formerly was a Parcel of the Manor of Myton, call'd La Maison Dieu, and which from this Time, we will should be called the House of St. Michael of the Order of Carthusians of Kingston-upon-Hull, as heretofore; together with a certain Chapel, built on the said Messuage; and all other Buildings standing thereupon, with all the Appurtenances whatsoever, as it is situated, within a certain Pitfall of Dame Katherine de la Pole, our most dear Mother towards the West; and a certain Hospital of ours, now called La Maison Dieu, facing the East; and a Trench of our aforesaid Mother towards the South; and the Land formerly belonging to Roger Swerde, towards the North.

So the Maison Dieu did exist; but Michael intended to replace it with a Priory. The implication is either that the hospital had never been occupied, or that it was to be closed. The founding document of Michael's own Maison Dieu, in 1384, makes the situation no clearer.

Sir William de la Pole, knight, lately, whilst he lived, moved of divine clemency, did purpose to found and establish near Kingston-upon-Hull, firstly a hospital for Minor priests, and poor people, then, altering subsequently his intention out of increased devoutness, a religious house for nuns or sisters, Minoresses Regular of the Order of St. Clare, and for certain poor people.

Yet he goes on to say that his new hospital will be “set up in two messuages of ours called the Maisondieu”.

We may never know. Michael de la Pole, 1^st Earl of Suffolk, rightly takes the credit for what we now call the Charterhouse, but the originator was his father William.