A Petition of the Master Shipwrights (who signed the same) in behalf of themselves and others, Master Shipwrights of England, was presented to the House and read: setting forth that the petitioners' predecessors were incorporated by charter in 1605, and were thereby empowered to rectify the disorders and abuses of the Shipwrights' Trade, and to furnish the Crown and Merchants with able workmen, and to bind and enrol their apprentices; but the breed of able workmen is almost lost, and for want of sufficient power to execute the good intent of their charter, the petitioners have not been in a regular method many years past to rectify the disorders amongst the shipwrights and to improve their trade; yet a Proposal of some additional heads to effect the same has been approved, and reported by the Commissioners of the Admiralty, Commissioners of the Navy, Corporation of Trinity House; and also his Royal Highness,[70] the 7th Nov. 1704, declares his opinion that it will be much for the public service to have the shipwrights incorporated by Charter, as desired by them; but in the said proposal there are some necessary clauses which cannot be made practicable and effectual without an Act of Parliament: and praying that leave be given to bring in a Bill, of regulating clauses, to be inserted in a new charter for the better breeding of Shipwrights and for the more firm and well building of ships and other vessels.
The motion to refer it to a Committee was lost, and thus went out the last spark of life of a Corporation that had struggled in vain for a hundred years to carry out the intentions of its founders.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] Cal. Close Rolls, 27 Jan. 1337. Rymer, Foedera, iv. 703.
[6] Exchequer Accts. 19/31.
[7] This rate was being paid in 1303.
[8] Oppenheim, The Administration of the Royal Navy, 1509-1660, p. 14.
[9] Thos. Allen, writing to the Earl of Shrewsbury in 1516, refers to 'one Brygandin son unto him that made the King's great ship.' Lodge, Illustrations of British History, vol. i. p. 14.
[10] Cal. S.P. Dom., May 12, 1519.
[11] 'An Act for Servants' Wages,' 11 Henry VII, c. 22.
[12] An Act concerning Artificers and Labourers, 6 Henry VIII c. 3.
[13] Op. cit., pp. 22, 153, 179, 232-3.
[14] Henry V had merely given a pension for past service to a shipwright incapable of further labours.
[15] Patent Roll 680.
[16] 'Ac in consideratione veri et fidelis servicii quod dilectus serviens noster Jacobus Baker durante vita sua impendere intendit.'
[17] Pat. Roll 704.
[18] Acts of the P.C., New Series, i. 233.
[19] Ibid., ii. p. 186.
[20] Pat. Roll 833. I cannot trace in the rolls any similar grant to Holborn or Smyth.
[21] Pat. Roll, 921.
[22] He may be the Richard Bull who was called before the Council in 1555. Acts of the P.C., v. 189.
[23] Stephins was engaged on the repair of the Lion barge in 1553, and was paid 20l. as 'the Queen's Majesty's Shipwright' for making the Leader barge in 1558. Acts of the P.C., iv. 362, and vi. 426.
[24] The difference in the spelling is no argument against this, as 'ph' and 'v' are used indifferently in the documents in this surname, Stevens' name being spelt 'Stevyns' and 'Stevins' and 'Stephens' in the rolls.
[25] Pat. Roll 1091.
[26] Officium Naupegiarii sive unius magistrorum factorum Navium et Cimbarum nostrarum.
[27] Pat. Roll 1249. The entry in Pat. Roll 1091 is vacated with an endorsement in the margin, signed by Mathew Baker and William Borough to the effect that the surrender was voluntary and in consideration of the grant to Baker and Addey.
[28] Sometimes spelt Adye, Adie, or Ady.
[29] Pat. Roll 1210. No office is mentioned; all that is conveyed is the 'annuity or annual fee of 12d. sterling a day.'
[30] Nec non in consideratione boni et fidelis servicii per præfatum Willelmum Pett Shipwright antehac impensi ac imposterum impendendi in fabricatione navium nostrarum heredum et successorum nostrorum ac in assistencia sua in causis nostris marinis.
[31] Pat. Roll 1300. In a MS. account of the 'ordinary wages and exchequer fees of his Majesty's Master Shipwrights' (Add. MS. 9299 f. 48) it is stated that this had been given in recompense for building the Ark Royal, but as this ship appears to have been originally built for Ralegh this can hardly have been the reason. The patent only speaks of 'good and faithful service done and to be done.'
[32] Pat. Roll 1342.
[33] Drake's edition of Hasted, History of Kent, p. 41.
[34] Add. MS. 9299. I have not been able to find his patent.
[35] He built the Warspite in 1596 and the Malice Scourge for the Earl of Cumberland, and in 1598 and 1600 received, in conjunction with others, the usual 'rewards' for building merchant ships (Cal. S.P. Dom., 30 July 1596, 24 Sept. 1598, 15 Jan. 1600).
[36] Pat. Roll. 1620.
[39] S.P. Dom. Chas. I, xxxv. 104. Although countersigned by Coke, this warrant is not signed by the Lord High Admiral, so presumably it is a duplicate.
[40] 11 July 1614. He does not mention this in the manuscript.
[41] Probably these amounts should be multiplied by 6.
[42] Thus in November 1591, whilst holding office as Master Shipwright, Chapman, who owned a private yard at Deptford, was paid the bounty of 5s. a ton for building the Dainty of London of 200 tons, 'as an encouragement to him and others to build like ships,' and Phineas was paid the like bounty for building the Resistance. (Cal. S.P. Dom.)
[44] Salisbury MSS. (Hist. MSS.), i. 276.
[47] Rotherhithe, where their Hall was situated.
[48] Probably it was due to the growing resistance of the City Company of Free Shipwrights.
[49] Cal. S.P. Dom., 12 July 1613.
[50] Ibid., 30 Oct. 1613.
[51] See Sharpe, Short Account of the Worshipful Company of Shipwrights. This author has made the mistake of assuming that the Charter of 1605 was granted to the City Company.
[52] It is not even mentioned in Stowe's list of sixty companies attending the Lord Mayor's Banquet in 1531.
[53] Cal. S.P. Dom., 4 Feb. 1632.
[54] Ibid., 17 June 1631. I am indebted to Mr. E. A. Ebblewhite for drawing my attention to the significance of this fact.
[55] Cal. S.P. Dom., 30 June 1637.
[56] Ibid., 10 July 1637.
[57] Ibid., 26 July 1637.
[58] Council Register, No. 50.
[59] Commons Journal, i. 563.
[60] Cal. S. P. Dom. January 21, 1633.
[61] Lords' Journal, vii. 286. Hist. MSS., Sixth Report, p. 51.
[62] Lords' Journals, viii. 232, 286; x. 403.
[63] Hist. MSS., Seventh Report, p. 40.
[64] Cal. S.P. Dom., 25 July 1672.
[65] By the Commissioners for inquiring into the State of the Navy. Cal. S.P. Dom., 22 Feb. 1627.
[66] Bodleian, Rawlinson MSS. A 177.
[67] Cal. S.P. Dom., 21 Aug. 1690.
[68] See Sutherland, Britain's Glory, or Shipbuilding Unvail'd, p. 70.
[69] Vol. xiv. p. 482.
[70] Prince George of Denmark, then Lord High Admiral.