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Beverley in York County England History and GeographyBEVERLEY, a borough, market town, and the head of a liberty, having separate jurisdiction, in the east riding of the county of YORK, 9 miles (N.E.) from Kingston upon Hull, 29 (E. S. E.) from York, and 183 (N.) from London, containing 6728 inhabitants. This place, from the woods with which it was formerly covered, was called Deirualde, implying the forest of the Deiri, the ancient inhabitants of this part of the country. By the Saxons, probably from the number of beavers with which the river Hull in this part abounded, it was called Beverlega, from which its present name is deduced. About the year 700, John, Archbishop of York, partly refounded the church dedicated to St. John the Evangelist, and established an oratory, in honour of St. Martin. These he subsequently converted into a monastery, in which, after having filled the archiepiscopal see of York for thirty-three years, with a reputation for extreme sanctity, he spent the remainder of his life in retirement and devotion; and dying in 721, was canonized by the title of St. John of Beverley. In the year 867, this monastery was destroyed by the Danes, in one of their incursions under Inguar and Ubba, and after remaining for three years in a state of desolation, was partly restored by the monks, who again established themselves at this place. In the early part of the tenth century, Athelstan, marching against the confederated Britons, Scots, and Danes, caused the standard of St. John of Beverley to be carried before his army, and having returned victorious, bestowed many privileges upon the town and monastery. He founded a college for secular canons, which, at the dissolution, had an establishment consisting of a provost, eight prebendaries, a chancellor, precentor, seven rectors, and nine vicars choral, and a revenue of £597. 19. 6., and he conferred on the church the privilege of sanctuary, the limits of which, extending for a mile around the town, were marked out by four crosses, erected at the four principal entrances. From this time the town began to increase rapidly in population and importance. About the year 1060, Kinsius, the twenty-third archbishop of York, built a hall, nearly rebuilt the church, to which he added a tower, and contributed greatly to its internal decoration. The memory of St. John of Beverley was held in such veneration, that William the Conqueror having advanced within seven miles of the town, gave strict orders to his army that they should not damage the church; the day of his death was appointed to be kept holy, and the festival of his translation, October 25th, was, in 1416, ordered to be annually celebrated, in commemoration of the battle of Agincourt, which was superstitiously thought to have been gained through his intercession. At the commcncement of the civil war in the reign of Charles I., that monarch fixed his head quarters at Beverley, and attempted to gain possession of Kingston upon Hull, which was then defended for the parliament by Sir John Hotham, who having subsequently made overtures for a reconciliation with the king, and entered into a negociation for surrendering the town, fled from Hull, upon the discovery of his intention, and was made prisoner on the day following at Beverley, which had fallen into the hands of the parliamentarians. The town is situated at the foot of the Wolds, about a mile from the river Hull, and consists of several spacious streets, in which are many handsome, well built houses: the approach from the Driffield road is remarkably fine, having, particularly on the north-east side, many elegant buildings, and terminating in an ancient gateway, which leads into the town. The streets are well paved, and the inhabitants are amply supplied with water: the air is salubrious, and the environs, which abound with rich and diversified scenery, afford agreeable walks. The races, which take place annually in June, are held on Hurn-meadow, one of the four common pastures belonging to the town, about a mile distant, on which a commodious stand has been erected. The theatre, built in 1805, is occasionally opened, and assemblies are held periodically in a suite of rooms for that purpose. The trade is in coal, corn, oatmeal, malt, and tanned leather, and has been greatly extended by means of a canal, called Beverley Beck, constructed under an act of parliament, in 1727, and connecting the town with the river Hull. The poorer class of inhabitants are employed in making bone lace. The market is on Saturday: the market place occupies an area of four acres, in the centre of which is a stately cross supported on eight pillars, each of one entire stone; fairs are held on the Thursday before old Valentine's day, Holy Thursday, July 5th, the Wednesday before September 25th, and November 6th, chiefly for horses, horned cattle and sheep, and on every alternate Wednesday there is a great market for sheep and horned cattle. The government of the borough, by charter of Queen Elizabeth, is vested in a mayor, recorder, twelve aldermen, and thirteen burgesses, assisted by a town clerk, and subordinatc officers. The mayor and burgesses are elected annually, and the aldermen are chosen by a majority of their own body, as vacancies occur: the freedom of the borough is inherited by the sons of freemen, if born within the liberty, acquired by servitude, or obtained by purchase; among the privileges which it conveys, are exemption from toll and custom in every town or port in England, and the right of depasturing twelve or thirteen head of cattle, at a trifling cost, on four large pastures containing about one thousand acres. The corporation have the power of trying for capital offences, but do not exercise it; they hold courts of session for the borough and liberty, which latter comprises the townships of Molscroft, Stockhill with Sandholme, Theame, Ticton with Hull Bridge, Weel, Woodmansey with Bevcrley Park, and part of the township of Aike, all in the parish of St. John; and a court of record is also held, called the Provost court, which takes cognizance of all pleas, except those respecting titles to landed property. A court of requests is holden under an act passed in the 21st of George III., the powers of which were extended by a subsequent act, in the 46th of the same reign, whereby debts under £5 are rccoverable. The guildhall, or, as it is here called, the Hallgarth, is a neat building, containing, in addition to the apartments in which the public business of the corporation is transacted, a court room in which the general quarter sessions for the east riding are held, and a registrar's office. The house of correction is a small, neat building, about half a mile from the town. The elective franchise was conferred in the reign of Edward I, but was not exercised from the end of that reign till the 5th of Elizabeth, since which time, the borough has continued to return two members to parliament: the right of election is vested in the freemen generally, whether resident or not, the number of whom is about one thousand four hundred; the mayor is the returning officer. Beverley comprises the parishes of St. John, St. Martin, St. Mary and St. Nicholas, all within the jurisdiction of the peculiar court of Beverley; the parish of St. John extends into the northern division of the wapentake of Holderness. The living of St. John's is a perpetual curacy, with that of St. Martin's united, and in the patronage of the Gorporation. The church, anciently belonging to the monastery of St. John, and still called the Minster, was almost entirely rebuilt in 1060, by Kinsius, Archbishop of York. In 1664, some workmen opening a grave in the chancel, discovered a sheet of lead, enveloping some relics, with an inscription in Latin, purporting that the ancient church having been destroyed by fire, in 1188, search was made for the relics of St. John of Beverley, which having been found, his bones were again deposited near the altar. It is not known at what precise period the present church was built, though probably it was in the early part of the reign of Henry III.; it is a venerable and spacious cruciform structure, in the early, decorated, and later styles of English architecture, with two lofty towers at the western end. Though combining these several styles, it exhibits in each of them such purity of composition, correctness of detail, and elegance of execution, as to raise it to an architectural equality with the finest of the cathedral churches, to which it is inferior only in magnitude. The western front is in the best character of the later style, the nave and transepts are of the carly English, of which the fronts of the north and south transepts are pure specimens: the choir is partly in the decorated style, with an exquisitely beautiful altar, screen and rood-loft, which, though unequalled in elegance of design and richness of detail, has been concealed by one of very inferior composition, put up within the last century. The east window is decorated with stained glass, which has been collected from the other windows, and skilfully arranged. Near the altar is the seat of refuge, formed of one entire stone, with a Latin inscription, offering an asylum to all criminals who should flee to this sanctuary; and on an ancient tablet are the portraits of St. John of Beverley, and King Athelstan, with a legend recording the monarch's grant of freedom to the town. In the choir there is a superb and finely executed monument to the memory of one of the Percies, and in the north transept is a fine altar-tomb, both in the decorated style. The living of St. Mary's is a vicarage, with that of St. Nicholas united, rated in the king's books at £14. 2. 8., and in the gift of the Crown. The church is a highly interesting structure, and contains fine portions of the various styles of architecture, from the Norman to the later English: the towers at the western end are finely pierced, and the octagonal turrets flanking the nave, are strikingly elegant: the roof of the chancel, which is in the decorated style, is richly groined, and the piers and arches are well proportioned; there are some interesting monuments, and a fine font in the later style. The churches of St. Martin and St. Nicholas have long since gone to decay. There are places of worship for Baptists, the Society of Friends, Independents, and Primitive and Wesleyan Methodists. The grammar school is of uncertain origin, though it appears to have existed at a remote period: the fixed endowment is not more than £10 per annum, which was bequeathed, in 1652, by Dr. Metcalf; this is augmented with a donation of £20 per annum by the members for the borough, and one of £70 per annum by the corporation, in whom the management is vested; these sums are paid as a salary to the master, who receive 40s. per annum from each of the scholars, and has also the privilege of taking boarders. There are three scholarships of £6. 13. 4. per annum each, founded by Dr. Metcalf; one of £6 per annum, by William Coates, Esq.; two of £8, in St. John's College, Cambridge, founded by Dr. William Lacey; and one of £10 to Corpus Christi, or St. John's, Colleges, Cambridge, founded by Dr. Green, Bishop of Lincoln. The blue coat charity school was established by subscription, in 1709, for the maintenance, clothing, and education of poor children; the annual income, arising from subsequent benefactions, is at present £126. 8. 8.: there are ten boys in this establishment, with each of whom, on leaving school, an apprentice fee of £3 is given. There is also a school, founded in 1804, by Mr. James Graves, who endowed it with stock in the Navy 5 per cents., producing £84 per annum: in this school are two hundred children of both sexes; the boys are instructed on the Lancasterian, and the girls on Dr. Bell's system. Almshouses for four aged widows, each of whom receives 10s. per month, were founded and endowed by Mr. Thwaite Fox, in 1636. Almshouses also for thirty-two widows, who receive a weekly allowance of 5s. each, were founded by Mrs. Anne Routh, in 1721, and endowed with estates now producing £674. 19. per annum; the matron receives two shillings and sixpence, and two nurses two shillings each, per week, in addition to their regular allowance. An hospital, containing fourteen apartments, was founded in 1712, by Mr. Charles Warton, who endowed it with property now producing £404. 2. per annum, for fourteen widows, who have a weekly allowance of 4s. each. There are also unendowed almshouses, erected by the corporation, comprising twenty-six tenements, the occupiers of which receive a portion of various bequests for charitable uses. Sir Michael Warton, Knight, in 1724, bequeathed £4000, as a perpetual fund for keeping the Minster in repair; and Mr. Robert Stephenson, in 1711, left an estate, now producing from £70 to £100 per annum, for the maintenance of 'Nonconformist preaching ministers.' Alfred of Beverley, a monkish historian of the twelfth century, is supposed to have been born here; Dr. John Alcock, Bishop of Ely, and founder of Jesus' College, Cambridge; Dr. Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, a martyr to his religious tenets in the reign of Henry VIII.; and Dr. Green, Bishop of Lincoln, an elegant scholar, and one of the writers of the Athenian Letters, published by Lord Hardwicke; were natives of this town. From Lewis's Topographical Dictionary of England 1831, courtesy of Databases 4 Sale |
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