Chertsey

“ In fact, he was dressed for the character of ‘Jonas the Graveless, or the Corpse-Snatcher of Chertsey Barn,’ one of his most remarkable impersonations, and one which the Cantervilles had every reason to remember, as it was the real origin of their quarrel with their neighbour, Lord Rufford. ”

“ Then the sound came again, this time from the direction of Chertsey, a muffled thud—the sound of a gun.
The fighting was beginning. Almost immediately unseen batteries across the river to our right, unseen because of the trees, took up the chorus, firing heavily one after the other. A woman screamed. Every one stood arrested by the sudden stir of battle, near us and yet invisible to us. Nothing was to be seen save flat meadows, cows feeding unconcernedly for the most part, and silvery pollard willows motionless in the warm sunlight. ”

“ Such good living should produce a good man, and Chertsey's great Abbot has left an abiding name. He was John de Rutherwyk, an ardent and admirable landlord and a prelate of enduring energy and wisdom. No squire of modern days ever did more to improve his property. He built chapels and rebuilt churches; he laid out roads and had pathways raised from the level of flooded meadows; he set up mills and threw bridges over streams; he sowed oak plantations and taught forestry ”

“ J. O. Clark, of Chertsey, for kind and valuable information and assistance. I have also to express my thanks to the Rev. S. J. Jerram, of Chobham, for useful information respecting the boundaries of that parish, and to Mr. Thomas R. Bartrop, of Chertsey, and to John Yonge Akerman, Esq., Secretary of the Society of Antiquaries, who accompanied me on a pedestrian excursion to identify some of the boundary-marks, and who has given me his able assistance in rendering the more difficult parts of the Anglo-Saxon charter into modern English. ”

“ He is described as a man of quiet, modest demeanour, simple in his habits and dress, constant to his pew at church, but addicted to large parties and miscellaneous entertainments on fair Sabbath evenings, to the horror of the late Reverend Cotton, whom he objected to have his ears stuffed with. His brother Arthur, subsequently Chancellor of the Exchequer, passed his early days at the ‘ Stank Pitch,’ well known to fishermen between the bridge and the tumbling bay. The tradesmen of Chertsey are honest, intelligent people. ”

“ Men are slow to conceive what might have been—nay, what almost _was_—in their national history; it seems difficult to our generation to imagine Westminster Abbey absent only from the national life; yet Abingdon is gone, all but a gateway, Reading all but a few ruined walls, Chertsey has utterly disappeared, so has Osney, so has Sheen—to mention the great river houses alone: Westminster alone survives, and the only reason it survives is that it had about it at the time of the destruction of the monasteries a royal flavour, and that its existence helped to bolster up the Tudors. ”

“ Egham and Chobham were both chapelries of Chertsey until the time of Edward I., and Thorpe to a still later period. Within these limits the Abbey had large possessions, not only of manors and livings, but lands and rents of various kinds. Thus, from the manor of Egham the abbot received annually 50 fat, and 24 lean hogs, and from Chobham no less than 150—all in that sleek condition which promised the monks speedy opportunities of enjoyment. Another manor supplied them with 325 eels every year, and Petersham, near Richmond, with no less than 1,000 eels, and 1,000 lampreys. ”

“ The country is too flat and open, and on a summer day one is too often scorched. Yet there is always some beauty to be found, and it is certainly in open spaces like these that we see best reflected "heaven's own blue." Away to the west the tiny Abbey river flows in past a mill. By Chertsey bridge a triumphant victory in regard to right-of-way over the Thames Conservancy in 1902, is recorded on two newly built villas. Opposite is the Bridge Hotel, which, with its little bay, its Lombardy poplars and green lawn, is a pleasant oasis. ”

“ Depend upon it your detectives will not trace her, and it seems to me you are all of you vastly underrating her power.”
The speaker is a man of about fifty years of age, with a fine forehead, rather scant hair, prominent, intelligent eyes, a sallow complexion, and somewhat of the middle height. He looks younger than he really is, and it is probably his long thick moustache that gives him a little of the military appearance. But Lord Pandulph Chertsey is no soldier. He is every inch a politician, living for nothing else but politics. ”

“ Gesta Pontiff. 143) , and this statement is to some extent confirmed by some spurious charters (Kemble, Codex Dipl. 986 sq.) , from which it may be inferred that Chertsey was founded in the reign of Ecgberht of Kent (d. 673) , and passed under Frithewald, the lieutenant of Wulfhere, when the Mercian king spread his dominion over Surrey (Stubbs; Green) . On the death of Bishop Wini, and during the reign of the East-Saxon kings Sebbi and Sighere, Archbishop Theodore, either in 675 or 676, consecrated Earconwald to the bishopric of the East-Saxons, and he had his episcopal see in London. ”

“ Southwark and its neighbourhood early became a suburb of London and a centre of trades which were crowded out of London. The earliest Delft ware manufactory in England was at Lambeth, which maintains its fame as a centre of earthenware manufacture. The beautiful encaustic tiles of Chertsey Abbey are thought to have been made in English monasteries and date from the 13th century. Although the county was doubtless represented in the representative councils of the reign of Henry III., the first extant returns of two knights of the shire are for the parliament of 1290. ”

“ Where love-sick girls with leg immured would stand,
The right leg ’twas—the other on dry land,
With face so simple—stocking in the hand—
Wishing for husbands half a winter’s day,
With ninety times the zeal they used to pray.
Other wells round Chester were “St. Giles’ Well” at Spital Boughton, “Jacob’s Well” near St. John’s Church, “Aganippe’s Well” at Newton, and the “Abbot’s Well” at Christleton, which supplied the monastery at Chester with water. It still exists, but the others are extinct. ”

“ Situate on the northern banks of the River Dee, the deified stream of the Ancient Britons,—built upon, or, as we ought rather to say, built into the solid rock, for the principal streets within the Walls are almost wholly excavations of several feet in depth—the city of Chester stands forth before the world certainly the most curious city in the British Isles, second to none of its fellows in martial strength or historic importance, and as a faithful and enduring relic of the past, “peerless and alone!” ”

“ Lilly told me that John Evans informed him that he was acquainted with Kelly’s sister in Worcester, that she showed him some of the gold her brother had transmuted, and that Kelly was first an apothecary at Worcester.”
[25] “As fair as Lady Done” is a well-known Cheshire proverb. Pennant (“Tour from Chester to London, 4 ed., p. 8”) , referring to this lady, who was the daughter of Sir Thomas Wilbraham, of Woodhey, says that “when a Cheshire man would express super-eminent excellency in one of the fair sex he will say, ‘There is a Lady Done for you.’” ”

“ In September intelligence was received that the King had left Hereford with his forces, and was on his way to Chester. Coming from Chirk Castle, he sent most of his horse over Holt or Farndon Bridge into Cheshire, and himself, with his guards and Lord Gerard and the rest of his troops, entered the city by the old Dee Bridge on September 23rd, and lodged that night at Sir Francis Gamul’s, in Lower Bridge Street. It is interesting to know that a portion of this house still remains, though its external appearance has been absolutely changed. ”

“ I insinuated, with a glance at the bowed back by his side. Chester snorted at me. “His eyes are right enough—don’t you worry. He ain’t a puppy.” “Oh, dear, no!” I said. “Come along, Captain Robinson,” he shouted, with a sort of bullying deference under the rim of the old man’s hat; the Holy Terror gave a submissive little jump. The ghost of a steamer was waiting for them, Fortune on that fair isle! They made a curious pair of Argonauts. Chester strode on leisurely, well set up, portly, and of conquering mien ”

“ Their position was generally one of great strength, having been chosen in early times in order that men might be able to beat off the attacks of enemies. Chester was, as you have already seen, guarded on two sides by a bend of the river Dee, and was the meeting-place of Roman roads. Northwich on the Watling Street, Middlewich on Kind Street, and Stockport were all built at a point where two rivers meet. Runcorn, Lymm, and Altrincham are on sandstone heights protected on the north by the Mersey; Macclesfield is astride the main road in East Cheshire, and Nantwich on the highway into Wales. ”

“ Though he was not a Cheshire man by birth, he claimed descent from the Kingsleys of Vale Royal. He was a great lover of nature, and, while he was Canon of Chester, founded the Natural History Society in Chester, whose home is in the Grosvenor Museum, and encouraged the people of Cheshire to take an interest in the story of their county, and to study the ways of plants and of the wild creatures of the fields and the forests. His pathetic ballad of the Sands of Dee, 'O Mary, go and call the cattle home,' will always be a favourite with the village people of Wirral. ”

“ For this reason Cheshire was called a County Palatine, that is, a county whose ruler exercises all the powers of an independent prince, save only that he owns allegiance to his overlord the king. And the sword, the 'sword of dignity', as it was called, was no light one. You may see it if ever you visit the British Museum, a mighty two-edged weapon four feet long, with its inscription in Latin engraved beneath the hilt, 'Hugo comes Cestriae,' Hugh Count of Chester. ”

“ It appeared that the accounts of the ferocity of the men of Chester that had reached York were not altogether without foundation. The English and Welsh, hitherto sworn foes, and continually at strife, seemed to vie with each other in their attacks on the invaders. Harassed on every hand, and exposed to continual anxiety and peril, Gherbaud grew tired of Chester, abandoned his earldom, and intensely disgusted with his taste of the conquered country, retired to Flanders. ”

“ Even so great a person as the Abbot of S. Werburgh was fined because his steward charged too big a price for the abbey corn.
When the next century dawned and the land had rest for a while under the Lancastrian king, churches were no longer built in the Decorated style of the fourteenth century. Another style of church-building prevailed.
The curious Chester 'Rows' were originally built during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, though they have been altered and rebuilt many times since then. There is nothing quite like them in any other English city. ”

“ On the corresponding estuary of the Mersey stands Birkenhead, the bustling modern port of Cheshire; but it was at Chester that Milton's college mate had embarked for another haven than the one he reached.
Chester itself is to many an American tourist the old-world city first seen and best remembered. Liverpool and Birkenhead are of to-day, but Chester, walled, turreted, with its arched gateways, its timber-and-plaster houses, its gables and lattices, its quaint Rows, its cathedral, is the mediæval made actual. ”

“ The Chester row is a broad arched stone gallery running parallel with the street within the façades of the houses; it is partly open on the side of the street, and just one story above it. Within the rows, of which there are three or four, are shops, every shop being on that side which is farthest from the street. All the best shops in Chester are to be found in the rows. These rows, to which you ascend by stairs up narrow passages, were originally built for the security of the wares of the principal merchants against the Welsh. ”

“ Many are the writers on Cheshire history whose names should be recorded—men who have loved their county and desired to tell of its beauties and historical associations. We can only mention a tithe of those worthy sons who have done honour to their shire, and accomplished work which has been often little understood or appreciated by their fellows.
The first of these is a name honoured by all historians, Henry Bradshaw, a native of Chester and a monk of St. Werburgh’s Abbey, who lived in the latter part of the fourteenth century. ”

“ Every one knows the result of the fatal fight fought within sight of Chester walls, when most of the knights and squires, the flower of Cheshire chivalry, lay dead on the stricken field. Woeful was the day for Cheshire men. Henry captured the Baron of Kinderton and Sir Richard Vernon, and beheaded them. Even some who fought on the King’s side fell in battle, including Sir John Calveley and Sir John Massey. Moreover, the stern Henry was wroth against the county, and every man felt that his head was in jeopardy. ”

“ Under the Normans, the town grew fast in strength and importance, and, at last, took the name of Chester. Lupus, the first Earl of Chester, built a castle, rebuilt the walls, and made it the head-quarters of an army, maintained on the frontiers, to keep down the Welsh. That brave, half savage people kept attacking the town and setting fire to the suburbs ”