History of corn milling .. - Centrostudirpinia.it

SOME FEUDAL MILLS. 83
mills for twenty-eight years, and to have been sue- i^^-
ceeded by Randal [Richard ?] Bold, whose appoint- Chester. '
ment was dated by Edward IV. from the first day of lo. An
his reign, March 4, 1461, and made for life. Bold was Uneventful
but was succeeded on or be-
living on August i, 1464,
fore November 4, 1465, by David and William Malpas.
The former was " one of the valets of our crown," and
the latter ''one of the valets of our chamber"; and the
appointment was made conjointly for life, with reversion
to the survivor of either. This arrangement came to
an end in 1476, when William Butler was appointed
clerk by Edward IV. during pleasure; to be re-
appointed for life by
Richard III. on his accession in
1483, and displaced by Henry VII., who, soon after
attaining to the throne, appointed on May 20, 1485,
Richard Gough, and on November 30 of the same
year Robert H anbury, gentleman, for life. H anbury
worked the mills by practical men, as had Robert
Castell by R. del Hope. In 1504 Hugh Hurleston,
as " farmer of the Dee Mills and the king's pools," is
i40Q-^r^2
entered in the compotus of the king's receiver for Had. MSS.,
Cheshire as paying on a twenty years' lease ^50 per ^° ^' ^"'
annum for the mills and ^24 for the pools.
Five years
later, July 6, 1509, the successors of Hanbury were
William Poole, a member of the king's guards (unus
valectorum honorabilissimi gardi nostri), appointed, Hist. Cheshire,
together with Edward Ap John, during pleasure ;
these being followed by Hugh Goldsmith; on whose
death Urian Dymok, one of the sergeants of the city,
was installed, March 19, 1524.
During this barren series of years the mills, as
will be seen, were directed by non-practical men—
soldiers, Court favourites, or local notables—invested
with the custody of the establishment at the pleasure
of the king or of the Chamberlain of Chester on his
behalf So long as this state of affairs lasted matters
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