History of corn milling .. - Centrostudirpinia.it

SOME FEUDAL MILLS. 99
continuance of the causeway. Gamull declared them to m-
• J 1 1 1 -1 DEE MILLS,
that Chester.
be actuated by purely personal motives ; averrmg
certain of the commissioners were his own neighbours, 19. Destruction
interested in the closing of Dee Mills. As he sub- of Causeway
sequently pleaded, " Some gentlemen of the parts of
^'^60^8
'
Wales, having mills within four or five miles distant •of the city, which they are desirous
Harl. MSS.,
of improving, and 2082. 20.
having grounds upon the river Dee, do now, after
600 years, earnestly labour to destroy these mills and
causey, being thus ancient many hundreds of years
before even any Statutes of Sewers was made, and
never since called in question." This assertion was ibid., 2084. 234.
certainly to an extent supported by a list of the local
commissioners which he caused to be drawn up,
showing that out of a total of fifty-five members no
fewer than thirty-five were owners of mills or lands
closely adjoining the Dee.* Foremost among them
was Sir Richard Trevor, owner of Morford Mill which
only recently Primatt and Wilding had sworn was
a certain petition by Gamull being endorsed,
frozen up ;
''Answer to one other petition lately preferred to ibid., 2084. 89.
their lordships by Sir Rd. Trevor, Knt., and others" ;
and a petition by the corporation of Chester, shortly
to be mentioned, again singling out Trevor as the
leader in the hostile movement. Gamull seems, there-
fore, to have had good reason to complain that ''
the
commissioners are none other than the persons who
had formerly taken private action against the mills
for their own personal reasons ; and they who are
parties interested are also the judges." However, at
Denbigh, the commissioners duly held their first inquisition
on, apparently, (for
in the various MSS. the ibid., 2003.
dates seem somewhat confused,) August 29,
^
1608 and ;
'
the jury found that the causeway was a hindrance to
* Another list of the commissioners, with a panel of jurors, occurs in Harl.
MSS., 2003. 37.