Searching - pewter searches in the 18th Century

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The good old days - how the Company kept standards up in the search of 1702 Part 1, the searching This article, written by the late Ronald F. Homer and first published in Issue 04 of Pewter Review, has been adapted for publication in The Pewterer. For the full article, please refer to the relevant issue (back copies available in the Library at the Hall) of Pewter Review). Here, in part 1, Ron Homer takes us through the rigours of a search party in 1702 (part 2, in the next issue, will look at the accounts, and at the food ordered for Masters’ Dinners in those times). Ron Homer wrote:

The late Ron Homer

TO have been an officer of the Pewterers’ Company in the 17th century not only imposed the obligations of attendance at Court meetings and numerous other functions, but also required a willingness and an ability to participate in countrywide searches for substandard pewterware made in the provinces. From time to time, and sometimes more than once a year, parties comprising the Master, the Wardens and the Clerk, together with other senior liverymen, set out on horseback from London on expeditions which sometimes lasted a whole month. The distances covered, on no doubt appalling roads, indicate a stamina and determination which would be difficult to match today. The formal records of some of these searches have long been known from the surviving Search Books, now deposited at Guildhall Library together with the Company's other archives. It is only within the last few years that the revealing informal notebooks and expense accounts for a few of these searches have been discovered among long-forgotten documents at Pewterers’ Hall. Appended to the note book which William Tarlton, the Clerk, made of the search of 1702 is an itinerary which starkly discloses what was involved for those concerned - the Master, the Wardens, five liverymen and the Clerk: 13 July





Dined at Colbrook and lay at Redding

14 July





Dined at Newberry and lay at Marlborow.

15 July

Dined at Sandy Lane, bated at Chippenham and lay at Marshfield in Gloucestershire.

16 July

Got to Bristol about 12 at noon and dined at 3. Lay there all night.

17 July

Made search at Bristol and ended that night and lay there all night.

18 July

Breakfasted with ye Bristol pewterers at ye Bull Tavern in High Street and set out half past 11 'clock. Mr Templeman, Mr. Dunn and Self dined at Newport 15 miles from Bristol. Mr. Templeman, Dunn and Self lay at Cambridge in Glou'rshire and ye rest lay at Tedbury.

19 July

Being Sunday we stayed all day at Cambridge. After evening sermon we rode with Mr. Harvey our landlord over ye Water Common and saw ye Severn but ye tide out and about 7 at night drank sider and ale at a house on ye commaon.

20 July

We all got well to Tewksbury before 9 in ye morning, bated, and then went search and afterwards soon to Worcester. Searched and lay there all night.

21 July

The Master and Upper Warden and Raper and self went to Bewdley and searched and dined there. The rest of the Company went to Droitwich and Bromsgrove. After our search there we went to Kidderminister and from there to Stowerbridge and lay there all night.

23 July

We searched at Stowerbridge at 7 in ye morning and from there went to Bermingham where we stayed all night first making a search.

24 July

We got to Warwick, searched and stayed all night.

25 July

Searched at Stratford on Avon and went thence to Shipston on Stour.

26 July 27 July





Lay there. Fletcher, Templeman, Dunn, Frith and self went to Chipping Norton and searched and thence to Burford and lay there all night.

28 July

We searched at Witney and then went to Oxford. The rest of ye Company went on ye 27th to Banbury, Bistur and Woodstock and came to Oxford ye 28th and we all searched and lay there all night. 2

29 July

We searched and dined at Thame and then went to Ailsbury and searched and lay there all night.

30 July

Searched at Tring and went to Dunstable and searched and lay there all night.

31 July

Searched at St. Albans between 10 and 11 in ye morning and then went to Watford and searched and lay there all night.

If this was typical of a country search it is no wonder that the Clerk was constrained to add, at the end of his notes of an earlier search, 'Came we all safe to Pewterers’ Hall'!

Photo of Ron Homer courtesy of the Librarian at the Pewter Society. Ron Homer was President of the Society in 1975-77

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The Pewterer, Volume 4, number 3. September, 2013. Editor: Alan Williams Published by Alan Williams, 21 Elder Street, Spitalfields, London E1 6BT and endorsed by the Worshipful Company of Pewterers, Pewterers’ Hall, Oat Lane, London EC2V 7DE Articles: copyright the several authors 2013. Get-up: copyright Alan Williams, 2013. No reproduction without permission. All enquiries to the Editor.

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