2 ELIZABETHAN KESWICK
of native gold and silver, and one-tenth of gold and silver ore holding 8 lbs. weight in the cwt. ; of every cwt. of copper, 2s., or one-twentieth during the first five years, and afterwards 2s. 6d. or one-fifteenth ; and too have the preferment in bying of all Pretious stones or pearl (!) to be found in the working of these mines ; also rights over tin and lead.
Daniel Hechstetter was acting as agent for David Haug, Hans Langnauer Co., of Augsburg, already great dealers in silks, cloths, and draperies, in groceries and the spices of the East Indies, and like other wealthy business men of the time, in banking and bill discounting. They had widespread branches, reaching from Venice to Antwerp and from Cracow to Lyons ; and though not originally interested in mines, they had recently taken over from the successor of the famous Augsburg house of the Fuggers the control of the copper mines
of Neusohl in Northern Hungary. One of their branches was at Schwatz, in Tyrol, near Innsbruck, a celebrated mining centre, where silver, copper, and iron were produced; and we find by these account books that it was from Schwatz that some of the first miners were sent by them to England. For their earlier history see Dr. Meilingers work, named in the Bibliography above.
The English records tell us that Hechstetter (July, 1565) offered to form a company and to give shares to Sir William Cecil, to the Earls of Pembroke and Leicester, Mr. Tamworth, and Alderman Duckett ; the actual assignment of the 24 shares can be gathered from the account books, with the dates at which the shareholders entered the Company.* For the sake of convenience I have set out these statements in the following table : -
* The expenses of 1564-5 (see p. 5) were charged to the first nine shareholders, who must therefore have joined the Company as from its formation.
?i?Title:?tab?Elizabetan Keswick, The settlement of the German miners, original accounts from Ausburg, translated, Tract series, no. 8, 1882
Description:?tab?Description based on: no. 9, Issued by: the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, 16
Volume:?tab?no. 8
Publication date:?tab?1882
Publisher:?tab?Kendal [Westmorland] : T. Wilson
Author:?tab?Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Arch?ological Society. cn
Sponsor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
Tags:?tab?allen_county, americana
Notes:?tab?Photocopied book. Photocopy marks., Irregular page numbering
Contributor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
?/i?
4 ELIZABETHAN KESWICK
George Needham; Patten | ; Sir L. Duckett i ; Tamworth | ; Field J ; Anthony Duckett. I ; William Burd, treasurer to the Company, | ; Customer Smyth, I ;
Lord Pembroke, i ; Richard Barnes, | ; Nicholas Culverwell, I; Thomas Revet, i ; Anthony Gamage, I. And in 15S0, when the company was reconstructed by Customer Smyth, the English shareholders were Lords Burghley, Pembroke, Leicester, and Mount joy ; Spinola and Tamworth; Aldermen Duckett, Gamage, Barnes, and Springham ; Customer Smyth, T. Revet, W. Patten,
N. Culverwell, W. Winter, J. Dudley, W. Burd, Jeffrey Duckett, Anthony Duckett, M. Field, and G. Needham.
That is to say, nearly all the English shareholders kept their places in the Company, while the German shares (10 out of 24) were in the hands of Daniel Hechstetter for the strangers. Mr. W. R. Scott (see the Bibliography given above) points out that the average price realised was ?1200 a share, which meant no more than the right to participate in the monopoly; and that beside this initial outlay, shareholders were liable to calls for prospecting and for development of their properties. From these accounts I gather that most of the English shareholders did not respond to these calls. The first of the detailed account books begins with 1569, but scattered through the volumes there are some notices which give general returns of expenses for the first four years, as well as a few particulars regarding the journeys of the miners to England and the implements and materials supplied from Germany. For the sake of clearness and brevity I have tabulated the figures representing the initial outlay, giving from 1566 to 1568 the sums in pounds only (most of the accounts being kept in English money), and where the odd shillings and pence of the original reach more than los. the amount is represented by the next higher figure in pounds (/19 gs. 6d. is stated as ?19, while ?19 los. 6d. is given as ?20), though ...
?i?Legacy Family Tree?/i?
?i?Title:?tab?Elizabetan Keswick, The settlement of the German miners, original accounts from Ausburg, translated, Tract series, no. 8, 1882
Description:?tab?Description based on: no. 9, Issued by: the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, 16
Volume:?tab?no. 8
Publication date:?tab?1882
Publisher:?tab?Kendal [Westmorland] : T. Wilson
Author:?tab?Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Arch?ological Society. cn
Sponsor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
Tags:?tab?allen_county, americana
Notes:?tab?Photocopied book. Photocopy marks., Irregular page numbering
Contributor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
?/i?
14 ELIZABETHAN KESWICK
and groves, which had for ages shaded the shores and promontories of that lovely lake - Where the rude axe with heaved stroke
Was never heard the nymphs to daunt.
Or fright them from their hallowed haunt.
But the accounts for Charcoal, Peat, and Carnage of Ore show the rise of actual smelting at the new buildings and the complete devastation of the woods, far and wide.
This work was done almost entirely by an army of local farmers (pauern), though, as we shall see, skilled workmen for charcoal-burning were imported from the Midlands. But the sum of over ?1600 distributed in the neighbourhood in two and a half years, in addition to all that found its way by employment, purveying, and indirectly into local pockets, must have assured
the Keswick folk that their early hostility to the Germans had been a great mistake.
Carriage usually meant fetching goods from London or Newcastle by the ordinary carriers. In the middle of 1567 the Company began keeping its own carts and horses, for building and for carriage of special articles close to Keswick ; but this did not supersede the use of English packhorses for charcoal, peat, ore, and a Httle later for stone-coal. As the work developed, other accounts were opened. Most of these will be found represented ; though I have omitted all under the heading of Interest, because their value for our present purpose is small in comparison with the many which claim a place.
1564.
For 1564 I find only one entry, recording a payment on June 21st to Daniel Hechstetter, Ludwig Haug, and Hans Loner for travelling (from Augsburg to England) and for men hired from Castein (Gastein in Tyrol,...
?i?Title:?tab?Elizabetan Keswick, The settlement of the German miners, original accounts from Ausburg, translated, Tract series, no. 8, 1882
Description:?tab?Description based on: no. 9, Issued by: the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, 16
Volume:?tab?no. 8
Publication date:?tab?1882
Publisher:?tab?Kendal [Westmorland] : T. Wilson
Author:?tab?Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Arch?ological Society. cn
Sponsor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
Tags:?tab?allen_county, americana
Notes:?tab?Photocopied book. Photocopy marks., Irregular page numbering
Contributor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center?/i?
24
ELIZABETHAN KESWICK
of English sliareholders, who were never to be less than sixteen.
The first letter calendared among the English State Papers for 1568 is from Daniel Ulstatt or Ulstet, who had come to reside in Keswick as representative of the German firm, in the place of Junker Ludwig Haug, as he is called in the accounts. Daniel Hechstetter was still travelling frequently between Germany- and England, and did not come into permanent residence until 1572. This letter reads rather curiously when wc remember that Mr. Ulstet was the father of an illegitimate child at Keswick ; and if the special provision of fish on Fridays
for him be taken as an indication of his religion, it is odd that he should have applied to Queen Elizabeth's minister for a German preacher. The miners from Tyrol, and especially from Styria (whence some by their names must have come), were probably Lutherans, though most Bavarians were Roman Catholics; at least, this was the case shortly afterwards, and all the colony seem to have gone without protest to the English church.* There is no trace in the accounts of the appointment of a German clergyman, though a chapel is mentioned (p. 32) ; the two Becks, clergy of that period, were pretty certainly English. And Ulstatt was soon on good terms with Lady Radcliffe.
1568, June 25. Daniel Ulstatt from Keswick to Cecil. Is surprised at the mineral richness of the kingdom. Progress of their works, which are opposed by Lady Radcliffe. A preacher in their own language is much wanted among the workmen.
June 30. George Lamplugh sends specimens to Cecil.
Sept. 2. Notes on Needhams letter touching his negotiation with Mr. Curwen for ground at Workington to build a wharf.
Oct. 12. More about the wharf. Difficulty of procuring
_________
* In the Privy Council Acts, June and November, 1574, there is mention of
one Martin Moisor or Moiscr as apprelicndod with James Dugdale, a priest,
on matters of religion, This looks like the name Moser or Moiser of our
colony, but our Martin M. was then only seven or eight years old. Moser,
from Mosser in Cumberland or Mozergh in Westmorland, was also a local
English surname.
?i?Title:?tab?Elizabetan Keswick, The settlement of the German miners, original accounts from Ausburg, translated, Tract series, no. 8, 1882
Description:?tab?Description based on: no. 9, Issued by: the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, 16
Volume:?tab?no. 8
Publication date:?tab?1882
Publisher:?tab?Kendal [Westmorland] : T. Wilson
Author:?tab?Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Arch?ological Society. cn
Sponsor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
Tags:?tab?allen_county, americana
Notes:?tab?Photocopied book. Photocopy marks., Irregular page numbering
Contributor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
?/i?200 ELIZABETHAN KESWICK
Although it is not intended in this volume to give a history of the Mining Company the reader who has followed the fortunes of Mr, Daniel and his party so far may reasonably ask for the end of the story, for we leave them at a crisis. From various sources* we gatlier that Hechstetter struggled on for a few years, but by 1578 found it necessary to propose that the shareholders should
provide ?1000 for working expenses, or else leave him to work the mines with his own partners. He died in 1581. Mr. Scott says that another German firm made an offer, in the belief that they could extract three times
as much copper from the ore as Hechstetter got ; and we
find elsewhere that in 1581 George Needham brought
Joachim Gans to Keswick with proposals for a reform
at Smelthouses. But this came to nothing. Meanwhile
Customer Thomas Smytli, one of the sliareholders, took
a lease of the Companys works, guaranteeing to pay
the Queens royalties and a dividend to the shareholders.
The Cornish mines were then opened afresh, and Ulrich
Frass was sent as manager to Treworth, near Perin Sands.
We hear of him there in January, 1583-4, as ill in health,
but verye carfful and dylygent, and as revisiting
Cimiberland in the summer of 1585. By this time Hans
Hering had been to Neath in South Wales to report on
the ores of that district, and in March, 1586, Ulrich Frass
had lately been sent to Neath and a smelting-house had
been set up there. Frass, improving on the invention
of Joachim Gans, found it more profitable to smelt all
sorts of copper ore together, and according to Sir Hussey
Vivian {Copper Smelting, 1881), he introduced the process
employed in South Wales up to modern times.
Mark Steinberger and Richard Ledes remained at
Keswick, with Emanuel and the younger Daniel Hechstetter.
For seven years Customer Smyths enterprise
* Mr. W. K. Scott, op. cit., Col. Grant-Francis, F.S.A., The smelting of
copper in the Swansea district (ed. 2, 1881), and local notices.
|
- 2 ELIZABETHAN KESWICK
of native gold and silver, and one-tenth of gold and |
silver ore holding 8 lbs. weight in the cwt. ; of every
cwt. of copper, 2s., or one-twentieth during the first
five years, and afterwards 2s. 6d. or one-fifteenth ; and
too have the preferment in bying of all Pretious stones
or pearl (!) to be found in the woorking of these mines ;
also rights over tin and lead.
Daniel Hechstetter was acting as agent for David
Haug, Hans Langnauer Co., of Augsburg, already great
dealers in silks, cloths, and draperies, in groceries and
the spices of the East Indies, and like other wealthy
business men of the time, in banking and bill discounting.
They had widespread branches, reaching from Venice
to Antwerp and from Cracow to Lyons ; and though
not originally interested in mines, they had recently
taken over from the successor of the famous Augsburg
house of the Fuggers the control of the copper mines
of Neusohl in Northern Hungary. One of their branches
was at Schwatz, in Tyrol, near Innsbruck, a celebrated
mining centre, where silver, copper, and iron were produced
; and we find by these account books that it was
from Schwatz that some of the first miners were sent
by them to England. For their earlier history see Dr.
Meilingers work, named in the Bibliography above.
The English records tell us that Hechstetter (July,
1565) offered to form a company and to give shares to
Sir William Cecil, to the Earls of Pembroke and Leicester,
Mr. Tamworth, and Alderman Duckett ; the actual
assignment of the 24 shares can be gathered from the
account books, with the dates at which the shareholders
entered the Company.* For the sake of convenience I
have set out these statements in the following table : -
* The expenses of 1564-5 (see p. 5) were charged to the first nine shareholders,
who must therefore have joined the Company as from its formation.
Title:?tab?Elizabetan Keswick, The settlement of the German miners, original accounts from Ausburg, translated, Tract series, no. 8, 1882
Description:?tab?Description based on: no. 9, Issued by: the Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Archaeological Society, 16
Volume:?tab?no. 8
Publication date:?tab?1882
Publisher:?tab?Kendal [Westmorland] : T. Wilson
Author:?tab?Cumberland and Westmorland Antiquarian and Arch?ological Society. cn
Sponsor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
Tags:?tab?allen_county, americana
Notes:?tab?Photocopied book. Photocopy marks., Irregular page numbering
Contributor:?tab?Allen County Public Library Genealogy Center
4 ELIZABETHAN KESWICK
George Needham
|
- Abt 1581
