Witney, Weavers and Welfare

Witney, Weavers and Welfare.

First published in 2021 by AlleyCat Books

© Julie Ann Godson

The author has asserted their moral right under the Copyright, Designs, and Patents Act 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

All Rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, copied, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the copyright holder, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

Publication reproduced here on the Witney Town Charity website with kind permission from the author Julie Ann Godson.

“Feed the hungry, and help those in trouble. Then your light will shine out from the darkness, and the darkness around you will be as bright as noon.”

Isaiah 58:10

Foreword

In 1935, all of Witney’s non-educational charities were combined into two: the Witney Town Charity and the Witney Parochial Charities. This book is concerned with the Witney Town Charity, comprising seventeen separate charities and including three sets of almshouses and other town property. At the time, the Town Charity received some £610 a year, including £275 rent from property in Witney, £115 from 130 acres in Eynsham, Freeland, Hailey and Bampton, and much of the rest from consols, war stock, and cash vested in the Official Trustee of Charitable Funds, together worth over £8,000.

Original documentation is lost, so this booklet draws extensively on the work of Charles and Joan Gott and the Victoria County History (see bibliography) in an attempt to commemorate the generous souls of the Witney area who recognised their duty towards those less fortunate than themselves. The town of Witney can be justly proud of a vibrant and forward-looking trust which plays an active role in the welfare of the town and district.

Julie Ann Godson

Summer 2021

Introduction

When Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries in the early 1530s, he cut off the main source of assistance for the poor and the sick. The regional organisation of the Church had previously ensured that the hungry were offered food at the gates of monasteries and priories without question and the sick would receive medical treatment within. Even free education was sometimes provided for children from humble backgrounds who showed promise. Whilst a proportion of the population was always in need of help, numbers could rise even higher in times of poor harvest or plague.

Where were they to go? New systems of support had to be devised. Each parish was required, under the Elizabethan Poor Laws at the end of the 16th century, to raise a rate for the benefit of the poor. And parish relief was supplemented by money bequeathed in Witney by eminent townspeople. The Dissolution had resulted in the dispersal of monastic lands in order to raise money for the royal exchequer, and the middling sorts rushed to snap them up. Modest farmers became substantial landowners and grew rich by raising sheep and selling the wool, even transporting it to London for export. Communications had improved from the 15th century when the building of Newbridge and Abingdon bridge diverted the main London-Gloucester route along the borough’s western edge. Witney possessed many of the natural prerequisites for cloth manufacture sufficient water power to sustain numerous mills; an abundant water supply suitable for washing and dyeing (the water of the river Windrush was said to confer blankets manufactured here with a particular whiteness and softness); and an abundant supply of wool.

Witney, with its many prosperous wool and cloth merchants, became a wealthy place, and consequently the town was well endowed with charities for the relief of its poor. Surname evidence from as far back as the 1200s indicates the presence in the town of weavers, fullers, quilters, nappers, and dyers, and similar names in some local villages reflect work put out by Witney woolmen.

A detailed examination of the donors reveals that it was generally those without children to whom to pass their fortunes who founded a charity. And even then resources were frequently left to the donor’s wife for her use during her lifetime; only after her death would the funds become available for charitable purposes.

The Witney Town Charity

The Almshouses on Church Green

Almshouses on the site at Church Green, near the entrance to Henry Box school, date back to the Tudor period. They are first recorded in an inquisition taken by the Commission of Charitable Uses in 1652. There was belonging to and for the use of the poor people of Witney, an almshouse and a garden in Witney consisting of three several parts and tenements, in which poor and indigent people of the borough of Witney were placed, and did inhabit. By the 1760s it had been divided into four dwellings occupied by five tenants, though whether they were still paupers is not clear.

By the end of the 18th century these almshouses were described as being ‘in a wretched state of repair and unfit for habitation’. The old houses were pulled down, and ‘six new substantial tenements of two storeys were built at the expense of £354’. Now a row of six cottages, each was usually let to non-paupers at commercial rents and the income used for charitable purposes. The rebuilding was financed chiefly by subscriptions, loans, and a subvention from the town’s Freeland Estate charity, together with sale of salvaged materials. With the new cottages let at their full value until the loan was repaid, strictly speaking they ceased to be almshouses.

Further improvements in 1814, including the addition of kitchens and fuel stores at the back, were funded similarly, both loans being repaid by 1819. After the money had been repaid, the income from the rents was used to help the poor. This help was mainly in the form of bread and beef at Christmas, and so the cottages came to be known as the ‘bread and beef cottages’. In the following year just over £61 from the rents was distributed in beef, and though there was disagreement as to whether that was as efficient as using the cottages to house the poor, a similar policy seems to have continued thereafter. The cottages remained part of the reconstituted Witney Town Charities in the late 20th century.

Under a Charity Commissioners’ decree of 1613 the almshouse, with the town hall and other charitable property, was placed in the trusteeship of twelve householders known thenceforth as the town feoffees. The body continued until the 20th century, managing and leasing charitable property in the town and distributing income to the relevant trustees, but not directly administering charities or keeping accounts. Two houses on the site of 45 Corn Street, also owned by the town in 1613, were similarly vested in the feoffees, and by the 19th century the income was combined with other bread and beef charities. The town hall and an adjoining house were reserved in 1613 for the bailiffs and excluded from charitable uses.

The Charity of William Lee

By lifetime gift in about 1632, William Lee of Sotwell near Abingdon, gentleman, left £40 to raise 53s 4d a year, of which 40s was to be distributed in bread and beef on Christmas Day to forty poor men and women named by the town feoffees. Also 10s for a sermon in the parish church, and 3s 4d for drink for the feoffees.

On 1 August 1632, an agreement was made whereby, in the event of the trustees defaulting, the money would go to the benefit of the poor and the feoffees of Faringdon. Perhaps fearful of seeing their 3s 4d drink money disappearing off to Faringdon, in that same year the feoffees of Witney used the money intended for the poor to buy a house on the site of the present numbers 12 and 14 Church Green, with land adjoining.

Son of Sir Humphrey de Lee de Coton Hall, Shropshire, Lee was five times mayor of Abingdon and a relative of Robert E Lee, commander of the Confederate States Army in the American Civil War. He lived to 92.

The Charity of Joan Green

By lifetime gift, Joan Green of Shipton-under-Wychwood left 20 for relief of the poor of Witney, which was used in 1640 to buy a cottage on the site of numbers 92 and 94 Corn Street,” the rents (24s in 1852)

to be paid to poor widows in 12d doles,

Born Joan Willet of Shipton, she married John Greene, also of Shipton, on 30 January 1603. She was buried on 9 November 1643.

The Charity of Sir Richard Ashcombe

By his will proved 1606, Richard Ashcombe of Curbridge, gentleman farmer, left £100 stock to the town bailiffs for relief of the poor, a house on High Street, the rent to be paid to the churchwardens by named trustees for the use of the poor; and £10 to be distributed immediately among the poor by the bailiffs.

The house was rebuilt as three (numbers 7, 9 and 11 High Street) before 1761; along with the neighbouring Congregationalist chapel, these were demolished in about 1970 to make way for a supermarket. Ashcombe also left £50 for the building of ‘a house over and above the Cross’ – the Butter Cross. It was used on market days for the sale of butter, poultry, eggs, and other commodities.

Ashcombe was a wealthy landowner and wool merchant who owned Witney Farm in Curbridge and Holway Grange. He died in 1606. In his will he was able to leave his wife £800 ‘in a little black trunk with a padlock on in my chamber in Witney’. The farm in Curbridge was deemed capable of providing an annuity of £40 for his widow. The extract of his will mentions ‘Witney, Sibford Ferris, Cudsdon, Handburough, Cole, Oxfordshire; Hanney, Berkshire; Pebworth and Marston, Gloucestershire; Dorset, Stafford’. One of the witnesses to his will was clothier Leonard Yate who, by his will proved 1554, left 20 marks (one mark = £13 6s 8d) to poor inhabitants of Witney, to be distributed by his son-in-law over twenty years in doles of 6s 8d at Christmas and Easter.

Richard Ashcombe married Johanna Brice, daughter of Stephen and Maud Brice (see below). They do not appear to have had children.

The Workhouse Site in Corn Street

The overseers rented from the town feoffees three cottages on the site of 45 Corn Street, which were rebuilt as a workhouse and which continued in use until around 1836.” In 1747, Edward Bolton, a Witney baker, was appointed by the parish overseers and churchwardens to provide ‘meat and drink, washing lodging and apparel for the poor’. He was paid £230 for a three-year contract.

In 1777, the workhouse could hold sixty inmates. Parish registers record the appointment in 1789 of Edward Druce as workhouse manager (also referred to as governor or keeper) at a salary of £30 per annum paid from the poor rate. The vestry (the governing body of the parish) also employed a permanent clerk, and retained the services of a surgeon and solicitor. In 1803 it housed 115 people and in 1813-15 around 80 excluding children.”

In the early 1800s, the local weaving industry was suffering a decline and demands on the poor rate escalated from 6820 in 1794-5 to a peak of £3,197 in 1820. The administrative duties increased to the point that a paid perpetual overseer, Joseph Lardner, was appointed at a salary of £40 per annum.

To try and keep the cost of poor relief in check, increasing use was made of the workhouse. The workhouse operator would contract to maintain and clothe the parish’s poor in return for an annual fee, and for whatever profit he could get from the paupers’ work. In 1810, the workhouse was being run by Daniel Hartshorn at a cost to the parish of £1,480 per annum.”

The Charity of Thomas Yate

By his will proved 1591, clothier Thomas Yate left a 40s rent charge from houses at Church Green, to be distributed to the poor annually by the churchwardens. In 1660 the houses were demolished for the new grammar school, on which the charge was subsequently levied. The rent charges were redeemed in the 1970s.

Yate was born in 1525, possibly the son of Leonard Yate. Multiple leases of properties belonging to him in Woodstock and Witney are kept at the Oxfordshire Records Office.

The Charity of Thomas Wilsheire

By his will proved 1032 yeoman Thomas Wilshere left a 10% rent charge on his house in Witney on the site of 15 and 17 Corn Street, to be paid to the poor by the churchwardens and overseers. The rent charges were redeemed in the 1970s Wilshere was buried in July 1032, and seems to have left no children.

The Charity of John Smith

By a lifetime gift, John Smith of Hailey left four acres in Hailey, sometimes known as the Priest Hill Ground, after the death of his wite loan (who died toot): halt the income was to benefit poor widows and orphans of Witney. By his will he left a further 12 for a gallery in Witney church.” The Hailey land was sold in 1930 and the proceeds invested.

According to the Charities Commission Report 1835-1839: ‘The land in Hailey, stated in the inquisition of 1652… to have been given by John Smith for the poor of Witney and Hailey, after the decease of Joan his wife, is called Priest Hill Ground. It contains about four acres and is let… at £o a year. The rent is divided between the poor of Witney and Hailey, and the portion belonging to the latter place is added to the rent-charge… [paid on Swan Hill), and to the dividend of Wright’s charity, and the whole amount is laid out in the purchase of bread, which is given away the day before Christmas to the poor of Hailey, principally to those who do not receive parochial relief.

The George James Hanks Charity

By his will dated 1874, college servant George Hanks left £1,000 in trust to the rector and churchwardens, the income (usually £25) to be spent on coal for the poor. Baptised at St Mary’s on 31 May 1812, George was the son of James Hanks and Anne Cooper. His father died when he was six. He lived at 64 Holywell Street in Oxford, and his occupation as a college servant may sound deceptively humble. Senior college servants like the steward of the dining hall, the butler, the head chef, or the porter, enjoyed advantageous working conditions and sometimes even a pension.

Hanks does not appear to have married. In 1851 he lived with his sister Elizabeth Hanks, aged 52, an annuitant, his aunt Eleanor Cooper, 87, an annuitant, and one maidservant. By 1861 there was just George and a maid-servant. George died on 5 April 1877 and his will was proved on 12 May 1877.

The Charity of Sophia Breton Warrington

By her will dated 1874, widow Sophia Warrington left £500 to the town bailiffs, the interest to buy coal for the poor.

Baptised in Stamford, Lincolnshire, on 19 February 1802, she was the daughter of Henry Parker West, a Stamford grocer and confectioner. Her father left her property. She married Leonard Warrington in Stamford on 4 September 1832. Leonard Warrington was a grocer and spirit merchant in Market Place, Witney. The couple do not appear to have had children. When Leonard retired, they moved to Church Green. As a widow, Sophia remained at Church Green with her cousin, a cook and a maid, living on ‘income from houses’. In 1876, she contributed £250 jointly with the vicar for the church chimes in memory of Leonard. She died at Witney on 23 September 1881, and her personal estate was valued at £18,995 10s 7d. She was buried in Ducklington.

The Charity of Andrew Holloway

By his will proved 1689,” clothier Andrew Holloway left six houses at Duck Alley in Corn Street worth £5 a year, stipulating that the legacy should be enacted only after the death of his wife Margery. He also contributed ‘Threfts’ in Freeland. The rents were to be distributed annually in bread, along with the town’s rents from Appleton. The houses, reduced to five by 1877, occupied the site of 15 The Crofts and 53 Corn Street.

Holloway lived in West End, between the houses of William Smith and Richard Roberts. He was buried at St Mary’s, Witney, on 13 October 1688. Holloway left the West End house to his eldest son John Holloway (of the Holloway Almshouse Charity below). Long Barn at Wood Green went to his wife Margery. Further sons were Andrew, Henry, and Richard. His daughter Elizabeth married Christopher Crelle of Coleman Street, London, on 16 April 1683. A doctor ‘of Physick’, Crelle was of Prussian origin and was paying taxes on a property in Bread Street, London in 1692.

The Charity of Leonard Wilmot

By deed dated 1608, Leonard Wilmot of Clanfield, gentleman, gifted a £4 rent charge from land in Clanfield (part of Chestlion farm), to be distributed by the churchwardens on Good Friday in sixpenny doles. Rent charges totalling £13 were given to six other places including Burford and Clanfield. 18

Wilmot purchased Chestlion House (originally Chastillon) behind the church, plus the lordship and demesne, from Humphrey Fitzherbert in 1596. Fitzherbert had bought it from the Wenman family of Witney. Wilmot acquired a further 63 acres from John Wenman.”

Leonard married Katherine Prince on 23 April 1607 at Appleford.

He settled the reduced manor on himself and his wife Katherine, later Hyde (died 1615), with remainder to his brother William Wilmot of Henley. William died in possession before 1627, and the manor passed to his daughter Martha (died 1637) and her husband Henry Smith, then to their son Leonard (died 1660) and grandson Thomas (died 1668), and then to John Smith (died 1704), possibly Thomas’s brother.

Wilmot’s will mentions his brother William at Henley, Thomas Prince and his sister Ann, his wife Katherine, his half brothers and sisters, and his cousin Henry Smith of Cosham in Hampshire. He left a standing legacy to Clanfield as well as Nuneham Courtney.

Holloway’s Almshouse Charity

Clothier John Holloway of Cripplegate, Finsbury, London, left money to build an almshouse for six widows to be chosen by his trustees, five to come from Witney and one from Curbridge, with preference given to widows of clothiers or blanket-makers. The houses, to include an upper and lower room and a garden for each occupant, were built at Church Green immediately east of the church, and then rebuilt in 1868 to designs by William Wilkinson.

Holloway’s estate in Curbridge, variously estimated at between 100 acres and 150 acres in the early 19th century, was given as an endowment, producing an allowance of some 5s for each occupant.

Falling income forced a reduction of the allowance in about 1823, and then in 1907, following difficulties during the agricultural depression, the trustees sold the farm, investing the proceeds (£1,455) at interest.

In 1910 the widows each received a 3s allowance. Applicants had to be at least 50 years old, with preference still given to blanket-workers, but were chosen irrespective of their religious denomination despite a resolution in 1857 attempting to enforce church attendance. Sometimes there were no applications for vacant places.

Holloway was baptised on 20 September 1647 at Witney, the son of Andrew Holloway (see above). He died 3 June 1724. His wife Anne and their daughter predeceased him. Holloway founded Witney Bluecoat School for the sons of journeyman weavers in 1724. The school was disbanded in the early 1900s with the endowments taken over by the new Witney Grammar and Technical School.

The Freeland Estate, including Heylin’s Charity

The Freeland Estate charity was first recorded in 1652, though it is certainly older than that because most of the money was given at the end of the 16th century. In 1652, and again in 1682, commissions were set up to examine the state of charities throughout the county, to see that they were being properly administered, and that the money was used for the purpose intended by the testators. When the Commissioners visited Witney in September 1682, they found that £417 10s Od had been left by various people for the relief of the poor. Along with the legacy of Richard Ashcombe of Curbridge (see above), it comprised the following:

By his will proved 1594, clothier Henry Jones of Witney and Chastleton left £20 to be lent to three poor tradesmen of the borough for periods of two years upon submission of sureties, with preference given to clothiers. Jones served as a bailiff, vestryman, and churchwarden. If the family pedigree is to be believed, he married Ann Hiatt; she predeceased him. The couple had eight daughters and one son, Walter. Walter became a lawyer and rebuilt Chastleton House.

By his will proved 1604, yeoman George Thompson of Bampton (died 1603) left £40 to the bailiffs of Witney and constable of Hailey, of which at least £10 was to be freely lent to four young occupiers of the town for periods of 1-2 years; the remaining £30 to be used to the town’s best advantage at the officers’ discretion and distributed on St George’s Day. Thompson married Joan Startup in Bampton in December 1593. He owned moveable property worth £951 when he died in 1603.

By their wills proved 1620 and 1624, Stephen Brice esquire (died 1620) and his wife Maud Brice (died c. 1623) left £40 to the town feoffees, to be lent every year to six poor tradesmen of Witney on good security, and repaid with 6s 8d interest; the interest to be distributed by the churchwardens to ‘the neediest inhabitants’ on St Stephen’s Day. The Brice family were weavers in the town during the 15th century, and Stephen leased the manor and the borough from the Bishops of Winchester. The Brices remained lessees of the borough until the 17th century. Stephen and Maud’s daughter Johanna married Richard Ashcombe (see above).

By lifetime gift, yeoman Thomas Sheppard of Hailey (born 1578, died 1626), left £8 as perpetual stock, to be lent to poor tradesmen of the town.

William Edgerley left £10. Son of Richard Edgerly, he was baptised at St Mary’s, Witney on 14 March 1646.

By her will proved 1627, South Leigh widow Elizabeth Sharp (died 1627) left £2 to be lent annually to a tradesman on good security, and for a 2s fee.

By lifetime gift before 1628, Hugh Barker, doctor of law and chancellor of the diocese of Oxford (died 1632), left £30 to the use of the poor, to remain as stock for ever. Barker came originally from Northamptonshire matriculated at New College on 4 March 1586 aged 28. By 1604 he was practising law in Chichester, where he was also master of the Prebendal School. He was dean of the Court of Arches, and president of the College of Advocates. He is buried in New College chapel where an elaborate monument honours him.

Before 1682, a Mr Bolt of Oxford left 15 to the poor of Witney. Perhaps this was the John Bolte, yeoman, who was involved in a property transaction with Leonard Wilmot in 1592 (see ORO B15/1/20/20).

Before 1682, an anonymous donor gave £1 10s to the poor of Witney. This may have been the 30s given to the use of the town of Witney in the year 1000 by Mr John Attwell, parson, of Devon/Cornwall, to the use of the poor artificers and craftsmen of the borough’. This same sum of money is again referred to in the Witney court book of 1609 as being ‘the gift of a parson in Devonshire’. Foster’s Oxford University Alumni shows a John Atwill of Devon, gentleman, who matriculated at Exeter College on 13 November 1607, aged 17. He was baptised at Totnes on 21 December 1589, son of Raffe Atwyll.

Before 1682, John Martin esquire gave £5 to the poor of Witney.” In her will of 1624, Maud Brice (see above) stipulates that her ‘loving friend Martin should be her overseer, and she leaves him a pair of Oxford gloves worth 5s.

Before 1682, Elizabeth Green of Shipton-under-Wychwood (died c. 1682) left £16 to the poor of Witney. (Perhaps Elizabeth was related to Joan Green, above.)

By his will proved 1650, John Palmer of Bampton, gentleman, (died 1650) left £50 to the poor of Witney, to be used at the discretion of his executors; further charitable bequests concerned Bampton.

Before 1682, clothier Philip Box (born 1590 to Philip Box of Crawley, died 1631 or 1671), left £30 to the poor of Witney. He married Barbara at St Mary’s in April 1613. He was perhaps the grandfather of grocer Henry Box, founder of the grammar school in 1660. Philip Box ‘senior’ was buried November 1592, so he could also have been the benefactor.

Before 1682, an anonymous donor from Fifield left £20 to the poor of Witney.

By his will proved 1674, Edward Carter, gentleman, of Alvescot (died 1674) left £50 to the town of Witney, the interest to keep poor boys in work yearly. Similar bequests were made to Northleach, Gloucestershire. There is no mention in his will of a wife or children.

By his will proved 1695 Henry Heylin esquire of Minster Lovell (born Hayes, Middlesex, c. 1617, died 1695) left £100 to the poor, later specified for poor householders attending Witney parish church. The bequest, unpaid in 1701, was later thought to have been used to buy copyhold land at Hailey in 1702 (the rent to be used for placing out two poor boys as apprentices), subsequently administered with the Freeland Estate charity. At 40 and a bachelor, Heylin married widow Alice Owen of Shrewsbury, also 40, in London in 1663. Alice already had children and grandchildren, but the couple had none together. Heylin’s sister Frances Peacock was mother to Lady Bathurst, wife of Sir Francis, 5th Baronet, of Lechlade.

As a result of the Charity Commissioners’ visit in 1682 all these funds, £417 10s in total, along with a further £64 10s ‘being money belonging to the town of Witney’, were used to purchase an estate called ‘Threfts’ in Freeland which was vested in trustees distinct from the town feoffees.

This land was let, and the income from the rent used to help support the poor. Under a decree of 1702 the trustees met every 2 November (All Souls’ Day) in the town hall, where they submitted their accounts to the rector, the master of the grammar school, and the bailiffs. More land was bought probably about 1702 using Henry Heylin’s bequest of £100 and so, by the early 19th century, after further small purchases, the estate comprised some 66 acres of arable and woodland in Eynsham, let at £48, with 10 acres at Hailey and 6 acres at Bampton.

In the late 17th century, a period of economic recession in the town, part of the income was regularly paid to the churchwardens and overseers to keep down poor rates, a policy condemned by the Charity Commissioners in 1701.

By the early 19th century, out of an annual income of £136, around £41 was spent on apprenticing up to 130 boys, £5 was paid to the bailiffs from Ashcombe’s charity, and varying sums were spent on repairs to charitable property; the residue was distributed in blankets, coats, and shoes. Recipients were chosen by the trustees irrespective of whether they received poor relief, with only those of ‘notoriously bad character’ being excluded.

During the 18th century most of the money went to providing apprentices’ indenture fees. At the time it was common practice for a master, when taking on an apprentice, to receive a fee of £5; by the end of the 18th century it had risen to £10. All but one of the apprentices whose indenture fee was paid by the charity were boys. The exception was Martha Breakspeare, 12, apprenticed in 1698 to Thomas Parme, fellmonger, to learn household employment.

While most of the boys were apprenticed to blanket weavers and allied trades such as fulling and dyeing, some were employed in other occupations. There were apprentice cordwainers, basket makers and blacksmiths. In 1790 Joseph Early, son of Thomas Early, was apprenticed to Thomas Savory of Oxford as a plumber and glazier. Other boys trained as tailors, shoemakers, harness makers, breeches makers and chimney sweeps. Most of the Witney lads were apprenticed in the town, but there were some who were sent to the surrounding towns, and others to London or even further afield. In the 1790s James Cork was sent to Hereford to learn to be a shoemaker, and in 1807 James Haynes was apprenticed to James Tyrie of Little Queen Street, St Giles in the Field, London, as a coach joiner.

Over 350 indenture certificates dating from 1670 to 1820 have survived in the Witney parish chest as receipts for the money that the charity paid out. These payments stopped in about 1822 – not because the system had come to an end, but because Witney had had another visit from the Charity Commissioners, who were not happy about the way the charity was spending its income. They found that it was not only the poor and needy whose fees were paid, but anybody who applied. There were many cases of sons being apprenticed to their fathers, and the fathers getting the fee.

After 1822 most of the Freeland charity money was spent on bread and beef for the poor at Christmas, though in 1855 3,786 yards of calico were distributed instead. By the end of the 19th century this distribution of Christmas cheer had got somewhat out of hand, and was causing concern among responsible citizens. Throughout the 1890s there were repeated demands at vestry meetings to see the accounts, but they fell on deaf ears. There were also letters in the Witney Gazette demanding reform.

On 23 July 1910 the Charity Commissioners again visited Witney, and again did not like what they saw. Could there really be 2,330 people in Witney in need of Christmas handouts? Could families in receipt of over £1 a week truly be called poor? In 1909, 2,609lbs of beef had been given away at Christmas, costing £105, and £14 worth of bread had been distributed.

There was a considerable outcry when the Commissioners put a stop to the large-scale distribution of bread and beef which many inhabitants felt was theirs by right, in spite of the fact that the churchwardens, who divided up the meat, would often find joints outside their doors, returned by disgruntled townsfolk who felt their families were entitled to cuts of better quality.

A further scandal was revealed when the Commissioners went through the accounts of the Freeland charity. Why had no rents been received lately for the shooting rights on the Freeland estate? Before 1900 a small income had been so derived. The explanation was simple: the trustees had been enjoying free shooting. That was the position in 1910. The Charity Commissioners then recommended that the Freeland charity and all the other small charities for the town’s poor be combined, so that they could be better administered and the needy more adequately catered for.

William Townsend’s Almshouse Charity

By his will proved 1832, William Townsend, a wealthy London haberdasher from a long-established Witney family, left an endowment for almshouses for six poor widows built by him at Newland, near Staple Hall. The almshouses were endowed with £2,000, producing a weekly allowance of 4s for each inmate. A deed of 1832 ruled that inmates should be at least 50 years old and should belong to a Christian church professing Trinitarian doctrine.

In the early 20th century the trustees did not advertise, but usually had eight or nine applications in hand, deciding each case on its merits; though preference was given to Witney women, they considered applications from Oxford and elsewhere and tried to avoid religious bias. Townsend also financed a new Congregationalist chapel, and left £400 to trustees of his charity, the interest to provide blankets or clothes for twenty aged men or women at the discretion of his heir-at-law, along with the Independent and Wesleyan Methodist ministers, and a representative of the Witney Quakers.

In 1763, Townsend was a haberdasher/hardware seller at 11 Bishopsgate, London. At his death aged 72 in 1832, he was at York Place, City Road, London.

The Charity of Elijah Waring

By his will proved 1815, Elijah Waring, gentleman, left £1,000 to the rector and bailiffs, the interest to be distributed in bread among the inhabitants of Witney, Crawley, Hailey, and Newland on New Year’s Day

A Witney Quaker and landowner, Waring was born on II April 1732 to Elijah and Hannah Waring. He remained unmarried. He died on 24 November 1815 and was buried in the Friends’ burial ground in Witney on the 29th. His burial order says that he was ‘of Hailey’.

Recent years

In 1957 it was resolved that the Witney Town Charity income Would be used for gifts in money, bedding, clothing, fuel, or furniture weekly allowances of between 2s 6d and 10s, and for grants to the sick or to those entering on or engaged in trade.

In the 1980s the emphasis of the Charity’s effort was to maintain eighteen almshouses and to support the eighteen occupants. This was achieved mainly by the application of the rental income from Elm Farm, Freeland, and commercial properties at 12 and 14 Church Green and Com Street. The Charity also owned two residential properties in Witney and small parcels of land at Ramsden and Hailey.

Rent charges from Yates’s, Wilsheire’s, and Wilmot’s charities were redeemed in the 1970s. In 1979 the Town Charity retained its Church Green and Gath Street houses, together with the almshouses and land a Hailey Bampton, and Freeland; invested stock totalled over Ovill with another 64,500 from the sale of Richard Ashcombe’s houses on High Street and some £10,500 in an extraordinary repair.

A major change came in 1971 when Mr Busby, the tenant of Elm Farm, gave up the tenancy on retirement, giving the trustees the opportunity to sell the major part of the property on the open market (though one 14-acre field with road frontage was retained). The proceeds were invested in government and commercial stock at the start of a sustained period of economic growth.

As the value of investments grew, together with the reinvestment of most of the dividend income, the trustees were able to expand the field of charitable benefits. In around 2000, a grants committee was formed to consider applications from Witney residents who, through ill health or misfortune, were in need of financial support which could not be met by any statutory authority. The charity now receives up to 250 applications a year, mainly from young people setting up their first home. The annual budget is now £35,000.

Another significant change came in 2006 when the charity successfully applied to have the area of benefit extended to the whole of the West Oxfordshire district.

The charity has also been able to support the housing needs of young adults who are unable to live independently. Ovens House in Corn Street was purchased from the Abbeyfield Society and, after improvements and alterations, was leased with up to ten individuals in residence to a social housing association which acts as administrator for the County Council social services department. More recently, following the sale of two properties in Corn Street, a house in Saxon Way was purchased and adapted to meet the needs of individuals with similar needs.

The eighteen almshouses still provide accommodation for single people who can show a need for subsidised housing. Rent is not charged, but occupants make a contribution of approximately £25 per week towards heating and other costs.

Michael Druce, Truster 1962-2020

The future

In late 2020 and early 2021, three of the long-term trustees retired and the charity is most appreciative of their contribution over many years. However, this provided the opportunity to bring in new trustees who may, in due course, become key leaders of the charity. It was also seen as a good time to examine the involvement of the charity within the community, which breaks down into three parts.

The first is the almshouses and their residents. Because the State has a responsibility to provide housing for those in need, the trustees wish to clarify where the Witney Town Charity fits into local social housing policy. Discussions will take place with the local authority to gain an understanding of local requirements and how best the charity might benefit residents.

The second area is the provision of housing for supported living, as seen at Ovens House and Saxon Way. The charity has provided these properties, fit for supported living and leased at a realistic cost, to specialist providers of services in this sector. This is seen as a growth area for future investment since it provides a reasonable income and a valuable service to the community. Research is ongoing into which aspects of supported living are most appropriate.

The third area of involvement is the grants process whereby individuals or families in need of support mainly for household goods can apply via one of the local agencies such as Citizens Advice for financial help. This will continue in its current form whereby a committee reviews requests on a monthly basis and decides on awards within an annual budget, currently of about £36,000.

Investment income will continue to accrue from the charity’s stock market portfolio as well as income from commercial property. However it is likely that further commercial property will be sold to fund an expansion into supported living.

Ashley Farmer, Chair of Trustees