Art Gallery and Museum

April 1939

SITE OF THE MUSEUM AND ART GALLERY. [Continued]

The members of the Drapers Guild were expected to attend Church services and they employed a Priest at a stipend of £5 per annum. If a member of the Guild died, the members must follow the corpse to the Church, and any absentee had a fine of sixpence imposed upon him. Members of note were often interred in the Lady Chapel in St. Michael's, like Thomas Bond, founder of Bonds Hospital, 1506, and Julian Nethermill, whose tomb is yet to be seen. For every apprentice and journeyman employed by them they paid a sum of fourpence each toward the light which burned before the rood or crucifix on the rood loft. Twopence per year was also paid for the purchase of strawing the seats with rushes in summer, and peastraw in winter, as also for keeping clean the chapel. Pageants were held by the Guild, one of the most popular being the pageant of Doomsday, and as early as 1392 they rented a room in Little Park Street for the storing of their properties. Rules prevented the stretching of cloth beyond a reasonable size. Many fields in the city were called Tenters Fields, where stretching was done. All cloth bought must be bought in the Drapery, and not in any man's house. In 1607 a Charter of Incorporation and Monopoly was obtained from the King, which had it been carried out would have ruined the mercers, who dealt in many kinds of materials. The mercers however successfully fought it and won the day.

Some well known people were members of the Drapers, such as Sampson Hopkins, of Palace Yard, Henry Davenport, Phillip Adams, Sir John Harrington, who schooled Princess Elizabeth at Coombe Abbey, and others. At this Drapery the sealing and search-ing of cloth took place, and only perfect cloth had the hallmark placed upon it, viz., an elephant in lead. No elephant in lead has yet been discovered, but I hope one may be found in excavations on this site. A hall which joined the Drapers Hall, where many of their meetings were held, stood at the entrance to St. Mary's Street, near St. Michael's Church, and at its demolition in 1728, the "Half Moon Inn" was built on its site, and the cloth fair was transferred to St. Mary's Hall. The grounds of the "Half Moon Inn" were used as a site for circus performers. It was pulled down in 1861. Referring again to Bayley Lane, it was spelt in some places as Balylane, and Baylilane. In front of the Drapers Hall on the north side was crowded together a number of old brick and timber houses, and only a narrow path running between the houses and the church wall.

Leading from the south corner of the Church was a footpath, the stile being joined to the Church. An old print or engraving has been discovered dating before 1743 which shows this stile and the path leading across to the present factory in Priory Row, a gate being opposite the factory,

The Avenue as we know it to-day was not made until 1852, nor was Priory Street made until this period. Following the course of Bayley Lane to the West, many buildings of 15th century stood where the Police Court buildings join up to St. Mary's Hall. One of these houses stood out on to the footpath, and was an old Inn. The roadway here was once a burial ground even going back to the Norman period, and is mentioned by Earl Hugh Kenilock, 1173.

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