Evaluación de la clase:

Wm CARBONEL Caen,

N o rm a n d y

French N at 1660

John LONGUET Bayeux,

Normandy

French N at 1665

Law. MARTELL London French English bom

Peter MARTELL London French English bom

Mark MAUBERT Rouen,

N o rm a n d y

? N at 1675

Note

a May have been his son Peter.

5.4 THE GEOGRAPHY OF THE LINEN IMPOR TERS IN LONDON

Overseas cargoes were required to be landed at the legal quays which occupied the short stretch of riverfront between London Bridge and the Tower. Before the Civil War, the merchant strangers mostly lived near the quays in Billingsgate Ward, with a few in Dowgate Ward.^®^ Those in Billingsgate were gathered in the lanes that led directly north

into the City from the quays which in a report of 1584 were noted as ‘wholly inhabited with Flemyngs’ and ‘for strangers g o o d e s *

The English merchants were dispersed throughout the City.^o? xhere were a few

including Thomas Keightley near the legal quays in the parish of St Dunstan’s-in-the-East with a larger group immediately to the west of London Bridge in the wards of Bridge Within and Dowgate. John Parker, Chris. Vivian and William Williams, three of the merchants who traded in Holland damask and diaper lived in the vicinity of Cheapside. This was one of London’s principal streets lined with fashionable shops selling luxury goods, including several linen drapers. To the north, in the wards of Cripplegate Within and Bassishaw was a concentration of merchant adventurers which included Hugh Windham, William Christmas, Walter Pell and Anthony Biddulph. Although they were importers of German linens including Sletia diaper, perhaps their major concern was the export of English cloth, the sale of which was controlled through Blackwell Hall, situated in this part of the City.

The Great Fire of 1666 destroyed the legal quays and the areas of the City where the merchant strangers lived. However, the quays were reconstructed on the same stretch of waterfront and the City was rebuilt essentially using the old ground plan. Many of the linen merchants were still in the wards of Bridge Within and Dowgate but noticeably fewer lived in Billingsgate Ward. The concentration in the north west of the City seems to have dissolved, possibly owing to the decline in the importance of Blackwell Hall. There were still a few merchants in the vicinity of the Dutch and French churches. Throughout the centuiy, those that lived in the north of the City possibly hired warehouse space near to the legal q u a y s . ^08

5.5 CONCLUSIONS

Recent studies of merchants have highlighted several characteristics of their operations, notably specialisation and methods of minimising risk. D. W. Jones writing of the mercantile community in London towards 1700 stresses the high degree of specialisation both in goods and in the type of trade; whether export, re-export or i m p o r t . ^^9 Together with others, he describes the part played by complex trade networks in minimising risk.^^^ These networks with links forged by birth, apprenticeship, service as a factor, and

marriage, ideally provided reliable commercial intelligence and trustworthy associates.

106 Dietz (1972), 160-167.

107 See Mitchell (1995C), Fig. 12, map.

10 8 Thomas Farrington’s address was given as ‘his warehouse, Mincin-Iane, at a Packers’, Lee (1677)*. 109 Jones (1988), 261.

splitting of cargoes between several vessels and the increasing use of insurance. When successful, merchants also invested excess profits in land, leaseholds in London and in various financial instruments. With the development of goldsmith-banking during the Commonwealth, there was a wider range of choices available, including loans to bankers secured by bonds, the purchase of tallies, lottery tickets and annuities, in addition to shares in the East India and other companies. Such investments reduced the proportion of

personal capital employed in overseas trade, thus reducing the risk of failure through war, piracy, shipwreck or the fickleness of the market. ^

All these trade characteristics were found among the merchants importing fine linens into London. Between 1600 and 1640, there was a high degree of specialisation which took three forms: the type of trade, whether a composite import-export or simply an import trade; the geographical area; and the goods traded. English merchants, particularly merchant adventurers trading with Hamburg, had a composite import-export trade, although the linen merchants’ imports were much larger than their exports. The merchant strangers who were effectively barred from membership of the chartered companies, were largely confined to an import trade. Almost all, English or stranger, traded with a distinct area whether the Low Countries, Germany or France. Even within the Low Countries, many merchants traded exclusively with either the Spanish Netherlands or the United Provinces, despite the severe disruptions caused from time to time by political and military events. There was also specialisation in the types of linen traded which was particularly marked among those dealing with the more expensive linens, notably ‘Holland’ damask and diaper, and cambrics and lawns. In taking decisions as to these three forms of specialisation, young merchants seem largely to have been influenced or constrained by their birth, wealth and the connections made during their training. Among the merchant strangers there were in addition links to kin and co-religionists abroad, and within the Dutch Church in London.

The inter-relation between specialisation and trade networks is exemplified by those dealing in damask and diaper from the Low Countries. It is noticeable that the leading importers from the Spanish Netherlands were not from merchant families, but had trade backgrounds from the linen towns of West Flanders. Indeed Andreas Boeve and his brother Lewes who drove between them a half to three-quarters of the trade over a period of fifteen years, were bom in Kortrijk. In contrast those trading in the United Provinces were from merchant backgrounds. The weaving of linen damask in Haarlem developed at the end of the sixteenth century and merchants from the Antwerp diaspora with contacts in the United Provinces were best placed to dominate the trade. Indeed most linen imports from the north were in their hands, with English merchants carrying just 18 per cent in 1633. Even

this figure is misleading for some 5 per cent was imported by Sir William Courteene, who like James Collent, was from a stranger family and was a member of the Dutch Church at Austin F r i a r s . 1 ^2 Por a number of years, Courteene and Collent were two of the three leading ‘English’ importers of damask and diaper, which they shipped from both the Spanish Netherlands and on occasion from the United Provinces. The third major player, John Parker, the son of a Leicester tradesman, specialised in napery from Flanders.

The degree of their concentration in these luxury goods was significant, for in 1609, 39 per cent of Andreas Boeve’s imports of linen cloth were of damask and diaper (Table 5.5). In

1633, the corresponding figure for John Parker was 25 per cent (Table 5.7). It appears that all these specialist merchants had close contacts with weaver-entrepreneurs in either Kortrijk or Haarlem. Presumably, this was necessary not only to fulfil orders for bespoke and personalised stock patterns but also to react to changing fashions in design. Among the merchants importing Sletia diaper such considerations, allied to the problems of quality control in a rapidly developing industry in Saxony and Silesia, seem to have led to an even closer involvement with manufacture. Of the trade in German linens. Dr Newman

concludes that ‘the commonest procedure was for German merchants to purchase linen upcountry and English merchants to buy in Hamburg’. She cites the Ashton papers to reinforce this view but acknowledges that ‘a minority of English merchants had more direct dealings - bypassing the Hamburg m e r c h a n t ’ . ^ Interestingly, amongst this minority were Thomas Keightley and John Holman who were major importers of Sletia diaper. Both lived for part of the year in Upper Lusatia and seem to have invested in production. John Bancks and his brothers with their direct trade to Leipzig, may also have had similar dealings with the producers in the south of Saxony.

Although this study is unsuitable for a detailed exposition of the changes that led to the assimilation of the merchant strangers into the mainstream of English commerce, it high­ lights certain trends that played a part in the process. Firstly, an increasing number of second and third generation strangers gained livery company membership and by the middle of the seventeenth century a few were elected to high office in the City of London. These included Sir John Lawrence, Lord Mayor in 1665, who was the son of the linen merchant Adam Lawrence [ L a u r e n s ] . ^ Secondly, before the Civil War several merchant strangers led by the Courteenes were engaged in interloping against the East India

Company in association with English merchants. These Englishmen were part of a group termed by Brenner the ‘New Merchant Leadership’ and rose to prominence in maritime and commercial affairs during the Commonwealth. Changes during this period and after the Restoration enabled merchants from stranger families to play leading roles in the New East

112 Table 5.4, English merchants carried £9,901 of total of £54,599, i.e. 18.1%.

Table 5.7, Courteene imported £2,791 of linens from the United Provinces, i.e. 5.1% o f the total. 113 Newman (1979)$, 282 & 285.

naturalised. These changes clearly gave greater opportunities to the merchant strangers although they did not immediately abandon their traditional trades. Nevertheless they ceased to form the powerful coherent group based on the Dutch Church that was so visible earlier in the century.

C H APTER 6 D IST R IB U T IO N : TH E R O L E OF TH E L IN E N D R A P E R S

Madame, what doth it please you to have? Would ye have any faire linnen cloath? Mistresse, see what I have and I will showe you the fairest linnen cloath in London. I f you do not like it you may leave it. You shall bestowe nothing but the looking on. ^

- Peter Erondell, 1605

As very little fine linen was woven in the British Isles before the eighteenth centuiy, most good quality plain and figured linens were imported. From the mid-fifteenth century, although some plain linens were imported through the outports, diaper and linen damask was traded almost exclusively through the port of London. Some fine linens were bought in the Low Countries by those with direct links through military or diplomatic service but most were imported by merchants. Until the middle of the sixteenth centuiy, these

merchants sold their goods both by wholesale to mercers in London and the provinces, and by retail to individual customers. Subsequently, with overseas trade confined to ‘mere merchants’, banning tradesmen and retailers, imported linens were principally sold to major linen drapers in the City.

From the Commonwealth period, the monopoly powers of the chartered companies were threatened both by interlopers and by regulation, which culminated in the revocation of the Merchant Adventurers’ monopoly in 1689.^ These developments gave increased freedom for merchants and tradesmen to engage in several parallel but interconnected activities, including overseas trade, sale by wholesale and retail, and direct or indirect involvement in manufacture.^ Early in the eighteenth centuiy the tight profit margins on linens led some London merchants to act as commission agents for linen merchants in Amsterdam and Hamburg, rather than trading on their own account. Soon, the continental houses dealt directly with major linen drapers, eliminating overseas merchants as intermediaries and reducing transaction costs.^

In the light of these developments, this chapter examines the linen drapers dealing in fine table linen, the nature and organisation of their trade, and the changing relationships with the overseas merchants and their customers.

1 Peter Erondell (1605)* quoted in Davis (1966), 105. 2 Ormrod (1995), 253-268.

3 A merchant who engaged in all these activities in the 1680s in London was the Turkey merchant, Jacob Turner; see Mitchell (1995A), 153-175.

6.1 DISTRIBUTION BEFORE THE MID-SIXTEENTH CENTUR Y

In the late middle ages luxury goods including Flemish linens were sold at the great fairs, particularly the Stourbridge Fair at Cambridge and the St Bartholomew Fair in London.^ However, by the late fifteenth century London had become the main source of luxury goods of all sorts, including fine linens. Diaper and plain linen napery were imported from the Spanish Netherlands by London merchants who sold parcels both to mercers in the City and to retail customers. One such merchant was Alexander Plymley, a merchant adventurer who drove a considerable trade principally with Antwerp, exporting woollen cloth in exchange for plain linens and certain other goods. The linens in his inventory consisted mainly of ‘gentishe hollonde cloth’, ‘brussell cloth’ and ‘right hollonde cloth’ with barras canvas and other cheaper linens. ^ Although he bought both damask and diaper table linen for his own use, there is none listed among his trade goods. His debtors in England fall into several distinct groups. A number with modest debts listed simply by name and title were possibly retail customers, for example, ‘The Lady Dracot’, ‘Master Doctor Bell*, and

‘Mr Olyver Leder gent’ ; whilst others indicate direct dealings with the royal household, ‘John More Clarke of the privy Seall’ and ‘Willm Gysnam of the Wardrobe*. Among the major debtors were several described as ‘of London mercer*. Although the description seems to indicate their company membership rather than their occupation, it is likely that they purchased a significant proportion of Plymley *s linens.^ A further significant group were listed by name and town, typically ‘John Kempe of Stafforde*. The geographical spread was wide from Southampton to Penrith, and Totnes to Norwich although the midland towns were particularly well represented. It is clear from his probate inventory of

1559 that one of these debtors ‘John Johnson of Walsingham* was a shopkeeper and it is likely that many in this group were also provincial mercers. In his inventory of 1559 Johnson’s trade goods were valued at some £100, with two-thirds represented by textiles including linens (canvas, holland and Dowlas), mixed fabrics (‘holmes* and ‘Jeans*

5 Davis (1996), Chapter II.

6 1533 P ly m le y . White wares valued at £1,476.5.7 V2; merchandise and divers wares at £486.1.11; woollen cloths in London at £340.6.8. From the variation in unit values, it seems they were at cost.

The white wares comprised:- £

Gentish Holland and Brussels 1024 pieces cont. 30368 ells, value 982 (7d to 8d per ell)

Right Holland* 90 pieces cont. 916 ells, value 130 (3s per ell)

Other linens value 176

Camlets, satins, etc value 188

Total £1476

•Probably indicates cloth woven in Holland rather than a similar material from Gent.

Some 25 mercers owed £987; the mercer William Mownslowe who may have been a partner of