Landrake with St. Erney - a rural parish in south east Cornwall.
Text only Web site.
The Ironmongers' Company
If anyone has an association with Sir Robert Geffery’s School or the village of Landrake, the name Ironmongers, comes up somewhere. Who or what are the Ironmongers?
The Worshipful Company of Ironmongers is one of the Twelve Great Livery Companies in the City of London. Its history goes back hundreds of years, in fact to the middle of the 11th century.
Simon de Montfort may be remembered as the man who forced the king at that time, King Henry III, to grant powers to the first English Parliament in the 1260’s. Simon de Montfort was the leader of a party of barons who wanted to remove some authority from the king and give it to a council of nobles. Alexander de Waltham, leader of the merchant Ironmongers, was one of the leaders of the popular revolt of 1263 in support of Simon de Montfort. Eventually this was granted by the king and the first Parliament began.
London then began to grow as the capital as well as an important centre trading with countries abroad. The Ironmongers were importing iron from Germany, Spain, Normandy and Sweden. A number of the other merchant traders, such as the Corders, the Pepperers and the Apothecaries introduced standards - well before the Weights and Measures Board, together with a price monopoly and punishments before the Mayor’s Court for those who were not honest.
In the mid 1400’s the Ironmongers purchased a Hall, were granted their own coat of arms and received their First Charter from Edward IV. The Company was now able to take its place in the affairs of the City and the Kingdom.
Over the years the Ironmongers were prominent at the time of coronations and funerals of monarchs. They also supported the Crown with men to fight rebellion and dissent caused by the religious changes, especially in the 1500’s. They provided fourteen men and two horsemen at the time of the Cornish Rebellion which was caused by the introduction of the Book of Common Prayer in 1549. This ‘duty’ was a survival of the medieval feudal duty of landowners to support their overlords and therefore inherited by the City and the City Companies. To help King Henry’s war with France, the Ironmongers’ Company provided ‘stockings, doublets, swords, daggers, bowstrings, sallets (helmets), gorgets (neck armour) and arrows’.
The riches of the Company continued to grow. Many rich Ironmongers left property to the Company. The Company’s Hall received a major input of finance making it a grand building. However, the sanitary arrangements were primitive. ‘The latrines were dug out at night by the dung farmers’. During the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the saltpetre men collected the excrement for making gunpowder! In the 1553-4 account book for the Company it reads, ‘for cleansing of the privy twenty ton and carrying away the candles for two nights, 35s 8d.’ Near that entry for that account is one for payment for ‘bows and flowers, roses and lavender for nosegays’.
During the Fire of London in 1668 the Hall survived, although the Beadles’ house next door was lost, but the Ironmongers lost other property in the city. The Hall provided gunpowder to make fire breaks in the city because it kept weapons and the like in the Hall for use when called upon to carry out the ‘feudal duties’.
A new Charter was issued by King James in 1685 which resulted in the Master of the Company being deposed. Sir Robert Geffery was appointed and later that year became Lord Mayor. He was perhaps the richest and most notable merchant at that time. The Ironmongers’ Company was moving into other areas of trading, particularly in Turkey. The release of British slaves from the Barbary pirates became one of the Company’s most important charities.
When Sir Robert Geffery died in March 1704, he left a fortune - part of which was for the building and maintenance of Almshouses. Today, this building remains but as the Geffrye Museum in London. £520 was left by Sir Robert to be invested by the Company to provide 2s a week for bread for the poor of Landrake and St Erney. The residue paid for a school master to teach the children of the poor in the parish to write and read English and learn the catechism. The first schoolmaster, Richard Cole, was appointed in 1704.
The need to educate the poor became very apparent after the French Revolution so the Ironmongers’ Company took a close interest in the school at Landrake. In 1790 there were forty children between the ages of five and fourteen being taught. In 1826 a set of rules was compiled by the Vicar John Roberts of Landrake. Those children who were members of the Church of England were to attend at ten and two thirty on Sunday for divine service, where they would walk from the school house to church in regular order. All children were to come punctually, with clean hands and faces and with their hair combed. Bad behaviour was to be punished at the school master’s discretion. Children who did not attend on Sundays were to be dismissed from school unless they were infectious.
1881 saw the building of a school at Landrake on land given by Lord Mount Edgecumbe. Within a few years there were one hundred and fifty children being educated there.
At about the same time a Commission was set up to look into all aspects of the City Livery Company government and constitution. Like all other City Livery Companies, the Ironmongers’ emerged unscathed from this Commission Report. Mr Adam Beck, the clerk to the Company had been questioned by the Commission about how the constitution could be improved. His reply was, “I know of no body of men more capable of managing affairs than the Ironmongers’ Company. It consists of members of the naval, military and legal professions and many are landed proprietors. All accounts are made in the clearest and simplest form so even a school boy may understand them. There is no official routine, so no delay.”
1925 saw the opening of the present Hall for the Ironmongers’ Company in Aldersgate Street, designed by Sydney Tatchell in the Tudor style. During the Second World War the area around the Hall was devastated but the Hall remained intact, although damaged in part, especially the windows. As in the Great Fire of 1668, the Company also lost property during the bombing of London.
Post war there was a great deal of re-building in London. Today, the Ironmongers’ Hall is surrounded by modern buildings. Next door is the Museum of London and also the Barbican Centre. The Hall’s cloisters, that once surrounded the fountain court, have now been converted into offices, two of which are occupied by the Shipwrights’ Company.
The Charitable Trusts, that the Company takes such a pride in, continue to grow. In 1976 the Geffery House was opened at Hook, in Hampshire, and the Geffery’s Field, another home for the elderly was opened in 1984 near the centre of Basingstoke. The new school at Landrake, Sir Robert Geffery’s C of E Primary, was opened in 1991. Already an extension has been added to equip the school with an up to date computer classroom and a pre-school classroom.About the Parish
Parish Council
Our Community
Businesses
August 2008
WesternWeb Ltd