Now! Then! A list of tithes included in, and excluded from, future Tory MP Richard Fountayne Wilson’s offer to pay the vicar of Leeds half the cost of their abolition

6 September 1823: A list of tithes included in, and excluded from, future Tory MP Richard Fountayne Wilson’s offer to pay the vicar of Leeds half the cost of their abolition

Leeds Mercury. 1823/09/06. [Richard Fountayne Wilson offers to pay half the price agreed with the Church of England (£7,000) to extinguish tithes in the parish of Leeds]. Leeds. Get it:

Excerpt

It may be necessary to explain the precise kind of Vicarial Tithes and Easter Offerings that it is proposed by this arrangement to extinguish, and also to state those which, being of a less general nature, will still exist, except indeed the land-owners and occupiers in this parish, emulating the example of their fellow-parishioners, should afterwards effect a commutation of those Tithes also. The Tithes are divided into three parts: Mixed Tithes; Personal Tithes, usually called Easter Dues; and Predial Tithes, that is, tithes payable in kind. It is the two first of these that are meant to be commuted at present, and the following is a list of them, with the amount of the annual payments.

	s.	d.
MIXED TITHES
12 cows	6	0
6 cows	2	6
6 calves	6	0
5 calves	1	4
4 calves	0	10
1 milch cow and calf	0	2
1 dry cow	0	1
1 foal	0	6
1 sheep	0	1
1 turkey	0	1
1 duck	0	½
Hens	0	2
1 plough	0	1
1 garden or plat. (except common gardens)	0	2
1 orchard	0	2
1 hive of bees	0	1
6 hives, 1 is due
Pigs and geese, 1 in 6; and half of one in five.
PERSONAL TITHES
1 house out of the bars	0	3
1 house within the bars	0	2
Each communicant, or person above the age of 16	0	2
Easter Offering	0	1
To the clerk in orders	0	2

The Predial Tithes, which it is not intended to include in the proposed commutation, are: wool and lamb, public market gardens, turnips, potatoes, cabbages, carrots, rape, teazles, woad, agistment tithe, etc.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Abbreviations

Comment

The vicar was Richard Fawcett. I haven’t yet found the relevant legislation or followed up on the meeting of 13 September. “Commutation Of Vicarial Tithes” on 20 September deals with the progress of the public subscription. I’m told that agistment tithes were abolished in England under the 1707 Act of Union, so why do they persist here?

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Original

That a valuation shall be made of the Vicarial Tithes and Easter Offerings of Leeds, that these claims upon the parishioners shall be for ever extinguished, by purchase, and that of the sum required to effect this commutation he will contribute one half. This valuation has already been made with a very indulgent consideration towards the parishioners, and the sum required for the purchase will be about £14,000, of which Mr. Wilson will contribute £7,000, if the parishioners will advance the other moiety. The sum fixed by the Vicar and the Clerk in Orders as a compensation for their due, &c. is £40 a year for the former, and £100 a year for the latter, and the Archbishop of the province has expressed his acquiescence in the arrangement. Fourteen thousand pounds invested in the public funds will produce the £500 a year required; and that the increase of the revenues of the Vicarage may advance with the increasing population of the town, it is proposed that the act of parliament to be procured for giving the sanction of the legislature to the business, shall provide that the Vicar and the Clerk shall contribute out of their stipends derived from this source 5 per cent. per annum, to be added to the capital stock as a perpetual accumulating fund. The question that arises, will it be advisable to accept or decline Mr. Fountayne Wilson’s offer? If the question be decided in the affirmative the next inquiry will be, how is the £7000 to be raised – by a compulsory rate on the parishioners, or by voluntary contributions. A rate, though, perhaps on the whole the most fair in principle, is on many accounts objectionable, and would involved great, if not insurmountable difficulties. We know of no law for imposing such a rate, nor of any for enforcing its payment. The practible plan therefore is a voluntary contribution throughout the parish, and as the object is to relieve not only ourselves but our poorer neighbours, and not only the present age but posterity, from an obnoxious and continually recurring impost, though to no great amount, we do not doubt but there will be found public spirit amongst us sufficient to raise the required fund, animated as the subscribers will be by the noble example set at the head of the List. To all the parishioners, without distinction of sect or party, this is doubtless a desirable consummation, but to the Members of the Established Church it is of the highest importance. It is with them no less a question than whether the head of their church in this parish, not only in this time, but in all time, shall be kept in a state of hostility with those to whom he ought to administer religious instruction, or looked up to with that veneration and esteem which properly belongs to a spiritual guide. Whether his mind shall be occupied with the collection and litigation attendant on six-penny and shilling payments from his parishioners, or it shall be set at liberty to pursue the great and important duties of his office. On Wednesday, a preliminary meeting was held, consisting of a number of the inhabitants, to receive this offer, which was communicated by Mr. William Beckett, and to take the necessary steps to bring it before the public. Feeling that this was a subject of general interest to the whole parish, the gentlemen then assembled judged it advisable to call a general meeting of the parishioners at an early day, to take the matter into consideration, and a committee was appointed to make the requisite arrangements. An advertisement in this paper, signed by the Mayor of the Borough, convenes a general meeting on Saturday, the 13th instant, at 11 o’clock, in the Court-House, at which, if it should be judged expedient, the necessary measures will be taken to give full effect to Mr. Fountayne Wilson’s benevolent intentions.

It may be necessary to explain the precise kind of Vicarial Tithes and Easter Offerings that it is proposed by this arrangement to extinguish, and also to state those which, being of a less general nature, will still exist, except indeed the land-owners and occupiers in this parish, emulating the example of their fellow-parishioners, should afterwards effect a commutation of those Tithes also:- The Tithes are divided into three parts – 1st, Mixed Tithes; 2d, Personal Tithes, usually called Easter Dues; and 3d, Predial Tithes, that is, tithes payable in kind: it is the two first of these that are meant to be commuted at present, and the following is a list of them, with the amount of the annual payments.

	s.	d.
MIXED TITHES
12 cows	6	0
6 cows	2	6
6 calves	6	0
5 calves	1	4
4 calves	0	10
1 milch cow and calf	0	2
1 dry cow	0	1
1 foal	0	6
1 sheep	0	1
1 turkey	0	1
1 duck	0	½
Hens	0	2
1 plough	0	1
1 garden or plat. (except common gardens)	0	2
1 orchard	0	2
1 hive of bees	0	1
6 hives, 1 is due
Pigs and geese, 1 in 6; and half of one in five.
PERSONAL TITHES
1 house out of the bars	0	3
1 house within the bars	0	2
Each communicant, or person above the age of 16	0	2
Easter Offering	0	1
To the clerk in orders	0	2