Miscellaneous articles
There were no muskets found on the Cheshire coast, nor any cannon; though it is well known that soldiers who employed these weapons arrived at and departed from the neighbourhood by sea. Heavy cannon, which Duke Schomberg shipped at Hoylake in 1689, were that which permanently damaged the Long Bridge of Belfast, then new and unconsolidated. But, though actual cannon and muskets have not been found, there were satisfactory indications that both existed. Musket Rest
This was a short stick, which had an iron socket or ferrule which partially fastened it to the ground, and an iron fork at the top, between the point of which the heavy musket was laid during the process of firing; some can be still seen exhibited in the Grosvenor Museum, Chester.
It can be said that portable fire-arms or hand-cannons date from about 1430; and that in some cases they were so cumbrous that the gunner was obliged to rest his gun, and level it on his own shoulder, firing of course without aim. The matchlock remained in use until the time of William III. and a `rest' of some kind, but not a formal professional one, was in use by many so late as the time of George III. That the object was in use in the district of Hoylake is clear from various kinds. Among this may be mentioned that the window of the Old Hall of Tranmere, Birkenhead, built in 1614 and described by one of our collectors a Mr. Mayer in 1851; one figure represented a musketeer, performing the operation of blowing in his pan, while the `rest' is attached to his gun-stock, by means of a hinge which lies along it, projecting at the butt.
This information was taken from Transactions Historical Society, III. 109. And can be viewed at the Chester library. In a list of the charges made by the armourers, gun-makers, pike-makers, and bandolier-makers, of June 1649, there is enumerated the following: "For a musket rest, Xd" Ten Pennies This represents in today's money a grand sum of just over 4p, not a lot for the job lot but an average weekly wage would have been about 50p (Ten Shillings) for a skilled worker. "Swine's Feather", or "prod". -- A projecting spike between the forks of the musket rest. This was known at the time as "sweyn's feyther," or swines feather. It consisted of a spike or prod, sometimes of such length as to lie along the whole length of the rest, and sometimes shorts, like a dagger. In the latter case it was inserted in the hollow of the shaft, coming out on touching a spring.
It was invented in the seventeenth century to protect the musketeer when loading, and may be regarded as the precursor of the modern bayonet. This latter implement which takes its name from Bayonne in France, was originally called the 'swine's feather', and resembled it insofar that it was inserted in the muzzle of the musket. It was thus called the plug-bayonet, as distinguished from the socket-bayonet. In the great fire at the Tower of London in 1841, there were 2025 of these old plug-bayonets destroyed. It is related that, in one of the campaigns of William III. in Flanders, three French regiments were furnished with the socket-bayonet, then unknown in England. Gunstones Among the objects discovered was a cannon-ball, about three inches in diameter; and, as the use of stone bullets was abandoned in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, this object probably belongs to the 15th century, or the early part of the 16th. Swords and daggers The sword was at one time the most important of offence and defence; but since the invention of gunpowder, it gradually declined in practical importance.
Swords and daggers are here taken together, because in many cases they differ in size only, and when the dagger was double-edged, like a sword, it is difficult or impossible to distinguish them. It was said that swords were restricted to the rich in the early and mediaeval periods, and this fact would also serve to show that the persons who owned the majority of these various relics were the "forefathers of the hamlet" -- the head of the community.
Both swords and daggers existed among the Assyrians, and sometimes they were very ornamental to a degree of symbolism. The oldest examples both in this country and in other lands were of bronze; whilst iron was comparatively modern. The Roman sword was short and strong; that of the ancient Gauls was long and badly tempered, so that it was sometimes necessary to straighten it with the foot. Among the American Indians, the sword never was common, and even during the 19th century, with all their instruction by the Europeans, it was hardly known. On Saxon sword-hilts, pommels were very rare, they have been recovered by metal detectorists in recent years, the metal of iron of course long gone, some are shown to have been most beautifully manufactured and designed. One was found in Kent in 1772.
The strig or part grasped by the hand was five and three quarters of an inch long, the breadth of the shoulder near the blade three quarters of an inch, and the blade itself only thirteen and a quarter inches long, and its breadth at the handle one and three eighths. This is what we would call a large knife; but examples of these were quite common in more recent times. The materials of which the sheaths were made were very various; in the first instance they were no doubt frequently of wood. In some instances these were covered with leather or skin, and afterwards leather alone was used. In not a few instances it was known that even cloth was used for scabbards.
At both top and bottom a piece of metal was necessary-- in the former case to give firmness to the opening of the scabbard, and to maintain it in suitable form; in the latter case it was known as the `chape', and served in a great degree as the tag or pendant on a strap. The pendant prevented the strap from being curled, or distorted, or worn away and rendering it more manageable in the process of buckling and unbuckling; so the chape prevented the leather from being worn or pierced through. Almost in any pictorial representation of the sword and scabbard, the chape may be seen.
Sometimes, however, it is unusually obvious, as in the four paintings on the windows of Tewksbury Abbey, and occasionally it is of a peculiar shape, as on a brass of Norwich of Brampton, shown in Hudson's Monumental Brasses of Northamptonshire. An interesting example is shown from the Fairford graves; and, in the Archaeologia, vol 38, p.96, the chape of an Anglo-Saxon sword from Brighthampton, Oxford, is engraved. Collars The collar was, no doubt, in use among the Celic Britons, and the people, especially of Ireland exclusively used it. Large numbers of collars, not only of bronze but also of silver and gold, have also been found in various parts of England and Scotland. Sometimes they were open at the ends, but a little expanded, like an African wrist bangle; and again they were grooved, wreathed, twisted, and ornamented in various ways.
Two beautiful collars were found in Norfolk by land workers around 1950 - 60 and were only recognize as possible gate fasteners and were used as such until they were presented to the Norfolk Department of Archaeology, who immediately informed the finders that they were of Celtic origin and were named as" torcs".
It is believed that only those of highest ranking wore such beautiful collars. It was even suggested that it might have belonged to Queen Boudicca, wife of KingPresutagus, before the infamous rebellion of A.D 60, but were also said to be used by male only. Stone implements Small stone objects Among the stone objects found on the Cheshire seashore was one, slightly orange-shaped, or an oblate spheroid.
A hole penetrated through it in the line of its axis; but the two outer sides of the hole were very much funnel-shaped. Stones of this kind were very frequently found in Ireland, but of hard material, whereas this appeared only to be of sandstone. In some, the actual hole in the middle is not half the width of it at the outer sides, so that it appears to have been pierced by a conical boring instrument. Perforated stones were used for other purposes.
They served for suspension about the person, like the lucky stone of today; and sometimes they were used as plummets or weights, as they were still at the loom of weavers in the 19th century.
I have in my possession an object, which has been identified as a net sinker, the age of which is uncertain. I found it in the bed of the river Alyn at Gresford Nr Wrexham during the construction of the A 483 trunk road. It is of black stone, possibly shale,.one inch in diameter, round, and flat, on one side the surface toward the centre is sunken and a hole in pierced through. The shape of it would have been ideally worn as a pendant. There is a Greek sling stone of bullet figured in the Archaeologia, vol 32. p96. It is egg-shaped, with the smaller end coming to a point, and letters stand out upon it in relief. In our Mr. Ainsley's collection was an implement of hard grey stone, about three inches long, which, apparently, he called a `Celt', but which is very unlike that which is called by that name. Querns Among the miscellaneous objects discovered near the site of Ancient Meols is a circular stone, with a perforation at the top; supposed to have formed part of and ancient quern.
The upper and lower stones were known to the ancients respectively as the rider or ass; and this is the part of the upper one, or rider; that is to say the one that is made to revolve. In the days when steam had almost superseded the ancient picturesque wind-mills and water-mills, we find some difficulty in looking back to a period anterior to either of these latter, when grain was made into meal and flour by the hand, and the whole mill apparatus could be lifted and placed upon a table. Hand-mills of this kind had been used at various times from east to west of the whole old continent, and were still in use in the eastern countries up to the turn of the 20th century.
The township of Quernmore, near Lancaster, is supposed to have been so named from the manufacture of querns, or hand-mill stones, at its quarries; and there were no doubt others at many parts of our north-western district also produced them. A large and beautiful Saxon quern was uncovered at Pimbo Lane, Nr Wigan, in the construction of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway; and others, British, Roman, and mediaeval, were not uncommon. In a Roman villa at Walesby, near Market Rasen, several portions of quern stones were discovered. These are, no doubt, of much the same kind as those, which were turned by the maidservants of Egypt.
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