Chapter III: The Forest Officers

The chief local authority over a forest was the keeper or warden, who was also variously known as a steward, bailiff, and chief or master forester. In no two forests were the terms for the various ministers exactly similar, and the nomenclature often varied for the same forest at different periods. Certain forests, such as those of Cheshire, were ruled by hereditary wardens or keepers; but they were more usually appointed by the Crown, during pleasure, under letters patent. This office was often held in conjunction with that of keeper of the forest castle, as was the case with the Peak Forest. Writs relative to the administration of the forest business were addressed to this chief keeper, as well as orders for the delivery of venison or wood.

For the most part he was expected to preside personally, or through his deputy or lieutenant, at the local courts. He had considerable perquisites and privileges, and was generally allowed to distribute a certain amount of venison to the county gentlemen of the district without direct warrant.

TWELFTH CENTURY

Bakewell, Derbyshire]

The verderers were forest officers directly responsible to the Crown, although, like coroners, they were elected by the freeholders in the county court on writ addressed to the sheriff. The appointment was considered to be one for life; but any verderer could be removed by the Crown for incapacity, or for lack of due property qualification within the forest. The verderers were always men of some position, and frequently knights; they had no salary, and perquisites of any kind were the exception. They varied in number; in the smaller forests there were only two; four seems to have been the average, but in Sherwood there were six. It was the verderer’s duty to view, receive, and enroll all manner of attachments for vert or venison trespass; and he had to attend all forest courts and take the leading part under the steward or keeper at the swainmotes. In the swainmotes, the verderers were the judges in all vert cases of the value of 2_d._ or under; this was afterwards raised to 4_d._

TWELFTH CENTURY

Chelmorton, Derbyshire]

TWELFTH CENTURY

Wirksworth, Derbyshire]

The verderer’s symbol of office was an axe. In several forests, as in Duffield, there was a chief verderer, styled the axe-bearer, appointed directly by the Crown, and the recipient of certain perquisites.

THIRTEENTH CENTURY

Bakewell, Derbyshire]

THIRTEENTH CENTURY

Hope, Derbyshire]

Foresters were officers sworn to preserve the vert and venison in their own divisions, or walks, or wards, which were sometimes termed bailiwicks. They had to “attach” offenders, and present them at the forest courts. If they found any man in the forest with bows and arrows, snares or dogs, they might arrest and imprison him as if they had actually seen him hunt or kill the deer. They had to take special care of the deer during the fence or close month, _i.e._ the fortnight before and after Midsummer Day, when the fawns were usually dropped, and to provide them with deer-browse or tree-clippings in the winter. They might not hunt themselves, or even carry a bow, save under warrant or direct order of the keeper, or when training the young dogs according to custom. Foresters had always certain rights of pasturage and pannage, and usually one or two deer and one or two trees during the year. The working forester was generally also paid so much the day, always reckoning seven days to the week, as he was supposed to be ever on duty.

The foresters of Clarendon, Wilts, eight in number, received 2_d._ a day each, at the rate of 365 days to the year, including all Sundays and holy days. This rate of payment is mentioned in 1360, and it remained the same in 1483. Twopence a day was also the usual wage of the Pickering foresters. Occasionally foresters were appointed by letters patent of the Crown; this was the case with some of the Sherwood foresters, _temp._ Edward IV., who received 4_d._ a day, and were allowed to act by deputy.

There was often a general or itinerant forester for the whole area, who had a higher rate of pay, and, as he was mounted, was frequently called the riding forester. Sometimes the Crown appointed several such foresters, as did Edward I. for Peak Forest at the beginning of his reign, calling them _forestarii equitii_. In the next century there is record of the Crown appointment of a chief forester for the same district at the very high wage of 12_d._ a day. Such an officer as this was, at a later period, known in various forests under the name of bow-bearer, from having the right always to carry a bow, personally or at the hands of his attendant. To this office special perquisites were usually attached, and eventually the duties were almost entirely honorary, save that he had to wait upon the king, and regulate the royal hunting, when he came to a particular forest.

Strictly speaking, the symbol of a royal or chief forester was a bow, whereas that of the ordinary forester was a horn.

In several of the larger forests, such as those of Lancashire, Cheshire, Dean, Sherwood, and Pickering, there were hereditary foresters-of-fee. In the Peak Forest, when the question of their origin came up at forest pleas, they always claimed to date back to the days of William Peverel. There were originally four (though afterwards subdivided) for each of the three great bailiwicks of the Peak Forest, who held certain bovates of land in serjeanty, discharging their obligations in one case by hunting wolves, and in the others by some amount of forest supervision. In two of the three bailiwicks they had sworn servants or grooms under them. This kind of forestership could be held by women and by clerks, but the duties had then to be discharged by deputy. The foresters-of-fee were bound to attend all courts, even the frequent swainmotes of their bailiwick, in person or by authorised sworn deputy.

THIRTEENTH CENTURY

Hope, Derbyshire]

FIFTEENTH CENTURY

Papplewick, Notts]

There were usually special perquisites at the time of holding an eyre. Thus the justices in eyre in 1488 assigned to the forester of Windsor a beech and a small oak, and to the forester of the baily of Basilles an oak and a buck.

In the earlier forest days, foresters appear to have been frequently quartered, in whole or in part, on the tenants within the bounds. Hence, long after definite wages had become customary, attempts were made to maintain these boarding arrangements. These wages in kind for themselves, their horses, and their dogs, were termed _puture_, or _putre_. A case occurs in the Year Book of Edward III. of a claim of this kind made by a forester of Inglewood against the abbot of St. Mary’s, York. He claimed food and drink at the table of the abbot’s servants on every Friday, together with the right to carry away, whenever he pleased, a flagon of the best ale, two tallow candles, a bushel of oats for his horse, and a loaf of black bread for his dog.

Special provision was made against this levying of payment in kind by the foresters or their servants, in the Forest Charter of 1217. A statute of 25 Edward III. also strictly forbade “the gatheringe of vitailes nor other thing by colour of their office against anye man’s wil within their bayliwick” by all forest ministers, but at the same time left a loophole for its continuance by exempting that which was “due of olde right.” Puture disputes were a special grievance in the Lancashire forests, where this charge on the tenants became commuted for a money payment.

The drink money of the Dartmoor foresters went by the name of _poutura_ in the thirteenth century.

The position of the woodward of a forest, as distinguished from a forester, is often misunderstood. The woodward, though primarily responsible for the actual timber or underwood, as the name implies, was also, as a rule, a forester—that is, he was at the same time responsible for the venison. To understand their position, it must be remembered that all the lands within a king’s forest were never entirely demesne. In every forest there were various woods which were private property; but they were subject to general forest jurisdiction, such as the free ingress and egress of the king’s game. Nor could the owners, without the king’s licence, do anything therein, such as clearing away growing timber for cultivation, building houses or sheds, establishing forges, or burning charcoal, that might be held to do damage or cause annoyance to the deer. To look after their rights, such wood owners were allowed, nay, were required, to have officials termed woodwards to guard the king’s venison, and therefore they were not allowed to act save as sworn servants, taking oath to serve the king in the matter of venison, and having power to attach and present.

The symbol of the woodward was a small hatchet or bill-hook.

TWELFTH CENTURY

Newcastle-on-Tyne]

FIFTEENTH CENTURY

Papplewick, Notts]

In later forest days a kind of chief woodward was sometimes termed the axe-bearer; and we find a “sealing axe” mentioned in later forest accounts of Wiltshire, Worcestershire, and Yorkshire, which was used for blazoning timber intended to be felled.

Agisters were the officers who were chiefly concerned with the collection of money for the agistment or feeding of cattle and pigs in the demesne woods or lands of the forest. Beasts of the plough (for the most part oxen, but occasionally an inferior breed of horse) were generally allowed such agistment under certain restrictions; and pigs, from 11th September to 11th November. But each forest had its own peculiarities. Horse-breeding establishments, or stud farms, were an early institution in Peak Forest; whilst cattle were the predominating feature of Dartmoor. Sheep were usually specially restricted. Goats were at all times peculiarly disliked by deer, and very rarely permitted. As a rule, agisters were expected to report to the verderers, or direct to the swainmote, cases of illegal agistment, or of escapes of animals into the forest.

Rangers were officials that are not heard of till towards the end of the fourteenth century; their duties were originally confined to seeing that forest law was duly observed in the outlands or purlieus of the forest. Their office corresponded in some respects with that of the mounted forester.

The regarders were responsible for the regard or survey of the forest, which has been already explained. Less than twelve could not make a certificate of their “view,” so more than that number were generally appointed. When making their regard, they were to require the presence with them of the foresters and woodwards. The regarders, or some of them, were expected to be present at every removing swainmote.

Another class of officers, of which there are many in such forests as Duffield, were the parkers or keepers of the different parks. They not infrequently had under them palers, palesters, or palifers, who were permanently employed to maintain the pale fences of the parks.