Page:History and characteristics of Bishop Auckland.djvu/130

 mSTOBY OF BISHOP AUCKLAND, 103 oity of Durham and at ParlingtoiL Such was the estiination in which he was held hj the local musical celebrities of that day, that shortly before his death, five members of the Durham Catiiedral choir, viz., Messrs. Brown, Smith, Freemantle, Stimpson, and Ashton, gave a concert for his benefit, in the Assembly Boom, Shepherd's Inn, Fore Bondgate. An attempt was made after his death, by several of his pupils and admirers, to raise a subscription^ for the purpose of erecting a monument over his grave, but for some reason or other, the project fell through. His last resting-place, which is under the east window of the chancel of St Andrew's, is, therefore, unmarked even by a simple stone. The following are also from the Begister fpr Burials : — 1846. — ^August 26. — Hunter Jones * Workhouse, Bp. Auckland, 85. 1846.— May 10.— Ann Clark, Bp. Auckland, 101. 1850.— February 8.— William Hedley,t Bp. Auckland, 95. 1854. — ^February 10. — James Hutchinson, 27 years Parish Clerk, 60. These, and previous entries, aflford fair evidence of the salubrious situation which has always been claimed for the town as a place of residence ; and even now, though our atmosphere is too often laden with the smoke from the surrounding collieries, the excellent position occupied by the site of the town for drainage and other purposes, renders it still one of the most healthy localities in the Kingdom. We must now bring to a close our extracts of baptisms, marriages, and deaths, from these curious and valuable old Eecords, which we may here remark extend over a period of upwards of three hundred years. In their pages will be found entries relating to individuals in every grade of life — ^from the mitred head to the nameless wanderer, — some of whom have made their mark upon the world s history in various ways, whilst others have played their humble part in life's drama and merely passed over its stage like a shadow, and whose only earthly record now is to be found in a single line in the Parish Registers of St AndreVa CHAPTER V. The early Registers seem to have answered a two-fold purpose, namely, that of being a record of births, marriages, and deaths, and also of the Churchwardens' account& We have already given several quotations from the latter, and in the following further extracts it will be observed there is an account of a bell having been sold. This entry is important, as it points, with some degree of probability, to the time when a peal of bells was first introduced into the tower, though it is some years subsequent to the time when the tower was raised The present bells — ^five in number — bear date 1720, but they are said to have been recast from an older peal which was previously used in the Church, the recasting having been done at York ; and it is stated they were brought from that city by a yoke of oxen belonging to one of the Downes fkmily. The frame in which the beUs are hung has a vacant place for a sixth bell, and tradition relates that the one intended for that place found its way, rather mysteriously, into the clock tower above the gates at the Castle of Auckland. This seems, however, to be a mistake, as the he waa detected cutting yoons treea, for the pnrpoae of making broom ahanka, in a plantation in the nei|^boorhood of Hamaterlej ; and for thia oflfenoe waa brongnt before the Anpkland Bench of magiatratea. When placed in the dock, and aaked what he had to aay for himaelf, he replied, "Why, gentlemen, ye mnn be canny wi' me ; aw her an honeat heart, bat raither rogoiah handa." t The above ia the laat earthly record of the old pnUio fnnotionary mentioned in former pagea. We there atated that he waa one of thoae preaent ftt the " Battle of Weardale," and in doing ao, were borne oat both by tradition and the aong there alladed to, in which nog bearing! for the ei-pte a a parpoae^of diaabnaing the paUio mind on the aoDJeot :— The iqmrtwhiohatatea that Wm.H6d]ey and Ua Black Bitch were in Weaidale, la merely a matter of ooqjecfeonb and totally onfoanded. Whoever can find ao good a man, Let them produce liim if they can ; He la the chief of oar place, I hope that God win iJlveUm I Digitized by Google
 * Hunter wm by tnde a linen-weaver, and when that tmde failed him, he feU beck upon that of beeaom-maker. On one ocoaakni