Page:The History of the Church & Manor of Wigan part 2.djvu/141

320 to whom Mrs. Letherbarrow's mother, Margery Banks (alias Margery Prescot), acted as midwife. Lord Strange, at his wife's request, rode over to Wigan and begged the bishop to bestow the said mill upon Margery Banks; upon which the bishop told him that he thought it necessary to take it first into his own hands for a while, but that he intended very shortly to admit either the widow Letherbarrow or her son to the mill, and promised Lord Strange that he would do so, only desiring of him that he would keep the matter secret to himself and his lady in the meanwhile; and when Lord and Lady Strange afterwards heard how refractory the widow had been in refusing to give up possession, although he had promised to bestow it on her presently, and in daring the bishop to turn her out, because she was under Lord Strange's protection, they fully released him from his promise. In the meantime the bishop went up to London to attend the parliament which was summoned to meet at Westminster on the 17th of March, 1628; where he was taken ill again, and having received permission to retire he lay sick for a while at Lichfield on his way home. After his return to Wigan he made and sealed a letter of attorney to Lawrence Booth, his servant, on 23rd June, 1628, to demand and take possession of the Corn Bridge mill in Wigan and the hill and barn in Scoles late in the possession of Miles Letherbarrow. But James Darrow, miller, for and in the name of his dame, Alice Letherbarrow, locked the door of the mill, shutting himself in with Margery Prescot, mother of the said Alice, who said that she would die before she would give up possession to the parson. Lawrence Booth took formal possession of the mill and barn, to the parson's use, in the presence of Henry Reynolds, as witness, but does not appear to have retained it. At the next quarter sessions at Ormskirk, on 14th July, 1628, before four justices of the peace, the bishop preferred an indictment against Alice Letherbarrow for a forcible entry into the said mill, and also into the mill hill and barn in Scoles. The jury found a verdict in his favour, and