Friday 15 February 1666/67
Up and with Sir W. Batten and [Sir] J. Minnes by coach to White Hall, where we attended upon the Duke of York to complain of the disorders the other day among the seamen at the Pay at the Ticket Office, and that it arises from lack of money, and that we desire, unless better provided for with money, to have nothing more to do with the payment of tickets, it being not our duty; and the Duke of York and [Sir] W. Coventry did agree to it, so that I hope we shall be rid of that trouble. This done, I moved for allowance for a house for Mr. Turner, and got it granted. Then away to Westminster Hall, and there to the Exchequer about my tallies, and so back to White Hall, and so with Lord Bellasses to the Excise Office, where met by Sir H. Cholmly to consider about our business of money there, and that done, home and to dinner, where I hear Pegg Pen is married this day privately; no friends, but two or three relations on his side and hers. Borrowed many things of my kitchen for dressing their dinner. So after dinner to the office, and there busy and did much business, and late at it. Mrs. Turner come to me to hear how matters went; I told her of our getting rent for a house for her. She did give me account of this wedding to-day, its being private being imputed to its being just before Lent, and so in vain to make new clothes till Easter, that they might see the fashions as they are like to be this summer; which is reason good enough. Mrs. Turner tells me she hears [Sir W. Pen] gives 4500l. or 4000 with her. They are gone to bed, so I wish them much sport, and home to supper and to bed. They own the treaty for a peace publickly at Court, and the Commissioners providing themselves to go over as soon as a passe comes for them.
23 Annotations
First Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
John Evelyn's Diary
15 Feb. My little book in answer to Sir Geo. Mackenzie on Solitude was now published, intitled 'Public Employment and an active Life with its Appanages preferred to Solitude.' [ http://www.archive.org/details/cu… ]
[ http://library.oxfordjournals.org… ]
http://snipurl.com/sz6lc
cape henry • Link
"...I told her of our getting rent for a house for her."
Good for her and good for him.
cum salis grano • Link
"...we attended upon the Duke of York to complain of the disorders the other day among the seamen at the Pay at the Ticket Office, and that it arises from lack of money, and that we desire, unless better provided for with money, to have nothing more to do with the payment of tickets, it being not our duty; and the Duke of York and [Sir] W. Coventry did agree to it, so that I hope we shall be rid of that trouble...."
?So whose job be it to have the Tars paid for work done.?
cape henry • Link
"So whose job be it..."A most excellent question.But this seems to me to be a dangerous can to be kicking down the road.
Miss Ann • Link
How do they pay the sailors if they don't have enough money? Is it "everyone on 1/2 pay", or "pay the full amount to the first in line and when we run out of cash the others will just have to wait"? Doesn't sound like a very good system at all.
Can't wait to see the new fashions ...
Ruben • Link
How do they pay the sailors if they don’t have enough money?
Every sailor gets a ticket (not money). When in port he goes to the ticket office to change his ticket for real money. If there is no money, he can sell his ticket to a merchant, or pay for his beer, etc., (with a discount). As the King is having a credit problem, merchants distrust tickets and will discount so much that sailors get almost nothing for their efforts. When this becomes clear to the sailor, he goes back to the ticket office and asks FOR HIS MONEY! When there are more than 3 sailors reclaiming their salaries, it is highly probably that the pale functionary that is in charge of the office will need more than good manners to control the situation...
Robert Gertz • Link
"They own the treaty for a peace publickly at Court, and the Commissioners providing themselves to go over as soon as a passe comes for them."
"What's this with the pass from the Hague?"
"Says it's the bill for King Charles' housekeeping when he was a refugee in Holland." young Morris holds bill.
The Hague...
"And they say we Dutch have no sense of humor..." Hearty chuckles.
cape henry • Link
Thanks, Ruben. No doubt we have been through this maze before, but if the Ticket Office is not a part of the Navy Office is it a function of the Treasury directly?
I get the idea that Pepys' position is that once the N.O. - absent real money - issues the Ticket-in-Lieu-Of, it has discharged its responsibility to the sailor.We then get the scenario Ruben outlines above where the sailor is pretty much on his own to be robbed either by the merchants or by the government.I say let's all attend a play, shall we gentlemen?
cum salis grano • Link
money and what it buys:
Have gold or silver, it is scarce, only a few have real gold, very few of the Lordly ones have any either, they wait until death to settle, they even have to ask permission to sell land in order to settle debts, there be tabs, chits, IOU's, home made farthings, a few copper groats, along with some silver tanners and bobs.
Samuell represents the new wealth, his father , fellow merchants and tradesmen relied on good will of the people to settle each quarter their tabs for purchases, this was still so in England, up to the second world war, the little guys had to wait for payment while they had to pay the big guys on receipt of mechandise.
'Tis why it is interesting to see how Samuell, every 3 months would settle his accounts.
Even little old me had a running account with the big paper companies and would settle every 3 months when they asked.
The man in the street had to have a tab running if he was trustworthy, else it was cash on the barrel.
Thus it was not a consumer market as little money in circulation.
Government and the big guys used pieces of wood to keep score.
See http://www.pepysdiary.com/diary/1…
it illustrates how One man [ Mr. Lanyon, ]loaned money to the kings Treasury from his stack.
Money and who has it, has always been the mystery that still needs a solution. Some know how to accumulate it, more know how to spend it, especially if they do not have money.
The Poor tars are in the same position as those that have no credit card and no bank account and work when it is available and short changed [fee] by money changers because the employer pays by check that may bounce.
Pennsylvania was named so, because C II had find a way to pay off his debt to William Penn. [ his bed companions always cash or goodies ]
Lots of theories on money, but the question of what something be worth is still up in the air.
Just a view point.
Terry Foreman • Link
"Just a view point."
Maybe so, cum salis grano, but one that is informed and informative about dealings that many of us have had no personal acquaintance with, living as many of us do and have (at least on the west side of the pond) in a world awash in cash (and credit). Thanks very much for clarifying matters.
Ruben • Link
16 ton and what do you get? another day over and deeper in debt...
...I own my soul to the company's store...
Robert Gertz • Link
However there is an alternative employer, who pays in dollars...As Sam and co will soon learn to their misfortune.
Nothing like putting your greatest skill to use in destroying your opponent.
Australian Susan • Link
"... it being not our duty..." hot potato, hot potato.
Ruben makes reference to workers getting goods on tick from "the company store" - which of course, charged the top whack for goods. Just after our period, when the industrial revolution cranks into being, some canny industrialists paid in tokens which could only be exchanged in the factory shop. It came to be a hated system.
In the 1950s, the Church of England was still paying Vicars quarterly and thus the butcher, the baker, the grocer etc all had to wait to be paid: they reckoned the Church could be relied upon...
Robert Gertz • Link
Whenever my brother and sisters claim there's no need for labor rights, I remind them of our uncles and grandfathers' tales of the company/factory store system. Pay pennies, steal them back, kick you out on the street if you get sick or hurt, beat or kill you if you complain too loudly.
cum salis grano • Link
Yep, history is rarely remembered, even recent events fade into nothing.
Jam yesterday [good old days rarely the pain], jam tomorrow [win the lottery], no jam today [whatever].
Failure to know or remember history is the down fall of many, while others use it to prosper.
Second Reading
Terry Foreman • Link
"'I moved for allowance for a house for Mr. Turner, and got it granted."
Not simple. L&M note on 10 June the Treasurer paaid a fine [?] of £108 to Joseph Batelier, the owner of a house in Crutched Friars, for this purpose. The Admiral's order referred to Thomas Turner's long service as a clerk in the Navy Office, and to his having lived in an official house for 20 years. Brouncker now occupied the Turners' old lodging in the Navy Office building.
Terry Foreman • Link
"I hear Pegg Pen is married this day privately"
L&M: She married Anthony Lowther; the license (22 February) gives his age as 24 and hers as 15.
San Diego Sarah • Link
"They are gone to bed, so I wish them much sport, ..."
I'm sure you do. Nudge nudge, hee hee. Pepys is so juvenile sometimes; his Puritan repressed upbringing is being lived in his 30's.
Louise Hudson • Link
Cum salis grano: “Yep, history is rarely remembered, even recent events fade into nothing.Jam yesterday [good old days rarely the pain], jam tomorrow [win the lottery], no jam today [whatever].Failure to know or remember history is the down fall of many, while others use it to prosper.”
—-
The problem is that most written history focuses on the big things, wars, businesses, building cities, trade, the wealthy. Hardly any focuses. on the common man, like the sailors who weren’t paid. Any history of the common man is passed on orally, often by families, almost never by historians. It’s not for lack of trying that ordinary people don’t remember history. Much of it gets lost, overlooked and misinterpreted over generations and little was written down. Who knows what happened to many of the ordinary people who were barely surviving that Pepys talks about? Only those who managed to live lives of some comfort and were able to get some education could afford to think about history, and literacy rates were abysmal.
“The literacy rate in England in the 1640s was around 30 percent for males, rising to 60 percent in the mid-18th century.”
Education in the Age of Enlightenment - Wikipedia
That means the vast majority of people in England were illiterate in Pepys’ time and it took another hundred years for the literacy rate to reach a paltry 60%. So 40% of the population were illiterate at the mid 18th Century. A good proportion of the “literate” were probably only semi-literate. How could they possibly know or remember history? Only the relatively well-off, like Pepys, could use history to prosper.
San Diego Sarah • Link
"Borrowed many things of my kitchen for dressing their dinner."
I suspect this gave Pepys both great satisfaction (the mighty Sir William Penn MP needed his platters, pots and pans) -- and some annoyance (they liked my platters, pots and pans, but Elizabeth and he weren't good enough to be invited -- but Mrs. Turner was good enough).
"its being just before Lent, and so in vain to make new clothes till Easter, that they might see the fashions as they are like to be this summer; which is reason good enough."
How different to today. As I understand this, the bride and groom used Lent as a reason not to have a big wedding or new clothes, so they could be fashionable next summer, and Pepys agrees with their frugality.
JayW • Link
“Terry Foreman on 15 Feb 2016 • Link
"'I moved for allowance for a house for Mr. Turner, and got it granted."
Not simple. L&M note on 10 June the Treasurer paid a fine [?] of £108 to Joseph Batelier, the owner of a house in Crutched Friars, for this purpose. “
Possibly the ‘fine’ was the premium paid to a landlord for granting a lease for a specific time. Then there would have been an annual ground rent, sometimes a small payment in cash, sometimes just a peppercorn, so the property reverted to the landlord at the end of the lease which could be for any period, sometimes as long as 999 years. An outright sale of land could require an Act of Parliament but a long lease would not.
San Diego Sarah • Link
"I get the idea that Pepys' position is that once the N.O. - absent real money - issues the Ticket-in-Lieu-Of, it has discharged its responsibility to the sailor."
When sailors were discharged from the ship they were met on the dock by someone representing the Navy Board who gave them tickets representing what is owed to them (pay minus cost of slops provided, etc.). This has been called "the Pay" in the past. Pepys used to help with this in his early days at the Navy Office:
see Apr 24 25 28 29 in 1662.
Later Phil changed the link to "Navy Treasury":
see Jun 27, Jul 1 2, Aug 26, Sep 8 15, 1662
Nov 21, 1663
Jul 13, 1667
It was then up to the sailor to carry his ticket to London (I suspect there were other ports???), and present it at the Ticket Office for payment.
Next, consider the toll the plague took on basic services. Even poor people left town if they could find other places to go; if they stayed, thousands died. Alternatively, who wants the job of supervising the cashing of tickets to seamen when everyone knows there is no cash? Dangerous work. So I find it easy to believe some functions have been running on auto-pilot without real supervision for a year or so.
As I posted yesterday, from L&M Companion: According to Pepys' notes in his 'Navy White Book' Batten [THE SURVEYOR] chose his clerks badly (see Gilsthorpe), and undermined the efficiency of the Navy Office by seconding them to the Ticket Office or Navy Treasury in order to earn extra pay.
So "... we desire, unless better provided for with money, to have nothing more to do with the payment of tickets, it being not our duty; and the Duke of York and [Sir] W. Coventry did agree to it, so that I hope we shall be rid of that trouble."
I agree with Pepys, Mennes and Batten that having seamen and their wives tromping through the office thinking the Navy Board might have some cash on hand was not a good idea.
Carteret, as Navy Treasurer, or the Exchequor should pay the seamen. (I recall Pepys helped to pay soldiers at the beginning of the Diary. But searching hasn't found anything as my notekeeping at that time wasn't very good, and my understanding wasn't fine-tuned. Can anyone clarify that for me please?)
It's now passed midnight and my annotations at this hour are notoriously bad, so I'll leave these notes for now.
San Diego Sarah • Link
I just found a "helpful" note at https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…
Note: The Navy Pay Office (domain of the Treasurer of the Navy) was independent of the Navy Board; although the Board's Commissioners were required to authorize payments, all funds were held and issued by the Pay Office (which was also known as the Navy Treasury).
This inter-dependence was a form of checks-and-balances, I suppose.