Tuesday 16 June 1668

(Tuesday).

So paying the reckoning, 14s. 4d.
and servants, 2s.
poor 1s.
set out; and overtook one coach and kept a while company with it, till one of our horses losing a shoe,
we stopped and drank and spent 1s.
So on, and passing through a good part of this county of Wiltshire, saw a good house of Alexander Popham’s, and another of my Lord Craven’s, I think in Barkeshire. Come to Newbery, and there dined, which cost me, and musick, which a song of the old courtier of Queen Elizabeth’s, and how he was changed upon the coming in of the King, did please me mightily,
and I did cause W. Hewer to write it out, 3s. 6d.
Then comes the reckoning, forced to change gold, 8s. 7d.
servants and poor, 1s. 6d.
So out, and lost our way, which made me vexed, but come into it again; and in the evening betimes come to Reading, and there heard my wife read more of “Mustapha,” and then to supper, and then I to walk about the town, which is a very great one, I think bigger than Salsbury: a river runs through it, in seven branches, and unite in one, in one part of the town, and runs into the Thames half-a-mile off one odd sign of the Broad Face. W. Hewer troubled with the headake we had none of his company last night, nor all this day nor night to talk. Then to my inn, and so to bed.

17 Annotations

First Reading

john  •  Link

So what happened to the horse with the lost shoe?

Jenny  •  Link

The lost horse shoe.

They all stopped for a coffee while the tire was changed.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"a song of the old courtier of Queen Elizabeth’s, and how he was changed upon the coming in of the King" -[ L&M note the song's story may be otherwise ]

This music is An Old Song of the Old Courtier of the Kings, / With a New Song of a new Courtier of the Kings.
The Tune is, The Queens Old Courtier.

Written by T. Howard, Gent. / London, Printed for F. Coles, in Wine-street, on Saffron-Hill, neer Hatton-Garden.

***

The English Broadside Ballad Archive / University of California at Santa Barbara, Department of English offers Pepys 2.211 • 20822, 1665 in these useful forms:

1) Ballad Facsimile http://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ball…

2) Text Transcription http://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ball…

3) Recording http://ebba.english.ucsb.edu/ball…

***

GrahamT  •  Link

Reading is now the county town of Berkshire, replacing Abingdon when the county boundaries changed in 1974 and Abingdon "moved" to Oxfordshire.
Coincidentally, there is still a pub in Abingdon (though no longer in Reading) called the Broad Face. It was supposedly so named because the inn had a good view of the gallows at the nearby prison. The Reading Gaol of Oscar Wilde fame wasn't built in 1668, but it is on the site of the old county prison, so maybe the inn sign seen by Pepys had a similar history.
Reading is a favourite to gain City status next year: Salisbury is of course already a Cathedral city, though Reading is much larger and has 3 times the population.

JWB  •  Link

Note the ballad printer's address in Terry's post.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"...there is still a pub in Abingdon (though no longer in Reading) called the Broad Face."

http://www.heraldseries.co.uk/new…

Broad Face Pub Abingdon unveils the recently found "Old Pub Sign". It is named as the Broad Face in a 1794 document. The name thus predates the opposite Abingdon Gaol by 71 years undoing the legend that the Broad Face referred to the swollen face face of a man hanged in the prison.
A certain Robert Carter was named as the landlord of the Saracens Head in 1694/1702 and this evolved into the Broad Face.
The Broad Face is one of Abingdon's most popular Restaurant Pubs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wf…

If it's on teh Internets it must be true.

Grahamt  •  Link

My son lives in Abingdon and works in a brewery there. he visits the Broad Face often and the story was told him by old brewery workers and regulars at the Broad Face. Folk fable isn't always reliable, which is why I said "supposedly so named".

john  •  Link

Jenny wrote: "...the tire was changed..."

Horses are not typically ridden for a day or so after reshoeing, especially after the shoe has been thrown -- at least, not in modern times.

Second Reading

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"another [house] of my Lord Craven’s, I think in Barkeshire."

L&M: Hampstead Marshall, Benham, nr. Newbury, Berks.: said to have been designed by Balthasar Gerbier (after Heidelberg Castle); built 1625-65; destroyed by fire, 1718: VCH, Berks., iv. 179. Craven was a distinguished soldier and a prominent figure at court.

Terry Foreman  •  Link

"I to walk about the town, which is a very great one, I think bigger than Salsbury: a river runs through it, in seven branches, and unite in one, in one part of the town,"

L&M: At Swan Bridges: see Speed's map (1610). Maps by John Speed
https://www.jpmaps.co.uk/maps/spe…
The Kennet was later canalised and the site is now built over.

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

'Charles II: June 1668', in Calendar of State Papers Domestic: Charles II, 1667-8, ed. Mary Anne Everett Green (London, 1893), pp. 418-468. British History Online
http://www.british-history.ac.uk/…

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June 16. 1668
Order of a general court of the Levant Company:

That no factor in Turkey shall sell cloth or other goods except for weighty dollar pieces of 8, of Seville and Mexican coin, and shall so account with his principals that if any factor receive other than such money, the damage shall be made good by himself.

That if any factor imports any false or faulty moneys, or receives any by way of consignation, and any Avania or other charge happen thereupon, he shall be accountable for all ill consequences, and shall not be owned or countenanced by the ambassador or consuls.

That his Majesty be desired to direct his ambassador to intimate to the Grand Vizier and Seignior the ill consequences of permitting such moneys to be imported and passed in payment, and to disown the same in some public way;
and if any English factor transgress, either by importing of such moneys, or colouring or receiving them, that he may be punished as to his Majesty shall seem meet.
[S.P. Dom., Car II. 241, No. 150.]

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

June 16. 1668
The Kent, Halfway-tree.
Capt. John Holmes, of the Falcon, to the Navy Commissioners.

The Clerk of the cheque at Woolwich pretends an order to enter no men aboard any ship after the 6th instant.
Presumes it was only intended for those ships that were stopped.

Asks an order not only to enter those he has on board, but the French Ruby's men also, which were turned over by the Duke's order.
Requests despatch, this being the only thing that detains him from sailing.
[S.P. Dom., Car II. 241, No. 146.]

Capt. John Holmes, born c.1640, the younger son of Henry Holmes of Mallow, co. Cork, and bro. of Adm. Sir Robert Holmes.
https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…

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June 16, 1668
The king to the Treasury Commissioners.

On 11 May 1664, we granted Sir. Hen. Bennet, now Lord Arlington, Marybone Park, without fine and on the former rent, which was reported by the Surveyor-General to amount to 36l. 14s. 6d.
The lease could not then be passed, because the park and manor were withheld by Sir Nich. Strode and Wm. Wandesford, on Pretence of a debt to them from the late King;
but his lordship having recovered possession and satisfied the said parties, he is to have a lease of it, in satisfaction for his services for 4 years, without recompense, as ambassador to the king of Spain, his disbursements being not less than 5,000/;

the lease is to be for 60 years, on rent of 36/. 14s. 6d., with all arrears from Michaelmas 1665, and he has leave to dispark the said park.
[S.P. Dom., Entry Book 31, f. 9.]

To dispark a park : to throw open (a private park) especially : to convert (a park) to something else than a private park. Henry VIII decided to dispark the Duchy parks and turn them more profitably into pasture — A. L. Rowse.

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June 16. 1668
Minehead.
John Maurice to Williamson.

The Earl of Roscommon and Lord Orrery, with several other persons of quality, have arrived from Ireland, and were warmly received by the people.

Abundance of people got together to see and welcome the Lord President of Munster, who took his journey for London with his company the same day. [S.P. Dom., Car II. 241, No. 148.]

Wentworth Dillon, 4th Earl of Roscommon (1637–1685), was an Anglo-Irish landlord, Irish peer, and poet. His son, Carey or Cary Dillon, who became the 5th Earl of Roscommon (1627-1689) was a friend of Pepys, who always calls him Col. Dillon.

The Lord President of Munster is Roger Boyle, Earl of Orrery; why he gets two mentions I don’t know, apart from clarifying that the two gentlemen were not travelling together, and Orrery was more popular than Roscommon.

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June 16. 1668
Newcastle.
Rich. Forster to Williamson.

Thirty light ships have come in, and the Success frigate is at the bar.

There has been a conventicle meeting of 60 or 80 nonconformists; the mayor went to apprehend them, but most escaped.
[S.P. Dom., Car II. 241, No. 149.]

Third Reading

San Diego Sarah  •  Link

The idea of sign posts was not widespread at the time. And the ones that existed were not easily read white poles with bars sticking out indicating in big black letters which road lead where.

By the 18th century, common London vernacular called them

"PARSON - A guide post, hand or finger post by the road for directing travelers: compared to a parson, because like him, it sets people in the right way."

Look at the article and you'll see four photos of a Guide Post column, presumably from a cross roads, which dates from 1686. Each side of the column tells you where one road leads. So the coach driver would have to stop, dismount, and walk around the column to assess his options.
https://alondoninheritance.com/lo…

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