Tolls, taxes and monopolies: how Hull’s authorities manipulated the market during early modern subsistence crises

 Hull evidently accepted its role in the national market network and with that came the obligation to monitor the legalities around illegal offences. Within the archival material presented we can perceive that the administration and surveillance of markets was occasionally a detrimental concern to the overall wellbeing of the town. However, there is also the indication that those who were placed in roles of power had the ability to manipulate the regulations of dearth for the benefit of the city throughout these 1580s and 1590s subsistence crises.  

Obviously, as a port town at the mouth of the Humber, the city gained a lot of wealth through taxing goods, victuals and shipments which passed through or anchored in the haven. Merchants from places such as York, Gainsborough or Beverley would have had to pay some kind of tariff to be able to use Hull’s port - for example, in 1533 we see an agreement between Hull and Beverley burgesses, which required the “inhabytantes of Beverley” to “pay ye burgesses of Hull ffor every quarter of wheate a penny & every quarter of other grayne a halfe penny.” (C BRG/2/180b). Hull would have seen a significant number of goods passing through and as the town, the town walls and port were in a state of decay and this second form of income through the grain market was much needed.  

The Borough of Kingston upon Hull had several methods of producing an income from the grain market, primarily through the shipping trade and then through the local licensed markets. The charters allowing Hull to hold markets and fairs were important grants. They allowed for trade and guaranteed that all known exchange within the borough of Hull was legal, above board and most importantly monitored and taxed. The upholding of market restraints, legislation and collection of tolls provided local authorities with the opportunity to visually assess the grain market, benefit from collecting tolls and instrumenting the transactions, whilst also monitoring who visited and what was brought to market. Any person presenting their wares to sell were to “willingly render and paie all such tolls, duties & dues as shall lawfully in that behalf to be demanded of them, concerning the same, without complication or constraint anie waies will be extended towared anie” and once again the audible sanction of the market bell is included as “no person doe hereafter make showe or sale of anie corne or other grain brought to this market before the market bell be ronge upon the forfaiture thereof.” (C BRG/2/316) 

Entry into Bench Book IV details of markets and Fairs, and where corn tolls, taxes and legal requirements are stated, Oct 1598 ]CBRG/2/215b &216]

The Bench Book’s entries on the fairs are biased towards the liberty of the market. They identify a market not only substantially stipulated but varied in its wealth of goods. On the 20th October 1598, the Bench Book details the amended practices of the town’s market and fairs. It repeats the legislative obligations set out by her majesty’s orders. It states that:  

These are therefore to give notice therof with all her majestie loving subjects that the said fair is here to be kept accordingly, and to begin the xjith day of September next, and to be continued for xv daies from thence next following. And so after that yearly during the daies aforesaid, if God permit to the intent that all manner of person that are disposed to buy or sell at the said fair anie wears, merchandises, horse, cattell, or other things may at that time repair and come hither at their pleasures without impeachment or hinderance of any in that respect. [C BRG/2/315b-316]

The entry presents a fair whose merchandise and sellers are all accounted for. The city has opened its gates for a market without prosecution with fair and open exchanges. It appears to be a diverse and also regionally significant marketplace, stretching across the boundary of Hull’s liberties. But with this event comes the opportunity for the city to make money or grow its grain stores and also allowed for the monetisation and monitorisation of grain goods. In Hull’s fair “all manner of toll, of all sort of victuals or other things belonging to anie such fair or market, shall from tyme to tyme be recyved with the use of this towne, by the officers for such purpose to be appointed”(C BRG/2/316b). These undertakings of tolls allowed country and state officials to identify how much grain was being moved within counties. This provided the authorities with the ability to see what was being brought into the town and who was selling what and at what prices.  

The jurisdiction of Hull’s market was overseen by the body of burgesses, aldermen and the mayor himself. This corporation was able to pass bylaws as they “shall and may have full power and authority to form, constitute and ordain, and make, from time to time, such reasonable laws, statutes and ordinances whatsoever, as, according to their wise discretions, shall be seen by them to be good, profitable, useful, honest and necessary” with the intent to “further the public utility and rule of that town or borough” (Boyle, 107). This was one of the first steps of Hull becoming a self-regulating market, being controlled by a small group of merchants which have been described as an oligarchy (Taylor, 2017). It was this body who was responsible for collecting charges for grain transport, exchange of goods and gathering provisions for the poorer sorts. It was a common practice for the town to hold a piepowder, which was a sort of tribunal in front of the Mayor and Sheriff, where: 

all manner of tolls and dues of all, and all manner of merchandise, victuals, and other things whatsoever, from time to time sold and brought within the aforesaid markets and fair, or either of them, with the customs, usages, profits, commodities and emoluments whatsoever, belonging, appertaining, occurring, happening, or arising at such markets, marts, fairs and courts of piepowder  (Boyle, 116) 

These occasions allowed for the collection of tolls, sometimes these were a portion of grain taken from the sellers total amount or sometimes it could be a monetary payment which was given to this governing body. Its uses depended on what the county thought was best, either a distribution of the collected grain amongst the poor or payment for the upkeeping of the county of Kingston-Upon-Hull. During times of scarcity this collection of taxes and tolls was heavily criticized as being unjust or coercive, especially when more people were becoming dependent on the market for their source of food (Taylor, 2023). As prices of corn nearly doubled between 1570s and 1630s and changes amongst labourers’ occupation leading them to depend more on the market than the field, these acts impacted on the socio-economic relations between residents and their aldermen who may manipulate the market and tolls for their own benefit. The movement of commodities through the town enabled the monopolizing of such a market and permitted the mercantile authorities of the town to precure a higher income. 

The money collected through taxes partly funded local infrastructure and charity. In October 1598, the aldermen of Hull ordered and agreed that a "toll of all manner of corne and graine brought to the markette here shall now be taken” meaning that a fraction of the goods were to be taken instead of money, and that it should be “given the same to the town, and by such measure by dishes for such purpse, as that been and now is hauled and taken by the citie of Yorke at & within the said cittie acccordinge with the azziase of which measure and dishes there accustomed to be used the said maior and aldermen have caused the like to be made, agreable in all respects in tynes and proporcion”(C BRG/2/ 316B). In Hull this toll could also be paid in money as it states that the mayor “shall have, like and receive the said toll of corne and grain so to be taken to his own [proper] use and [before] yielding and paying to the use of the townes chamber for the same, xx.s.” (C BRG/2/ 316B) Here we see the source of revenue becoming an important supplement to the town’s organising body - whether that caused any social disturbances due to the sensitivities around who collected, how much they collected or where this money did actually end up it is difficult to determine.  

Entry in Bench Book IV of an order detailing how the collected tolls and taxes were to be distributed amongst the inhabitants of the town [CBRG/2/216b]

The obligations of Hull’s local authorities were to interact at local levels with the everyday ongoings of the town. The duty to provide alms and dispense whatever manner of aid available could become tarnished by the aldermen acting in their own narrow interests; there were opportunities for personal gain in governing one of the most influential ports in England whilst regulating an international and internal market network.  

Episodes of dearth continued into James Ist reign, and we can see the aldermen once again circulate grain to those who need it most. In 1609, an agreement between William Gee - a previous mayor who later went on to be sectary of the Council of the North - and the Bench is recorded. Gee’s Father’s legacy gives,  

one hundred and threescore pounds in monie which he willed should by therein maior and his brethren their good advice or other honest psons be yerely at the beginning of the yere imployed to buy corne for the use of the poore of the saide towne that they might have the said corne for monie so that the saide towne loose not by it […] [C BRG/3/4] 

Here we witness a charitable act of an alderman giving alms to the poor of the city. The act of giving alms in the wills of wealthy members of society was not unusual, it was of course part of the Christian culture. Yet, here Gee is wanting this act of almsgiving to take place every year, indicating the problem of food supply was a consistent anxiety. Poverty and hunger are closely connected, and the need to distribute food goes beyond the means of avoiding hunger but preventing disorder and instability in the wellbeing of the town. Five years later we see this pocket of money being delved into, as “it is agreed and ordered by the Maior and his bretheren […]shall for a yere have the usage and ordering of the monie being Master Gees Legacie for the provecion of corne for the poore and for making upp the same corne to have also the collection” (C BRG/3/39). The supply of grain for the ‘poorer sort’ is funded by those who appropriated the resource and is given in order to maintain a legacy. It is a complicated socio-economic cycle, which manipulates a much-needed resource and has further consequences throughout society.  

Entry into Bench Book V, revealing how the Corporation spent Master Gee’s father’s legacy [CBRG/3/39]

Felicity Wood (University of Hull)