The Winter Siege (Daniel Cheswis Book 1) Page 2

  It was market day in Nantwich, and I had risen early to set up my stall. The cheese and butter that I had collected from local farmers during the course of the week lay on two small tables in the hall, waiting for me to summon up the enthusiasm to move everything to my designated area in front of the house, ready for the first customers. Outside, fresh snow had fallen, and, although the streets in the centre of town were beginning to come alive, the bitterly cold weather that had plagued us for the past two weeks deterred me from venturing outside until absolutely necessary.

  Mrs Padgett, my housekeeper, had prepared a simple breakfast of porridge, bread, butter, and ale, and I was just sitting down to eat when I noticed soldiers on the street outside the window.

  “It seems as though you are in demand,” said Mrs Padgett, as she poured me a mug of ale. She gestured with her jug towards two musketeers, who were outside my house, standing their weapons against the wall, before preparing to knock on the door. I groaned inwardly at the prospect of my office imposing further on my time. It was now a year and seven weeks since the Michaelmas Court Leet of 1642, where Sawyer and I had been appointed as Nantwich’s two town constables for, supposedly, the following twelve months. At the time, I was happy to take on the role, knowing that, as a local tradesman of growing, albeit still modest, stature, I would be expected to fulfil the task at some point over the course of the next few years. My thinking had been that, at a time when business was likely to be curtailed by the war that was about to take place on our doorstep, now was as good a time as any to get this particular responsibility out of the way.

  I had, however, misjudged the situation. Within months of my appointment, local government, as we knew it, had collapsed. Quarter sessions had ceased in January, and Cheshire had fallen under the control of the ‘County Committee’, a wartime administration managed by Sir William Brereton, head of the parliamentary forces in Cheshire, to whose officials, the Deputy Lieutenants, I now reported. The Committee’s interests, it seemed to me, were focused on raising men and money for the war and not on the day-to-day concerns of a petty constable. What was more, it was made clear to Sawyer and I that elections to find our replacements after our year in office were to be delayed until the political situation had stabilised.

  This may not have been such a disaster, were it not for the fact that the establishment of Nantwich as a parliamentary garrison town earlier in the year had actually resulted in increased custom for my business. In addition to the population being boosted by around a thousand foot soldiers and cavalrymen, the extra security offered by the garrison had started to attract all manner of puritan and parliamentary sympathisers, largely from Chester, which was now firmly in the hands of the King. The arrival of four thousand seasoned troops from Ireland, to support the King’s cause, had not helped either. Stories of the atrocities committed by the papist hordes had been rife, forcing even more terrified folk to seek safety within our walls. With a rapidly increasing number of mouths to be fed, business had been good. As such, on market day, I needed to be working and avoid the burden of onerous civil duties.

  Indeed, my responsibilities went far beyond law enforcement. My many tasks, shared with Sawyer, included such varied roles as maintaining the pillory, stocks, and cuckstool, overseeing the practices of innkeepers, the apprehension of vagrants, restricting unlawful games on Sunday, tax collecting, and drawing up muster rolls – in other words, plenty of opportunity to make myself unpopular with the local population. I could, of course, call on the help of friends and other townsfolk, who responded with varying degrees of willingness. Nevertheless, I had been counting the days to when some other unfortunate would have to take over from me. Now, I was uncertain whether that day would ever come.

  I motioned for Mrs Padgett to open the door, and was greeted by a blast of icy air and a flurry of snow. The two men framed in the doorway, one in his late thirties, the other younger, perhaps mid-twenties, introduced themselves as Carter and Hughes.

  “We have been sent by Major Lothian,” announced Carter, the older man, rubbing his hands against the cold. “It is Master Daniel Cheswis that we seek.”

  “Would you disturb a man at his breakfast table?” scolded Mrs Padgett. “You would do best to come back later.”

  Unsure of themselves, the two men hovered on the threshold, but I waved over to my housekeeper. “Let the men in, for goodness sake,” I said. “They will freeze to death”.

  Grumbling somewhat, Mrs Padgett stepped aside and allowed the men to remove their hats and take a seat by the hearth. They were grateful for the opportunity to warm themselves by the fire.

  “You must take no notice of Mrs Padgett,” I said, as she disappeared into the kitchen to fetch some ale. “She means well, but I’m afraid she could sometimes be mistaken for my mother.”

  It was true. My relationship with my housekeeper was certainly somewhat unorthodox. Many would have said that the owner of a single wich house and a fledgling cheese business was living beyond his means having a housekeeper, but at the age of thirty-three I was still unmarried, and Mrs Padgett, a slightly plump but energetic widow of forty-eight, had, together with her nine-year-old grand-daughter, Amy, shared my house for the past eight years.

  Mrs Padgett was a cousin of Edward Swindells, the childless previous owner of the wich house I had acquired, whose apprentice I had once been. Indeed, on the culmination of my training in the salt trade, it was made clear to me that one of the conditions for the eventual acquisition of Swindells’ business was that I provide Mrs Padgett with a home.

  Not that I minded. Mrs Padgett – Cecilia was her given name, although she had always been Mrs Padgett to me – was a kindly and organised woman, who had suffered the misfortune of losing both her husband and her only daughter within the space of a month, both in tragic circumstances. The husband had died in a freak farming accident, bleeding to death after cutting himself with a scythe, whilst the daughter had succumbed to the rigours of childbirth. Mrs Padgett had the mildly irritating habit of mothering me, sometimes taking liberties when she shouldn’t, but I tolerated this, accepting that her positive characteristics far outweighed the negatives. Her cooking, for example, was extraordinary. Her veal and ham pie, to which I was particularly partial, was one of Nantwich’s best kept secrets. If one thing could be said about Cecilia Padgett with absolute certainty, it was that she kept a good table.

  Her granddaughter, Amy, was a quiet child, who kept herself to herself much of the time. However, I had always been good with children, and over time she had begun to accept my role in her life. It was inevitable, I suppose, that these circumstances would result in us practically living together as a family. It was an arrangement which was perfectly understood by our closest friends and relations, but one which was often misunderstood by outsiders and sometimes needed clarification.

  The two musketeers glanced at each other, somewhat embarrassed, but said nothing. I cut myself a slice of bread and spread it liberally with butter.

  “So, how can I be of service to Major Lothian?” I asked, taking the initiative.

  “A body has been found near the sconce at Welsh Row End,” replied Carter. “We don’t know who it is yet, but it would appear to be a townsman. Major Lothian says it is a civil matter, and so he has requested the presence of a constable without delay.”

  I looked at Carter with interest, making a mental calculation as I did so. Welsh Row was on the other side of the River Weaver from where I lived, and the sconce, the earthen fortification constructed at the end of the street, would take fifteen minutes to reach at least, especially with a fresh fall of snow to negotiate. I still had my market stall to set up, and my apprentice, James Skinner, was already late. I was going to be pushed for time.

  “You have tried Arthur Sawyer, I presume. He is supposed to be on duty this morning.”

  “Yes, sir,” responded Carter, “but he is not at home. His wife told me I had missed him by no more than five minutes.”

  I sighed. “Very wel
l then, tell me more. Where exactly was this body found?”

  “In a ditch by the earthworks,” interjected Hughes, the younger man. “I was nearby when the body was found, sir. He was half-covered in snow. Some bastard had smashed the poor fellow’s head in.”

  “And nobody saw this happen? Ever since the Irish army landed, the town has been teeming with soldiers.”

  “No sir, it was snowing a blizzard last night and we couldn’t see five feet in front of our faces. The body also looks to have been dragged into the ditch. It looks like he was killed somewhere else.”

  “I see. And you say Sawyer is nowhere to be found?”

  “No, sir, and Major Lothian wants the body moved as soon as possible.”

  “I’m sure he does.”

  Major James Lothian was not a man given to inefficiencies of any sort, and it was no surprise to hear of the urgency he had placed on the removal of the body. Lothian was Sir William Brereton’s second-in-command and one of his most trusted advisors. As well as being responsible for training new recruits in Shropshire and Cheshire, he had been instrumental in the skirmish the previous January, whereby Sir William had taken control of Nantwich. A Scotsman by birth, Lothian was considered to be a ruthlessly efficient officer and, with Sir William absent in North Wales, he was now a vital advisor on military matters to Colonel George Booth, who had been placed in charge of the Nantwich garrison. I took a mouthful of ale and turned to face Carter.

  “I need to set up my market stall and await the arrival of my apprentice,” I said. “Please tell the Major not to move the body. I will be with him in an hour or so.

  3

  Nantwich – Saturday December 9, 1643

  Although my activities in the cheese business were not my main source of income, it was no accident that I became involved in that particular trade. I grew up in Barthomley, a small village six miles to the east of Nantwich, where my parents leased twenty ‘Cheshire acres’ of land from Lord Crewe. We grew wheat, oats, and turnips and produced meat, cheese, and butter, a standard mixture of produce, in those days, for farms of our size.

  I was the second of three sons, and, by the time I reached my late teens, it had become clear that my elder brother, George, was going to inherit the farm. So my father, who for some reason thought that the future lay in Nantwich’s status as a salt-producing town, bought an apprenticeship for me at Edward Swindells’ wich house. To be fair, my father made a shrewd move, for Swindells was an ageing widower with no children, whose main motivation was to make sure he was taken care of in his old age. When I finished my apprenticeship, my father lent me the money to make an unusual arrangement with Swindells. I would continue to operate the wich house and make sure Swindells did not starve in his dotage, in return for which, I would inherit his business on his death. As it happened, one Sunday in 1637, Swindells dropped dead as he walked to church, and at the age of twenty-seven I became the owner of a single wich house with six leads, with the responsibility for Swindells’ cousin and her grand-daughter.

  The life of a brine worker never really appealed to me, though. The salt trade in Nantwich operated like a co-operative and offered little chance for development. There were too many restrictions, especially for a bachelor like myself, so I started looking for ideas for an alternative method of employment.

  My inspiration to become a cheese merchant came from a chance meeting with my father’s landlord, Sir Ranulphe Crewe, who had bought one of my father’s finest Cheshire cheeses and taken it to London, where it had been received with considerable enthusiasm. Sir Ranulphe, now in his eighties, was a self-made man, the son of a Nantwich tanner, who had risen to become both Attorney-General and Lord Chief Justice of the Court of the King’s Bench. Nowadays, he spent most of his time in comfortable retirement in Westminster, but was still occasionally to be seen riding his piebald gelding through the Cheshire countryside with his sons, Sir Clippesby and Sir John. Sir Ranulphe was held in great regard in Nantwich, and it was an honour to have him as a patron and advisor.

  Sir Ranulphe had explained to me that the old full milk cheese that he had taken was considered far superior to the Suffolk cheese that most of London ate. Suffolk cheese had originally also been full milk cheese, but as demand for butter had increased, local farmers had started to skim off some of the cream, with the result that the quality of Suffolk cheese had deteriorated over time. Sir Ranulphe said he believed discerning gentlemen in London would be prepared to pay up to a penny a pound more for our Cheshire cheese.

  I saw the market and made my plans. Shipping the cheese by land would have cost between £5 and £10 a ton, which would have made it unprofitable, as the value of cheese itself was only around £20 a ton. I therefore planned to transport whole cheeses by ship from Chester or Liverpool, the cost of which would have only been £1 a ton. In the meantime, I developed my business locally. I offered to sell my brother George’s surplus cheese, allowing him to buy extra cows as he saw my business increase. I then started approaching other farmers in the area and started buying up their surplus too. I sold cheese from my stall on market day and build up a local clientele amongst inns and the larger houses, who tended to buy from me when they ran short of the cheese their own livestock had produced.

  Unfortunately, the onset of war in 1642 changed everything. The growth of my business beyond the boundaries of Nantwich was stymied, and I was forced to bide my time. Chester was in royalist hands and I would have to wait until more stable times before I could realise my ambition. Fulfilling my debt to the town by taking on the role of constable had seemed a logical step at the time. On days like this, though, I had seriously begun to doubt my sanity.

  Once the soldiers had left me in peace, I put on my overcoat, gloves, and hat and ventured outside to set up my stall. My house was located in a strategic position on a slight bend, halfway up Pepper Street, meaning I could see both ends of the street from my front door. To the right, less than a hundred yards away, was Beam Street and the Beast Market, and to the left the square and St Mary’s Church.

  About three inches of fresh snow had fallen overnight, but this was already being disturbed as local farmers and traders began to enter the town to set up stalls. Soon, the town would be teeming with all kinds of people trying to sell goods. A pale sun shone above the thatched roofs of the houses. Steam rose from the thatch, and smoke billowed from the chimneys. It was bitterly cold, and my breath froze instantly on the light breeze that blew right to left down the street.

  Although the centre of Nantwich was relatively new, having been rebuilt in 1583 after a devastating fire, which destroyed almost all of the town on the east side of the river, the closely crowded buildings still gave off an aura of fragility. I mused on the fact that all that was required was a stray spark and a strong wind, and lives could be destroyed again in an instant. It was a reminder that life was constantly on the edge, even more so now that Nantwich was one of the few remaining parliamentary strongholds in Cheshire.

  Market day in Nantwich was a well-organised affair, and traders were located together according to what they were selling. Stalls ran all the way through the town from one end to the other. Livestock, as one would expect, was largely sold in the Swine Market and the Beast Market, but the butchers were located at the end of Pepper Street by the square, the offal being transported down Castle Street to be dumped in the river. Fish was also sold on boards around the square, whilst the drapers were all located in the Booth Hall nearby. Pillory Street was mostly full of tanners, shoemakers, and potters, but the far end of the street, next to the Beete Bridge, was reserved for vegetable farmers. My own street was largely inhabited by milk maids and farmers selling eggs and other dairy produce. Various other traders, such as quacks, booksellers, spice merchants, and the like, fought for space where they could.

  I was fortunate in that I had been able to persuade the town officers to give me a position right in front of my own house, making it easier to transport my wares into position. I would store my cheeses in
a cool place in the rear of the house until Saturday morning, when I would simply transfer them onto tables by my front door.

  I dragged the two tables out of the hall and started to load them with the eight cheeses I had to sell. On the left-hand table, I placed a single 10lb cream cheese and two new milk cheeses of the same size. The cream cheese, which I sold at 4d per pound, was the most expensive cheese and was usually only eaten by the more affluent townsfolk. New milk cheese, made of full, unskimmed milk, was 3d per pound. On the other table I placed two flett cheeses and a large tub of butter. The flett cheeses, slightly smaller at 8lb each, were made of skimmed milk and tended to be eaten by servants and the poor. Flett cheese sold at 1 ½d per pound. The remaining three cheeses, one new milk cheese and two flett cheeses, were placed in the parlour to be brought out later if required. I calculated that, if I managed to sell all my stock, I stood to make about 5 shillings profit, more than acceptable for a morning’s work.

  I took great pride in the layout of my stall. Each full cheese was positioned exactly four inches from the front of the table, and each cheese was placed three inches apart. The neatness and perfect symmetry of the stall pleased me, although Mrs Padgett thought me too fastidious in my approach. My obsessiveness was the work of the Devil, she said.

  “But how can order be the work of the Devil?” I would respond. “Surely the Devil rules over chaos, not order?”

  Once the cheeses were in place, I fetched my scales, some knives, and some plates, and started to cut the cheeses up into 1lb blocks. This was a task I usually entrusted to my apprentice, James Skinner, but the boy had still not turned up. I cast my eye anxiously down the street, but there was no sign of him. If he didn’t arrive soon, I would have to ask Mrs Padgett to look after the stall, whilst I dealt with Major Lothian.