Differing Responses to an Industrialising Economy - eTheses ...

his career, when he served as a juror. 174
The inventory of another cooper, John Baker,
who had shops in Alcester and Studley, records timber bought as a joint venture with
William Harrison, the wheelwright. 175
By contrast, other coopers were of lower status, for example John Freeman of
Sambourne, (also referred to as a teugerer), and the ‘cowper’, Thomas Underhill, who
was valued at a mere £10, including ‘whoops’ and barrels. 176
Underhill lived in the
hamlet of Berrow, and it is noticeable that other woodworkers were by no means
concentrated in the principal settlements within parishes. In some cases it was more costeffective
to live near the source of timber and then to transport the (lighter) finished
articles to market or direct to the customer.
Wheelwrights were present, some doubling as coopers, carpenters, timbermerchants
or ploughwrights. In 1686 wheelwright Ralph Beosly’s large store of cartsides,
spokes, axle-trees and other parts spilled out on to the highway; he also owned timber
waiting to be brought home from woods some miles away. 177
Clues in probate suggest
that wheelwrights perhaps had to be mobile in order to take on an established business.
The storage of timber as it seasoned took up considerable space so they needed larger
premises than many other craftsmen. 178
The growing importance of wheeled transport
led to an increase in the number of wheelwrights, as is evident in probate and in other
sources. 179
In addition to the production of wheels and all manner of vehicles,
174 WaRO, QS76/3, jurors’ lists and Studley parish register 1744-1782.
175 WoRO, probate of John Baker, Studley, cooper, 1717, £287-6-10.
176 WaRO, Coughton parish register, 1747-1765, mentions John Freeman. WoRO, probate and
miscellaneous probate (799/784) of Thomas Underhill, Berrow, (Feckenham), cooper, 1666, £10-0-0.
177 WoRO, probate of Ralph Beosly, Sambourne, (Coughton), (no occupation given), 1686/7, £393-2-11.
Buchanan, ‘Studies in the localisation of seventeenth century Worcestershire industries’, 19, p. 47, shows a
concentration of ‘wheelers’ in the Feckenham Forest parishes, where 55% of the county’s total were based.
178 WoRO, probate of John Edwards, Beoley, wheelwright, 1730, £17-19-6, and of William Harrison,
Sambourne, (Coughton), wheelwright, 1731, £55-0-0.
179 In probate there were 0 in Period A, 2 in Period B, 0 in Period C and 5 in Period D.
284