Bryan M

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Bryan M has posted six annotations/comments since 15 January 2024.

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Third Reading

About Saturday 12 October 1661

Bryan M  •  Link

"the custom of Brampton"
Wikipedia provides some useful background on Copyhold tenures and the role of the manor:
"Copyhold was a form of customary land ownership common from the Late Middle Ages into modern times in England. The name for this type of land tenure is derived from the act of giving a copy of the relevant title deed that is recorded in the manorial court roll to the tenant; not the actual land deed itself. The legal owner of the manor land remained the mesne lord, who was legally the copyholder, according to the titles and customs written down in the manorial roll.
... The specific rights and duties of copyholders varied greatly from one manor to another and many were established by custom."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cop…

Back in July SP was concerned with finding the "surrenders" for the properties:
"When copyhold land is conveyed from one person to another, it is surrendered by the owner to the lord, who by his payment of the customary fine makes a new grant of it to the purchaser. The lord must admit the vendor’s nominee, but the form of the conveyance is still that of surrender and re-grant." 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Copyhold
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/19…

About Wednesday 9 October 1661

Bryan M  •  Link

"They hadn't invented deficit financing yet"
Not quite correct. They just hadn't worked out to do it very well.
In 1672, Charles II defaulted on his debts to the goldsmith-bankers in what is known as the Great Stop of the Exchequer.
"Under Charles II the state finances were in such a grievous condition that the Crown found itself no longer able to honour its debts.
Throughout the 1660s, state expenditure had been running ahead of the taxation and revenue that Parliament was prepared to authorise. To bridge the gap, the Crown departments increasingly sold more and more debt to the leading London goldsmith bankers, secured against first call on the following two years' revenues. ...
The stop came suddenly and unexpectedly on Tuesday 2 January 1672."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sto…

Of course, SP's problem (and the Navy's) was that Charles blew a lot of the money raised on good times with the ladies.

About Wednesday 31 July 1661

Bryan M  •  Link

The slave was likely escaping from Algiers in the confusion of the bombardment by the English fleet.
Sandwich's fleet was attacking Algiers because it was a base for Muslim privateers/pirates (Barbary Corsairs) who preyed on shipping in the Mediterranean. They also raided coastal areas as far away as England, the Netherlands, and even Iceland and took slaves.
It's possible the escaping slave was English. Freedom and a ride back home could well have been adequate incentive for a dangerous swim. Providing intelligence then just a secondary benefit.

These images help picture what Sandwich was doing.

Algiers circa 1540: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alg…

Algiers circa 1690: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim…
In February 1662 SP reports that the mole at Algiers was severly damaged by a storm and many ships lost.

About Tuesday 23 July 1661

Bryan M  •  Link

Actually LKvM, Robert Gertz was more than half right. Elizabeth Pepys' mother was English.
From Claire Tomalin, Samuel Pepys: The Unequaled Self:
"Her father (Alexandre de St. Michel) was born a French catholic, but converted to the Protestant faith as a young professional soldier fighting in Germany. He married Dorothea, the daughter of Sir Francis Kingsmill, in Ireland. Elizabeth and her brother Balthasar were both likely born in Devon."
quoted by Pauline, link: https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…

About Wednesday 31 October 1660

Bryan M  •  Link

Just to clarify, if Elizabeth Pepys kept a diary it did not survive.
The Diary of Elizabeth Pepys by Dale Spender is a work of fiction from a feminist perspective.

About Sunday 2 November 1662

Bryan M  •  Link

"Is there any evidence that Elizabeth actually spoke French?"
Yes there is evidence. Pauline quotes from Claire Tomalin's Samuel Pepys: The Unequaled Self.
"Elizabeth and her brother Balthasar were both likely born in Devon. The family's fortunes and bad luck were such that in 1652 Madame de St. Michel was alone in Paris with her two children. She was persuaded to hand them over to Catholic friends, who placed Elizabeth in an Ursuline convent and Balthasar as page to the papal nuncio, ... The children were rescued by their indignant father, who carried the whole family off to London; this was shortly before Elizabeth met Pepys." https://www.pepysdiary.com/encycl…

If Elizabeth was in Paris when she was 11 or 12 (1652) and married Samuel (December 1655) within 12 months of meeting him, Wheatley's claim that Elizabeth was only in the convent for 12 days is doubtful.

BTW, it was Elizabeth's mother, Dorothea, who was the daughter of Sir Francis Kingsmill. Samuel's mother was born Margaret Kight (Kite).