enclosure at the top of the town was afterwards produced by Mr. Walter Inskipp at a reduced estimate of £230 7s 4d, and a further subscription of £79 16s was obtained.
Another apprenticeship under Saunders Charity was provided for, in the person of Henry Phillips, son of Hy. Phillips, deceased, who was taken by Edwin Tyhurst for 7 years to the tailoring business - the Henry Phillips who has since then been a dramatist, a farmer, a fruiterer, a town-councilman, and an innkeeper, and now - as all who know him must regret - in indigent circumstances near London. Such is one phase of human existence and unrequited versatility!
Permission was given to Joseph Kaye, Esq., to enclose trees opposite to Tor Field, and to alter footpaths from the Turnpike road to the Minis Rock at his own expense. The purpose, as reported at the time, was to build a crescent, but it was not carried out.
The recipients of Lasher's Charity this year were John Sisley, aged 66; Richard Adams, 70, John Gallop, 71; Wm. Bumstead, 71; Stephen White, 77; Thos. Swaine, 81; and John Phillips, 82.
At the parochial meetings of St. Clement's and All Saints in 1835 I have no particulars, but to follow on with those of the Castle parish from the preceding year it should be said that at the January vestry, when Mr. G. Clement was chairman, it was resolved that the ground behind Mr. Honiss's house in Wellington place be let to him at £3 per year. Also that a part of the yard, 4 feet in width, extending from the engine house to Ransom and Ridley's fence, be let to Wm. Campbell at £1 per year, he to build a separate wall. At the March vestry meeting William Longley was re-elected assistant-overseer and John Savery, surgeon. At the August meeting it was resolved:-
That it having been reported to this vestry that the Board of Guardians have decided that this workhouse is insufficient, and will not be any longer required, and the Poor Law Commissioners having been applied to on the subject, they having expressed their concurrence in the expediency of selling the same at any time named by the parish (wishing, however, to be informed how it is proposed to dispose of the paupers now in the house) it is hereby ordered that the ground leased to Honiss, Banks and Nelson be retained by the parish, and that the ground leased to Campbell be sold to him for £15. Also, that the ground behind the houses of Honiss and others be sold by auction, the starting price to be £200. Also that the Workhouse and yard to be let from year to year to the highest bidder. It was further resolved to give up ground in front, enclosed by a fence, if Ransom and Ridley's fence be removed and the Commissioners lay down a footpath.
I close the notice of local events in 1835 with the following brevities:-
In January there was great talk of establishing a Liberal Association to counteract the movements of the Conservatives. In the same month a schooner was sunk off Fairlight.
On the 6th of Feb. a man named Boniface and a boy named Chiverton, with a dead brother of the latter, got ashore at Hastings, with great difficulty, and were taken in by Mr. Chandler, of the Pelham Arms Inn. They had put to sea in an open boat three days before from Plymouth, and were blown away in a storm. The elder Chiverton had died from hunger and exposure, and the two other persons were completely exhausted.
Three days later, an inquest was held at Fairlight on the body of Mrs. Austin, late pastry-cook of Hastings, who had destroyed herself while temporarily insane.
On the 19th, during a terrific gale, fishing-boat fell in with a cutter's crew in a galley, and rescued them from imminent peril.
On the following day, a woman, named Sandford, 85 years of age, and suffering from deafness, was run over by a van at the foot of High street, and dangerously, if not fatally, injured.
During the month of March, many highway robberies were committed in the neighbourhoods of Hastings, Westfield, Guestling and Ewhurst.
In the Month of May the Unionist movement in this part of the county was supposed to have emitted its expiring spark, and as the excitement had calmed down, it was thought that the movement had been credited with too much importance. True, there had been a meeting of labourers at Rye, a few days before, but it was altogether a failure. In the same month, the Old Friendly Society, which had then been established forty years, held its Whit-Monday anniversary, when 250 members dined at the Ship and King's-head inns, Mr. Howard Elphinstone, M.P., being one of the company.
During the month of August, Halley's great comet re-appeared and continued visible for several subsequent months.
On the 8th of October, about fifty persons attended Mr. Yates's opening dinner at the Royal Oak Hotel; and on the 9th an adjourned vestry meeting for St. Clement's was held, when Mr. Joseph Brown made an attempt at wholesale disenfranchisement of the occupiers of cottages worth £10 a year. But he did not succeed at this attempted set-off against the Liberals, who had previously struck off 28 names of his Tory friends from the register.
