A History of the County of Gloucester: Volume 5, Bledisloe Hundred, St. Briavels Hundred, the Forest of Dean. Originally published by Victoria County History, London, 1996.
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Ruardean,a largely rural parish but much affected by mining and other industrial activity, lies on the boundary with Herefordshire 7 km. SSE. of Ross-on-Wye (Herefs.). Accounted part of the Herefordshire hundred of Bromsash in 1086 (fn. 1) but later in Gloucestershire and part of the Forest of Dean, (fn. 2) Ruardean was, as a parish, roughly rectangular in shape, extending eastwards from the river Wye to a stream called Dry brook and having extraparochial land of the Forest to the south and east. (fn. 3) The river Wye marked the parish boundary downstream to the village of Lydbrook, the lowest part of which was divided between Ruardean and English Bicknor by a tributary stream. At Lydbrook Ruardean included most of a small island in the river, which disappeared in the mid 19th century, (fn. 4) and had a small detached piece to the south bounded partly by extraparochial land. Ruardean's northern boundary followed a track running westwards from Dry brook and then turning northwards for a short distance to Bartley's (formerly Bereslys) Oak, which in 1787 marked the county boundary. (fn. 5) Land to the north between Dry brook and Bartley's Oak, part of the Crown's ancient demesne woodland, (fn. 6) was sometimes said to be in Ruardean (fn. 7) but, although it was still regarded as part of the royal forest in 1833, (fn. 8) it was later in Hope Mansell parish (Herefs.). (fn. 9) Further west the Ruardean boundary followed Lodgegrove (formerly Bishop's) brook, which rose at a place called Ashwell in the 13th century and flowed into the Wye at Bishopswood. (fn. 10) Ruardean's long southern boundary, less regular than the others, was marked in places by tracks and old banks along the edge of the extraparochial land, (fn. 11) on which the settlements of Ruardean Woodside and, to the east, Ruardean Hill, grew up. In 1787 and 1833 the lords of the manor of Ruardean claimed rights within the Forest at Ruardean Hill. (fn. 12)
In the later 1870s, after some minor adjustments in the Forest's boundaries, Ruardean's area was 1,593 a. (fn. 13) The detached piece at Lydbrook was consolidated with the rest of the parish in 1884 when Ruardean absorbed two detached pieces of Newland, one containing 22 a. at Lydbrook and the other 14 a. on the southern boundary at Reddings. (fn. 14) In 1935 Ruardean lost 142 a. at the south-western corner to the new civil parish of Lydbrook and gained 4 a. from East Dean civil parish. In 1957 Ruardean's boundaries with Drybrook civil parish were adjusted by transferring 21 a. in the east to Drybrook and 95 a. in the south at the Pludds and Knights Hill to Ruardean, which was left with 1,567 a. (634 ha.). (fn. 15) The following account deals with the parish as it was constituted before 1884 except for those areas in the east and west forming parts of the villages of Drybrook and Lydbrook, which are treated as part of the Forest of Dean. It does not entirely respect the northern boundary for it includes the history of the Bishopswood ironworks, which were partly in Walford (Herefs.).
The land rises steeply from the river Wye to over 250 m., reaching 290 m. in the south-east near Ruardean hill, and falls at the eastern end to 180 m. Most of the parish is drained by streams flowing in deep valleys north-westwards to the Wye or Lodgegrove brook, and the eastern end is drained by Dry brook. The southern part of the parish, where the land falls slightly towards the Forest at Ruardean Woodside, lies on the beds of sandstone and shale forming the Forest of Dean coalfield, of which one of the deepest and most productive seams, the Coleford High Delf, forms an outcrop running through Ruardean from Ruardean hill to Lydbrook. Elsewhere the land is formed mainly by various strata of carboniferous limestone but the underlying Old Red Sandstone outcrops in an area of lower ground at Bishopswood. (fn. 16) The coal and limestone have been extensively exploited and deposits of iron ore near Drybrook (fn. 17) have also been mined. Clearance of land in Ruardean for cultivation was piecemeal and much land, notably in the east and the southwest, remained uncultivated in the late 13th century. (fn. 18) The pattern of small closes in which the land was farmed was completed before 1608. (fn. 19) Most of the surviving, woodland, extended at 42 a. in 1847 (fn. 20) and 59 a. in 1905, (fn. 21) is in the valley of Lodgegrove brook, and at Bishopswood it includes Catshill wood, recorded from 1647. (fn. 22) An area of woodland known in the later 14th century as Goldfinch's grove was also in the north. (fn. 23) Some woods also remain in the south-west near Lydbrook. The existence of medieval parkland next to a castle north of Ruardean village is suggested by a field name recorded from 1607. (fn. 24)
The village, on a hillside in the centre of the parish, grew up along a route linking Mitcheldean with Lydbrook and Monmouth. (fn. 25) Several ancient tracks crossed Dry brook to combine east of the village. One, marking a section of Ruardean's northern boundary, was joined south of Bartley's Oak by another, which was the old county boundary, (fn. 26) and east of the village at Varnister by a road which linked the village with Ross-on-Wye in the 15th century. (fn. 27) Further south Morse (formerly Haseley) Lane, (fn. 28) running west from Drybrook village, had become the principal route from Mitcheldean to Ruardean village by the later 15th century. (fn. 29) The route from Ruardean to Lydbrook once followed a track descending past Ragman's Slade to the Wye, (fn. 30) where it joined a road running beside the river. That road was also joined by Vention Lane, which emerged from the woodland near Moorwood (fn. 31) and apparently took its name from a coal mine known in the later 17th century as New Invention. (fn. 32) In the south several ancient routes lead into the Forest. One, running south-west from Ruardean village to the Pludds, was known in 1282 as the smiths' way (fn. 33) and, at its southern end, in 1833 as Eddy's Lane. (fn. 34) The road running south from the village to Ruardean Woodside (formerly Hanway Eaves) (fn. 35) was called Hanway in 1282. (fn. 36) At Turner's Tump it was crossed by a track which led south-east to the Forest and was joined below Ruardean hill by a route from the village and Varnister by way of Crooked End, (fn. 37) known in 1598 as Diggins (later Walker's) Lane. (fn. 38)
In the late 18th century the road beside the river Wye was part of a route between Ross-onWye and Coleford. (fn. 39) From 1827 the Ruardean section, from Bishopswood to Lydbrook, was maintained by the Dean Forest turnpike trustees, (fn. 40) who improved it. In 1841 the trustees built a new road across the parish to link Bishopswood with Nailbridge to the south-east. The road, which incorporated parts of old roads, ran by way of Marstow, the village, and Crooked End and provided a new route from the village to Ross. (fn. 41) By that time the track past Ragman's Slade had been replaced as the principal route from the village to Lydbrook by a road branching from the Pludds road for Moorwood and Vention Lane, (fn. 42) and a more direct route to Lydbrook opened in 1909 on the completion of a road at Joy's Green. (fn. 43) Tollgates were placed near Bishopswood on the Lydbrook and Nailbridge roads, (fn. 44) which ceased to be turnpikes in 1888. (fn. 45) In the 19th century several mineral railways were laid down in Ruardean. (fn. 46) One crossing the eastern end of the parish also carried passengers from Newnham and Cinderford to Drybrook between 1907 and 1930. (fn. 47) Waterscross, on the Wye at the foot of Vention Lane, was mentioned by that name from 1642 (fn. 48) and may have been the site of an ancient river crossing, but its use is not recorded until 1852 when a ferry operated there. (fn. 49) Later there was a ferry downstream, just above Lydbrook, to Courtfield, in Welsh Bicknor (Herefs., formerly Mon.), the seat of the Vaughan family and the site of a Roman Catholic chapel. (fn. 50) Both ferries no longer operated in 1990.
Ruardean church, dating from the 12th century, stands near the top of the village. (fn. 51) Some distance to the north-west was a manor house, which was replaced in the 14th century by a castle. The early cottages were built along the road west of the church and by the 17th century they extended beyond the junction of Caudle Lane, (fn. 52) which led southwards to a spring providing a public water supply until the 20th century. (fn. 53) Among buildings near the church in 1591 were a former church house, west of the churchyard, and the church house then in use, between the churchyard and the street. That house had been replaced by 1667 by a new cottage, (fn. 54) which was probably pulled down for an enlargement of the churchyard in 1743. (fn. 55) A few cottages on the north side of the churchyard (fn. 56) were removed in the 1870s. (fn. 57) At the west end of the village a medieval house known as Hathaways Hall was used in the 17th century as a court house (fn. 58) and in 1667 there was a dwelling at the place called Cinder Hill, north of the main street. (fn. 59) Many early buildings in the village were replaced in the 19th and 20th centuries. A cottage near the church bears the date 1728 and the initials of the innholder Richard Bennett and his wife Grace. (fn. 60) Midway along the village street a former chapel, dating from 1798, (fn. 61) is set back behind the sites of a pond and a pound. (fn. 62) Further west the street broadens at the junction of Caudle Lane to form an area known by 1823 as the Square. (fn. 63) At the west end of the village, known as Townsend, one house bears the date 1770 and the initials of the carpenter John Bennett and his wife Ann, (fn. 64) and further west another house is dated 1835. (fn. 65) Above the village to the south one or two cottages stood at Turner's Tump in 1608. (fn. 66) In the mid 1820s there were several houses there and at Shot hill, to the west, (fn. 67) where a new village school was built in the early 1870s. To the south a street of five houses was laid out at Petty Croft in the late 1860s. (fn. 68) In 1935 five pairs of council houses were built at Townsend. (fn. 69)
After the Second World War the village was much enlarged by council and private housing. Most of the new houses were at the eastern end along the Drybrook and old Ross roads. Earlier building on the Drybrook road included one or more houses at Crossways, just beyond the junction of the Ross road, (fn. 70) and a few farmsteads and cottages and a chapel at Crooked End, to the east by a small green known in 1609 as Darby's green. (fn. 71) At Varnister (formerly le Vernhurst) (fn. 72) several cottages clustering around a green, perhaps that called Dymock's green in 1603, (fn. 73) were apparently pulled down in 1722, (fn. 74) and settlement comprised two or three cottages east of the green in the early 19th century. (fn. 75) Among the first dwellings built after 1945 were those on a council estate created at Crossways in the early 1950s. (fn. 76) It was enlarged in the early 1970s and the roads linking the village, Crooked End, and Varnister were filled with private houses from the 1960s. (fn. 77)
In the early 17th century there were scattered farmsteads and cottages throughout the parish. Some stood at intervals along the Forest boundary (fn. 78) and some on waste ground in other parts of the parish. (fn. 79) All the early buildings, including five houses built shortly before 1656 by William Roper, lord of Ruardean manor, (fn. 80) appear to have been replaced. In the east a few dwellings on Morse Lane included Ash Farm, purchased in the 1720s for several Mitcheldean charities. (fn. 81) At White Hill, known sometimes as Morse or Hazle Farm, (fn. 82) the house was rebuilt on a larger scale in the 18th or 19th century and was unoccupied in 1990. In the south-eastern corner of the parish, part of an area known as the Morse, (fn. 83) there was a farmstead at Ground Farm in 1749 (fn. 84) and a few cottages were later built on the Nailbridge road (Morse Road) constructed in 1841. (fn. 85) In the 16th and 17th centuries there were a few cottages in the north-eastern corner of the parish at the place known as Haseley (fn. 86) (later Hawthorns). (fn. 87) On Ruardean's northern boundary the farmstead at Barrelhill was recorded from 1709. (fn. 88) In the south a farmstead west of Ruardean hill, evidently established by the later 17th century, (fn. 89) became known as Hill Farm. (fn. 90) On the road to Ruardean Woodside a house (formerly Meend Farm) on the site of a dwelling recorded in 1608 (fn. 91) incorporates a range bearing the date 1737 and the initials of John Cradock and his wife Grace. (fn. 92) Smithers Cross, near the road to the Pludds, belonged to Thomas Terrett in 1723 (fn. 93) and remained in his family in the mid 19th century, when it was one of Ruardean's principal farmsteads. (fn. 94) To the south the farmstead at Smithway was built by the Eddy family in the early 17th century on land called Smithway Meend. (fn. 95) To the east the earliest building at Knights Hill was a farmstead established within Ruardean parish by 1608. (fn. 96)
In the west there was a dwelling at Marstow before 1293 when a man surnamed of Marstow lived in the parish. (fn. 97) His dwelling may have been at Great Marstow Farm, where there was a farmstead in the mid 17th century. (fn. 98) Also by the mid 17th century the small farmsteads to the south at Little Marstow Farm, Ragman's Slade, and Glasp Farm had all probably been established. (fn. 99) Further south there were a few houses within Ruardean at Moorwood in the early 18th century. (fn. 100) Waterscross had a farmhouse by the mid 18th century (fn. 101) and several houses were later built at the bottom of Vention Lane near wharves on the river Wye. (fn. 102) Some were in ruins in 1959 and a row of mid 19th-century cottages was demolished after that. (fn. 103) Further north houses were built at intervals along the Ross road by the river in the 19th and 20th centuries. One known as Wyelands, occupied in the 1820s by a partner in a firm trading from an adjoining wharf, (fn. 104) was demolished in the 1970s and its grounds used for a pumping station constructed to supply water from the Wye to a large part of the county. (fn. 105) In the north-eastern corner of Ruardean a few houses by the river were part of the settlement of Bishopswood. (fn. 106) Most of those surviving were built in the 19th century by John Partridge, whose mansion nearby was destroyed in 1873. (fn. 107) Beverley House (formerly Beechgrove), built in the early 1840s, (fn. 108) was in 1901 the residence of the vicar of Bishopswood. (fn. 109)
Four inhabitants of Ruardean were recorded in 1086 (fn. 110) and 18 persons were assessed there in 1327 for the subsidy. (fn. 111) The muster roll of 1539 gives 40 names for Ruardean (fn. 112) and in 1563 there were said to be 54 households in the parish. (fn. 113) The number of communicants was estimated at 160 in 1551 (fn. 114) and at 250 in 1603, (fn. 115) and there were said to be 80 families in Ruardean in 1650. (fn. 116) The population, estimated c. 1710 at 500 in 100 houses, (fn. 117) grew considerably during the 18th century (fn. 118) and was estimated at 758 c. 1775 (fn. 119) and enumerated at 845 in 1801. It fell to 729 by 1821 and then rose steadily to 1,295 by 1881, before falling again to 1,096 by 1901. The decline was reversed in the mid 20th century, the change being partly accounted for by the boundary changes of 1957, and Ruardean had 1,420 residents in 1981. (fn. 120)
The sites of two Ruardean inns named in the early 18th century are unknown (fn. 121) but in the village Caudle Lane had the Crown in 1756 (fn. 122) and the south side of the main street had the Angel, the Malt Shovel, and the Bell, recorded from 1760, 1774, and 1780 respectively. (fn. 123) The Bell, opposite the church, (fn. 124) was for a time the principal meeting place in the parish; (fn. 125) it was closed after 1939. (fn. 126) The Crooked Inn, recorded in 1775, (fn. 127) may have given its name to Crooked End. Inns and alehouses were opened elsewhere in Ruardean in the 19th century. (fn. 128) Waterscross had the New Inn in Vention Lane by 1829. (fn. 129) Known later as the King's (or Queen's) Head (fn. 130) it was closed c. 1890. (fn. 131) A beerhouse on the parish boundary at Ruardean Woodside in 1841 (fn. 132) was known later as the Jovial Colliers; it closed after 1959. (fn. 133) At the Morse the Nelson (later the Nelson Arms) had opened in Morse Road by 1868 and the Rose in Hand in Morse Lane by 1876. (fn. 134) They, together with the Angel and the Malt Shovel in the village, survived in 1990.
Between 1760 and 1817 five friendly societies, meeting in inns in Ruardean village, were established. (fn. 135) Two societies existed in 1803 and just over 100 parishioners belonged to societies in 1813. (fn. 136) The earliest known society was the club which lent money to the parish overseers before 1769. (fn. 137) By 1800 one local society owned property in the parish, (fn. 138) perhaps at Varnister where a friendly society had two cottages in 1847. (fn. 139) Other societies were formed in Ruardean in the mid 19th century, including in 1841 a branch of the Odd Fellows. (fn. 140) A hut, used in the later 1930s as a centre for unemployed villagers, became the village hall. It was replaced by a brick hall built in 1956 on a corner of land near Crossways acquired by the parish in 1947 for a playing field. Earlier the Forest of Dean miners' welfare committee had provided a playing field in the village. (fn. 141) In the 20th century annual brass band and choir contests were held in Ruardean; the band competition, established before 1910, was abandoned in the late 1970s. A mock court presided over by a mayor, an office dating from well before 1908 and supposedly held by the village's tallest man, met in the Angel inn in the 1980s. (fn. 142)
In the 17th century Ruardean had a number of Roman Catholic families, notably the Vaughans who were landowners. From the early 18th century the parish was without resident gentry, and until 1842 it lacked its own incumbent clergyman. Among natives of Ruardean, James Horlick (1844-1921) amassed a fortune in the United States of America from a malted milk drink bearing his surname and was given a baronetcy in 1914. (fn. 143) Ruardean featured in Mayne Reid's historical romance No Quarter, (fn. 144) and gained local notoriety in 1889 when two performing bears, belonging to a troupe of Frenchmen, were killed there after a hostile mob had pursued them from Cinderford. (fn. 145)
MANORS AND OTHER ESTATES.
An etate of 4 hides in Ruardean, held in 1066 by Hadwig, had passed by 1086 to William son of Baderon, under whom it was held by Solomon. (fn. 146) Robert of Aumale (fl. 1176) (fn. 147) was perhaps the man with that name who claimed the advowson of Ruardean church in 1200 (fn. 148) and held land in Ruardean from the Crown by the serjeanty of guarding the bailiwick of Ruardean in the Forest. He was succeeded by his son William of Aumale, who obtained seisin of the land in 1233. (fn. 149) William, from whom the bailiwick was taken in hand for the Crown in 1250, (fn. 150) held the manor of RUARDEAN at his death c. 1256 by a cash rent, the service of attending the constable of St. Briavels with a horse and hauberk in the Forest, and suit to the Forest court. The manor was divided between his sisters or their sons, Thomas d'Evercy, Isabel of Aumale, Richard of Stalling, Maud of Aumale, and William Hathaway. (fn. 151) Some rents passed to Robert of Stalling, who died c. 1296 leaving an infant son John. (fn. 152) Although Thomas d'Evercy's share was said to be held by the service of guarding Ruardean bailiwick and paying a cash rent of 20s. at St. Briavels castle, (fn. 153) the Crown entrusted the bailiwick in 1301 to two men. (fn. 154) The Crown also made grants of the bailiwick in 1376 during the minority of the heirs of Thomas Hathaway, who was said to have held it in fee, (fn. 155) and in 1385. (fn. 156) Custody of the bailiwick had been restored to Ruardean manor by 1428 (fn. 157) and was held with it until the late 18th century. (fn. 158)
Thomas d'Evercy's share of the estate, which continued to be called the manor of Ruardean, (fn. 159) passed at his death c. 1293 to his grandson Thomas d'Evercy. (fn. 160) William of March, bishop of Bath and Wells, who was apparently the latter's guardian, (fn. 161) had given the manor by 1302 to Robert Urry, possibly a relative of the d'Evercys, and Robert had sold it by 1306 to Alexander of Bicknor. (fn. 162) Alexander, a clerk who was appointed treasurer of Ireland in 1307, (fn. 163) agreed in 1311 to settle the manor on the marriage of his niece Margery and Geoffrey of Langley (fn. 164) but he retained it in 1325 when the reversion was granted to Richard of Carrant and his wife Margery, presumably the niece. (fn. 165) Alexander Carrant died seised of the estate in 1375 leaving his son John, a minor, as his heir. (fn. 166) John (d. 1382) was succeeded by his brother Edward, also a minor, whose father-in-law Thomas of Manston (fn. 167) had been custodian of the estate from 1376. (fn. 168) By 1415 it had apparently passed to Thomas Carrant (fn. 169) and in 1428 Thomas Carrant of Gloucester quitclaimed it to Robert Baynham of Mitcheldean. (fn. 170) At his death in 1436 (fn. 171) Robert settled the manor on his daughter Anne. She later married Thomas Deerhurst (fn. 172) and the manor passed to their son John. (fn. 173) He died in 1484 leaving Thomas Deerhurst, an infant, as his heir. (fn. 174) Of Robert Baynham's direct descendants Sir Alexander Baynham died seised of land in Ruardean in 1524 (fn. 175) and William Baynham held the manor at his death in 1568. William was succeeded in turn by his sons Robert (fn. 176) (d. 1572) and Joseph (d. 1613), whose son Alexander (fn. 177) retained the manor at least until 1617. (fn. 178) The descent of the manor after 1617 is obscure. Joan Vaughan, owner of Hathaways in Ruardean, claimed ownership in and before 1634 (fn. 179) but Thomas Roper evidently owned the manor in 1645. Thomas, a Roman Catholic, (fn. 180) died in 1647 (fn. 181) and his son William recovered part of the manor sequestered for his own recusancy. (fn. 182) William (d. 1685) was succeeded by his son John but in 1703 the manor was held by Benjamin Hyett, a Gloucester attorney, who was apparently among John's creditors. (fn. 183) Just before his death in 1709 John Roper appointed trustees to sell the manor and in 1717, the sale having been delayed by his protestant heir Edward Roper of Eltham (Kent), it was purchased by Edward's son-in-law Charles Henshaw, who paid off John's debts. (fn. 184) Charles (d. 1726) was succeeded by his daughters Elizabeth, Katherine, and Susanna, (fn. 185) and in 1738 Katherine and the baronets Edward Dering and Rowland Wynne, the respective husbands of Elizabeth and Susanna, sold the manor to Stephen Ashby of Worcester. (fn. 186) Ashby, who had acquired Hathaways manor and other land in Ruardean, died in 1743 leaving his Ruardean estate to his cousin Richard Clarke of New Hill Court (later Hill Court) in Walford (Herefs.). (fn. 187) Richard (d. 1748) was succeeded by his brother John (d. 1759) and John by his sisters Alicia (d. 1779), Jane (d. 1806), and Mary (d. 1789) as joint owners. (fn. 188) After Jane's death much of her Ruardean land was sold off in lots (fn. 189) but the Hill Court estate, which she left to Kingsmill Evans, (fn. 190) retained a small part of it. (fn. 191) The manorial rights and some land were bought by James Pearce of Lydbrook. (fn. 192) He died in 1827 leaving his estate to his wife Ann for life, and in 1856, when she was still alive, his surviving son John sold the manorial rights and a little land to John Francis Vaughan of Courtfield, (fn. 193) whose family had held land in Ruardean since 1635 or earlier. (fn. 194) From J. F. Vaughan (d. 1880) the manorial rights passed in the direct line to Francis (d. 1919), Charles (fn. 195) (d. 1948), and Joseph (d. 1972), (fn. 196) and trustees acting for Joseph's son Mr. Patrick Vaughan held them in 1990. (fn. 197)
In the later Middle Ages the manor included a castle (fn. 198) built under the licence granted in 1311 to Alexander of Bicknor to crenellate his house at Ruardean. (fn. 199) The castle, on a spur north-west of the church, was defended by a perimeter wall and included a substantial earthwork. It may have been still standing in 1611 (fn. 200) but most of its masonry had been removed by 1831. (fn. 201) In the 1930s, when the site was investigated by local treasure hunters, remains of a small chamber were uncovered and in 1990 the surviving fabric included part of a doorway. (fn. 202)
William Hathaway, one of the lords of Ruardean in the early 14th century, (fn. 203) had probably inherited part of William of Aumale's estate as a minor. (fn. 204) Hathaway's estate, later called HATHAWAYS or HATHAWAYS COURT manor, (fn. 205) was held from Alexander of Bicknor for a cash rent. It passed from William (d. c. 1317) to his son William (fn. 206) and by 1355 to the latter's son Walter. Thomas Hathaway, the owner in 1366, (fn. 207) held land in Ruardean from the Crown for a cash rent paid at St. Briavels castle and at his death in 1376 his heirs were his infant daughters Isabel, Sibyl, and Ellen. (fn. 208) His estates in Ruardean and St. Briavels were divided between them in 1382, when Isabel and her husband Thomas Walwyn received her share. (fn. 209) The Crown retained the other shares until Sibyl, who married Nicholas Hyde, and Ellen came of age. (fn. 210) Thomas Walwyn, of Much Marcle (Herefs.), died in 1415 and was survived by Isabel and several sons, of whom Richard was his heir. (fn. 211) In 1445 Ellen, the widow of William Walwyn, quitclaimed rents in Ruardean to John Hickox and his wife Isabel, and in 1450 Isabel quitclaimed land which she had inherited from her mother Sibyl Hyde to William Walwyn of Bickerton in Much Marcle. (fn. 212) William held a manor court in 1454, (fn. 213) when he was also described as of Ruardean, (fn. 214) and at his death in 1471 Hathaways, held from Ruardean manor for 1d., passed to his daughter Alice, wife of Thomas Baynham (fn. 215) (d. 1500). Alice, who later married Sir Walter Dennis (d. 1505 or 1506), (fn. 216) died in 1518 and the estate passed to her son Sir Christopher Baynham (fn. 217) (fl. 1534). (fn. 218) His son George, who held it in 1541, (fn. 219) was knighted in 1546 and died later that year leaving the manor for life to his wife Cecily, who later married Sir Charles Herbert. (fn. 220) From Cecily, whose son Richard Baynham may have held the manor court in the 1550s, it passed in 1585 to another son Thomas Baynham, (fn. 221) who was succeeded in 1611 by his daughter Joan and her husband John Vaughan of Kinnersley (Herefs.). (fn. 222) John, a Roman Catholic, was outlawed and in 1612 the manors he held in Joan's right were confiscated. (fn. 223) Joan recovered her estates but forfeited them, temporarily, on her conviction for recusancy in 1619. John died later that year and Joan, who continued to support the Roman Catholic cause and resided in Ruardean, in 1642. Her son and heir Baynham Vaughan (fn. 224) died in 1650, (fn. 225) his estates having been sequestered for his recusancy. (fn. 226) Hathaways, which in 1658 was held by Thomas Frewen and John Monger, was eventually recovered by John Vaughan, (fn. 227) Baynham's eldest son, who died in 1694. (fn. 228) The estate passed to John's cousin Thomas Vaughan, a lunatic by 1703, and reverted at his death c. 1727 to Sir John Gifford, Bt., of Burstall (Leics.). (fn. 229) In 1736 Joseph Clarke bought the manor from Gifford for his nephew Stephen Ashby, (fn. 230) and in 1738 it was united with Ruardean manor, with which it passed to the Clarke family on Ashby's death. (fn. 231)
A house called Hathaways Hall, presumably the residence of the Hathaways in the 1350s, (fn. 232) was recorded from 1482. (fn. 233) Its site, known in 1438 as the Court Place, (fn. 234) was at the west end of the village by a lane to Marstow. (fn. 235) The house, which was occupied by tenants in the 16th century, was used for holding courts in 1616 and possibly much later. (fn. 236) Another house in the village became the home of Joan Vaughan before 1623, (fn. 237) and John Vaughan was assessed on 10 hearths in Ruardean in 1672. (fn. 238) In the early 18th century the Vaughans' house was the home of Roger Vaughan (d. 1719), (fn. 239) brother of Thomas. (fn. 240) The house, which was by the road to Turner's Tump, passed with the manorial rights. (fn. 241) It was unoccupied by 1847 (fn. 242) and its remains had been demolished by 1878. (fn. 243)
Flaxley abbey granted a lease of land at the Morse for 99 years to George Baynham in 1535. (fn. 244) After the Dissolution the abbey's lands in Ruardean, which were sometimes known as the manor of RUARDEAN, remained part of the Flaxley Abbey estate until 1749 (fn. 245) when Thomas Crawley-Boevey conveyed them to Maynard Colchester. (fn. 246) The land, which in 1785 covered 34 a. centred on Ground Farm, (fn. 247) descended with the Colchesters' Wilderness estate until c. 1918. (fn. 248)
An estate in the east part of Ruardean was known in the late 18th century as the manor of the MORSE or the HAZLE. (fn. 249) It included land which belonged in 1647 to Benedict Hall (fn. 250) and descended with his Highmeadow estate (fn. 251) until 1726 when Thomas Gage, Viscount Gage, sold over 130 a. in Ruardean to John Hopkins. (fn. 252) By 1755 some land, known as Hazle farm, had passed to William Harrison (fn. 253) (d. 1759) of Newnham, who left it to his granddaughter Elizabeth Harrison. She died in 1774 (fn. 254) and her husband Charles Jones in 1796, (fn. 255) the farm then passing to their daughters Margaret and Elizabeth. Elizabeth and her husband Samuel Damsell relinquished their interests in 1797 when they separated and Elizabeth secured an annuity from the estate. Margaret, the widow of Joseph Jackman, twice remarried, the second time to Thomas Smith, and was succeeded at her death in 1827 by her son Robert Jackman, (fn. 256) who owned 84 a. including the homestead at White Hill in 1847. (fn. 257) Most of that land was owned in 1870 by Charles Wadley (fn. 258) and in 1906 by James Brain of Drybrook. (fn. 259)
In the early 19th century a large estate was created at BISHOPSWOOD by the Monmouth ironmaster William Partridge. It included woodland in Walford (Herefs.) formerly belonging to Ross Foreign manor, ironworks and land in Walford and Ruardean formerly belonging to the Foley family, (fn. 260) and from 1809 land in Ruardean formerly belonging to the Clarke family. (fn. 261) William Partridge (d. 1819) was succeeded by his son John, who built a mansion just within Ruardean. He sold the estate, which covered c. 1,300 a., mostly in Walford, in 1874 following the house's destruction to Jacob Chivers. (fn. 262) Jacob died in 1883 leaving his estates in trust for his son Thomas. (fn. 263) The Bishopswood estate was acquired by 1889 by H. L. B. McCalmont (fn. 264) and was bought in 1901 by W. O. N. Shaw, in 1906 by Sir George Bullough, and in 1910 by R. H. Storey. Storey, who sold off some farms in Ruardean, (fn. 265) retained the estate until the late 1940s. From 1950 land which had belonged to the estate was bought piecemeal by T. S. Chambers and at his death in 1978 it passed to Mr. William F. Brooks, the owner in 1990 of c. 530 a. (c. 214.6 ha.), mostly woodland in Walford and Ruardean. (fn. 266) Bishopswood House was built for John Partridge in the early 1820s to designs in an Elizabethan style by Jeffry Wyatt. (fn. 267) It stood by Lodgegrove brook in wooded grounds incorporating ponds originally formed for ironworks there. (fn. 268) In 1873 the house was destroyed by fire except for two rear wings, (fn. 269) and a partial restoration, begun by Jacob Chivers, was completed after 1885. (fn. 270) The restored house was pulled down following a fire c. 1918. (fn. 271) Some outbuildings in Walford were retained and converted as dwellings. (fn. 272) Among outlying buildings in the grounds belonging to Ruardean are an entrance lodge on the Lydbrook-Ross road (fn. 273) and a gamekeeper's lodge to the east. The latter incorporates a castellated tower of three storeys providing extensive views of the river Wye and surrounding countryside and used by 1844 as a summer house. (fn. 274)
Corn and hay tithes in Ruardean belonged to the precentor of Hereford cathedral as appropriator of Walford church, of which Ruardean was a chapelry, and small tithes to the vicar of Walford. (fn. 275) The vicarial tithes, which sometimes were held under a lease (fn. 276) and in the mid 18th century were paid to a curate serving Ruardean, (fn. 277) were given to the new benefice of Ruardean in 1842. (fn. 278) The precentor's tithes, which usually were farmed by a lessee (fn. 279) and in 1847 were commuted for a corn rent charge of £135, (fn. 280) later passed to the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and in 1875 were used to augment the Ruardean benefice. (fn. 281)
In 1086 the Ruardean estate of William son of Baderon had 3 ploughteams in demesne and his tenants there, a bordar, 2 villani, and a Welshman, shared 3 teams. (fn. 282) In 1220 five teams were recorded in Ruardean (fn. 283) and in 1256 the manor, to which some customary services were owed, included two ploughlands and assized rents worth just over £10. (fn. 284) That value indicates that many freehold estates had been established. Ruardean manor in 1293 included 60 a. and rents from free and customary tenants valued at £5 5s. 6d. and 10s. respectively (fn. 285) and in 1306 thirty free tenants paid rents worth 6 marks. (fn. 286) Robert of Stalling's estate in 1297 comprised rents and other payments from customary tenants worth 32s. 4d. and 18d. respectively. (fn. 287) Hathaways manor included 30 a. of arable and 20s. in rents from free tenants in 1317, (fn. 288) and 80 a. of arable and 26s. 8d. in assized rents in 1376. (fn. 289) Leases for lives or years had been introduced on that manor by 1481, and 11 free tenants owed reliefs, heriots, and suit of court besides cash rents in 1519. (fn. 290)
In the 17th century there were many small freeholds and leaseholds in Ruardean. Most parishioners had only a few acres or a garden (fn. 291) and did not depend primarily on agriculture for a living. Of 72 parishioners listed in 1608 only 2 were described as yeomen and 9 as husbandmen. (fn. 292) On Hathaways manor, to which 15 freeholders owed suit of court and from which 42 holdings were held by lease in 1620, (fn. 293) several leaseholds remained burdened with heriots and additional rents of hens and capons at the end of the century. (fn. 294) A few other holdings, including several of Ruardean manor, also owed rents of a customary nature. (fn. 295) By the later 18th century most leases granted in the parish were for 21year terms. (fn. 296)
Clearance of land for cultivation at Ruardean began before 1066 (fn. 297) and continued well into the Middle Ages. An assart apparently next to the Wye was recorded in 1199; (fn. 298) some small parcels of land were described as old assarts in 1270 (fn. 299) and others as new assarts in 1282. (fn. 300) The eastern half and the southern and south-western parts of Ruardean remained uncultivated at that time (fn. 301) and the area between the Crown demesne in the Forest and Bishopswood was described in 1354 as a wilderness. (fn. 302) Farmland and woodland at the Morse, where there was pasture in 1482, (fn. 303) was regarded as new assart in 1535. (fn. 304) In 1608, when the pattern of closes was complete, the Crown claimed those west of the road to Ruardean Woodside as former assarts, (fn. 305) accepting a composition for them in or soon after 1618. (fn. 306) The place-name element 'meend' indicating waste or open ground in forest land was applied to much land in Ruardean, (fn. 307) where the survival of waste ground and a number of greens (fn. 308) also reflected the parish's origins. The waste ground, which was regarded as the property of the lords of Ruardean and Hathaways manors, was used for the tipping of cinders or slag from early ironworks and for common pasture. (fn. 309) Occupiers of land had pasture rights on the extraparochial land of the Forest, for which the parish paid 3s. 4d. in herbage money in the early 1680s, (fn. 310) and 16 people exercised those rights in 1860. (fn. 311) Sheep were being kept at Ruardean in 1222 when Henry III granted the monks of Flaxley a sheephouse nearby during his minority, (fn. 312) and in 1306 a Ruardean man was accused of stealing sheep. (fn. 313)
Most agricultural holdings in Ruardean were small and in the late 18th century and the 19th inhabitants sometimes combined husbandry with coal mining or a trade such as carpentry, haulage, or malting. (fn. 314) In 1831, when about a third of families depended chiefly on agriculture, 32 farmers lived in the parish and 29 of them employed labour, mostly one or two farmhands each. (fn. 315) In 1806 the largest farms on Jane Clarke's estate comprised 80 a., 70 a., 62 a., and 56 a. (fn. 316) and in 1820 the largest of ten holdings on Kingsmill Evans's estate was a farm of 46 a. at Moorwood. (fn. 317) By 1837 two of the principal farms, Marstow and Ragman's Slade on the Bishopswood estate, had been amalgamated to create a holding of 152 a. (fn. 318) and in 1847 there were also six farms with 60-100 a. and another eight with 20-60 a. in the parish. (fn. 319) In 1880 Marstow farm, from which Ragman's Slade had been detached, contained 212 a. and was in hand. (fn. 320) The number of agricultural occupiers recorded in 1896 and 1926 was 38. A majority of them were tenant farmers and at the latter date most had under 50 a. (fn. 321) The pattern of landholding remained much the same in 1988, when of 30 agricultural holdings returned for the parish 21 had 20 ha. (c. 50 a.) or less and only 2 had 40 ha. (c. 100 a.) or more. Most were worked on a part-time basis. (fn. 322)
In the early 19th century farmland in Ruardean was used chiefly as pasture. (fn. 323) Stock raising, sheep farming, and dairying were all presumably represented in the local economy in 1802 when it was announced that a toll-free fair would be held each year in late June at Ruardean for the sale of livestock, wool, and cheese. (fn. 324) In 1801 arable crops were said to cover 360 a., of which barley and wheat accounted for all but 20 a. devoted to potatoes, (fn. 325) but in 1847 the parish contained 643 a. of arable and 796 a. of meadow and pasture. (fn. 326) In 1866, when the arable area was smaller, wheat, barley, turnips, and grass leys were grown in rotation and 618 a. were permanently under grass. (fn. 327) Sheep farming remained a significant activity, 1,136 sheep being recorded that year, and beef and dairy cattle and pigs were kept. (fn. 328) A village publican was a cattle dealer and a farmer was a butcher in 1870, (fn. 329) and one farmer dealt in wool and another in manure in 1876. (fn. 330) In the late 19th century and the early 20th some arable land was turned permanently to grass and by 1926, when permanent grassland covered some 831 a., the amount of cereals and root crops grown was much reduced. Orchards covered 34 a. in 1896. The dairy herds were enlarged during that period and the flocks, which had decreased in size by 1896, and the beef herds were also enlarged in the early 20th century, 1,343 sheep and 212 cattle, including dairy cows, being returned in 1926 compared with 808 and 133 respectively in 1896. (fn. 331) An annual sheep and cattle fair was held in the village in the 1890s. (fn. 332) A dairyman lived in the parish in the early 1930s. (fn. 333) Some land was made unsuitable for agriculture by subsidence and tipping connected with coal mining. (fn. 334) At Hill Farm below Ruardean hill the site of an opencast mine worked in the late 1970s had been returned to agricultural use by the mid 1980s. (fn. 335) In 1988 most of the land in the parish remained under grass and four of the larger farms specialized in dairying and another kept a large flock of sheep. Some beef cattle were also reared and one holding was devoted primarily to egg production. (fn. 336)
Mills and Ironworks.
Robert of Aumale had one or more itinerant forges working in woodland within the Forest by the late 12th century. (fn. 337) Up to five such forges operated in or near Ruardean at any time in the mid 13th century (fn. 338) and more than five, possibly including one owned by a ploughmaker, worked in the area later that century. (fn. 339) Smiths and forges were frequently recorded in the later Middle Ages (fn. 340) and a parishioner was described as a tongholder in 1579. (fn. 341) At least five smiths and the son of another lived in Ruardean in 1608 (fn. 342) and a founder was resident in 1664. (fn. 343) A furnace presumably operated east of Ruardean village in a field by the Drybrook road known in 1685 as Furnace meadow. (fn. 344) A forge producing anvils in the late 17th century (fn. 345) was perhaps that, in the western part of the village, belonging in 1792 to the Highmeadow estate. (fn. 346)
Among the earliest mills known to have belonged to Ruardean were several at Lydbrook, which became an industrial centre with corn and cloth mills and ironworks; its history is treated below. (fn. 347) In 1336 Richard Talbot obtained permission to construct a mill on Lodgegrove brook. (fn. 348) It was perhaps that later called Diggins Mill, (fn. 349) an ancient grist mill which remained in use in 1706. (fn. 350) Downstream in Walford (Herefs.) stood New Mill, which belonged to Robert Devereux (d. 1646), earl of Essex. (fn. 351) Two furnaces at Bishopswood, evidently the property of Robert's father Robert, earl of Essex, were worked from 1600 by George Catchmay together with forges at Lydbrook. (fn. 352) Both furnaces were abandoned before 1617 (fn. 353) and the younger Robert Devereux later built a furnace at Bishopswood on Lodgegrove brook, which he diverted for that purpose. (fn. 354) In 1633 that furnace may have been worked together with a forge at Lydbrook by Sir John Kyrle, Bt., (fn. 355) and by 1638 it may have been shut down by the lessees of the king's ironworks in the Forest of Dean. (fn. 356) George Williams, a founder employed at the furnace at least until 1675, (fn. 357) produced castings, perhaps including ordnance, for John Hannis in 1639. (fn. 358) The furnace, above the Ross road, (fn. 359) was controlled by Robert Kyrle in the late 1640s. (fn. 360) Later it was operated by Paul Foley in partnership from 1674 with his brother Philip and from 1685 with Richard Avenant and John Wheeler. (fn. 361) The Foley family worked the furnace with forges at Lydbrook in the late 1720s (fn. 362) and built a forge upstream of the furnace probably in the late 1740s. (fn. 363) The forge, which produced blooms for conversion to bar iron at the Foleys' forge at Lower Lydbrook, (fn. 364) had changed hands by 1787 when it was operated by the Monmouth ironmaster William Partridge. (fn. 365) William and his brother John (d. 1810) later purchased the Bishopswood ironworks, (fn. 366) which included stamping machines for crushing cinders. (fn. 367) Most of the works closed c. 1815 but James Pearce operated the forge for a few years until the early 1820s, (fn. 368) when John Partridge used the ironworks' site for a new mansion and its grounds. (fn. 369) The lowest pond made for the ironworks disappeared (fn. 370) and the forge, described in 1878 as an old corn mill, fell into ruin. A pumping station was built there in the 1960s. (fn. 371)
Other mills in or near Ruardean included several of unknown or uncertain location. One existed in the later 13th century, (fn. 372) when a route probably south of the village was called Mill Way. (fn. 373) In 1419 there was a post mill near Diggins Lane, (fn. 374) land to the east of which was later known as Windmill hill. (fn. 375) In 1617 there was a new mill apparently south-west of Ragman's Slade, (fn. 376) and in or before 1658 Henry Rudge conveyed a paper mill possibly on Lodgegrove brook to his son Henry. (fn. 377) In 1698 John Vaughan of Huntsham (Herefs.) owned a paper mill, which passed in 1721 to John Vaughan of Courtfield. (fn. 378) It was presumably among several paper mills at Ragman's Slade, (fn. 379) which continued in use in 1733. (fn. 380) Two water mills in Ruardean were acquired in 1690 by Samuel Brewster and Thomas Stone. (fn. 381) A mill recorded in 1778 (fn. 382) was presumably that, on the stream north of the village, (fn. 383) which in 1795 had a pump downstream to draw water back to its pond. (fn. 384) The mill was unoccupied in 1829. (fn. 385)
Other Industry and Trade.
The iron industry generated much economic activity in Ruardean. Charcoal burners, who supplied the fuel for the forges, worked in or near the parish in the later 13th century. (fn. 386) Among metal trades nailmaking, established in Ruardean by 1509, (fn. 387) was represented by six nailers in 1608 (fn. 388) and continued well into the 19th century. (fn. 389) In 1667 and 1678 pins were apparently also made in the parish. (fn. 390) The cinders left by the early forges, many of which were scattered near the village, (fn. 391) were being removed for resmelting at nearby ironworks in the late 17th century. In 1702 the lord of Hathaways manor agreed to end digging at Cinder Hill where building had taken place (fn. 392) and in 1722 the lord of Ruardean manor evicted four cottagers to enable cinders at Varnister green to be mined. (fn. 393) Many horses were kept in the parish in the early 18th century to transport cinders and charcoal to ironworks and coal from the Forest to the surrounding countryside. (fn. 394) Cinder mining and charcoal burning continued in Ruardean in the mid 1760s. (fn. 395)
Land in Ruardean was mined and quarried over a long period. Colliers were recorded in the parish from 1608 (fn. 396) and some inhabitants worked or had interests in mines within the Crown's demesne woodland of the Forest. (fn. 397) The coal outcrops south of the village were mined before 1720 (fn. 398) and two pits, called True Blue (fn. 399) and Windrills, the latter by the road to the Pludds, were in production in 1788. (fn. 400) True Blue was owned by a partnership (fn. 401) and by the early 19th century its workings honeycombed the ground as far south as Ruardean Woodside. (fn. 402) In 1835 the workings nearest Ruardean Woodside belonged to Newham Bottom colliery, which had the same owners as True Blue, and those south-west of the village to Reddings Level colliery, and in 1841 the right of two other collieries to exploit seams near Ruardean Woodside and Ruardean Hill was confirmed. (fn. 403) Coal mining was much the largest source of employment in Ruardean at that time, (fn. 404) and the Forest branch of the Amalgamated Association of Miners established a lodge in the parish in 1872 or 1873. (fn. 405) True Blue and Newham Bottom collieries, acquired in 1884 by a syndicate of free miners and in 1889 by the Brain family, were abandoned c. 1910. (fn. 406) True Blue mine was reopened in the 1920s (fn. 407) and employed 35 men at the outbreak of the Second World War. (fn. 408) It closed in the 1950s. (fn. 409) Reddings Level colliery, which came into the same hands as True Blue, had closed by 1901. (fn. 410) Little more coal was mined in that area (fn. 411) until 1955 when a drift mine was opened near the Lydbrook road. It employed 10 men in 1966 (fn. 412) and continued in production until the late 1980s. (fn. 413) After the Second World War several smaller drifts were opened near Hill Farm. They were abandoned in the late 1950s but mining was resumed later and the remaining coal there was extracted by the opencast method in the later 1970s. (fn. 414) The Brains also mined iron ore near Drybrook. Their mine, north of Morse Lane, opened before 1869 and was linked by 1877 to a narrow-gauge railway serving Trafalgar colliery in the Forest. The mine proved unprofitable (fn. 415) but, although the railway lines had been removed by 1901, (fn. 416) it was not finally abandoned until 1923. (fn. 417)
Stoneworking in Ruardean was represented by a mason in 1608, (fn. 418) and in the 18th century and the early 19th several stonecutters, quarrymen, and masons lived there. (fn. 419) Two lime burners were recorded in 1608 (fn. 420) and a limekiln was built by the river Wye shortly before 1635. (fn. 421) One or more kilns were operating near Bishopswood in 1818. (fn. 422) A brickmaker living within the parish at Moorwood in 1803 opened a quarry and built a limekiln there before 1829. (fn. 423) In the mid 19th century quarries were opened elsewhere in the parish (fn. 424) and cranes and a shed were provided for working sandstone beds south of the village at Petty Croft. (fn. 425) Many quarries and kilns had been abandoned by the late 1870s but limestone was still worked north of Drybrook. (fn. 426) One quarry there was served by a railway in 1870 (fn. 427) and was worked by the county council in 1910. (fn. 428) The Drybrook quarries, which were idle in the mid 1920s, (fn. 429) were served by the Forest's railway system from 1928 until 1953 (fn. 430) and included tarmacadam works by 1942. (fn. 431) The main quarry was enlarged considerably by Amey Roadstone Corporation after 1960 (fn. 432) and in 1989 it employed 25 men and produced among other things crushed aggregates for the building industry and lime for agricultural use. (fn. 433)
Trade on the river Wye gave work to sailors in 1608 and 1743. (fn. 434) Forest coal destined for Herefordshire was loaded into barges from the river bank above Lydbrook before 1680 (fn. 435) and there were several wharves on that section of the bank in the later 18th century. (fn. 436) More were provided to handle the increase in the coal and stone trades following the construction in the early 19th century of the Severn & Wye tramroad to Lydbrook and of a branch line from Lydbrook to Bishopswood. At Bishopswood the tramroad, completed in 1814, had sidings to wharves near the Ruardean boundary and was linked by an inclined plane with the forge on Lodgegrove brook. (fn. 437) In 1820 E. J. Scott, a London solicitor, built a tramroad to link a colliery at Moorwood with the Wye at Waterscross. The line, which incorporated an inclined plane running down Vention Lane and crossing the Bishopswood tramroad, was opposed by the Severn & Wye company and was taken up c. 1823. (fn. 438) At that time a Lydney firm traded at a wharf midway between Waterscross and Bishopswood, (fn. 439) and in the mid 1830s the partnership of William Montague and Charles Church of Gloucester occupied four of the coal wharves at Bishopswood. (fn. 440) By the late 1840s the only wharves in use above Lydbrook were those at Waterscross and midway between Waterscross and Bishopswood (fn. 441) and few if any of the Ruardean men living outside Lydbrook and Bishopswood worked as bargemen or watermen. (fn. 442) The Lydbrook-Bishopswood tramroad, the northern end of which was removed after the closure of the Bishopswood ironworks, ran as far as the Ross road in 1833. It carried little traffic and the track was taken up in 1874. (fn. 443) The line's course to the road, winding to maintain a steady gradient, was still clearly visible in 1990.
Osiers growing by the river Wye have supplied basket makers in Ruardean. One maker active in 1608 (fn. 444) was granted a lease of osier beds on both river banks in 1640, (fn. 445) and his craft continued to be practised in the parish at least until 1803. (fn. 446) The Wye fishery adjoining Ruardean belonged to John Vaughan of Huntsham in 1698, when he leased a right to take small fish to Richard Wheatstone. (fn. 447) The Wheatstones of Lydbrook retained the right, under the Vaughans of Courtfield, to fish for eels and small fish with nets, poles, and wheels until the later 18th century. (fn. 448)
Personal names suggest that cloth was made in Ruardean in the later 13th century. (fn. 449) Flax and hemp were worked there in 1482, (fn. 450) and in 1608, when a fuller and two weavers were recorded in the parish, (fn. 451) the local cloth industry was centred on Lydbrook. (fn. 452) A weaver lived in the parish in 1791 (fn. 453) and another in Ruardean village in 1841. (fn. 454) In the 17th century several Ruardean men worked as woodcutters or sawyers (fn. 455) and others used timber in making shovels, (fn. 456) trenchers, barrels, cabinets, and saddletrees. (fn. 457) In later centuries a number of timber merchants was recorded. (fn. 458) A local tanning industry established by 1608, when three glovers also lived in the parish, (fn. 459) was based on Lydbrook. (fn. 460) In the 1620s Hathaways manor court sought to regulate the leather trade. (fn. 461) Ruardean had a baker and several butchers in 1276 (fn. 462) and the usual village crafts and trades were later fairly well represented. (fn. 463) Inhabitants included soapboilers and tallow chandlers in 1523 (fn. 464) and 1781 (fn. 465) and a musician in 1793. Ropemaking, introduced by 1818, continued in 1851. (fn. 466)
Ruardean, where 67 of the 187 families resident in 1831 depended chiefly on trades or crafts and 60 on agriculture, (fn. 467) was generally impoverished in the 19th century and the early 20th. (fn. 468) Few professional people apart from a surgeon at Bishopswood in 1851 (fn. 469) and another in the village in 1876 (fn. 470) lived there. In the mid 19th century building trades and haulage provided some employment. The village had several shops, mostly grocery and drapery stores, (fn. 471) and in the later 19th century outlying places such as Waterscross and the Morse also had shops. The Cinderford co-operative society had opened branches at the Morse and in the village by 1894 and 1906 respectively. (fn. 472) In the 1920s and 1930s many traditional trades and crafts disappeared. (fn. 473) One of the last blacksmiths worked a smithy, built by the Lydbrook-Ross road in the mid 19th century (fn. 474) and occupied by a joiner and furniture maker in 1990. A bacon-curing factory in the centre of Ruardean closed in 1928, (fn. 475) and the parish, which continued to depend heavily on the mining industry, (fn. 476) suffered much unemployment in the early 1930s. (fn. 477) Mining jobs were lost with the gradual cessation of deep mining in the Forest coalfield, completed in 1965. (fn. 478) In 1990 the village had half a dozen small shops.
William of Aumale's profits from a manor court in Ruardean were mentioned in 1256. (fn. 479) Later the courts of Ruardean and Hathaways manors exercised view of frankpledge. For Hathaways manor there survive a court book of 1620-1, (fn. 480) court rolls of 1642, 1647, and 1658, and court papers, mostly records of presentments, for many years in the periods 1454-82, 1519-89, and 1603-38 and for a few years between 1642 and 1715. (fn. 481) The court assembled twice a year as a court leet and a court baron. It sometimes sat as a court of survey and in the mid 17th century sometimes only as a court baron. It heard pleas of assault, affray, and bloodshed and enforced the assize of ale until the mid 17th century. In addition to tenurial and estate matters it supervised the repair and maintenance of roads and watercourses and regulated encroachments on the lord's waste. In 1530 it appointed two constables, two aletasters, two bread weighers, and two water bailiffs and in the 1620s, by which time the offices of aletaster and bread weigher had been merged, it chose a searcher and sealer of leather. The court was held until 1735 or later. (fn. 482) For Ruardean manor court papers survive for most years between 1692 and 1707 and for 1720, 1723, and 1725. (fn. 483) It met twice a year, combining view of frankpledge with a court baron, and dealt with the repair and maintenance of roads and watercourses and with encroachments on the lord's waste besides tenurial and other estate matters. The lord's failure to provide a pound was presented in 1698 and the pulling down of cottages on the waste by the lord of Hathaways without the freeholders' consent in 1700. The court met until 1730 or later. (fn. 484)
Ruardean had at least one churchwarden in 1446 (fn. 485) and two churchwardens (procuratores ecclesie) were recorded in 1523. (fn. 486) They derived some income from land and buildings belonging to the parish. (fn. 487) Poor relief was administered by two overseers (fn. 488) and highway repairs by two surveyors, who were reported to Ruardean manor court in 1702 for failing to cleanse ditches alongside the parish roads. (fn. 489) The parish provided stone water troughs at Caudle well in 1779. In the later 18th century, when the overseers each served in turn for six months, poor relief took the usual forms. Paupers were badged and some were employed to spin flax and make cloth, which was occasionally given to the needy. The parish subscribed to the Gloucester infirmary by 1770 and had several poorhouses. (fn. 490) Other cottages built at the parish's expense on waste land had been pulled down c. 1700. (fn. 491) A parish workhouse had been established by 1803, when it had 7 inmates and 21 children attended one or more schools of industry. (fn. 492) The workhouse was managed by a married couple in 1816. (fn. 493) In the late 18th century many people living in the extraparochial Forest of Dean had legal settlement in Ruardean (fn. 494) and among parishes adjoining the Forest the burden of relief was greater only in Newland. Ruardean's annual expenditure on the poor rose from £117 in 1776 to £377 in 1803, when 66 people were on relief, all of them permanently, (fn. 495) and to £699 in 1813, when the numbers receiving regular and occasional help were 50 and 25 respectively. (fn. 496) Much less was spent in the later 1820s. (fn. 497) In 1831 a local butcher agreed to administer relief and the following year an outsider farmed the poor for £310. (fn. 498) At that time the parish was responsible for c. 166 families in the Forest and continued to experience great difficulty in financing relief. (fn. 499) In 1837 Ruardean parish was added to the Herefordshire poor-law union of Ross (fn. 500) but following the implementation of the 1894 Local Government Act it became part of East Dean and United Parishes rural district. (fn. 501) East Dean rural district as constituted in 1935 included Ruardean except for the area transferred that year to the new civil parish of Lydbrook, which was part of West Dean rural district. (fn. 502) Both Ruardean and Lydbrook were included in the new Forest of Dean district in 1974.
In 1200 Hugh of Walford disputed the advowson of Ruardean church with Robert of Aumale. (fn. 503) In 1291 Westbury-on-Severn church received an annual render of 1 lb. of incense from Ruardean church but the latter was a chapel of Walford (Herefs.), of which the precentor of Hereford cathedral was appropriator (fn. 504) and patron of the vicarage. (fn. 505) The precentor appointed a curate or chaplain for Ruardean chapel in the early 16th century but the vicar of Walford apparently claimed that right in 1523. (fn. 506) The dispute was evidently resolved after 1535 (fn. 507) and the vicars of Walford or, more usually, their curates served the chapelry. (fn. 508) Although its church had acquired burial rights by 1472, (fn. 509) Ruardean remained a chapelry of Walford until 1842 when it was constituted a separate benefice in the precentor's gift. The new benefice, endowed with the income that the vicar of Walford had enjoyed from Ruardean, was a perpetual curacy (fn. 510) (later a vicarage) (fn. 511) and following a fuller endowment in 1875 was styled a rectory. (fn. 512) The patronage was exercised by the bishop of Gloucester and Bristol in 1846 by reason of lapse (fn. 513) and passed to the bishop after the precentor's death in 1855. (fn. 514) Bishopswood House was included in the ecclesiastical district assigned in 1845 to a church which John Partridge had built on the Walford side of his estate, (fn. 515) and the south-western corner of Ruardean was part of the district given in 1852 to a new church at Lydbrook. (fn. 516)
The profits of Ruardean church, farmed by two men in 1397, (fn. 517) comprised tithes, including those of milk, lambs, and wool, and offerings valued at £5 5s. 4d. in 1535, when the precentor of Hereford and the vicar of Walford disputed their ownership. (fn. 518) Later they belonged to the vicar (fn. 519) and were worth £15 in the mid 18th century, when they were paid to his curate, (fn. 520) and £60 in 1842, when they were assigned to the new benefice of Ruardean. (fn. 521) The tithes were commuted in 1847 for a corn rent charge of £100 (fn. 522) and the Ecclesiastical Commissioners increased the benefice's value, £150 in 1856, (fn. 523) by annual grants of £5 from 1857 and, in response to a gift of £200, of £6 13s. 4d. from 1869. (fn. 524) The £5 was replaced in 1875 by the tithe rent charge of £135 in Ruardean formerly awarded to the precentor of Hereford. (fn. 525) In 1842 Ruardean was said to have a glebe house unfit as a residence (fn. 526) but no other mention of it has been found (fn. 527) and in 1851 the perpetual curate had lodgings in the village. (fn. 528) A subscription for building a parsonage house was opened in 1857 (fn. 529) and, following a grant from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in 1871, (fn. 530) a small house at the east end of the village was purchased together with 3 a. The house, which was remodelled and enlarged in the early 1880s, (fn. 531) was sold c. 1980 when a bungalow was built for the rector in its grounds.
It was reported that no quarterly sermons were preached in Ruardean in 1548 (fn. 532) and again in 1576; at the latter date only one annual communion service was held. (fn. 533) The curate serving the church in 1551 had a satisfactory knowledge of doctrine (fn. 534) and the curate in 1593 was deemed unlearned but of honest life. (fn. 535) A later curate may have been the Ruardean minister involved in inclosure riots at Mailscot, near English Bicknor, in 1631. (fn. 536) Of the Walford vicars who served Ruardean in person Richard Greenaway, vicar 1681-1745, (fn. 537) was suspended in 1739 for failing to attend an episcopal visitation. (fn. 538) Edward Kidley, rector of Welsh Bicknor (Mon., later Herefs.) across the river Wye, was employed as curate in Ruardean between 1737 and 1754. (fn. 539) From 1811 and until his death in 1842 Ruardean was served by the antiquary and county historian Thomas Dudley Fosbrooke, curate and later vicar of Walford. His writings published during that time included a guide to the river Wye. (fn. 540) In 1822 Fosbrooke allowed Isaac Bridgman, the curate of Holy Trinity near Drybrook, to deliver a weekly lecture in the church, which Bridgman opened on one occasion to the evangelical preacher Rowland Hill. (fn. 541) In his later years Fosbrooke sometimes employed a curate at Ruardean. (fn. 542) Henry Formby, the first holder of the separate benefice of Ruardean, was, by his support for the Oxford Movement, soon unpopular with parishioners and he resigned in 1845. (fn. 543) During the ministry of William Penfold, 1850-81, (fn. 544) who was poverty-stricken and frequently at odds with parishioners, a lead in church matters was often taken by John Burdon, rector of English Bicknor. (fn. 545)
In 1442 there was a chantry of St. Mary in Ruardean served by a chaplain (fn. 546) but no other record of it has been found. Property owned by the parish, presumably including a house left for the church by a Ross man in 1504, (fn. 547) produced an income used to repair the church, acquire ornaments and books, and provide other benefits for the parish, besides helping to equip parishioners for militia service. In 1591 feoffees were appointed to administer the property (fn. 548) and later the income was applied solely to church repairs and the trust became known as the Church Lands charity. (fn. 549) Two thirds of the income were assigned to the church in 1898, when the parish charities were reorganized, (fn. 550) and were worth £122 in 1989. (fn. 551)
The church, which was dedicated to ST. JOHN THE BAPTIST by the 14th century, (fn. 552) is built of sandstone rubble and ashlar and has a chancel, a nave with a north organ chamber and a south aisle and porch, and a west tower with a spire. The aisle was probably the 12th- century church, and the tympanum over its south doorway has a carving of that period representing St. George and the Dragon. (fn. 553) The chancel and nave, which had no division between them, and the porch were built in the 13th century and the tower was added in the 14th, presumably beginning in 1364 when the foundations of a belfry were laid. (fn. 554) Many windows in the chancel and nave and the west window of the tower were renewed in the 15th century. In 1563 the whole church was in need of repair and a parish rate had been levied for repairing the spire. (fn. 555) The north doorway had been blocked and the pulpit placed against the north wall of the nave by 1721 when the church was repewed by order of the parish vestry and seating for the singers was provided in the chancel. (fn. 556) By 1754 more pews had been installed (fn. 557) and in 1776 a west gallery was erected in the nave against the tower to provide more accommodation for the singers, the chancel seats being sold to parishioners to help defray the cost. (fn. 558) The space under the tower was ceiled for use as a vestry room. (fn. 559) On the advice of Joseph Bryan of Gloucester the spire was rebuilt in 1768, the cost being borne by a church rate and voluntary contributions, including payments from 37 cottagers and young men apparently living on extraparochial waste land adjoining Ruardean. (fn. 560) For a time a side of the tower was whitewashed to serve as a fives court; the game was discontinued in the churchyard in the early 19th century. (fn. 561) The church had fallen into serious disrepair by the mid 19th century. Some restoration work was carried out, notably on the south aisle, and in 1866 and 1867 the spire was rebuilt under the supervision of the Revd. John Burdon, who paid for the addition of pinnacles and flying buttresses. (fn. 562) The chancel east wall was also rebuilt but in 1889 the church, its walls and nave arcade leaning dangerously, was closed as unsafe. It reopened the following year after much of it had been rebuilt to designs by Waller & Son of Gloucester. During that work many windows were renewed or replaced, new seats were installed, the gallery and the ceiling under the tower were removed, screens were placed in the tower arch and between the chancel and nave, the organ chamber was built, a concrete floor was laid, sealing the vaults below, and the ground around the church was lowered to improve drainage. (fn. 563) A small carving of two fishes, probably a jamb of the south doorway, was discovered in a house in Ruardean in the mid 1950s and was reset in the aisle south wall in the mid 1980s. (fn. 564)
Of the fittings the font and the wooden pulpit date from the 17th century, the font having an octagonal bowl dated 1657. (fn. 565) Tombchests in the nave for Baynham Vaughan (d. 1650) and members of his family, Roman Catholics, were removed in the 19th century, before 1872. (fn. 566) By deed of 1590 Anthony Sterry, vicar of Lydney, gave a rent charge of 5s. for the repair of the church bells and the ringing of a peal at Christmas. (fn. 567) Later the church had six bells, of which three were recast at the Whitechapel foundry in 1866, and in 1905 the peal was enlarged by the gift of two trebles from the same foundry by Francis Brain and the Horlick family. Of the bells untouched in 1866 one was cast by Abraham Rudhall the younger in 1725, another was recast in 1926, and one dating from the late 16th century was replaced in 1929 and was kept in the church in 1990. (fn. 568) The church had a clock in 1680. (fn. 569) Among the plate is a chalice of 1744 acquired in 1746. (fn. 570) The parish registers survive from 1538 but most marriages between 1690 and 1735 took place at Walford. From the later 18th century the registers distinguish some entries for inhabitants of the extraparochial Forest of Dean. (fn. 571)
Several parishioners did not attend church in 1582 (fn. 572) and a clerk performed a marriage in a house in the late 1580s. (fn. 573) The Vaughans, landowners in the parish from 1611, (fn. 574) were a prominent Roman Catholic family and Joan Vaughan's employment by 1623 of the priest John Broughton (or Crowther) as her steward suggests that she had a private chapel. Broughton was still at Ruardean in 1641 when his patroness was imprisoned for sheltering him. (fn. 575) In the later 17th century several households included Roman Catholics (fn. 576) and in 1676 eight papists were recorded in Ruardean. (fn. 577) Five papists were said to live there c. 1720 (fn. 578) but only one was recorded in 1735, (fn. 579) after the Vaughans' departure from the parish. In the early 19th century a few parishioners belonged to the congregation of a Roman Catholic chapel across the river Wye at Courtfield. (fn. 580)
Among protestant dissenters living in Ruardean in 1668 were John Chapman and Thomas Bradley, (fn. 581) whose houses were licensed for worship in 1672. Bradley belonged to a congregation with Thomas Smith, formerly vicar of Longhope, as its minister. (fn. 582) Four protestant nonconformists were in Ruardean in 1676 (fn. 583) and Chapman's house was being used for meetings in 1679. (fn. 584) Two Presbyterians were recorded in 1735. (fn. 585) From 1775 the Mitcheldean Independent church under its pastor Benjamin Cadman used the Crooked Inn for a mission to Ruardean. (fn. 586) Another house was licensed for the mission in 1782 (fn. 587) and a chapel was built in the village in 1798. (fn. 588) During the ministry of John Horlick, 1801-51, who also served Mitcheldean, the congregation grew; in 1804 a gallery was erected in the chapel and in 1813 the building was enlarged. (fn. 589) Horlick, who in 1808 registered a collier's house for worship, (fn. 590) claimed an average congregation of 130 for the chapel in 1851. (fn. 591) The meeting, later called Congregational, (fn. 592) had 25 members in 1900. (fn. 593) The chapel closed after 1960 (fn. 594) and was used as a carpenter's store and was in disrepair in the late 1980s.
In 1824, about the time a Wesleyan Methodist preacher visited Ruardean, (fn. 595) a house in the village was registered for worship. (fn. 596) In 1828 Mary Cook built a small Bible Christian chapel at Crooked End. (fn. 597) The chapel, the Bible Christians' first in west Gloucestershire, (fn. 598) was known as Ebenezer (fn. 599) and had congregations of up to 80 in 1851. (fn. 600) It was enlarged in 1873 (fn. 601) and became part of the United Methodist Church formed in 1907. (fn. 602) The chapel closed in the early 1980s (fn. 603) and was in bad repair in 1990. A few people continued to worship in an adjoining house. (fn. 604) In the mid 19th century Bible Christians and Primitive Methodists both attempted to establish meetings in the village and below Ruardean hill at Hill Farm. (fn. 605) A group of Christadelphians, which in 1914 moved its meeting from the Pludds to Morse Lane, (fn. 606) has not been traced later.
John Broughton, the Roman Catholic priest whom Joan Vaughan was harbouring by 1623, sometimes acted as a schoolmaster (fn. 607) and in 1631 William Browne, his co-religionist, was teaching in Ruardean without a licence. (fn. 608) One of them presumably was the 'notorious popish schoolmaster' suspended in 1635 by Archbishop Laud's vicar general. (fn. 609) In 1704 Thomas Wade, a member of Gloucester's Independent church, was paying a schoolmistress £5 a year for teaching 12 poor children to read and recite a nonconformist catechism. (fn. 610) The Revd. Richard Greenaway by will proved 1745 left £60 to pay a master to teach 15 poor children to read the bible and say the church catechism. (fn. 611) The principal, at first lent out, was used to open a free school in 1774, the master having a salary of £3. (fn. 612) A legacy from Thomas Richards (d. 1766) (fn. 613) of £25 to teach poor children reading and to buy them books was not applied as intended but by 1812 £1 5s. had been added to the salary of the free school's teacher in respect of it. (fn. 614) In 1819, although other day schools supplemented the 15 places in the free school, many children were without schooling. (fn. 615) In 1833, when the free school was funded partly by subscriptions, a benefactor supported a day school teaching 43 children and the parents of 10 children in another day school paid fees; there were also 16 children in a boarding school begun in 1830. (fn. 616) Sunday schools were started in the early 19th century by the curate T. D. Fosbrooke (fn. 617) and, evidently without success, by the Independents under John Horlick. (fn. 618)
The departure of the curate Henry Formby in 1846 occasioned the closure of a school (fn. 619) but in 1851 the inhabitants included a schoolmaster and a schoolmistress. (fn. 620) The salary of the free school's teacher, which was paid during that period, was used from 1851 by the incumbent (fn. 621) to support a mixed school, opened perhaps as early as 1848, in a cottage north of the churchyard. That school, which also had a small income from voluntary contributions and pence, was run on the National plan but its premises were unsuitable and in 1872 it moved to a new building at Shot hill. The new school, built with the help of the Revd. John Burdon, started with an average attendance of 55. (fn. 622) It had separate mixed and infants' departments from 1874 and lost some children to a new board school at Ruardean Woodside in 1878. The National school, in which evening classes were held in 1878, was enlarged in 1882 (fn. 623) and had an average attendance exceeding 200 before the end of the century, (fn. 624) falling after 1910 to 85 in 1938. (fn. 625) It accepted controlled status in 1947 (fn. 626) and, as Ruardean C. of E. Primary school, had 79 children on its roll in 1990. (fn. 627) After 1898, when they were directed to provide prizes for schoolchildren, the Greenaway and Richards charities paid small sums to the church's Sunday school and the primary school respectively. (fn. 628)
CHARITIES FOR THE POOR.
Richard Poole (d. 1618) by nuncupative will gave 40s. for the poor and the church. Although the churchwardens received the gift (fn. 629) no evidence for its distribution has been found. John Williams by deed of 1674 gave land, yielding 15s. in 1683, for a cash distribution (fn. 630) and Godfrey Taylor, a London gunmaker, by deed of 1697 a house with 2 a. to pay 28 Ruardean inhabitants, preferably his relatives or widows of parishioners, 1s. each and to provide 2s.-worth of refreshment for the trustees. (fn. 631) The charities were distributed together in the later 18th century. (fn. 632) A gift of £30 from Thomas Richards (d. 1766) (fn. 633) by will for a cash dole to widows and householders was not used as intended at least until 1803. In the later 1820s it was represented by a distribution of 30s. with Taylor's charity, (fn. 634) but it has not been traced later. Elizabeth Moore (d. c. 1780) gave a house yielding 15s. for the poor but the charity's income had fallen to 6s. or less by the 1820s, when the incomes of the Williams and Taylor charities remained at 15s. and 30s. respectively. (fn. 635) In 1898, when the parish charities were reorganized, the Williams, Taylor, and Moore charities and a third of the income of the Church Lands charity were assigned for general eleemosynary purposes, (fn. 636) and in 1989 the income available for the needy was £74, of which £61 came from the Church Lands charity. (fn. 637)