EMPLOYMENT SCHEMES FOR THE ABLE-BODIED

Compulsory rating was well established in Wisbech for more than a decade before the enactment of 1598, though all sides of relief continued to be administered much more immediately by corporate, as distinguished from parochial, authorities than was contemplated by the sponsors of the new Act.

By far the most interesting of corporate activities were the endeavours to provide work for the unemployed. It was possibly the influence, direct or indirect, of governmental measures that determined the Ten Men of Wisbech, faced with the serious economic difficulties of 1598, to follow the precedent of Cambridge and of the still nearer East Anglian towns, and in July of that year to “purchase an howse of Mr Styrman to sett the pore on work”. The moment was propitious, for a recent bequest of £100 relieved the rulers here, as at Cambridge, of the necessity of further raising the rates, and rates for the relief of unemployment were still eyed with deep suspicion notwithstanding legislation. The first plan seems to have met with little success, for a new scheme was adopted eighteen months later. The corporation entered into an agreement with certain local manufacturers who were to employ, “in bunchinge of hempe, pashelinge, hicklinge, and spynnynge of candleweek”, all poor—vagrant or settled—sent to them by the town officials.