CLANDESTINE CHURCHES

A couple of Woodley marriages took place at Dukes Place which was one of several so-called 'clandestine churches' outside the direct control of the church authorities - until new acts were introduced which closed down their activities, and started the fashion of racing to Gretna Green for a 'no questions asked' marriage. The other clandestine church in London, used by the Woodleys was St Brides Chapel inside Fleet debtors prison. You need not be, and usually were not, an inmate of the prison, you simply paid the fee and got married without question.

Such marriages were often preceded by a Marriage Bond - a legally binding contract.

BASTARDY BONDS

Bastardy bonds were in use from the 17th until the 20th centuries to provide support for illegitimate children. In church records illegitimate children were referred to as ‘base-born’. Up to 1834 bastardy bonds were used by a local authority to identify and claim support money from the assumed father of the child. After 1834 the mother herself had to pursue the claim.

A woman who repeatedly produced illegitimate children was liable to be sent to prison. An illegitimate child was the responsibility of the local parish where the child was born so there was an incentive to move pregnant women back to their ‘home’ parish.

WITCHFINDERS

1644 to 1646 was the period of witch-finding, which was particularly prevalent in Essex, originally encouraged by the superstitious King James I and evidently tolerated by his son Charles I. Matthew Hopkins 1620-1647 the self-styled 'witchfinder-general' based in Manningtree and later Chelmsford operated from 1644-1646 when he put to death 100 alleged witches, by far the biggest known sequence of witch executions. This was a precursor and model for the Salem witch trials of New England 1692-3, which were influenced by his notorious work. Matthew Hopkins is buried in Mistley, Essex. It has been asserted but not confirmed that Joan Woodley Pamphilon (1617-1666) was arrested for witchcraft, but presumably survived. This would undoubtedly have been an awkward time for Richard Woodley as Chief Constable of Uttlesford. She was a somewhat distant cousin but was living in a neighbouring village. The Pamphilons and the Woodleys were close friends.

The proof that a woman was a witch was apparently the existence of external haemorrhoids! William Harvey the discoverer of the circulation of blood had intervened in a few cases confirming this was a common medical condition - but his advice did not extend as far as the Harwich peninsular.

See 'Witchfinders', by Malcolm Gaskill, publ John Murray 2005