THE EPPING HUNT.
35
opinion given stated that it was quite within the competence of the
Corporation to abolish the office, and, indeed, to resign any or all
their franchises ; but the inexpediency of such a course was strongly
urged, mainly, it seems, on the ground that it would destroy an
evidence of the dignity and pre eminence "of the City of London
in times of the remotest antiquity," and a parallel was instituted
between the office of Grand Falconer and that under consideration.
The Corporation, notwithstanding all this, did finally on July 21st,
1807, pass a resolution abolishing the office of Common Hunt, but
the extracts before us afford no information as to what solace was
given to the then holder of the office.
Though the Huntsman ceased to exist, the hunting continued.
For, in the Minutes of Evidence taken before the Select Committee,9
and ordered to be printed in 1863, Lieut.-Colonel George Palmer,
the then surviving Verderer, said that the Lord Mayor and Aldermen
had, to his knowledge, exercised for fifty years the right of hunting and
killing a stag once a year ; and Mr. Alderman Copeland elsewhere
(Question 1,131) spoke of having attended the Easter hunts from
1808 downwards.
With this last entry the Memorandum ends. Perhaps the brief
account of its contents already given may incite someone interested
in the subject of the Epping Hunt to pursue the subject, and to see
how much further back it can be traced. For it clearly was already an
established custom in 1808 ; and, if so, mention of it must surely occur
in old newspapers or elsewhere. So early as February 12th, 1705,
John Wroth, then lord of the manor of Loughton, and a Justice of
the Peace, is reported 10 to have committed the Lord Mayor's Foot-
huntsman to the custody of a constable for hunting the City's hounds
in the Forest. Mr. Common Hunt was thereupon ordered to repair
to Mr. Wroth and tender bail. Mr. Wroth, who expressed a desire
"to try the City's right of hunting," bound the huntsman and others
over to answer at the next Quarter Sessions for unlawfully hunting
in the Forest. It was then thought advisable to bring an action
against the constable for assault and imprisonment, but it does not
appear that anything further was done in the matter. The records
of Quarter Sessions, if still in existence, might throw some addi-
tional light on it. William Chapman Waller.
9 Royal Forests of Essex : 793, p. 25.
10 "Repertory Rawlinson" No. 110, fo. 73B (City Records, as quoted in the Memorandum).