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COLLES.
PEIRSON v. MILES [1702]

nails were not." And that Oates had further declared, that respondents deserved to lose the cause, because they brought it into that cursed Babylonish Court of Doctors Commons, which, he said, was nothing but a damned relict of popery: And that upon hearing the cause, the Lord Keeper, upon reading the said several deeds and proofs, and the conviction of perjury of Doctor Oates, declared that neither the reference or award were fairly or indifferently obtained; and that the award appeared to be made revengefully and partially, and therefore decreed [262] the award be set aside, and the award bond to be cancelled, and appellant to acknowledge satisfaction on the record of the judgment obtained thereupon; and the security formerly given by respondents to the sheriffs of London and Middlesex, upon a ne exeat regno being sued out against them, to be vacated and discharged: Which decree respondents insisted was just and reasonable, and ought to be affirmed; and the rather, because appellant had the sentence with him, if it could be supported, in the Ecclesiastical Court; whereas if the award should stand, respondents had no remedy at law or elsewhere. (Thomas Powis. William Cowper.)

Die Jovis, 28 Januarii, 1702, After hearing council upon this appeal, it was adjudged that the same should be dismissed, and the decree complained of affirmed; and that appellant should pay respondents 20%. costs of defending the appeal. Lords Journ. vol. xvii. p. 261.

The editor hath been more circumstantial in the foregoing report than usual, because this being a private case, long after all plot businesses were cool and laughed at, shews the true mind of the famous Titus Oates, about which some historians seem to entertain doubts.



[263]Case 53.—William Peirson, Esq.,—Appellant; Thomas Miles, and William Miles,—Respondents [1702].

The appellant stated, that he was and had for many years been seised in fee of the castle and manor of Stokesley, with the appurtenances, in the county of York, belonging antiently to the family of the Baliols, after to Lord Eure, and after to Sir Richard Foster; held formerly from the Crown under the annual rent of 13s. 4d. and now from Sir Henry Horwood, Baronet, patentee of the crown, under the same rent; and that, time out of mind, there had been an antient water corn-mill, and also an antient horse-mill at the west end of the town of Stokesley, within, and part of the manor, whereat all the tenants, freeholders and inhabitants of the town of Stokesley, did use and ought to grind all their corn, grain, and alt, consumed in their houses, allowing the sixteenth dish, or other reasonable toll or moulture: And that Stokesley was a market town, and that the water which drove the will ran through the town from east to west; and that the mill-dams frequently stopping the water below the town, occasioned such inundations and floods in the town, that the people could not live in the lower rooms, and those who had not upper chambers were forced to quit their houses: And that the inhabitants, to prevent such mischief from the floods, requested Sir Richard Foster, then lord of the manor, to remove the antient mills to a more convenient place; and he, for their ease and benefit, at his private expence of 150l. removed his antient mills from below the town, and built other mills above the town, and pulling down the old dams, gave free passage to the water, so that the town was now seldom flooded: And that instead of the antient water-mill and horse-mill, he had built two water-mills under one roof; and that appellant, since he purchased the manor, had built a horse-mill under the same roof for grinding malt, and had kept the other mills in good order for grinding corn, and that they were suffici-[264]-ent to serve the town: And that respondents had set up a hand-mill within the town, in which they ground malt for themselves and others, which was consumed in the town, and also ground their corn at other mills: And that appellant exhibited his bill in the Exchequer against respondents, to have his suit of mills continued and established: And 7th July last, the cause was heard before the Lord Chief Baron Ward, Barons Bury and Price; and that appellant had

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