Murengers

(work in progress}

The office of Chester Murengers were active from 1249 until 1835. In early times the reparation of walls was considered as the duty of the burgesses and the expense of performing the duty was a "common burden" upon the burgesses and inhabitants. The Murengers managed this process and, looking closely, have left traces on the walls in the form of various inscriptions. Repair of the walls is an ongoing issue and can sometimes lead to controversy.

Medieval


The extent to which the Roman defences were reused when Æthelflæd refortified Chester in 907 remains uncertain. Little is known about the condition of the walls between the end of the Roman occupation in the late 4th century and the refounding of Chester by Æthelflæd as a burgh as part of the reconquest of Mercia by the Anglo-Saxons.

One possibility is that she adopted the north and east walls, extending them to the river and creating thereby an L-shaped landward defence, but there are also indications that the entire Roman enceinte was used. Substantial sections of the north wall and portions of the east and west walls were repaired in early medieval times. Nevertheless, the likely length of the Anglo-Saxon defences, c. 1,700 yd., accords better with the L-shape than with the full legionary enceinte. It has been suggested that even if the Roman walls were refurbished it remains possible that the manned defences comprised only the northern and eastern sides of the fortress, extended to the river perhaps by earth walls. However the section of the City Walls from Morgan's Mount to Bonewaldenthorn's Tower seems to have been construucted in stone from an early, possibly late Roman, date.

The intrusion of Chester Castle in the late 11th century would have involved the final abandonment of any remaining south and west walls of the legionary fortress and the construction of an enlarged enceinte. Shipgate, in the southern riverside wall, seems to have been built by the 1120s.

As elsewhere, upkeep of the City Walls was largely financed by murages, occasional duties on merchandise entering and leaving the city, levied by the city authorities under royal grant. This was granted by the king by letters patent for a limited term, but the walls were frequently not completed within the term, so the grant was periodically renewed. The earliest grant was for Shrewsbury and is dated 26 June 1220, in the time of Henry III. The first recorded murage at Chester occurred in 1249 and was for five years, the money being collected by two officials called "murengers". Other towns than Chester receiving early grants included Bridgnorth, Stafford, Worcester, Oxford, Gloucester, and Bristol. In Dublin there was a major scandal over murage in 1311–12, when it emerged that none of the funds collected for murage had actually been spent on repairs to the city walls.

Further murages were granted in 1290, 1297, and 1299, for three, five, and seven years respectively. Royal permission was also needed to breach the defences: in 1246, for example, Henry III allowed the Franciscans to penetrate the walls to bring in building materials. In 1321 a murage was granted for two years, and in 1322 the citizens contracted with John of Helpston, a royal mason, for a new riverside tower, the Watertower in the northwest of the city. Further murages were granted in 1329, 1352, 1355, 1358, and 1363, with work continuing under royal master masons and in 1339 under the temporary supervision of a royal controller of murage.

In 1387 Richard II authorized the city to use the murage to rebuild the Old Dee Bridge, and perhaps because of that by 1395 the walls were claimed to be in great disrepair. Succeeding murages in 1395 and 1397 were devoted to their restoration, and no further money was diverted to the bridge until 1407. It was evident that the defences could still assume a military importance during the Ricardian rising in 1400, when the rebels seized the keys to the gates, and again in 1408–9, when attempts were made to enforce the watch on the walls.

Local Action
Although in the earlier 15th century royal officials continued to supervise repairs, care of the fortifications became increasingly a local affair. A grant "Given at Chester the 5th day qf March, 1407," by Prince Henry Stuart, Earl of Chester, confirmed previous charters and wants, giving to the:


 * "Mayor and Commonalty of our city of Chester" [the profits and emoluments of prisa et captione of Murage for five years,] "which before these times was wont to be taken and received, but one-half was to be faithfully expended upon the repair of the city walls, and the other in finishing the tower on the Dee bridge which had been commenced in the time of Richard, late King of England."

Two years later the same Earl extended the licence to take Murage from five years "so long as it shall please us."

After 1466 the murengers, who by then had a regular income from customs levied on goods entering and leaving the city, served for two years rather than one, one retiring each year. In 1506 murages became a permanent custom under the administration of two annually elected officials.

Such developments did not, however, bring much improvement in the upkeep of the walls. In 1410, 1452, and c. 1531 men were indicted for breaking them down and carrying off stones. By then the full circuit included some eight or nine watch towers, the four principal gates, and at least six posterns. The whole was embattled. Outside, to the north and east, lay the town ditch, and inside, except in the abbey precinct and between Eastgate and Newgate, a roadway to provide access. In the later 16th or early 17th century the ditch was filled in. By the mid 16th century with the decline of Chester's trade the murengers' income had become inadequate. Some of the principal towers were rented and maintained as meeting places by the city's craft guilds, but the walls themselves were in poor condition.

In 1538–9 the city authorities agreed to pay a mason, Thomas Wosewall, 40s. a year and provide materials and two labourers to keep the entire circuit in repair. Extensive renovations were undertaken in 1555–6, and in 1562 the contract was renewed, but the results were not satisfactory: in 1569 a portion of the wall between Watertower and the Watergate fell down, and in 1589 the entire defences were described as ruinous. In 1590 Wosewall surrendered his patent because he was unable to keep the walls in repair. The murengers were increasingly reliant on special levies: in 1589 they were granted an assessment of £100 and in 1599 the profits from one year's toll on corn. Even so, in 1600 the walls still endangered those walking on them, and a further assessment of £100 was ordered. A "great breach" between the Watertower and Watergate required £80 in 1608 and 100 marks in 1620. Further assessments for repairs were levied in 1621, 1625, and 1629, but there appears to have been some resistance to their collection, and yields probably continued low, for the walls were still called ruinous in 1641.

Civil War
With the growing prospect of a Civil War, measures were taken to improve the city's defences. In September 1640 the corporation ordered repairs to the Eastgate, Newgate, and Bridgegate, and in 1641 it allocated all customs duties on wine imports (prisage) to the renovation of the walls.



An additional assessment of 100 marks was granted in 1642. In 1643, with the growing likelihood of a siege, new outer fortifications were built. They initially followed a line from the north wall near the Goblin Tower northwards to a point between Parkgate and Liverpool roads, and thence east to Flookersbrook Hall; from there they ran south and then east to Boughton, terminating at the river. The new works comprised trenches, mud walls, mounts, and pitfalls. Newgate and the New Tower were walled up, and the former ditch outside the Eastgate was perhaps re-excavated. In 1644 the line of the defences was brought back nearer the city to a "turnpike" barrier at Cow Lane (later Brook Street / Frodsham Street), abandoning the enclosure of Flookersbrook; escarpments were deepened and widened, parapets raised, and new mounts thrown up around Cow Lane. Finally, in February 1645 the fortifications assumed the form they had until the end of the siege: the outworks were brought back from the Cow Lane "turnpike" to Cow Lane Gate (the present site of Cow Lane Bridge), and the tower now known as Morgan's Mount was constructed on the northern city wall near the Goblin Tower.

The medieval defences suffered from the parliamentary bombardment during the siege of the Civil War. Two important breaches were made, a large one near the Newgate and a smaller one between the Goblin and New Towers, both in places where the fabric had already crumbled and been strengthened by earthen ramparts. The Newgate breach is associated with the Battle of Rowton Moor.

Modest disbursements were made in the later 1640s and 1650s to patch up the great breach near the Newgate and further breaches on either side of the Northgate. Major work costing over £120 was done near the Watergate between 1659 and 1661, and in the 1660s and early 1670s spending on repairs continued to be fairly heavy. Yet the condition of the walls remained precarious. Frank Simpson recorded a stone visible in 1910 "aabout fifty yards north-west of the Grosvenor Road" on which was inscribed:


 * T SIMPSON
 * 16.M.74
 * I.POOLE
 * R.TAYLOR

This apparently had some further inscription which had become buried in the pavement and seems to record the efforts of the murengers at the date it gives. Many such monuments are only recorded through the efforts of amateur historians, for example here.

Although the antiquary Ralph Thoresby could describe them as in excellent condition in 1682, another opinion in 1686 was that they were 'far out of repair'. In 1690 the corporation granted £160 for renovations, but there were still breaches in 1694. By 1700 the murage duties were in arrears.

Nevertheless, the walls seem already to have become a popular promenade, perambulated for example by Thoresby in 1682, and in 1707–8 the Assembly undertook major repairs with the object of restoring the entire circuit to use. The cost of £1,000 went towards repairing 'divers large breaches' and levelling and flagging the wall walk. Thereafter the walls became one of the walks favoured by Henry Prescott, deputy registrar of Chester diocese, and his friends. Access to the fashionable pleasure grounds in the Groves was made easier in 1720, when the corporation built Recorder's Steps, east of Bridgegate. After all the improvements, the walls, though no longer of military use, were described in 1728 as 'of great delight and benefit' to the citizens.

Promenade


In the 18th century the walls were perambulated by such distinguished visitors as John Wesley and Samuel Johnson, though the walkway was not continuous as it was still interrupted by some of the towers over the main gates. The reconstruction begun in 1707 continued piecemeal, and seems generally to have involved the total replacement of medieval fabric but the retention, where it existed, of Roman.

Part of the Goblin Tower was taken down in 1708 "on account of its ruinous condition", and the remainder arched over. At this time the front of the tower was refaced and ornamented with stone panels, by John Tilston circa 1710, bearing the Royal and the City Arms, and between these was placed an inscribed stone which reads:


 * "In the seventh year of the glorious reign of Queen Anne, divers large breaches in these Walls were rebuilt, and other decays therein, were repaired, two thousand yards of the pace were new Flagged or Paved, and the whole Improved, Regulated and Adorned, at the expence of One Thousand Pounds and upwards."

The names of the various Mayors and Aldermen were then listed:


 * Thomas Hand Esq 1701; The Right Honble. William Earl of Derby, Mayor 1702 (who died in his Mayoralty} Michael Johnson 1703, Matthew Anderson 1704, Edw.Partington 1705, Edward Puleston 1706, Pulest Partington 1707, Humphrey Page 1708, James Mainwaring ESQS. MAYORS Roger Comberbach Esq.Recorder, William Wilson, Aldn. Peter Bennet, Aldn. And upon the death of the said William Wilson, Edw.Partington, Aldn. Justice of the Peace MURENGERS.

Unfortunately the inscribed stone was not to last. John Seacome, in 1828 had written:


 * On the front was some excellent carved work in stone and the names of the Mayor the Earl of Derby and the other corporate officers of the year in which the repairs were made, but partly from the soft and friable nature of the stone and partly owing to the mischievous spirit that actuates many of the lower orders of the city who are continually injuring the walls both the inscription and the carved work are now almost obliterated.

Pigot writes:


 * This Tower now generally known by the name of Pemberton's Parlour lately dlsplayed on its front some excellent carved work in stone which however was unfortunately almost destroyed by some mischievous vagabonds in the year 1813.

Pemberton was active in the restoration, there is an inscribed stone on the north side of the spur archway, which states that the tower was restored in 1730, during the mayoralty of John Pemberton, who also restored the Goblin Tower, which is now better known as Pemberton's Parlour. The original badly damaged inscription, perhaps restored by Pemberton, is still there. Above the panel a moulded cornice has a crenellated parapet inscribed GOBLIN TOWER: REBUILT 1894 indicating yet another repair.



An engraving entitled "The South West Prospect of the City of Chester 1728" by Samuel and Nathaniel Buck shows a view of the city of Chester in that year. The somewhat inaccurate text on the engraving reads (in part):


 * Chester, or WestChester, Said to be so calld from the Roman Legions: When Julius Caesar intended the redection of Ireland & Claudius Caesar design'd to surprize the / Orcades, they took up winter Quarters for them here. Likewise Galba the Emperor settled here the 20.th Legion call'd Victrix, under the command of Titus Vinius to be a barrier & check / unto the Ordovices, which growing too headstrong for him, Titus Vespasian made Julius Agricola their Lieuten.t Tis probable that this Settlement of the Roman Legion gave birth to this City. / And it is evident, from the Inscriptions of several Altars, & Coins found in, & about this City, with the names & titles of Julius Caesar, and several other Emperors, that the Legion called / Victrix was assuredly Quartere'd here. King Edgar triumphed here over the British Princes by causing Hennadius K. of Scotland, Malcolm K. of Northumberland, & Macon K. of Man / & the Isles, with all the Princes of Wales; being in N.o 8 to row him like Bargemen up the River Dee. This City is surrounded with a Wall two miles in compass, which affordeth a / delightfull walk all round: Said to be built by Edelfleda, that noble Mercian Lady; A.D. 902. The Streets are remarkable for their double rows of Shops, or Piazzas; which screen / you from the rain through most of the City.



Later work included the construction of the present unfortified parapet, the rebuilding between 1767 and 1810 of all the main medieval gates with wider arches, better for vehicles below and pedestrians above, and attempts to render the wall walks more convenient by means of features such as the Wishing Steps, built in 1785 to ease the steep ascent east of Recorder's Steps. Further work was done in 1828–9, when a collapsed portion between Abbey Street and the Phoenix Tower was rebuilt and Grosvenor Road leading to Grosvenor Bridge was driven through the defences west of the castle. Shortly after, in 1830, part of the southern wall west of Bridgegate was moved further south to run along the new riverside embankment, a project involving the insertion of an archway to permit access to the extended enclosure of Chester Castle. In 1831 the walls were said to have been altered recently "not so much for strength as for ornament"; the walks had been levelled, the battlements lowered, and the towers refurbished.

After the Murengers
The office of murenger was abolished in 1835, when its duties were vested in the corporation's finance committee, handing over a set of walls in fairly good condition. The tolls at Eastgate, Northgate, and Watergate, most if not all of which were in the corporation's hands by 1662, were abolished in 1836. Those at Bridgegate, acquired in the 17th century, had already been granted to the Dee Bridge Commissioners in 1824.

1843 saw a major legal case between the Corporation of Shrewsbury and the Crown over murages. This provides an interesting review of the law.

Further work was done on the walls and towers of Chester in the late 19th century. In particular, at least 120 yd. of the north wall in Water Tower Street between the Northgate and Pemberton's Parlour were rebuilt or refaced in 1882–3, work which included a new gateway opposite Canning Street. Some sections of this wall have become a cause for concern.

In 1887 and 1890–2 other stretches of the north wall west of the Phoenix Tower and west of the Northgate were extensively reconstructed, and in both locations large numbers of inscribed and sculpted Roman memorial stones were found. These form a major collection in the Grosvenor Museum.

In the 1920's work on the 1789 Watergate filled in what were possibly drainage passages with cement. The rigidity of the cement meant that trapped moisture couldn not escape through the hard mortar and travelled through the softer stonework instead. Initially a 2017 repair project estimated that 10% of the stonework on the bridge would need to be replaced due to delamination – where water flakes away outer layers of stonework. However, the 2017 repair discovered that due to the 1920's repair 85% of the stonework would need to be replaced because the hard cement has bonded so strongly to the stone that it could not be removed without causing damage to the stone. The current arch was constructed in 1789 replacing an earlier medieval gate which was described at the time as so "dangerously ruinous" that it had to be immediately demolished and the present arch, designed by Joseph Turner, was erected the following year. Pigot, writing in 1815, describes the Watergate as follows:




 * "The serjeant of this gate was bound to execute the Mayor's processes on the River Dee. The present beautiful arch was erected in the room of the old gate way in l788-9 the expense being defrayed out of the Murage Duties. On the west side the gateway but now illegible from the street without the aid of a glass is the following inscription: IN THE XXIX YEAR or THE REIGN OF GEO. III IN THE MARYOLTY OF JOHN HALLWOOD AND JOHN LEIGH ESQUIRES THIS GATE WAS ERECTED - THOMAS COTGREAVE  EDWARD BURROWS  MURENGERS". The view from this gate way is very pleasing on the right is a regularly built street called Crane street. Little more than a century ago the sea at high water overflowed all the ground which the houses now occupy washing up to the Watergate. The Roodee also is represented to have been so much covered by the tide that the cross seemed to stand in the water and from this circumstance the name probably originated which has ever since been applied to the ground reclaimed from the water."

Attempts were made to strengthen the east wall north of the Kaleyards Gate in the 1930s, and both that work and the earlier reconstruction in Water Tower Street were much renewed in the 1990s. In the 1960s the Inner Ring Road, breaching the walls, was built. St Martin's Gate consists of a concrete arch, opened in 1966, to carry the wall walk over the road.

The city council remained responsible for maintenance work, until its dissolution. On the formation of Cheshire West and Chester Council in 2009, responsibility for upkeep of the walls passed to Transport and Highways because the walkway is both a Public Right of Way and a Highway. There were ongoing problems at the time: the section of the walls that collapsed at the side of the Grosvenor Hotel in 2008 took two years, to be repaired due to the complex archaelogical investigation required. However from 2009 – 2012 the EU-funded Portico project completed a number of improvements to the walls at sites including Morgan’s mount, the Newgate, and also allowed for the Watertower and King Charles tower (Phoenix Tower) to be made safe again for visitors after years of dereliction.

Scheduled Monument
The law in the UK as regards development and archaeology is complex. Measures to avoid, further investigate or mitigate the adverse environmental effects of a development proposal may be secured by planning conditions that enable the development to proceed. Historic and natural environment designations often overlap e.g. 19% of scheduled monuments coincide with Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs). Several resources are available online to explore these including the Heritage Gateway and more detailed local resources.



The wide range of legislation in the UK means that the terminology describing how historic sites are protected varies according to the type of heritage asset. Monuments are "scheduled", buildings are "listed", whilst battlefields, parks and gardens are "registered", and historic wrecks are "protected". Historic urban spaces receive protection through designation as "conservation areas", and historic landscapes are designated through national park and Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) legislation. In addition, there are areas in the UK are also protected as World Heritage Sites.

A scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The protection provided to scheduled monuments is given under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979. A monument can be: a building or structure, cave or excavation which is above or below the surface of the land; or on/under the sea bed within UK territorial waters (or a site that contains the remains of one), or, site comprising any vehicle, vessel, aircraft or other moveable structure (or contains the remains of one). Scheduling offers protection because it makes it illegal to undertake a great range of "works" within a designated area, without first obtaining "scheduled monument consent". "Works" are defined as anything which would demolish, damage, remove, repair, add or alter the monument (including agriculture, forestry, flooding and tipping).

Historic England, monitors the condition of scheduled monuments. They encourage owners to maintain scheduled monuments in good condition. Historic England occasionally award grants to support management agreements for monuments, and in some cases can help with major repairs. a "List of sections of Chester city walls and associated structures" can be found on Wikipedia. The Official List Entry is very sparse.

Repairs Since 2010
The 21st Century brings "new" issues for the walls and new opportunities. Issues include the age of the walls and the fact that they have been partially rebuilt and repaired over the centuries with varying degrees of care and quality. Stonemasonry is not as widespread a profession as it once was, but Chester is perhaps fortunate in that the Cathedral hosts a number of them. Opportunities include the use of new media to make information about the walls more widely available.

The 2010 "Heritage at Risk" register, identified that Chester had issues with its walls, using the rather odd description:


 * "Extreme significant problems i.e. under plough, collapse"

In 2012 Cheshire West and Chester Council and Historic England agreed a framework for the management and repair of Chester’s City Walls, Towers, Gates and Posterns which are a Scheduled Monument protected by law under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979 (as amended). The management programme includes regular inspections of the whole circuit of the Walls and monitoring of sections of the walls previously identified as being at risk.

The inspections found that a section of the Wall adjacent to the north side of the Eastgate was unstable and tilting inwards. Archaeological investigations revealed that the inner face of the Wall was resting on and sinking into the earth rampart of the Roman fortress. Major repair works took place in 2015 that required archaeological excavations through the core of the Wall. As this section of the Wall walkway had to be closed the opportunity was taken to also carry out restoration works to the Eastgate and the Eastgate Clock (Calibre Metalwork) as well as install waterproofing measures to the Wall walkway south of the Eastgate. The conservation and repair works were carried out by York-based building conservation specialist William Anelay Ltd and conservation engineers Rambol.

Eastgate to Newgate
As noted above, on the third of April 2008, a 30-metre section of the walkway behind the Chester Grosvenor hotel and the Mall shopping centre, was closed after part of the City Walls collapsed at 5.30pm. The collapse happened at the junction of two much earlier repairs where water had washed some of the core material away. This left a length of unstable wall between the repairs. The remaining wall was carefully taken apart until all the unstable material had been removed. It was then rebuilt using the original stone as far as possible, together with modern materials designed to tie the different parts of the wall together.



This section of the walls has a history of problems and issues. As a result of the excavations carried out at the south-east angle of the Roman fortress in the early years of this century (Newstead 1909), it became clear that the alignments of the fortress wall and medieval City Walls running northward to the East Gate did not coincide. Unlike the situation prevailing north of the East Gate and also along long stretches of the North Wall, where the medieval wall either sits directly on top the fortress wall or very nearly so, south of the East Gate the medieval wall is set back behind the line of its Roman predecessor by a distance of three to four metres. Archaeology revealed that this wall had collapsed in Roman times. The turf rampart of the original Flavian defences had, in accordance with the sequence normally encountered, been supplemented by the construction of a revetment wall built of massive facing blocks of local sandstone with a rubble backing. Judging from the evidence obtained from this particular site, this event seems most likely to have occurred at some time during the opening decades of the second' century. Subsequently, maintenance of the ditch in front of the wall was allowed to lapse with the result that the ditch became progressively choked with silt and organic matter until the point was reached where this fill came up almost to ground level. This was not the only element of the defences to suffer from neglect, for the process of ditch silting was found to have been brought to an abrupt end by the outward collapse of the fortress wall itself. This was represented in the archaeological record by a jumbled mass of intact and fragmented facing blocks which not only sealed over the ditch fill but also, because of its composition, had subsided into it. Whether any significant interval passed between this catastrophic event and the refurbishment of the defences which followed is impossible to determine from the available evidence: it can only be said that both events occurred within the period AD 250-350. The ultimate demise of the repaired wall appears to have been much the same as its initial collapse.

In January 2020 a further section of the City Walls behind the Wesley Church Centre in St John Street collapsed. Early indications appeared to show that earth had been removed from the bottom of the city walls behind 15 to 19 Newgate Street by a developer. The local paper had reported in 2019: "Cllr Don Beckett, Labour, was less convinced that the location would be suitable. He said: I think the application site is too near to the famous walls....".

St Martin's Gate


St Martin’s Gate is a breach in a northern section of the city walls, made in 1966 when the route for the ring road was decided upon. The Cheshire Historic Environment Record notes that "it was named because of an association of the area with the ancient parish of that name", but fails to note that the church of St Martin was demolished to facillitate the construction of the Ring-Road. This new gateway through the walls was designed by the City Engineers, A H F Jiggens and George Grenfell-Baines of the Building Design Partnership, with approval from the Royal Fine Arts Commission. It was opened in 1966 by the Minister of Transport, Barbara Castle. It was known for a while as "Jiggens Bridge". It is said to have been praised for "its elegance and combination of simplicity and lightness". Ahead of the building work, a team of archaeologists undertook a 16-week investigation of the site. During construction, remains of a Roman corner tower were found, along with some Roman and Saxon pottery, as well as the foundations of some previously-unknown agricultural buildings and features associated with a Roman cemetery. The location of the corner tower has been marked out in cobbles at the base of the concrete steps leading down from the bridge. A large amount of green and yellow-glazed medieval roof tiles were also discovered, as well as later material dating from the 17th-19th centuries.

Northgate
Movement was detected in the walls in 2010. The steps had been propped up with scaffolding since 2011 with repairs beginning in April 2016 by the Eric Wright Group. The extended repair period was complicated by the discovery of foundation stones thought to be part of the original Roman gate. Matters were not helped by much earlier building work having been sub-standard. The inner leaf of the city wall had been constructed on poor quality ancient rubble and the Northgate Steps were founded on the soft, organic Roman rampart material, which was once part of the original Roman Gate footings.

(to be continued)

Related Pages

 * City Walls;
 * City Gates;

Online

 * Chester City Gates on "The castles, towers and fortified buildings of Cumbria";