Hillingdon, including Uxbridge: Local government

LOCAL GOVERNMENT.

From the early 12th century Colham manor, which probably included the hamlet of Uxbridge, formed part of the honor of Wallingford (fn. 1) and presumably owed suit to the view of frankpledge for the honor instead of to the hundred court. In 1293, and probably earlier, the frankpledge court for the Middlesex bailiwick of the honor met at Uxbridge. (fn. 2) At this date Hillingdon manor apparently owed suit to the hundred court, (fn. 3) but by the early 15th century Hillingdon also was attending the annual view for the honor at Uxbridge. (fn. 4) Courts for the Middlesex division of the honor of Wallingford (later Ewelme) (fn. 5) were held at Uxbridge until the early 19th century. (fn. 6)

How far the jurisdiction of the honor court overlapped that of the local manorial courts is unknown since no manorial court records have survived. In 1245 the lord of Colham apparently claimed the right to hold a court to which his free tenants owed suit, (fn. 7) and from the 14th century onwards he was usually described, although holding of the honor of Wallingford, as having pleas and perquisites of courts leet and baron and, occasionally, the right to hold view of frankpledge. (fn. 8) Fourteenth-century manorial accounts appear to indicate that medieval lords of Colham held leet courts and views of frankpledge for Colham and Uxbridge in addition to those held annually by the steward of Wallingford. (fn. 9) Perquisites of 'portmoots' held for Uxbridge are also included in an early-14th-century extent of Colham. (fn. 10) Courts baron for Colham were held in the 17th century, (fn. 11) and in 1800 courts leet and baron were said to be held annually at the 'Red Lion', Hillingdon. (fn. 12) Courts baron for the manor continued to meet until at least as late as 1872. (fn. 13)

Which of the courts appointed local officers is also uncertain. In 1536 the honor court appointed 2 constables and 6 headboroughs for the Middlesex bailiwick, (fn. 14) and in the 19th century was said to have always appointed the officers for Uxbridge town. (fn. 15) A hayward for Colham was appointed at the manorial leet in the late 18th century, (fn. 16) but by this time control of local administration had almost certainly been assumed by the parish. The constables of Hillingdon are mentioned in 1609, (fn. 17) and again in 1642 when there were 2 constables and 2 overseers. (fn. 18)

The functions of the constables and churchwardens of Hillingdon seem to have overlapped during the 17th century. The churchwardens were administering the 'church-houses' in 1676 and perhaps as early as 1636. (fn. 19) Repairs to the parish property were paid out of the church-rate and most of the balance was spent on out-relief. (fn. 20) The parish property, later described as almshouses, seems to have been used as a poor-house or workhouse before 1747 when a new workhouse was built in Royal Lane. (fn. 21) The new premises comprised 9 rooms, together with a kitchen, dining-room, brewhouse, outbuildings, and hospital room. By 1768 a workroom equipped with tools and spinning wheels had been added. Six years later the house contained 58 paupers, and by 1796 there were 65 inmates. Further extensions before 1810, when there were 47 persons in the house, included rooms for cobblers and weavers and a schoolroom. (fn. 22) During the 18th century both workhouse and out-poor were maintained out of the poor-rate. The Hillingdon poor-rate yielded £263 in 1739; six years later the amount realized was £404, the bulk of which was spent on occasional relief. (fn. 23) Thirty years later the poor-rate yielded £414, of which £320 was spent on the poor. (fn. 24) After 1790 the usual rate was 1s. in the £, but occasionally, as in 1800, 1819, and between 1830 and 1833, a 1s. 6d. rate was levied. (fn. 25) In 1802-3 the rate realized £1,553, of which £722 was spent on the workhouse. During the year 32 parishioners received regular relief out of the workhouse and a further 416 persons, including 60 non-parishioners, were given occasional relief. (fn. 26)

Efforts to reduce poor-relief expenditure began with the revival of the Hillingdon vestry as an effective administrative body in 1806. For administrative purposes the parish was divided into four divisions-Hillingdon East, Hillingdon Town, Goulds Green, and Yiewsley-to each of which the vestry usually appointed 3 overseers. In addition the vestry elected 4 constables and 11 headboroughs for the parish. (fn. 27) Early vestry activity was marked by the formation of procedural rules and attempts to encourage the attendance of parishioners at the monthly meetings. In 1809 the vestry was instrumental in the formation of an association, consisting of Hillingdon, Cowley, and West Drayton parishes, for rewarding the apprehension and prosecution of felons. (fn. 28) Apart from this early interest in law and order the staple business of the vestry, throughout its history, was the election of parish officers and the administration of the poor law and settlement Acts. In 1807 the vestry farmed out the maintenance of the parish poor, both in and out of the workhouse, for approximately £900 and employed a doctor to attend the poor at a salary of £26 a year. Annual contracting continued until 1810 when the vestry entered into a separate contract for the maintenance of the workhouse at £605 a year. Responsibility for out-relief was then transferred to the overseers. The overseers violently opposed the change, refusing to submit their accounts or to attend vestry meetings, (fn. 29) and during 1811 only 41 persons received occasional relief. (fn. 30) The vestry petitioned the local bench for assistance and, shortly afterwards, discontinued the allowance traditionally paid to the overseers for their refreshment at inns after the vestry meeting. (fn. 31) Following further increases in poor relief expenditure during the 1820s (fn. 32) the vestry introduced a scheme in 1829 for the temporary employment of the parish poor by individuals and for the purchase of land where they might be set to work. In the following year the workhouse was enlarged so that male and female paupers could be housed separately. (fn. 33) A 22acre field adjoining the workhouse was rented in 1833, and the vestry appointed a special committee, the Parish Land Allotment Committee, to supervise the introduction of 'spade husbandry'. (fn. 34) The workhouse was again enlarged in 1834, but two years later Hillingdon became part of the Uxbridge Poor Law Union (fn. 35) and the workhouse was sold to the guardians. (fn. 36) The building then became the union workhouse and was further enlarged. (fn. 37) In 1841 it contained 169 paupers; thirty years later the number of inmates had risen to 232 and in 1911 reached a maximum of 282 persons. (fn. 38) At a later date the workhouse infirmary became the nucleus of Hillingdon Hospital. (fn. 39)

Other wider units of local government began to assume the responsibilities of the parish shortly after its inclusion in the Uxbridge Union. Despite a vestry resolution in 1839 that the inclusion of Hillingdon in the Metropolitan Police District was undesirable, (fn. 40) the parish was added to the District in 1840. (fn. 41) By 1864 there were police stations in Kingston Lane and at Goulds Green. (fn. 42) The western portion of Hillingdon was included in the Uxbridge Local Board of Health district constituted provisionally in 1849 and confirmed four years later, (fn. 43) and the remainder of the parish was covered by the Uxbridge Rural Sanitary Authority created in 1875. (fn. 44) The formation in 1878 of a board of management for highways under the Highways Act (1835) (fn. 45) relieved the vestry of another duty. (fn. 46) The vestry finally ceased to exist in 1894 when that part of Hillingdon old parish lying within the new Uxbridge U.D. (formerly the local board district) became the civil parish of Hillingdon West and the remainder, which was included within the new Uxbridge R.D. (replacing the rural sanitary authority's area), became the civil parish of Hillingdon East. (fn. 47) Two years later Yiewsley civil parish was created from the southern portion of Hillingdon East. (fn. 48) From 1895 until 1928 Hillingdon East had a parish council. The council met several times each month in various schools in the parish and was largely concerned with the election of officers and routine business connected with highways and street lighting. (fn. 49) Larger projects were undertaken by the rural district council which began work on a joint sewerage disposal scheme for Hillingdon East, Cowley, and West Drayton in 1898. The council was also responsible for the beginnings of public housing in Hillingdon under the Government Assisted Housing Act. (fn. 50) In 1929 Uxbridge R.D. was dissolved and Hillingdon East parish was added to Uxbridge U.D. At the same time Yiewsley, which had been created an urban district in 1911, became part of Yiewsley and West Drayton U.D. Responsibility for local administration in these areas was then assumed by the two larger units of government. (fn. 51)

The importance of Uxbridge as an administrative centre is first indicated in the 13th century when meetings of the Wallingford honor court were being held in the town. (fn. 52) From the mid 16th century petty sessions of the Middlesex justices also met in Uxbridge, (fn. 53) and from 1750 (fn. 54) alternate meetings of the county court were held at the 'George'. (fn. 55) In 1853 the former petty sessional division of Elthorne hundred was renamed the Uxbridge division. (fn. 56) During the 19th century the magistrates met in the 'King's Arms' and, later, in the public rooms. From 1907 both magistrates' and county courts were held in the Court House, Harefield Road. (fn. 57)

Whether Uxbridge enjoyed some form of autonomous government during the Middle Ages is not known. (fn. 58) Constables of Uxbridge appear to have been at variance with manorial officials as early as Henry VIII's reign when one of them was attacked and killed by the bailiff of Colham and his men. (fn. 59) It was later said (fn. 60) that as early as 1572 the constable was the chief officer of the town. A constable and headborough of Uxbridge are mentioned in 1613, (fn. 61) when there were both stocks and a pillory in the town, (fn. 62) and there were 2 constables, 2 churchwardens, and 4 collectors in 1642. (fn. 63) In the 1650s and again in the 19th century it was stated that, although Uxbridge remained technically part of Hillingdon parish, the townspeople had always elected their own officers and maintained their poor independently of the parent parish. In neither instance was the basis of this claim stated. (fn. 64) In the early 19th century the town was governed by 2 constables, 4 headboroughs, and 2 ale-conners, (fn. 65) said to be appointed in the Wallingford court leet held at Uxbridge in Easter week each year. (fn. 66) After the honor court was discontinued about 1813 (fn. 67) the town officers were presumably appointed by the Uxbridge vestry. The lords in trust, who were said in 1727 to have the right to hold a court baron and a 'burgage' court every three weeks, (fn. 68) appointed and paid a hogsherd and the keeper of the pound and shared with the vestry the right to appoint a beadle and town crier. (fn. 69)

In the late 17th century the poor-rate at Uxbridge, which, under an agreement made in 1624 between the townspeople and the authorities of Hillingdon parish, was levied on the occupiers of approximately 300 a. lying in and around the town, (fn. 70) was disbursed by the overseers as occasional relief to sick and needy paupers. (fn. 71) Almshouses and, possibly, a workhouse, had apparently been built in the Lynch before 1727. (fn. 72) After the reorganization of the manorial trust in 1729 the new trustees covenanted to rebuild the almshouses and to add a workhouse. (fn. 73) Of the management of the town workhouse in the 18th century almost nothing is known. It contained 60 paupers in 1775, (fn. 74) and 76 inmates in 1803. (fn. 75) The maintenance of workhouse and out-poor was farmed out by the vestry on a contract basis. (fn. 76) In 1795 the contractor agreed to maintain the poor both in and out of the workhouse for £450; by 1808 the contract was worth £1,050. (fn. 77) The poor-rate, which had yielded £410 in 1775-6, (fn. 78) raised £1,033 in 1803, all of which was spent on the poor. (fn. 79) During the year 59 parishioners received regular out-relief and a further 32 persons, of whom 5 were non-parishioners, were given occasional relief. Relief provided out of the poor-rate was augmented by the chapel wardens who administered the church-rate and the Uxbridge charities (fn. 80) and by the lords in trust who devoted an increasingly large part of the manorial profits to the provision of out-relief. In 1743 a total of £58 was spent by the trustees on occasional relief to 95 'townspeople', 12 'out town people', and 16 tenants of the almshouses. (fn. 81) Thirty years later almost twothirds of the manorial profits of £378 were spent on the poor. (fn. 82) During the 1790s weekly payments were made to widows, paupers, and to 8 inmates of the workhouse: in 1801 widows received 2s. a week and workhouse poor 6d. (fn. 83)

During the early 19th century the Uxbridge vestry made several attempts to reduce the cost of poor relief. From 1814 the workhouse was farmed separately, administration of out-relief being undertaken by the overseers. Four years later the town entered into a contract with a married couple who agreed to live in the workhouse and to manage the establishment, under the supervision of the overseers, at a weekly salary of 12s. (fn. 84) The management of out-relief, however, was apparently left in the hands of unpaid officers and this probably led to some embezzlement. In 1819 weekly relief was being given to more than 100 persons. By the 1820s expenditure on the poor had risen to nearly £3,000 a year, (fn. 85) and the administration of poor relief was being greatly criticised. An overseer was defined as 'one who overlooks the advantage of the town' and a lord in trust as 'one who refuses to give account of his trust to any but the Lord'. (fn. 86) The vestry too was attacked for awarding the workhouse contract to John Keen, who had submitted a tender of 4s. 3d. a head. Another tender of 4s. was submitted but Keen, who was said to be a notorious drunkard, received the votes of eight Uxbridge publicans and was awarded the contract. (fn. 87) In 1833 protests were made in the vestry that part of the poor-rate was being used for road repairs. (fn. 88) Despite further public agitation for the appointment of a salaried overseer to live in the workhouse, the vestry apparently continued to farm out the maintenance of the workhouse until the transfer of the Uxbridge poor to Hillingdon workhouse. (fn. 89) The town workhouse was used by the Uxbridge volunteer police force (fn. 90) until the introduction of metropolitan police in 1840. (fn. 91) Two years later the trustees sold the workhouse premises. (fn. 92) The building seems to have been demolished before the 1880s when the site was said to be occupied by the fire station and almshouses. (fn. 93)

Apart from their interest in the poor the lords in trust were chiefly concerned with the provision of amenities for the town. Wooden pipes supplying the town with water from the Colne are said to have been laid by the manorial trustees in 1701. (fn. 94) A fire engine costing £48 was purchased in 1770 and a further £14 spent on erecting an engine-house. The scheme was financed by contributions from the Sun Fire Office, private subscribers, and the church-rate. (fn. 95) Little seems to have been done, however, to alleviate the congestion and the insanitary nature of High Street (fn. 96) until 1785 when an Act was passed (fn. 97) authorizing specially appointed trustees to widen the main street by demolishing the market-house and other buildings. (fn. 98) Provision was also made for removing protruding signs and spouts and for paving, lighting, and cleaning the streets. Until the institution of the Uxbridge Board of Health in 1849 all major improvements in the town were undertaken by trustees exercising powers conferred by the Acts of 1785 and 1806. (fn. 99) Land and houses involved in the widening of High Street were valued by a specially appointed jury and purchased by the trustees who also assessed compensation for land taken for the Grand Junction Canal. The trustees also appointed a highways surveyor with a salaried assistant and requested from the justices authority to levy an additional 3d. rate for road repair. (fn. 100) Improvements to the town water supply, which since 1701 had been drawn from the Colne, (fn. 101) began in 1800 with the sinking of two wells in the town. A third well was sunk in 1853, and these formed the basis of the municipal supply until the 20th century. (fn. 102) In 1801 the trustees resolved that the system of oil-fired street lighting was inadequate and appointed a committee to improve and extend the existing arrangements. (fn. 103) An application from the British Gas Light Co. to light the town was considered in 1824, (fn. 104) but nothing had been done by 1828 when the trustees were criticized for not introducing gas. (fn. 105) About 1832, however, a private speculator, James Stacey (d. 1879), built a gas-works near the canal on Uxbridge Moor, (fn. 106) and by 1833 some streets were apparently lighted by gas. (fn. 107)

During the 1830s Uxbridge began to assume a wider administrative importance. (fn. 108) An unofficial local board or sanitary authority for the town and its immediate neighbourhood may have been in existence as early as 1832. (fn. 109) Four years later the Uxbridge Poor Law Union was formed. (fn. 110) The union, which comprised the parishes of Hillingdon, Harefield, Ruislip, Ickenham, Cowley, West Drayton, Hayes, Norwood, and Northolt, was administered by three guardians meeting weekly in the 'White Horse', Uxbridge. (fn. 111) Hillingdon workhouse was adapted as the union workhouse for the reception of paupers from the constituent parishes. (fn. 112) Shortly after the formation of the Uxbridge Union a volunteer police force was created under the supervision of the town watch committee, and a police station was set up in the recently vacated workhouse. (fn. 113) This volunteer force was disbanded in 1840 when Uxbridge was added to the Metropolitan Police District. (fn. 114) Responsibility for the town's amenities, exercised since 1785 by trustees, was assumed by the Uxbridge Local Board of Health which was formed provisionally in 1849 and confirmed four years later. (fn. 115) The board was preoccupied with the provision of adequate sewerage and water-supply systems; other committees were appointed to deal with lighting and paving, rates, and the location and suppression of nuisances. (fn. 116) Until the 1850s gas lighting in the town was provided by the Uxbridge Old Gas Co., which had succeeded the private venture started in the 1830s. (fn. 117) In 1854, however, a second gas company, the Uxbridge and Hillingdon Consumers' Co., was incorporated, (fn. 118) and for a time both companies competed for the town lighting contract. Competition became acrimonious in 1860 when the Gas Consumers' Co. accused the local board of partiality towards the Old Gas Co. A police report on the state of street-lighting in the town was submitted to the government and an Act passed in 1861 (fn. 119) provided for the purchase of the Old Gas Co. by the Gas Consumers' Co. and the incorporation of the amalgamated concern. (fn. 120) A burial board was formed when burials in St. Margaret's church ceased and the cemetery at the bottom of Windsor Street was closed in 1855. (fn. 121) The board opened a cemetery in Kingston Lane in 1853 and an adjoining cemetery for Hillingdon burials in 1866. (fn. 122) A volunteer fire brigade, with a station in Windsor Street, was formed in 1864. (fn. 123)

Under the Local Government Act (1894) the local board became an urban district council and the rural sanitary authority, created in 1875, (fn. 124) a rural district council. (fn. 125) Uxbridge R.D.C. was dissolved in 1929 and the urban district extended to include Harefield, Ickenham, and the whole of Hillingdon and Cowley civil parishes. (fn. 126) In 1951 the population of the new district was 55,944. (fn. 127) From 1949 the district was divided into seven wards, increased to nine in 1952, together returning 27 councillors. (fn. 128) In 1951 there were eight standing committees, for allotments, civil defence, finance and general purposes, housing, parks and open spaces, public health, rating and valuation, and works and town planning. (fn. 129) The warding arrangements remained unchanged after the incorporation of Uxbridge Borough, co-extensive with the former urban district, in 1955. (fn. 130) The borough council administered five departments in 1958: those of the town clerk, treasurer, surveyor, public health, and parks, all of which were housed in converted dwellings in High Street. The council employed a permanent staff of 115, and 299 manual workers. (fn. 131) In 1929 the rate was 12s. in the £, and had risen to 21s. in the £ by 1962. The product of a penny rate rose from £845 in 1929-30 to £4,800 in 1961-2. (fn. 132)

The main task facing the rural district council and its successors was the provision of housing and amenities to meet the population expansion after 1890. Work on a joint sewerage disposal scheme for Hillingdon East, Cowley, and West Drayton began in 1898. (fn. 133) Council building also began in the 1890s with the completion of a small estate in Austin Waye. (fn. 134) By 1962 successive councils had erected 4,702 dwellings in the borough, of which approximately two-thirds were sited in Hillingdon old parish. (fn. 135) Amenities provided by the local authorities included municipal shops on some estates, a swimming-pool (opened in 1935) on the Hillingdon House Farm estate, and an industrial estate (opened in 1946) in Cowley Mill Road. (fn. 136) By 1962 there were also more than 2,000 a. of open spaces, parks, and recreation grounds, representing approximately 20 per cent. of the area of the borough, including nearly 80 a. of permanent and temporary allotments. (fn. 137)

In 1965 Uxbridge Borough was merged with the urban districts of Hayes and Harlington, Ruislip- Northwood, and Yiewsley and West Drayton to form the new London Borough of Hillingdon. (fn. 138)