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1660 - Restoration of the monarchy, Charles II. 1662 - The Act of Settlement of this year attempted to prevent anyone from settling elsewhere than their place of birth. Privileged people were excepted and it was intended mainly to prevent paupers moving to be maintained by a parish other than their own. Removal orders were made returning people to their own parish right up to the 1840s. Money was sent from one parish to another to pay for upkeep and funerals etc of paupers. The priest, or "Vicar of Bray, Sir" from this time until 1688, at Skelton All Saints Church was Christopher Thornton. An act was passed in this year "for preventing mischiefs and dangers that may arise by certain persons called Quakers, and others refusing to take oaths." The act declared it "altogether unlawful and contrary to the word of God" to refuse to take an oath, or to persuade another person to refuse to do so. It further made it an offense for more than five persons,"commonly called Quakers," "to assemble in any place under pretense of joining in a religious worship not authorized by the laws of this realm." |
 Escaping from the plague |
1665 - During this year, the year of the great Plague, people coming from London to the North riding were quarantined in their
homes with their families for 40 days to guard against the spread of infection, by the order of the Justices. It was also ruled that clergymen should
not be charged on their revenues beyond the limit set by Act of Parliament, viz: "every spiritual person shall pay to the King one yearely rent or
pension of the tenth part of his living." It was made a punishable offence to build a cottage without "laying four acres of land to it."
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1666 A great drought during August September which contributed to the Great Fire of London in this year. 1681 - Among the plate held by Skelton church is a cup made by Marmaduke Best of York and inscribed:- 'the gift of Madame Jane Thwenge of Kilton to the Church of Brotton 1681'. The alum works at Hagg, Skelton were re-opened by Edward Trotter and were worked until 1720. 1683 - The ice held from November this year to the February of the next. A sheep was roasted on the frozen River Tees. |
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1685 - Death of Charles II and accession of his brother James II. 1687 - Tobias Hoopes of Skelton is one of four leading Quakers of the area who buy a room in a house in Westgate, Guisborough for a meeting place. George Fox, the founder of the Quakers, visited Cleveland in 1651 and prior to the Act of Toleration of 1689 the Quakers were forced to meet in secret in private houses. The paved track over the moors from Charltons to Commondale is called the Quakers Trod and people from local villages are said to have walked to Commondale for these illegal meetings. It is an ancient trackway, used by people for centuries and possibly dating back to the times when bronze age people took their dead up to their Sun god to cremate and bury in a pile of stones.
1688 - Flight of James II and accession of William and Mary. 1689 -The new priest at Skelton Church from this year until 1727 was Matthew Waters. 1693 - The Quarter Sessions for the North Riding sitting at Richmond orders to Chief Constables regarding vagrants. 1. The Constable to give notice to all housekeepers in his Constabulary, not to relieve vagrants begging out of their parish, but to take or report them to him for punishment. 2. The Constable to give notice to all poor in his Constabulary not to wander or beg out of their parish under pain of punishment.
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3. The Constable to give notice to the Overseers of the Poor to see that their impotent and aged poor are relieved,
and that there is sufficient
stock of flax, hemp, wool, etc., for setting to work such as can work but cannot find employment.
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6. The Constable shall take all begging vagrants to the Justice of the Peace for punishment, or shall have them whipped and sent by testimonial
under his own hand and seal wth those of the Minister of the parish, to the place of their birth or last legal settlement, testifying the time and place
when and where last punished, the destination, and the time allowed for the journey.
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