and appoint these my good friends Mr. William Peers and Mr. Ralph Eden my true and lawful executors to order and dispose all things in this my last will and testament. IN WITNESS whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal this one and twentieth day of December in the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred and sixty-one. Mem. "Old Cockrell, the father of old Robert Cockrell, the schoolmaster (who had his first school in the Tollbooth, was captain of a ship, and, in a violent storm, being washed overboard by one wave and thrown upon deck again by another, in pious memory of this miraculous escape, would never after suffer his beard to be shaved, and kept the day of the week (Wednesday) on which it happened as a solemn fast."+-Without a date. CHAPTER XXXIV. Rudd-Rudd, Jun.-Allison-Reed. THE REVEREND THOMAS RUDD, wwwwwEFORE the division of the parish of Norton, A. D. 1712, Mr. Rudd had continued for half a century the indefatigable minister of the ancient chapel of Stockton, having become curate, May 1, 1663, as he himself BAWWWWWWWWWWww observes, "under the good and learned Dr. Allen Smalwood." An autograph sketch of * Par. Register. + Mr. Ritson's papers, from Mr. T. Harrison of Durham. his own life appears in the parish register; as well as some memoranda, which have been useful in compiling this history. He was a native of Westmorland, and son of John Rudd, of Sandforth, in the same county. The period of Mr. Rudd's ministry at Stockton was critical :— he first became resident there soon after the restoration, before the town had recovered from the devastation of those troublous times, and was only just beginning to rise either in trade or population. He was not a negligent observer of the change that was taking place; and doubtless his judgment and discretion contributed his part towards its prosperity. It is not improbable that his representation had its weight in separating the chapelry of Stockton from the mother church. The first sermon in the new church was preached by him, March 30th, 1712, before its consecration, which took place on the 21st of August following; and he was instituted to the rectory of Longnewton July 15th, and inducted the 21st of July the same year. The last circumstance, so immediately connected with his last act at Stockton, seems to confirm the pious and zealous part he must have taken in promoting the religious establishment at Stockton. The period of Mr. Rudd's ministry here was also one of considerable anxiety to a large body of conscientious clergymen, who suffered under great difficulties from the acts of parliament which required a repetition of the oath of allegiance during the changes of government, from the time of the revolution to the settlement of the crown at the accession of the house of Hanover. Mr. Rudd had not experienced the same difficulties himself; but the benevolence of his heart led him to soften their ill effects to his friends. "The vicarage of Norton becoming vacant by the Rev. Thomas Davison (who was vicar then) refusing to swear allegiance to King William and Queen Mary, the said Thomas Rudd was inducted into the said vicarage of Norton, July 25, 1691, yet continues at Stockton still, and allows his good master the profits of his vicarage as formerly, because he left it upon the account of his conscience."* The short character on his tomb-stone, in the chancel of Long-newton church, is a deserved tribute to his memory. "Hic conditus est THOMAS RUD Minister; vir morum simplicitate Patriæ, Ecclesiæ, amicis fidelis ; THE REV. THOMAS RUDD, M. A., Librarian of the Dean and Chapter's Library at The following biographical preface, from the classical pen of a respected dignitary of the cathedral church of Mr. Rudd's MS. apud par. reg. "John Rudd and Thomas Rudd, of Durham, Esquires, both of them Barristers at law (the former Solicitor-General to Bishops Crew Talbot, and Chandler, ob. Jan. 14, 1732) of considerable eminence, and men of accomplished and elegant minds, formed a complete series of extracts from the Close rolls at Durham, which were communicated to Hutchinson by the late William Rudd, of Shincliffe, Esq."-Surtees. Such extracts as were useful in this work, were also communicated to me by W. R., Esq. J. B. These gentlemen were descendants of the Rev. Thomas Rudd, of Stockton, and afterwards of Long-newton. Durham, and formerly vicar of Stockton, needs no further introduction than an intimation that the subject of it was son of the Rev. Thomas Rudd, noticed in the preceding article; the worthy son of a worthy sire. Having during his residence at Durham, as librarian of the college library, made a most beautiful catalogue of the manuscripts contained in it, it has been printed, 1825, by the Dean and Chapter, with the elegant narrative prefixed. PRÆFATIO. QUERAS fortasse, lector benevole, quis fuerit hicce Thomas Rud, qui Catalogum nostrum MSS. tam diligenti cura exaravit. Non multa profecto sunt quæ de illo colligere licet, neque ea quidem admodum notatu digna; quæ tamen enotuerint, vel ab aliis audiverimus, paucis accipe. Filius erat natu secundus Thomæ Rud, Ecclesiæ de Longnewton in agro Dunelmensi Rectoris, antea vero, ut a lapide ejus sepulchrali monemur, "quinquaginta annis Ecclesiæ Stocktonensis Ministri." Natus est igitur Stocktoniæ super Teisam anno 1667. Quo ludo literario prima doctrinæ rudimenta hauserit, non patet; hoc tantum pro comperto habemus, illum Collegii S.S. Trinitatis apud Cantabrigi, enses fuisse aliquando alumnum. Quicquid bonarum literarum in Academia juvenis perceperat, id nimirum haud longa mora interposita Reipublicæ reddidit; anno enim 1697 Scholæ Grammatices Dunelmensis Archididascalus constitutus est. Post duos annos, in Novocastrum profectus, simili officio in Regia Schola istius oppidi fungebatur. Deinde, undecim annis exactis, Dunelmiam reversus, ipsi ibidem Scholæ cui antea præerat iterum præpositus est. 1707. Interea, libellum, quem titulo tantum cognovisse nobis contigit, Cantabrigiæ ediderat—“ Syntaxis Anglice & Latine & Prosodia, Editio altera. Adjicitur de Figuris Grammaticis et Rhetoricis Libellus in usum Scholæ Novocastrensis." fu Insequenti anno, cum jam sacerdotium inivisset, et gradu A. M. isset insignitus, ad Vicariaın Sancti Oswaldi et Decano et Capitulo Dunelmensi vocatus est. |