The Corporation of the Borough of Belturbet
County Cavan, Ireland
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The Corporation of the Borough of Belturbet County Cavan, Ireland
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Town Management and the Economy This page is still under construction The Book answers some questions about town growth, trade, burgess and provost remuneration and inhabitants' standard of living, but it raises many new ones too. Its contribution to knowledge of the contemporary local economy is mixed. In the latter half of the 17th century, some accounts of market tolls and customs charges show what type of goods came to market at that time. Revenue was raised through market tolls and customs, collection of which was frequently 'farmed out' to a trusted inhabitants for a fee which was entered in the Book. Other sources of revenue included 'quarteridge', a quarterly tax on journeymen and the non-free, and special road taxes levied on those who owned homesteads in the town The rising value of the Tolls and Customs 'farm' over the years 1674-1740 (including inflation) is evident. However lack of price and quantity data and toll rates from the town market hampers analysis and data from other sources is needed to draw sustainable conclusions. Though the linen trade was becoming a major factor in the local economy by 1760 the town economy appears to have gone into decline well before 1776, when John Wesley, who preached there commented: '. . . we went through a lovely country to Belturbet, once prosperous, now greatly decayed. . . In fact the decline continued. By 1780, the local patron, Lanesborough had sold his patronage of the borough. The Provost later borrowed £150 from Lord Belmore, the new Borough patron, to repair the Town House. In 1800 the Provost made a secret deal (not entered in the Town Book) rotating the office of provost with two others and foregoing the election process required by the Charter. In 1802, Coote in his Statistical Survey of the County of Cavan, condemned the practices in the Belturbet market and added: '. . . this terrible monopoly is now vested in two families who alternately preside over the Corporation by which and a Provost the town is governed and is now in fact their estates . . .' These dealings and others suggest a declining economy as well as a declining morality among the elite. The economic decline may be attributable to many factors; improvement in road transportation taking trade from once important river-based towns re-siting of markets as the linen trade expanded lack of interest by the town Patron, Lanesborough and the town's Burgesses. There is no published biography of the Lanesboroughs. gross and sustained abuse of trust by the ruling clique Opinions are sought as to how and when the town grew from 34 single-storied thatched or shingled houses stretched between the Church and the top of Deanery Street in 1619 into the multi-storied terraced arrangement which appears to have existed by 1857(Ordnance Survey)
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Send comments about this website and its contents to:webmaster@belturbet.org This site last updated February /2007 Acknowledgement: Ownership of the Archives of the Corporation of Belturbet resides with Belturbet Town Commission and is administered on its behalf by Cavan County Archives Service. Excerpts from the archives are identified with the Archives codes (BC/n). Permission to quote the excerpts presented on this site as of the above date has been granted by Cavan County Archives Service. Permission to publish these excerpts or any other parts of the Archives should be sought from archives@cavancoco.ie. Tel: 049-4378300 |