Records of the Manor Court of Newton, Kirkmanshulme and Deansgate

The Papers of the Courts Baron and Courts Leet held for the Manor of Newton, including: court proceedings (rough and some neat copies), call books, lists of amercements (fines for such transgressions as: obstructing water courses, not repairing roads, encroaching on common land, fighting etc.), court forms (notices to attend, oaths etc). The records are incomplete, though coverage for the periods 1677-1690 and 1775-1836 is comprehensive. It appears from references in the papers, and from the surviving neat copy from 1775 onwards, that the Court proceedings were recorded in a Book, rather than individual sheets of paper or parchment. A receipt of 1705 describes the loan to George Kenyon of '3 Court Books or Rolls' concerning the Manor of Newton, which he had received from Dr Wroe, the Warden. One is described as starting in 1634, one in 1641, and a bound book beginning in 1661 upto 1704, 'With some other papers relating thereto'. These are now missing.

Newton was a mesne Manor within the Manor of Manchester. Albert de Grelley became possessed of the Manor of Manchester by marriage in 1129, and presented four bovates of land to the Church in around 1150, possibly in Newton. A Survey of the Manor of Manchester in 1320 recorded that the Church of Manchester was endowed with one messuage with rectory, eight burgages in Manchester, and all the hamlet of several houses of Newton and Kirkmanshulme. In the Survey, no lands in Newton or Kirkmanshulme were attached to the Manor of Manchester, indicating that this part of the Manor had been alienated prior to 1320. The Manor of Newton embraced the township of Newton with the hamlet of Kirkmanshulme, as well as the possessions of the College in Manchester (Deansgate), Rusholme, and Salford. The title of the Manor Court, as it most often appears is 'The Manor Court of Newton, Kirkmanshulme and Deansgate', the tenants of Yield House in Rusholme being coupled with those of Kirkmanshulme, and those of Salford included under Deansgate. For the Newton Manor there was a Court Baron and a Court Leet. The former was the Manorial Court which only the freeholders could attend, presided over by the Lord of the Manor in person, or by his steward. Courts Leet, however, were deemed the most ancient courts known to the law, and are believed to represent the ancient village assemblies of pre-feudal days. All the inhabitants of the Manor were suitors to the latter court. The Court Leet for Newton survived into the twentieth century, being held twice a year by the Dean and Canons of the Cathedral, with the help of a 'bait of a substantial dinner for the jurymen' after the close of business. An enquiry in 1851 reported that these sessions were 'renowned for good eating and drinking and loss of time to the jurors', and that 'it was notorious that though persons were regularly amerced (fined) in various sums, yet in no case had the Court further interfered to levy these fines, whether the evil has been remedied or not'.