David HUGHES (c. 1530-Feb 1610; buried Woodrising 14 Feb 1609 [=1610!!]),
Estate Manager to Sir Robert Southwell was, as a lad of 16 in Ynys Mon (Isle
of Angelesey), employed by a farmer from Whinburgh, Norfolk who came to
Angelsey to buy cattle, to drove them to Norfolk. That is around 1546 !!!!
The cattle had to SWIM across the Menai Strait and were then walked to
Norfolk by David.
David HUGHES had been taught to read and write English by his (previously
aristocratic) mother, and at the end of the drove sought employment in
Norfolk. It seems he must have found as employer one of Sir Robert
Southwell's tenants, because he was soon in Sir Robert's employ (Sir Robert
was Henry VIII's visitor for the dissolution of the monasteries in Norfolk
and squire of Woodrising Estate) and eventually became estate manager and
died a rich man, endowing the Grammar School in his home town of Beaumaris,
Ynys Mon (from whom I received this information - and for whom I checked the
burial record of David HUGHES in the Woodrising Parish Register):
1609 David Hughes, gent. 14th February 1609 [1610 in the modern calendar]
I must complete the story by telling how I came across it: We keep the key
of Woodrising church - and one day, a few years ago (in Septmber 1996) , I saw a brand new coach from Wales parked by the village green and thought we must have a visiting
party. It turned out to be an empty, brand-new coach from Wales (its party
of passengers spending the day looking around Norwich), whose driver had
been asked by his father, on behalf of Beaumaris Grammar School, to see, if
he had time, if he could find the site of David HUGHES' burial. (According
to his will he had asked to be buried in Woodrising church near the grave of
his master). We could not find the grave - but I subsequently found the
burial record at NRO and the rest of the story came out in later
correspondance. And that's what really started me on transcribing
information about the village - and led to my present web-site on
Norfolk......
My interest in the article was not least because I am interested in both local history and genealogy and in agricultural history - and David Hughes came to these parts droving cattle - the earliest documentary evidence I have encountered of cattle droving to Norfolk, which was for long an area for fattening cattle (mainly from the Highlands of Scotland) for Smithfield Market in London - and this reference is to 1546...