Home / Topics / Henry Hichmough, Richard Washington, and a Windsor obligation, 1593

Henry Hichmough, Richard Washington, and a Windsor obligation, 1593

Primary Manuscript And Independent Control Ready evidence packet

Henry Hichmough and Richard Washington at Windsor, 1593

Finding

Royal Berkshire Archives D/EN/F6/1/3 is a sealed obligation from Henry Hichmough, yeoman of Windsor, to Richard Washington of Windsor.

The obligation is dated 6 December 1593 and acknowledges a debt of £9 13s. 4d, payable on demand. Hichmough calls Washington “my master.” Henry Neville is not named, and the document does not state why the money was owed.

The public catalogue exposes the nineteen-document parent file rather than a separate description for physical item /3. Its endpoint returned a temporary gateway error during the 2026 re-audit, so no item-level catalogue wording is silently supplied.

Primary-image control

The opening securely identifies:

“I Henry Hichmoughe of windsor in the county of Berks yeoman”

as indebted:

“unto my master Master Richard Washington of windsor aforesaid”

in the sum of £9 13s. 4d. The amount is repeated in a second hand at the foot as the “holle Som.” The date is clear. The subscribed name reads consistently with Henry Hichmoughe, but no independent signature exemplar was located; it is therefore not authenticated as Hichmough's autograph. The witness area is obscured.

The phrase “my master” establishes hierarchy but does not tell us whether Washington was an employer, household head, occupational superior, or former apprenticeship master.

Document type and limits

The wording follows the form of a simple bill obligatory: debt acknowledgment, creditor, sum, demand clause, and binding of the debtor and his representatives. William West's Symboleography provides a close contemporary precedent. West's separate form for money lent explicitly says that a loan occurred; Hichmough's document does not. The instrument proves debt, not its cause.

Nor does its archival location prove that Neville owned, assigned, or collected the debt. The public catalogue groups the item in a miscellaneous Neville file, but the photographed obligation contains no Neville name, assignment, receipt, or explanatory docket.

The £9 13s. 4d sum equals £9 plus two-thirds of a pound. It can also be expressed as 14½ marks or 29 nobles of 6s. 8d., but the manuscript uses none of those unit labels. The arithmetic is useful for account searching and must not be converted into an explanation of the debt.

Richard Washington

Tighe and Davis's Annals of Windsor, freshly checked against the page images, names Richard Washington among Windsor's aldermen or chief benchers in the 1604 charter. Its corporation-account extracts later record:

5 Jac. To Mr. Washington Maior for his fee this yeare ... 30 0 0

The Windsor Local History Group list assigns Richard Washington mayoralties in 1596, 1600, 1606, and 1613. The shared uncommon full name, Windsor residence, and later civic office make identification with the 1593 creditor highly probable. The obligation itself gives no civic office or trade, and the corporation-account line uses only the surname.

Subscription and Signature Status

The subscription area contains a Latin delivery formula, an obscured witness space, and a written name consistent with “Henry Hichmoughe.” Its initial, connected given-name sequence, surname shape, and terminal flourish are visible in the original-color image. A stain or tear crosses the terminal surname area.

The body independently names Henry Hichmoughe twice as the first-person obligor. That documentary naming evidence controls the party even though the subscription has no securely identified comparison exemplar. The proper status is:

Document names Henry Hichmough; subscribed name consistent; autograph hand

not independently authenticated.

It should not be described as a verified Hichmough autograph.

Why “my master” Matters—and What It Does Not Mean

The phrase records a relationship of acknowledged hierarchy. In this context it could describe household service, employment, apprenticeship or former apprenticeship, occupational supervision, or deferential usage. The bond gives no occupation for Washington and no service terms. “Master” must therefore remain relationship evidence, not an inferred job description.

Neville-File Provenance

Nothing on the photographed leaf assigns the debt to Henry Neville. Several routes could explain survival among Neville papers: later assignment, collection, estate administration, borough business, litigation evidence, or subsequent filing. None is written on the instrument. The absence of a legible historical verso docket makes this an open provenance problem, not evidence of Neville's participation in the original debt.

Safe formulation

In December 1593 Windsor yeoman Henry Hichmough acknowledged a debt of £9 13s. 4d to Richard Washington of Windsor, whom he called “my master.” Washington is probably the man who later served repeatedly as mayor of Windsor. The instrument neither explains the debt nor connects it directly to Henry Neville.

Research Program

  1. Search Windsor borough court, chamberlain, freedom, apprenticeship, and

    2. parish records for Henry Hichmough and spelling variants in 1593-1600.

  2. Search Washington's civic and private accounts for £9 13s. 4d, £9 13s. 4d

    3. expressed as 14½ marks, or a £10-scale transaction.

  3. Locate any counterpart, acquittance, assignment, or endorsed payment that

    4. states consideration and later ownership of the debt.

  4. Seek at least two independently identified Hichmough signatures before

    5. attempting autograph comparison.

  5. Reinspect the physical seal and obscured witness area under conservation

    6. lighting; the present photograph cannot recover those names.

Sources