CARLISLE, a market-town and port and city (ancient), having separate jurisdiction,
situated in the ward and county of CUMBERLAND, 302 miles (N. N. W.) from
London, on the great western road to Edinburgh and Glasgow,
containing 15,476 inhabitants. It was anciently
called Caer-Luil, or Caer-Leol, implying the city of Luil, a
British potentate, by whom it is stated to have been founded. The Romans,
on selecting it for a station, changed the name to Lugovallum,
which is probably derived from Lugus, or Lucus, a tower
or fort in the Celtic tongue, and vallum, in allusion to
Hadrian's vallum that passed near it. From its earliest
foundation till the union of the English and Scottish
kingdoms, it suffered those shocks of incursive warfare,
to which, as a border town, it was peculiarly exposedj
and by which it has been repeatedly overwhelmed. In
the reign of Nero it is stated by the Scottish historians
to have been burnt by the Caledonians, during the abr
sence of the Romans from the island, who in the time
of Agricola repaired it, and constructed fortifications as
a barrier against the future attacks of the invaders.
Soon after their final departure it was probably again
destroyed, for, in the seventh century, it was rebuilt by
Egfrid, King of Northumberland, in whose reign it rose
into importance. About the year 875, it was demolished
by the Danes, and lay in ruins till after the Norman conquest,
when it was restored by William Rufus, who, in
1092, built and garrisoned the castle, and sent a colony
from the south of England to inhabit the city, and
cultivate the neighbouring lands. The fortifications
were most probably completed by David, King of Scotland,
who in 1135 took possession of Carlisle, and resided
there for several years, the whole county having
been subsequently ceded to him by Stephen: ,the Scottish
historians attribute the building of the castle and
the heightening of the walls to this monarch. After
the disastrous battle of the Standard, in 1138, this city
was the sanctuary of David, who in 1150 conferred
the honour of knighthood upon Prince Henry, son of
the Empress Matilda, and afterwards Henry II., with
whom and the Earl of Chester he formed an alliance
against Stephen. The counties of Cumberland and
Northumberland having been given to Henry II, in
1157, by Malcolm IV., Carlisle was besieged in 1173, by
William the Lion, brother and successor to Malcolm, by
whom the garrison was reduced to the greatest distress,
from which it was relieved by his capture at Alnwick:
the city was afterwards taken by his successor, Alexander,
but was surrendered to the English in 1217. In
1292, a great part of it was destroyed by a conflagration,
originating in the vindictive malice of an incendiary,
who set fire to his father's house: the priory, the
convent of the Grey friars, and the church, were all
consumed; the convent of the Black friars alone escaped.
The public records and charters being thus destroyed,
the city was taken into the king's hands, and the government
was vested in justices of assize. After the battle
of Falkirk, in 1298, Edward I. marched with his army
to. Carlisle, where he held a parliament; in 1306, he
appointed here a general rendezvous of the forces destined
against Scotland, under Prince Edward; and the year
following, after celebrating his birthday at Carlisle, in
the last stage of a decline, he reached Burgh on the
Sands, where he died on the 7th of July, 1307. In 1315,
Carlisle was besieged by Robert Bruce, who had been
prowned King of Scotland, but was resolutely defended
by its governor, Andrew de Hercla, afterwards Earl of
Carlisle, who, in the year 1322, being accused of holding
a treasonable correspondence with the Scots, was arrested
by'Lord Lucy, in the castle of which he was
governor, degraded from his honours, and executed.
The Scots, in 1337, laid siege to the city, and fired the
suburbs; and the former, in 1345, was burnt by them,
under the command of Sir William Douglas. In 1352,
Edward III., in consequence of the importance of Carlisle
as a frontier town, and of the many calamities it had
suffered, renewed its charter, which had been destroyed
in the conflagration of 1292. In 1380, a party of borderers
invested the city, and fired one of the streets;
and in 1385, an unsuccessful effort was made to capture
it. In 1461, Carlisle was attacked by a Scottish army
in the interest of Henry VI., who burnt the suburbs:
this is the only event respecting it that occurred during
the war between the houses of York and Lancaster.
During Aske's insurrection it was besieged, in 1537, by
a. party of eight thousand rebels under Nicholas Musgrave
and others, but without effect; the leading insurgents,
except Musgrave, were apprehended, and, together
with about seventy others, executed on the city
wall. In 1568, Mary, Queen of Scots, in the hope of
finding an asylum from the hostility of her subjects,
took fatal refuge in the castle; and in 1596, Sir William
Scott, afterwards Earl of Buccleuch, attacking that
fortress before day-break, to rescue a noted borderer,
celebrated in the ballads of those times as "Kinmont
Willie" effected a breach, and triumphantly bore him
away. In the following year the city was visited by a
destructive pestilence, that destroyed more than onethird
of the population.
On the union of the two kingdoms, and the accession
of James to the English throne, the importance
of Carlisle as a frontier town having ceased, the garrison
was reduced. At the commencement of the civil
war in the reign of Charles I., the citizens embraced
the royal cause; and the city being besieged by the
parliamentarian army under General Leslie, after a
vigorous resistance, and incredible hardships on the
part of the inhabitants, it was surrendered upon honourable
terms: during this siege, a coinage of one
shilling and three shilling pieces was issued from the
castle, which, though very scarce, are still to be met
with in the cabinets of the curious. In 1648, the city
was retaken by Sir Philip Musgrave, for the royalists,
who entrusted it to the custody of the Duke of Hamilton,
by whom it was garrisoned with Scottish troops;
at the close of the war it was surrendered by treaty to
Cromwell. A dreadful famine, in 1650, caused by the
consumption of the garrison, compelled the inhabitants
to petition parliament for assistance; more than thirty
thousand persons are said to have been destitute of
bread and of money to purchase seed. The celebrated
George Fox, founder of the Society of Friends, was imprisoned
in the dungeons of the castle in 1653, on account
of his religious tenets. During the rebellion in
1745-, the young Pretender laid siege to Carlisle, which,
from the weakness of its garrison, surrendered in three
days, when the mayor and corporation, on their knees,
presented to him the keys of the city, and proclaimed
his  father king, and himself regent, with all due solemnity.
On the approach of the Duke of Cumberland,
the Pretender retreated, leaving four hundred men in
the garrison, who, unable to sustain a siege, surrendered
on condition, of being reserved for the king's pleasure;
the officers were sent to London, where, having suffered
death as traitors, their heads were sent down and
exposed in the public places of the city. Cappock,
whom the Pretender had created Bishop of Carlisle, was
hanged, drawn, and quartered, and nine others, concerned
in the rebellion, were executed in the city. The
castle is situated at the north-west angle of the city, on
the summit of a.steep acclivity overlooking the Eden: it
is of an irregular form, and consists of an outer and an
inner ward; the former, two sides of which are formed
by part of the city walls, is quadrangular, and contains
no buildings of importance, except an armoury, in which
ten thousand stand of arms were formerly deposited,
and which is now converted into barracks for the infantry
of the garrison, the cavalry being quartered on the
innkeepers. The inner ward is triangular, and contains
the keep, or dungeon tower, into which the armoury has
been lately removed; it is square, and of great strength,
having a circular archway leading from the outer into the
inner ward, and is, no doubt, that part of the castle
built by William Rufus. The other parts are evidently of
later date, and correspond with the times of Richard III.,
Henry VIII., and Elizabeth, by all of whom it was
partly rebuilt and repaired: a great part of the buildings
erected by Elizabeth has been taken town. It is
the head of the ancient royal manor of the soccage of
Carlisle, which includes part of the city, and five hundred
acres of land in its immediate vicinity.
Carlisle is pleasantly situated on a gradual eminence
at the confluence of the rivers Eden and Caldew, which,
with the Petterel, almost environ it. The four principal
streets diverge from the market-place, and have several
minor ones branching from them; they are well paved,
and lighted with gas by a company formed pursuant to
an act obtained in 1819, who have erected works at an
expense of £10,000; the houses in general are handsome
and well built, and the inhabitants have it in contemplation
to conduct water into, their houses by means
of pipes leading from the new prison, where there is a
capacious reservoir, into which it is raised from the river
Caldew by a tread-wheel. In 1827, a police act, for
watching, regulating, and improving the city and its
suburbs, was obtained, ordaining the appointment of
fifty commissioners once in three years, in addition to
the higher civil and ecclesiastical authorities, whereby
a police establishment has been formed: the magistrates
attend at the police-office as occasion requires. A very
handsome bridge of white freestone was erected over
the Eden, in 1812, from a design by R. Smirke, jun.,
at an expense to the county of about £70,000; it consists
of five elliptical arches, and is connected with the
town by an arched causeway: two stone bridges, of one
arch each, were built over the Caldew, on the west side
of the city, in 1820; and a bridge of three arches over
the Petterel, about a mile from the town, is now being
erected. The environs abound with genteel residences:
the view embraces the course of the river Eden, as
it winds through a fertile and well cultivated tract of
country. In 1818 and 1819, a subscription was'begun
for the relief of the poor, who by this means were employed
in completing and forming various walks near
the town; the most interesting of these is the promenade
on the slope and summit of the hill on which the
castle stands, a terrace-walk on the opposite bank of the
Eden, and a raised walk along the south margin of that
river. A subscription library was established here in
the year 1768, and a news-room has also lately been
added to it: in January 1830, some ground was purchased
opposite the Bush Inn, for the erection of a new
subscription library and news-room, the foundations of
which were soon afterwards laid. A commercial newsroom
was opened in the year 1825; and an academy of
arts, for the encouragement of native and other artists
in sculpture, painting, modelling, &c., was instituted in
the year 1823, in which annual exhibitions are held: a
mechanics' institution was formed in the year 1824.
The theatre, which is a building possessing no claim to
architectural notice, was erected about fourteen years
since; it is constantly open during the races, and at
other times. The races were first established here
about the middle of the last century, and the first
King's plate was given in the year 1763; they continue
so be held annually in the autumn upon a fine
course called the Swifts, which is situated on the
south side of the Eden, and they are generally very
numerously and respectably attended.
The trade principally consists in the manufacture of
cotton goods and ginghams for the West India market,
in which upwards of one thousand looms are employed
in the town, and a greater number in the adjacent villages:
there are ten gingham and check manufactories;
nine cotton-spinning factories, employing eighty thousand
spindles; a small mill for weaving calicoes; a carpet-
manufactory; several hat-manufactories; three ironfoundries;
four tan-yards; and four breweries: there are
also several fisheries on the river Eden, for the regulation
of which an act of parliament was passed in 1804.
In 1819, a canal was begun from Carlisle to the Solway
Frith at Bowness, a distance of eleven miles, and finished
in 1823, at an expense of about £90,000, by means
of which vessels of small burden can come up to the
town. The number of vessels belonging to the port,
in 1829, was forty, averaging sixty-seven tons' burden;
these are chiefly employed in supplying the city and the
neighbourhood with iron, slate, salt, and other merchandise,
and in conveying grain, oak-bark, alabaster, freestone,
lead, staves, &c., and other produce of the place,
to different towns on the coast. A rail-road from Carlisle
to Newcastle is about to be formed, the expense of
which is estimated at £260,000. The market days are
Wednesday and Saturday: fairs for cattle and horses
are. held on August 26th and September 19th; during
their continuance all persons are free from arrest in
the city. There are also fairs, or great markets, oh
the Saturday after Old Michaelmas-day, and on every
Saturday following till Christmas; these fairs are held
on the sands, near the bridge across the Eden. In
April there is a great show-fair for cattle, when prizes
are distributed by the Agricultural Society. The Saturdays
at Whitsuntide and Martinmas are great hiring
days for servants.
This city received its first charter from Richard I.; it
was renewed by Edward III., and confirmed by Charles I.
in 1637. The government is vested in a mayor, recorder,
two bailiffs, or sheriffs, twelve aldermen, and
twenty-four common council-men, assisted by a chamberlain,
two coroners, a town-clerk, a sword-bearer, three
Serjeants at mace, and subordinate officers. The mayor
is elected annually from among the aldermen, by a majority
of the mayor, aldermen, bailiffs, and common
council-men, on the Monday after Michaelmas-day, when
the bailiffs and coroners are also chosen in like manner:
the aldermen are chosen from the common council-men,
by the mayor and aldermen; and vacancies in the common
council are filled up from the freemen, by the court
of aldermen. The mayor, recorder, and two senior
aldermen are justices of the peace within the city, and
hold a court of session quarterly for the trial of all but
capital offenders; the mayor and bailiffs also hold a
court of record every Monday, for the recovery of debts
to any amount, and have the power of issuing process
to hold to bail in actions for debt. A court is also held
weekly on Monday, at which the mayor presides, for
the recovery of debts under 40s. These courts are held
in the town-hall, an inconsiderable structure in. the
centre of the town, near which are the moot-hall and
council-chamber. There are eight fraternities, or companies,
viz., Grocers, Tanners, Skinners, Butchers, Smiths,
Weavers, Tailors, and Shoemakers, who have each their
public room, all in the same building, called guilds;
where they hold a general meeting annually on Ascension-
day. The freedom of the city is inherited by birth,
and acquired by an apprenticeship of seven years to a
resident freeman, and by gift from the corporation. The
assizes for the county are held regularly, and the Easter
and Midsummer quarter sessions (the remaining two
being held at Cockermouth and Penrith) take place in
the new court-houses, erected in 1810 by act of parliament,
at an expense of £100,000, from a design by Robert
Smirke, jun., on the site of the ancient citadel that
flanked the eastern gate: they consist of two large circular
towers, one on each side of the entrance into
the city, in the decorated style of English architecture,
and contain two court-rooms, with apartments for the
grand jury, counsel, and witnesses: one is appropriated
to the Crown, and the other to the Nisi Prius bar. From
the former is a subterraneous passage to the county
gaol and house of correction, a noble building completed
under the same act, in 1827, on the site of the ancient
convent of the Black friars, at an expense of £42,000,
and surrounded by a stone wall twenty-five feet high.
The borough first exercised the elective franchise in the
23rd of Edward I., since which time it has regularly
returned two members to parliament: the right of election
is vested in the free burgesses who have been previously
admitted members of one of the eight fraternities,
whether resident or not, the number of whom is
about one thousand; the mayor is the returning officer.
The diocese of Carlisle originally formed part of the
diocese of Lindisfarn; but the see being removed from
that place to Durham, and considerable inconvenience
being felt from the distance of Carlisle from that city,
Henry I., in 1133, constituted it a distinct bishoprick,
and appointed to the episcopal chair Athelwald
his confessor, who was prior of a monastery of Augustine canons, founded here in
the reign of William Rufus, by Walter, a Norman priest,
and'completed and endowed by this monarch. It comprises
the whole of Cumberland, except the ward of
Allerdale above Devwent, which, forms part of the diocese
of Chester, and the parish of Alston, which is in
the diocese of Durham; and the county of Westmorland,
except the barony of Kendal, which also forms
part of the diocese of Chester; and contains one hundred
and two parishes, throughout the whole of which
the bishop, or his chancellor, exercises sole ecclesiastical
jurisdiction, the powers of the archdeacon having
been anciently resigned to him for an annual pension,
in consequence of the smallness of the diocese
rendering their concurrent jurisdiction. inconvenient.
The revenue of the priory, in the 26th of Henry VIII.,
was estimated at £482. 8. 1. This monarch dissolved
the monastic establishment in 1540, and instituted a
dean and chapter, composed of a dean, four prebendaries,
and eight minor canons, and endowed this body
with the whole, or the greater part, of the possessions
of the dissolved priory, constituting the bishop, by the
same charter, visitor of the chapter; he also appointed
a subdeacon, four lay clerks, a grammar master, six
choristers, a master of the choristers, and inferior officers.
The advowson of the prebends has, since 1557,
belonged to the bishop, who also has the patronage of
the archdeaconry; the deanery is in the gift of the
Crown.
The cathedral, dedicated to St. Mary, is a venerable
structure, exhibiting different styles of architecture:
it was originally cruciform, but the western part
was taken down, to furnish materials for the erection
of a guard-house, in 1641; and during the interregnum,
part of the nave and the conventual buildings
was also pulled down for repairing the walls and the
citadel; it has a square embattled central tower, and
the east end is decorated with pinnacles rising above
the roof. It consists of a choir, north and south transepts,
and two remaining arches of the nave, walled in
at the west end and used as a parish church: the choir
is in the decorated style of English architecture, with
large clustered columns enriched with foliage, and
pointed arches with a variety of mouldings; the clerestory
windows in the upper part are filled with rich
tracery, and the east end has a lofty window of nine
lights, of exquisite workmanship, abounding in elegance
of composition, and harmony .of arrangement, which
render it superior to any in the kingdom; the aisles are
in the early English style, with sharply-pointed windows
and slender-shafted pillars; the remaining portion of
the nave and the south transept are of Norman architecture,
having large -massive, columns and circular
arches, being evidently the part built in the reign of
William Rufus. There are monuments to the memory
of some of the bishops, and one recently erected to that
of Archdeacon Paley, who wrote some of his works
whilst resident in this city, and who, with his two wives,
was buried in the cathedral.
Carlisle stands within the two parishes of St. Mary
and St. Cuthbert, both in the diocese, and locally in
the archdeaconry, of Carlisle. St. Mary's includes the
townships of Abbey-street, Castle-street, Fisher-street,
Scotch-street, Caldew - gate, Ricker-gate, and Cummersdale;
also the chapelry of Wreay, which is without
the city, and in Cumberland ward. St. Cuthbert's
includes the townships of Botchard-gate, Botchardby,
Brisco, and English-street, within the city; and the
townships of High Blackwell, Low Blackwell, Carleton,
Harraby, and Upperby, without the city, and in. Cumberland
ward. The parochial church of St. Mary is part
of the nave of the cathedral: the living is a pe.rpetual
curacy, endowed with £200 private benefaction, £600
royal bounty, and £1000 parliamentary grant, and in
the patronage of the Dean and Chapter. The church,
dedicated to St. Cuthbert, Bishop of Lindisfarn, is a
plain edifice, rebuilt in the year 1778, at the expense of
the inhabitants, upon the site of the ancient structure:
the living is a perpetual curacy, endowed with £600
private benefaction, £1200 royal bounty, and £1000
parliamentary grant, and in the 'patronage of the Dean
and Chapter. Two new churches, or chapels of ease,
were completed in September 1S30, at an expense of
£13,212. 0. 10., of which. £4030 was subscribed by
the inhabitants, and the remainder granted by the. parliamentary
commissioners: the first stone of each was
laid on September 26th, 1828; they are in the early style
of English architecture, each having a tower surmounted
by a spire. There are' meeting-houses for Baptists,
the Society of Friends, Independents, Wesleyan Methodists,
and Presbyterians, besides a Roman Catholic chapel.
The grammar school was founded by Henry VIII.,
on instituting the dean and chapter; the endowment is
£190 per annum, of which the dean and chapter and
the mayor and corporation contribute each £20 per,
annum; the remainder arises from an estate in the
parish of Addingham, purchased in 1702, with a gift
of £500 by Dr. Smyth, a former bishop: the management
is vested in the Dean and Chapter. Dr. Thomas^
Bishop of Rochester, left £1000 stock, directing the dividends
to be applied to the benefit of two sons of clergymen,
instructed here, and sent to Queen's College,
Oxford. Dr. Thomas, Dr. Tully, and the Rev. J. D.
Carlyle, a learned orientalist, received the rudiments of
their education here; the last is interred in the church
of St. Cuthbert. The. girls' charity school, founded ia
1717, is endowed with lands purchased with a donation
of £40, by Mr. Nicholas Robinson, in 1719, and one
of £320 by Mr. Samuel Howe, in 1722: the dean and
chapter contribute £5, and the corporation £2 annually.
A Lancasterian school was instituted in 1813.,
and a National school in 1817: a female infant school
was established in 1806. St. Patrick's day and Sunday
school, for the instruction of children of all religious
denominations, was erected in 1826, and is supported
by subscription. Near the English gate are some
almshouses for decayed freemen, or their widows. The
dispensary, established in 1782 j and the house of recovery
from fever, erected in 1820, are supported by
voluntary subscription. A savings bank was opened in
1818; and a general infirmary for the whole county is
about to be erected: there are various benevolent societies
and charitable donations. Near the city was an
hospital, dedicated to St. Nicholas, founded prior to the
21st of Edward I., for thirteen leprous persons, which,
at the dissolution, was assigned toward the endowment
of the dean and chapter. In the city walls, near the
castle, an ancient vaulted chamber, having a recess at
each end, and accessible only by an opening through the
wall, has been lately discovered; it is supposed to have
been a reservoir, or fountain, in the time of the Romans.
In the reign of "William III., a Roman Triclinium
with an arched roof still existed, and, from an
inscription on its front which Camden read "Marti
Victori" is supposed to have been a temple in honour
of Mars. A large altar was lately found, inscribed Deo
Marti Belatucardro; and, a few years since, a Prefericulum,
ten inches and a quarter high, having the handles
ornamented in has relief with figures sacrificing:
the latter is now in the British Museum. In the castle
yard is a has relief of two figures hooded and mantled.
Carlisle confers the title of earl on the family
of Howard.