PENRYN, a borough and market-town and chapelry,
having separate jurisdiction,
though locally in
the parish of Gluvias, hundred
of KERRIER, county of
CORNWALL, 2 miles (N.W.)
from Falmouth, and 266
(W. S. W.) from London,
containing 2933 inhabitants.
The manors of Pen-
ryn-Borough and Penryn-
Foreign have belonged from
time immemorial to the Bishops of Exeter, who had formerly
a country-house at or near this place. In the thirteenth
century, Bishop Stapleden founded a college here
for twelve prebendaries, the revenue of which, at the
dissolution, was valued at £205.10. 6.: the building is
said to have occupied an area of three acres, and to have
been surrounded by embattled walls. During the great
civil war, Penryn was garrisoned for the king, but was
surrendered to Sir Thomas Fairfax, in March 1646. The
town is large, and pleasantly situated on the declivity
of a hill, at the head of an inlet communicating with
Falmouth harbour, of which it commands a fine view.
It consists principally of one street, from which others
diverge at right angles, not lighted, and roughly paved;
the inhabitants are supplied with water from streams
which issue from the adjacent eminences, one of which
forms a cascade, and the scene, diversified with mills and
cottages, presents a scene of picturesque beauty. The
adjacent country is highly cultivated, and interspersed
with elegant mansions. In addition to the general trade
of the town, great quantities of granite, supplied by the
neighbouring quarries, are shipped here, for London and
elsewhere. The manufactures consist of paper, woollen
cloth, gunpowder, and arsenic, and paint is made in great
quantities by the " Cornish Colour Company:" cornmills
and breweries afford employment to several persons;
and there are spacious warehouses, generally well
filled with flour and grain from the Isle of Wight and
Hampshire, this being considered the granary for the
south-eastern part of the county. A market and fair
were granted, in 1258, by the Bishop of Exeter, and a
fair on the festival of St.Vitalis, in 1312; the present
market is on Saturday, for meat, fish, poultry, and vegetables;
and cattle fairs are held on Wednesday after
March 6th, May 12th, July 7th, October 8th, and December
21st.
Penryn is a borough by prescription, and was incorporated
in the 18th of James I.: it is governed by
a mayor, eleven more aldermen, and twelve common
council-men, with a recorder, steward, town clerk, and
inferior officers. The mayor, commonly styled portreeve,
is chosen at the manorial court; the town clerk
is appointed by the recorder; and the remaining officers
are elected by a majority of that body. The mayor,
recorder, deputy recorder, and justice (who is the mayor
for the preceding year), are magistrates for the borough,
exercising concurrent jurisdiction with the county magistrates,
and holding a court of session quarterly. A
court of record for the manor of Penryn-Foreign is held
for pleas to any amount, at which the steward of the
manor presides. The borough first regularly sent representatives
to parliament in the reign of Mary, but
is said to have returned once in the reign of Edward VI.:
the right of election is in the inhabitants paying scot
and lot, in number about one hundred and forty: the
mayor is the returning officer; and the influence of
Lord de Dunstanville is predominant. The living is a
perpetual curacy, with the vicarage of Gluvias, within
the peculiar jurisdiction of the Bishop of Exeter. The
chapel, dedicated to St. Mary Magdalene, has received
an addition of one hundred and forty free sittings, to
which the Incorporated Society for the enlargement of
churches and chapels contributed £85. There are places
of worship for Bryanites, Independents, and Calvinistic
and Wesleyan Methodists. A grammar school was
founded by Elizabeth for the education of three boys,
and endowed with a rent-charge of £6. 13. 4., which is
for the present discontinued. In 1758, John Verran
bequeathed £1000, which sum was laid out in the three
per cents., for the support of eight poor men, or women,
who have never received public relief, and other purposes.
James Humphry, Esq., in 1823, bequeathed
£3000, directing the sum to be invested also in the
three per cent, consols., and the dividends to be appropriated,
first, to the payment of certain annuities, and,
on the death of the annuitants, the whole to be given, in
sums of £10 per annum each, to inhabitants in reduced
circumstances, not receiving any other charitable relief.