Cloth Seal, Searcher, Named, William Dyson

Cloth Seal, Searcher, William Dyson, Image & Found by Mark Didlick.

W(ILLIAM)? / DYSO(N) / 458 // 24 5? / 28

A searchers seal for Yorkshire narrow wollen cloth (see below).

From Paul Cannon, "The surname clearly reads DYSO[..] and I guess a good candidate is Dyson. The first name is much more difficult to read. At first I thought I could make out [..]SH[..]. Based on the following I wondered if the name was Joshua Dyson. One Joshua Dyson gave evidence to a Select Committee recorded in ‘Report from the Select Committee on the Laws Relating to the Stamping of Woollen Cloth’ contained in Parliamentary Papers’ Vol 6 (1821). Joshua Dyson gave his evidence on 5 April 1821. See Parliamentary Papers, Volume 6, H.M. Stationery Office, 1821, p 37 onwards. Joshua Dyson states that he was a cloth miller ie involved in the fulling of cloth; that he worked in Mr Patterson’s mill in Southowrum, Halifax and had worked as a cloth miller for 40 years. In his evidence to the committee he is asked, “It was your duty to measure all this cloth?” to which he answers ‘yes’. Further he states that he is not a sworn searcher. I then noticed that in Law’s table of cloth searchers appointed in 1738 there was a William Dyson. He was responsible for 4 mills on Marsden Beck and was paid £14 annually for his work. On closely looking at the Dyson seal I think I can just make out a W at the beginning of the first name and maybe with the eye of faith the rest of the first part of William. It will take a better preserved example to be sure what the name is for certain."

See also BSG.CS.00318 and BSG.CS.00963.