‘Where’s my grandfather’s name?’ ledger showing all the freemen of the borough is hidden away in safe
When Ena Naghi was taking a tour of Maidstone Town Hall she was shown a wooden board on in the council chamber listing the freemen of the borough.
It records the names of eminent figures from the town’s past such as Fiennes Cornwallis, a former MP for Maidstone and later the 1st Baron Cornwallis.
There’s also William Haynes, from the family who founded Haynes Bros in the town, and George Marsham, who was the chairman of Kent County Council for 10 years.
George Foster Clark – whose Maidstone food factory has featured many times in these pages – is there as is, of course, Garrard Tyrwhitt-Drake, the owner of Maidstone Zoo and oft-times mayor of Maidstone.
“But where’s my grandfather’s name?” asked Mrs Naghi.
She was right, her grandfather, Alfred Baker, was not on the list even though she knew he had been a freeman.
Mrs Naghi’s son, Dave, who is a Maidstone borough councillor, decided to delve into the matter for her – and uncovered a forgotten strand in the borough’s history.
In modern times, the council has occasionally bestowed the title of freeman of the borough, Hidden away in a safe in the Town Hall there is a second book – the Freeman’s Roll. It records those who earned their freedom by apprenticeship or who inherited it through their father.
The current ledger was started in 1835, although clearly earlier records were transferred to it because the very first entry is for Alexander Thomas who gained his freedom in 1772.
Alongside each name is entered either “servitude” – meaning they completed an apprenticeship, or “birth” on those it feels have done the town a significant service.
In recent years, that included Ann Widdecombe MP and Jimmy Corbin DFC, then one of the last surviving RAF pilots to have fought in the Battle of Britain.
The title now is ceremonial, but historically it had a real meaning they were the children of a freeman.
Sure enough, Mrs Naghi’s grandfather is there by “birth”.
Her first direct ancestor in the roll is in fact Thomas George Baker, who served his apprenticeship and was made a freeman in 1838.
His two sons, another Thomas George Baker and Alfred Spencer Baker became freemen in their turn in 1868 and 1870 respectively.
Alfred Spencer Baker had two sons who became freemen by birth: yet another Thomas significance. Before 1832, when the Reform Act gave the vote to all men who owned property in the constituency worth £10, the only people entitled to vote in elections were the freemen of the town.
The term has much earlier origins: it meant the freedom from serfdom of medieval times. George Baker in 1904, and Mrs Naghi’s grandfather, Alfred John Baker, who lived in Queen’s Road, Maidstone, also in 1904.
One of Alfred’s brothers, Charles Baker, produced two further generations of freeman for the family, with the last being Christopher Charles Baker, Mrs Naghi’s second cousin, who was made a freeman in 1968.
It wasn’t until 1961 that Dorothy Relf, who had been mayor of Maidstone in 1952, was the first woman to become an honorary freeman.
There were three ways to become a freeman of the borough.
They were to serve an apprenticeship to a craftsman who was already himself a freeman, to inherit the freedom, because your father was a freeman and up until 1771 it was also possible to buy your freedom at a cost of £15 (a huge sum in those days).
The board in Maidstone’s council chamber charts only the honorary freemen – those whom the council has chosen to bestow with the honour.
Their names are also recorded in a ledger entitled The Roll Of Honorary Freeman.