towards the purchase of the Workhouse ground, and that tenders be invited for a sixty years' lease for the two pieces of the Workhouse land for building thereon, the erections not to exceed three storeys, including basements - Hence the dwarfed appearance of those houses and shops opposite to York Buildings, even at this time (1897). The three lots were sold - so it was understood - to Peter Banks, Thomas Nelson and Edward Honess, the price of each lot being £14 15s. and the leases ordered to be prepared at once. An engine-house was also permitted to be built on a piece of the Workhouse yard for which the Corporation was to pay 1s. a year.
On the sea-front of this ground was Denmark Place, and a complaint was made to the Corporation that the taking of beach from the mouth of the Priory Water was endangering the houses. It was therefore ordered that Messrs. Ransom, Prior and Gallop see that the waggons remove the beach from a spot where no harm would accrue.
On the 5th of April, Robt. Ranking, a surgeon and a freeman was called to the magistrates' Bench to serve as a jurat, for the honour of which he paid a sum of 40s. In the following year he was chosen Mayor. He also in 1836 took the office a second time, in the place of solicitor W. Thorpe, who had been declared a bankrupt. Later in the yer, the Corporation ordered to be written on the minutes the followingMr Crouch had been Mayor in 1817, 1819, 1821, 1823 (when he laid the first stone of the High-street Town-hall and Market), 1825, 1827, 1829 and 1831; altogether eight time. He, like Mr. Ranking, was a surgeon by profession. At the same meeting that Mr. Ranking was made a jurat, a letter was received from Messrs. Shipdeen and Stringer (solicitors to the Cinque Ports) requesting the interference of the Corporation at the House of Commons in relation to a Bill of the Commissioners of Sewers, containing clauses which would impinge on the ancient jurisdiction and liberties of the Ports. The action taken on this communication was a petition against such clauses, presented by the town's representatives, Messrs. North and Warne. As a detailed account of the Reform Banquet, and festivities of 1832, appears in Chapter VII under the heading of St. Leonards, it will not, of course, be repeated here - but as the money collected for the purpose did not quite meet the expenses, it was ordered by the Corporation on the 2nd of August that £25 be paid by the Chamberlain to make up the deficiency. In the same chapter, reasons are given for recording the joyous event under the head of St. Leonards, rather than thatMemorandum, that on the 22nd of October 1832, at 11 p.m. Charles Steevens Crouch, Esq., one of the jurats, departed this life at 53 years of age, universally respected.
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