NESTLING in a lovely valley in the most romantic part of Cleveland lies the little town of Guisborough, with the mouldering ruins of its once famous Priory. At the time of the Conquest it consisted of three manors, which were given to the Earl of Moreton, and soon after, united into one manor, passed to Robert de Brus, Lord of Skelton, to hold in capite, by military service. In the year 1129 he founded the Priory of Canons of the Augustine order, and endowed it with a manor of twenty caracutes and two oxgangs, with the tenements, mill, and all other appurtenances. It flourished apace, grew rich, and nurtured some learned and eminent men within its cloisters, until it fell beneath the ruthless axe of Henry VIII.

The Chaloners of Guisborough are of Welsh descent, tracing their ancestry to Trayhayrne, son of Maloc Krwm, one of the fifteen peers of Wales. His grandson, Madoc, otherwise Chaloner, was ancestor of Thomas Chaloner, of Beaumaris, one of whose sons was Roger Chaloner, a citizen and silk mercer of London, whose son, Sir Thomas, Knight (born 1521), was eminent as a statesman, diplomatist, and poet; was employed on several embassies; was knighted at the battle of Pinkie for bravery; and was author of several esteemed works—"The Praise of Folly," "De Republica Anglorum," and many others. He purchased the manor of Guisborough of Sir Thomas Legh, to whom it had been granted at the Dissolution, for the sum of £998 13s. 4d.

His portrait was painted by Holbein and by Antonio More, the former engraved by Holler, the latter exhibited at Leeds in 1868.

Sir Thomas, Knight, his son (born 1559, died 1615), succeeded to the Guisborough estates, and was the discoverer of the alum mines. He was twice married, and had issue several children, of whom the eldest—William—was created baronet in 1620, by the title of Sir William Chaloner, Bart., of Guisborough, in the county of York; Rev. Edward, d.d., an eminent polemical writer; and Thomas and James, Parliamentarian officers and regicides. At college he gained some reputation by his Latin and English verses, but was not equal to his father as a poet. He was, however, a good naturalist, at the time when the science was little understood and less studied. In 1580-84, he made le grand tour, and spent some time in Italy, where he associated with all the most eminent literary and scientific men of the day.

Being a keen observer of natural objects and phenomena, he had noticed that on a certain part of his Guisborough estate the soil never froze, that it was speckled with divers colours, chiefly yellow and blue, which sparkled in the sunshine, and that the trees and shrubs which grew thereon spread their roots laterally, and penetrated the earth very superficially, and that their leaves were of a peculiar tint of green. When in Rome he paid a visit to the Pope's alum works at Puzzeoli, where he noticed with his quick, observant eye that the earth and trees presented the same remarkable features as those on his Guisborough estate, and he immediately came to the conclusion that his land was impregnated with alum. He hastened back to England to test his hypothesis, which he soon verified by experiment, and saw that a mine of wealth lay beneath his feet. But how to work and prepare it he knew not, and there was no one in England who did, and scarcely any one in Europe, outside of Italy, which then had a monopoly of alum, and he set his wits to work to devise some means for separating it from the earth, and preparing it as a manufactured commodity for the market.

Alum is a mineral salt found in clay and other earths, and is a valuable commodity used in various manufactures, and for other purposes. It was first extracted from the earth in which it was embedded, and prepared for use in the East, chiefly at Edessa, in Syria; afterwards near Constantinople; and, on the fall of the Eastern Empire, the alum workers transferred the industry to Italy where it was established in various places, and was confined to the Peninsula for more than a century, after which it spread into Germany, France, and Flanders. The Popes had works at Rome and Civita Vecchia, and carefully guarded their secret, not allowing the workmen to leave the country on any pretence whatever, under pain of excommunication, as the profits of the sale brought a handsome revenue to their coffers.

Sir Thomas Chaloner cogitated the matter in his mind, and the more he thought, the more he saw that the only mode of bringing his alum mines into operation was by kidnapping some of the Pope's workmen, a difficult and perilous task, but which he resolved to attempt, and with that view went again to Italy. Of course the best place for accomplishing his object was at Civita Vecchia, a seaport in the Papal States. Thither, therefore, he went, and lived in retirement, eluding observation as far as possible, but mingling, whenever he could, with the alum workers, ingratiating himself with them by means of wine, friendly and familiar converse, and the judicious distribution of money. By these means he became acquainted with their characters, and with their hopes and aspirations. Three of the more intelligent he singled out to work upon, but each one separately. He would take them into a wine-house and ply them well with the tongue-loosener, and then turn the conversation upon their occupation and future prospects. Of the three, one seemed to have some influence over the other two, who, to a certain extent, took their opinions from him, and re-echoed his sentiments; and Sir Thomas shrewdly perceived that if he could win over this one, the others would follow, like sheep after the bell-wether. They were seated in a wine shop one day, talking over the alum workers' great grievance. "And so," said Sir Thomas, "you would really like to escape from this life of slavery?" "I should, indeed," was the reply; "work here is neither better nor worse than that of a galley-slave." "Why not escape, then, and fling off the chains that gall you?" "Alas, sir," he replied, "we are too closely guarded and watched to render escape at all hopeful. Besides, money would be required, and of this we have but sufficient to get our daily bread." "But if anyone were to put the means of escape in your hands, would you be sufficiently daring to make the attempt?" "Most certainly." "And you would not fear the Pope's excommunication, which would assuredly follow?" "Look here, signor, although I am a poor ignorant alum worker, I know something of what has been doing in England and Germany, and have heard of Wickcliffe, Luther, and Calvin, and I should care no more for excommunication at the hands of the Pope than I should for a snap of his fingers."

Chaloner saw he had got hold of the right man, and he gradually revealed to him his discovery of alum earth in England, and proposed that he should accompany him thither to work it, where he would be absolutely free, and promising him a much higher remuneration than he was receiving in Italy; to which the man readily assented, and undertook to gain over the other two men, who he felt assured would accompany him. At a subsequent meeting of the four confederates the question was discussed as to the best mode of smuggling them out of Italy, and, after several projects had been suggested and dismissed as impracticable, it was decided that they should be conveyed on board a vessel in casks, as merchandise, and liberated when out at sea.

Sir Thomas at once set to work to find means for carrying out his project, the first being to find a vessel captained by one equally resolute with himself, and to whom he could venture to entrust his secret. Fortunately for his purpose, there chanced to be lying in the harbour a ship from the port of Hull, commanded by an honest fellow-Yorkshireman, a man who, as he said himself, "feared neither the Pope nor the Devil." With this captain he sought an interview, explained who he was, and by careful steps laid his scheme before him. The rough, weather-beaten old captain grasped him by the hand, and, giving it a vigorous shake, swore to stand by him "through thick and thin." He was waiting for a return cargo, had got his vessel half filled, and he agreed, whether full or not, to set sail on that day week. Sir Thomas then went into the market and purchased a quantity of grain, to be delivered on board in six days, packed in casks. He then caused three casks to be constructed secretly, with false ends to be filled with grain, leaving the central part open and pierced with holes, in great number, but so small as to be scarcely perceptible. On the sixth day, when the alum works were closed, the three men came to him, and were placed in the three casks, which, having passed the ordeal of the Customs Office without suspicion, were shipped, and at daybreak the following morning the vessel was loosed from her moorings, spread her canvas, and bade adieu to Civita Vecchia. It was soon discovered at the alum works that the three were missing, and strict search was made for them, without result. At length it occurred to the authorities that they had escaped in the English vessel which had sailed that morning, and three ships were sent in pursuit of her, but she had several hours' start, and had a fair wind, and the pursuers never caught sight of her. The men were released from their uncomfortable berths when at a safe distance, and revelled in their feeling of liberty as they sped over the blue waves of the Mediterranean, across the Bay of Biscay, and up the Channel, arriving safely at Hull, whence they proceeded with Sir Thomas to Cleveland.

Sir Thomas established his works beyond Bellemondegate, where now mountains of refuse shale are piled up. For some time the works yielded but small profit, and it was not until Chaloner got more workmen from Rochelle that they became a success, after which they yielded a handsome revenue, and had the effect of breaking down the Italian monopoly, and reducing the price of alum in England to one-half its former cost.

When Chaloner had got the mines and works into thorough working order, King Charles I., at the instigation of some of his rapacious courtiers, made a claim to them as Crown property, and he was compelled to surrender them. They were then let to Sir Paul Pindar, at a rent of £12,500 per annum, to be paid into the Royal Exchequer, besides £1,600 per annum to the Earl of Mulgrave and £600 per annum to Sir William Pennyman, but they were restored to the Chaloners by the Long Parliament. Eight hundred men were employed on the works, and the alum sold at £26 per ton, which left a large residue of profit. Other mines were discovered in Cleveland, on the estates of the families of Phipps, Pennyman, Fairfax, D'Arcy, and Cholmley, when competition brought down the price, and consequently reduced the profits; and, as some of these were situated nearer the sea-coast, with greater facilities for shipment, the Guisborough mines became less and less profitable, and were eventually abandoned.

This conduct on the part of King Charles caused the Chaloners to become zealous Parliamentarians in the Civil War. Sir Thomas's sons, James and Thomas, drew their swords against the King, and both sat as members of the High Court of Justice for his trial. The former was tried as a regicide after the Restoration, was condemned to death, and drawn on a hurdle to Tyburn for execution, but received a reprieve when the halter was round his neck; was remitted to the Tower, and died of poison, it was reported, by his own hand, "an invention," says Markham, in his Life of Fairfax, "of the carrion vultures of the Restoration."

The latter, at the Restoration, was included in the list of those excluded from pardon, but saved his life by flight. Winstanley says of him, "He had travelled far in the world, and returned home poysoned with that Jesuitical doctrine of King-killing, which he put in practice, being the great speech-maker against the King, ... and a great stickler for their new Utopian Commonwealth, but upon His Majestie's return fled, his actions being so bad as would not endure the touchstone."