VI. THE PILOTS.
The Dover Pilots — first Cinque Ports, and now Trinity Pilots — have long formed an important element in the social life of Dover. They were called Cinque Ports Pilots, because, for nearly four centuries, their organisation was controlled by the Court of Lodemanage of the Cinque Ports, over which the Lord Warden presided.
The piloting of merchant ships to the Thames and across the Channel to the Dutch ports became a regular occupation before the Reign of Henry VIII. Dover mariners took up that business on their own account ; but the Lord Warden found it to be necessary to regulate the organisation, so as to ensure that the pilots were properly qualified and that they made uniform charges for their services. In 1526, Sir Edward Guildeford, the Lord Warden, established the Trinity House of the Cinque Ports, about the same time that the Trinity Houses of Deptford, Hull and Newcastle were formed ; but there was no need for the Trinity House of the Cinque Ports to have a charter, because it was authorised under their general charter. In course of time the term, Trinity House of the Cinque Ports, dropped out of general use, because the pilots' affairs were regulated by the ancient Court of Lodemanage, which continued to control the Cinque Ports Pilots until the death of the Duke of Wellington.
The Court of I-odemanage was first regularly organised for the control of the Pilots in the year 1526, and the first enrolment of Pilois was made on the 26th February in that year, when fourteen candidates from the Port of Dover were licensed, one from Deal, and two from Margate. Most of the Dover pilots were Jurats of the Corporation, and some had filled the office of Mayor of Dover. More lodesmen were from time to time licensed, and the Court ordered that four substantial men should be wardens. Sir Edward Guilde ford, the Lord \\'arden, and the four wardens formed the Court, and framed the bye-laws for the regulation of the fellowship. Their successors in oflfice made many other regulations, forming a continuous series from 1526 to 1724. At the latter date the substance of the various regulations was embodied in a code, which was authorised by Act of Parliament. One of the regulations was that the fines inflicted on the Pilots were to be used, half for the repair of Dover Castle and half for the repair of St. Martin's Mill; and, after the Reformation, the second half was for the repair of the old Wike. In 1590, it was decreed that once a year the Lodesmen should take a boat and examine the Channel from the South Foreland to the Nore, and report alterations in depth and other changes. These records of soundings were afterwards made annually. One of the bye laws formed under the new Act of Parliament required that a certain number of the Pilots should be always cruising at sea, except in very bad weather; but, in 1730, a Look-Out House for Pilots was erected on Cheeseman's Head (where the Admiralty Pier now leaves the shore), and that, instead of cruising, the Pilots next on turn should watch for ships there. In 1735, ^^ ^^^ further ordered that, in addition to the Dover Look-Out House, the Pilots should regularly cruises in three sections — the Dover Pilots as far west as the Red Fall, near Folkestone ; the Deal Pilots as far west as the South Foreland ; and the Thanet Pilots in their own bays as far as the North Foreland, the whole of the sections being controlled by the Court of Lodemanage at Dover.
The Pilots resident at Dover fonned by far the larger proportion of the fellowship, and they had a separate fund, to which they contributed to provide themselves with sick pay and superannuation allowances as early as the year 1648. At that time they invested ^180 in purchasing a small estate at Hesling Wood, Napchester; but in 1689 they sold it to the owner of Waldershare, and bought half an acre of land under the cliff above Snargate Street, where they built a look-out, from which they had a good view, and a short cut to the Harbour. The early Pilots were supposed to be all Churchmen, for it was ordered, in 1682, that all Lodesmen, Wardens or Pilots found at a conventicle or a dissenters' place of worship should be suspended. In 1700, the Dover Pilots built a gallery for their own use across the west end of St. Mary's Church, and paid ^2c for a faculty authorising the structure.
The Court of Lodemanage, as re-constructed by an ordnance of William III., consisted of the Lord Warden, the Lieutenant of Dover Castle, the Mayors of Dover and Sandwich, and the Captains of Deal, Walmer and Sandown Castles, but the regulations which permitted the Pilots to elect their Master and Wardens was revoked by George I. The last Court of Lodemanage was held by the Duke of Wellington, Lord Warden, on the 21st October, 1851, at St. James's Church, Dover. Before the time for the next annual Court Day the great Lord Warden was dead ; and within two years the Pilots of the ancient Cincfue Ports Trinity House had been re-organised under the Master and Brethren of Trinity House, Deptford. All the Pilots who were licensed by the Court of Lodemanage are now dead; but the Cinque Ports' Pilots, although now called Trinity Pilots, are still treated as a separate body under the Deptford Trinity House, their number being now about one hundred. The Pilots, since 1891, have cruised in steam cutters, and they have their officers and pilot houses as of yore. At Dover the Pilots have long formed an important section of the community ; and if in the larger Dover of to-day they are not so conspicuous as in ages past, as long as compulsory pilotage continues they will be an interesting element in the maritime fraternity of this ancient Cinque Port.