quently was, in the case of benefices scantily endowed. In 1667 the chapel was unsupplied, and a caveat was entered by Joseph Maynard Esq. against the licensing of a curate. Mr. Maynard was brother-in-law of Sir Edward Mosley Bart., then recently deceased, whose will was under litigation; and it is inferred that as claimant under the deceased baronet's will he was desirous that his asserted right of concurrence in the appointment of minister (upon which concurrence the payment of certain sums left by his wife's family in augmentation of the minister's income had been made conditional) might not be prejudiced. In 1678 the Rev. John Walker was found exercising the function of curate; he held the curacy till 1685. He was a graduate of Magdalene College, Cambridge, M.A. 1669. His successor was the Rev. Peter Shaw, who at the time of his appointment was curate of Stretford Chapel. Mr. Shaw continued at Didsbury for some years; his name is met with in the Chapel Registers in 1699. In the following year he resigned the cure. In 1704 (June 7) the Rev. Joshua Wakefield B.A. of Queen's. College, Cambridge (B.A. 1695, M.A. 1699) was nominated to Didsbury by the Warden and Fellows of Manchester, his nomination being signed by Richard Wroe, Warden; Roger Bolton and Robert Assheton, Fellows; - but though receiving in 1704 his formal appointment, he was officiating as curate at Didsbury four years earlier, his signature as minister being attached to the churchwardens' accounts for the year 1700. He was therefore Mr. Shaw's immediate successor. His stay was but short, for we find one Joshua Wakefield, probably the same individual, instituted December 9, 1705, to the rectory of Wilmslow on the presentation of John Harrison. In 1706 Roger Bolton signs his name as "Curate" at the annual auditing of the churchwardens' accounts of the preceding year. It seems not improbable that Mr. Bolton was the Fellow of Manchester Collegiate Church of that name. He was succeeded in 1709 by the Rev. David Dawson, who was found officiating as curate in that year, and subsequently also in 1715. Mr. Dawson was of St. John's College, Cambridge, B.A. 1706. In 1716 the Rev. James Leicester B.A.

of St. John's College, Cambridge, was minister of the chapel; the date of his nomination is not recorded. He was also Librarian of the Chetham Library in Manchester, to which he had been appointed in 1712 on the resignation of the Rev. Nathaniel Banne. He died at Didsbury, and was buried there September 5, 1718. The next curate whose name has reached us is the Rev. Thomas Wright B.A., nominated July 11, 1720, by the Warden and Fellows; his nomination is signed by Thomas Hall, Roger Bolton, and Robert Assheton, Fellows. There had doubtless been an intermediate nomination following more closely the death of Mr. Leicester, but the name of the curate is unknown. Mr. Wright appears to have been a man of a litigious spirit, as his correspond.. ence, elsewhere given, with Bishop Gastrell will serve to show. From the commencement of his ministration at Didsbury he was unfortunate, beginning as his career did with an humble submission to his diocesan for previous informal practices now first objected against him. The document is short, and explains itself: — " Forasmuch as I Thomas Wright, clerk, did perform the service of the Church of England and preach at Winnington Hall without the license of the Right Reverend Father in God Francis Lord Bishop of Chester, I do hereby acknowledge that my offence, and am heartily sorry I did anything to incur the displeasure of my honourable diocesan; but forasmuch as it was not done in contempt, but through ignorance on one hand and the necessitous obligations I lay under on the other, I therefore hope your lordship will pardon me, who from henceforth promise to be your lordship's most obedient dutiful son."— His stay at Didsbury was under two years. He failed to conciliate the people, and was probably starved into a resignation of the living. He held also the chapel of Birch, to which as well as to Didsbury he had been nominated July 11, 1720. He resigned both chapels the same day, January 10, 1721-2, and was succeeded by the Rev. Francis Hooper M.A. (B.A. 1716, M.A. 1720), Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, at that time Librarian also of the Chetham Library, Manchester, in succession to Mr. Leicester. He resigned the two appointments

after having held them for about five years. On the 15th September 1726, the Rev. Robert Twyford B.A. of Brazennose College, Oxford, was nominated to the chapel by the Lady Anne Bland, to whom the patronage had been recently alienated. Mr. Twyford was a native of Didsbury, the son of Mr. Robert Twyford, descended from a royalist family of respectable connexions in the township; he was born in 1690. For the two or three last years of his life he held the adjacent chapel of Birch in conjunction with that of Didsbury; he died at Didsbury, and was buried there March 2, 1746-7. On the 15th day of May following, the Rev. William Twyford B.A. of St. John's College, Cambridge, was nominated by Sir John Bland Bart. to succeed his father, the late curate. He had been already licensed (March 17) to Birch Chapel, but this he resigned in 1752. He held Didsbury for nearly fifty years, and dying in 1795 was succeeded by the Rev. John Newton M.A. of Queen's College, Cambridge, who was nominated July 28, 1795, by John Newton gent. Mr. Newton held the chapel until his death, which occurred September 16, 1807. He was buried at Didsbury. On the 3rd of November 1807, the Rev. John Gatliff M.A. succeeded on the death of Mr. Newton. His nomination was under the hand of the Rev. Henry Brown, "who had purchased the presentation during the life of the late incumbent, but had it not in his power at present to hold it." In 1792 Mr. Gatliff was elected clerk in orders of the Collegiate Church, Manchester, on the death of the Rev. John Everard Upton, who was killed by a fall from his horse after holding the office for the brief space of six weeks; and on the decease of the Rev. Dr. Griffiths was appointed to succeed him March 19, 1798, as Fellow of the Collegiate Church. He became rector of St. Mary's, Manchester, in 1804, and died November 22, 1843, aged eighty, having three years previously resigned the Chapel of Didsbury. He was succeeded by the Rev. William John Kidd, Incumbent of St. Matthew's, Manchester, who received his nomination to Didsbury from Thomas Darwell of Manchester Esq. December 30, 1840, and is the present incumbent.

The following is a list of the Curates of Didsbury, as far as their names can now be recovered:

The Registers of the Chapel commence in the year 1561, and are for the most part in good preservation. The arrangement of baptisms, marriages and burials, under separate heads, is more methodical than often happens. In the earliest volume the first page, consisting of entries of marriages from 1561 to 1570, is all but illegible, the soiled condition of the parchment rendering the writing indistinct; but in other respects the earlier entries are more carefully made than those of a later date.