A street of many parishes: Chester neighbours 1670-1730

This chapter focuses on various petitions drawn up by people living on Bridge Street, alongside dedications in The Academy of Armory. While probing what it meant to be an urban neighbour in post-Restoration England through an examination of Bridge Street, it considers the various motivations which spurred neighbours to petition civic authorities with planning requests and challenges and also to complain about nuisances. The chapter also focuses on one man and his neighbours on Bridge Street in Chester. Nick Alldridge has examined Chester parishes between 1540 and 1640. Although none of the Chester wills uncover a story as vivid as Bedford’s, clues in the testamentary fragments highlight elements of the petitioners’ mindsets regarding Holme and his building activities. Hugh Starkey, who appeared at the top of the list of petitioners against Dewsbury, had only finished a term as Alderman of the Company in the year that Dewsbury became a company steward.