Liskeard (St. Martin)
Liskeard was made a free borough in 1240, by Richard, Earl of Cornwall, who conferred on the burgesses similar privileges to those enjoyed by the towns of Launceston and Helston; and several charters were afterwards bestowed, under the last of which, granted by Elizabeth, and dated the 26th of July, 1587, the corporation consisted of a mayor, nine capital, and an indefinite number of inferior, burgesses, a recorder, and a town-clerk. The government is now vested in a mayor, four aldermen, and twelve councillors, elected under the act of the 5th and 6th of William IV., cap. 76; and the magistrates, four in number, assemble on alternate Mondays for the despatch of business. The powers of the county debt-court of Liskeard, established in 1847, extend over the registration-district of Liskeard. The borough first sent representatives to parliament in the 23rd of Edward I.: it formerly returned two members, but was deprived of one by the act of the 2nd of William IV., cap. 45, when an enlarged district was substituted for the borough, for elective purposes. The limits, previously comprising 2387 acres, now extend over an area of 8115 acres, embracing the old borough and parish of Liskeard, with part of the parish of St. Clear. The mayor is returning officer. There is a small prison.
The parish is intersected by the river Looe, and comprises by measurement 7126 acres: the soil is various, but generally fertile, and in some parts a deep rich loam; the surface is very hilly, and the surrounding country strikingly diversified. The living is a vicarage, valued in the king's books at £18. 13. 11½.; net income, £303; patron, the Rev. F. J. Todd. The church stands on an eminence at the eastern entrance of the town, and is a spacious and handsome edifice of fine large slate-stone, with a low embattled tower, which was erected in 1627; it contains several monuments, among which is one raised by Captain Martyn and his brother officers, to Lieut. James Huntley, who fell in a gallant attack on a squadron of Russian gun-boats in the Gulf of Finland. An episcopal chapel was opened at Dubwalls, in 1839. Amongst other lands of smaller value, a tenement called Lanseaton, now let for £50 per annum, is vested in the wardens for the repairs of the church. There are places of worship for the Society of Friends, Independents, Wesleyans, and Association Methodists. A school was founded by the trustees of the Rev. St. John Eliot, who died in 1760, and was endowed by them with £5 per annum. A British and Foreign school was erected in 1835; and a diocesan classical and commercial school has been established. The union of Liskeard comprises 26 parishes or places, with a population of 26,484: a workhouse has been built near the town for 350 persons. A great part yet remains of the buildings of the nunnery of Poor Clares, founded here, and endowed by Richard, Earl of Cornwall; it is called "The Great Place," and has been converted into dwelling-houses.
Transcribed from A Topographical Dictionary of England, by Samuel Lewis, seventh edition, published 1858.