ABSTRACT
In 1646, Robert Thoroton was granted by Cambridge University licence to practise medicine. Thoroton became friendly with Gilbert Sheldon who had been expelled from the wardenship of All Souls’ College, Oxford, by the Parliamentary commissioners and lived at East Bridgford for three or four years in the 1650s. Thoroton was alleged to have encouraged informers who received one-third of the fine and urged the constables to be severe in distraining on the goods of offenders. Dugdale had pressed Thoroton to stay at York and examine the archbishops’ registers and other archives, but he was unable to go and had to rely on agents, some of whom proved unsatisfactory. Thoroton was equally unable to leave his practice and spend time in London searching the public records. Thoroton’s comments on the effects of enclosure in his time and before are a unique source for the economic historian, because in this matter alone did he allow his emotions to dictate what he wrote.
