The Sheriff
On 30th April 1479 Edward, Prince of Wales decreed that the town should have a Mayor, a Sheriff and two Bailiffs. He then conferred on the town the status of a county. That status was confirmed by the Act of Union of England and Wales in 1543, which gave it the right to hold its own assize. In 1545 it was granted the right to have its own Custos Rotulorum, or master of the rolls and its own Member of Parliament. In 1761 it was granted its own Lord Lieutenant. However these privileges have disappeared with time.
As a county, Haverfordwest had its own Sheriff and that office continues as one of fifteen City and Town Sheriffs in England and Wales and alone with Carmarthen, in Wales.
In early times the Sheriff was involved with the legal process, from the courts to the gaol. He was also instrumental in conducting Parliamentary elections in the Borough.
A well documented story dating back from 1741 regarding the capacity of the sheriff’s powers involves a woman called Dorothy Rees from Prendergast who was caught stealing a flannel petticoat worth sixpence. The Sheriff had to arrange her transportation to America for seven years, but before this, she was stripped to the waist and marched through the streets from the goal near St Thomas Green to her home in Prendergast. This punishment had to be supervised by the Sheriff.
The Sheriff was elected at the first Hundred Court held after the Feast of St Michael, either from the 24 common council-men or from the burgesses at large. He was as often chosen from the one body as from the other.
The Sheriff waited upon the Judge of Assize and when no crime had been committed in the borough, he presented the Judge with a pair of white gloves, a ceremony last performed in 1995.
The Sheriff received £10 to provide a breakfast on Whit Monday for important citizens of the Town and would see that donkeys and ponies were at hand for them to ride later in the day to Portfield for special races and sports. At Cuckoo Lane novices went through an initiation ceremony at the Bumping Stone, where a fee was demanded. They later rode back through the streets of the town to a special dinner provided by the Mayor. He also received a quota of 200 apples from each shipload of apples arriving at the quay-usually from the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire.
The Shrievalty Association of Haverfordwest was formed in 1996. A Sheriffs Service is held at St Mary’s Church in April each year and this is followed by a Sheriffs breakfast.
SHERIFF’S CHAIN
The Sheriff wears a silver-linked chain inscribed with the names of those who have held office from the middle of the last century onwards. From the chain hangs a badge showing the reverse of the Town Seal. There is a representation of a fortified gatehouse with side towers. On the central tower is a trumpeter flanked by flying banners and on the base a slain wyvern. On one side is a lion and on the other an eagle. The badge is suitably inscribed and bears the town’s motto. The badge and chain were presented by former Sheriffs in 1953 to commemorate the Coronation of Her Majesty the Queen.
Many of the Sheriff’s traditional roles have developed into ceremonial ones as their relevancy has altered over the years. He appears with the mayor on formal occasions. The National Association of City and Town Sheriffs of England and Wales held its annual general meeting at Haverfordwest in 1995 and again in 2007.