A History of Mark Masonry
MARK MASONRY BETWEEN 1813 AND 1856
PART III
Introduction
Following the last module’s glimpse at Mark Masonry before
1813, this paper attempts to trace its subsequent story, until the establishment
of the 1856 English Grand Mark Lodge.
We will follow developments in Scotland, then England,
thereafter Ireland and, finally, elsewhere in the wider world.
This study ends with the formation of the English Grand Mark
Lodge, when it can be said that Mark Masonry, as it is generally understood
today in the British Commonwealth, began.
SCOTLAND
Introduction
It will be recalled that the Unlawful Societies Act of 1799
caused the Scottish Craft Grand Lodge to allow its lodges to work only the
standard three degrees. Other degrees, however, were looked after by other
authorities.
There were nearly 20 Irish Early Grand Encampment encampments
(Cryer:217) in Scotland in the early 1800’s. These included Mark ceremonies.
Following the Irish example the ‘Royal Grand Conclave of Knight Templars for
Scotland’ was formed in 1811. Included in its repertoire was the Mark.
Defiance of Grand Lodge, however, occurred. Some St John
(Craft) lodges continued to work the Mark, so preserving versions of it. Various
encampments and chapters also worked it. There were also in existence
independent lodges, giving their allegiance to no one, and they also conducted
Mark ceremonies.
The Supreme Grand Royal Arch Chapter of Scotland
In 1817, notes Cryer (217), the Grand Lodge of Scotland
considered the position it had taken on Masonic degrees in 1800. It confirmed
that position. It would only recognise the first three degrees. In addition,
officers of the ‘higher degrees’ would not be allowed to sit in Grand Lodge.
As a reaction, and aware beforehand of what was coming, those
prepared to stand by their convictions formed, within three weeks of the
announcement, the Supreme Grand Royal Arch Chapter of Scotland. This was done by
removing all the non-chivalric degrees (Grantham: 7) from the care of the Royal
Grand Conclave, and putting them in the control of the newly formed body. This
had twelve degrees. The Mark thus passed to the Grand Chapter. The Royal Grand
Conclave of Knight Templars for Scotland continued on, with less degrees, seven
in all, but not the Mark.
The new Supreme Chapter invited all the chapters in Scotland to
join, but got off to a slow start, with only about five wishing to sign up. Many
Irish-warranted chapters considered it disloyal to leave the Irish fold. Many
independent chapters considered the new body to be an upstart. By 1842, however,
The Supreme Chapter had 56 chapters (Grantham:10) on its books, although those
active numbered but 25.
The Early Grand Encampment of Scotland
The remaining Irish Early Grand Encampment bodies, unwilling to
go into a novel arrangement, and lose old practices, formed their own ruling
body. This was with Irish blessing. Titled the Early Grand encampment for
Scotland (Cryer:218), it was consecrated in 1822.
By this means other forms of the Mark were worked, and still in
association with Knight Templary. This particularly ancient link was important,
although their possible significance by now was probably known to a very few.
Putting this time into an historical context, Melbourne was founded in 1835. In
1839, in Scotland, Kirkpatrick Macmillan, a Dumfries blacksmith, invented the
bicycle. King George IV had died in 1830, and his son, William IV, had taken the
British Throne.
The other Scottish grand bodies, seen by most as
straightforward, grew in strength. The Early Grand Encampment, however declined,
and was to expire in 1985.
It is known that a Mark token was used in Scotland in the
1820’s (Cryer:300-1), a ‘shekel’. It depicted the Pot of Manna on one side and
‘the rod of Aaron budding’ on the other. Even now a shekel token, of a white
metal, is used in Queensland, one side depicting the budding rod.
Master Passed the Chair
In 1842 the Scottish Supreme Grand Chapter enacted that any
Mason wishing to take the Royal Arch had to be a Past Master (Cryer:219). This
harked back to the situation in older, probably operative times. To enable a
non-Past Master to become a Royal Arch Mason it was decided that a special
‘Master Passed the Chair’ degree would be used. To this end it issued ‘Chair
Master’ warrants to purpose-formed lodges.
It was also a Supreme Chapter condition that no-one became a
Past (or Passed) Master without first taking the Mark (Grantham:10). Hence the
Chair Master arrangement gave the Mark a boost. However the whole business was
apparently too hard in practice, and after 1846 no more Chair Master warrants
were issued.
Although the Master Passed the Chair ritual received no
official support after 1846, where it had been established it tended to live on.
Cryer (219) is of the opinion that the present Installed Master Degree of the
English Mark Grand Lodge type was derived from it, being picked up in 1856 by
the newly formed Mark Grand Lodge. In Scotland. of course, there were no Mark
lodges as such, the St John, chapter or encampment lodges, etc, installing the
one master for all the degrees they worked, that master being installed in the
group’s top degree or order.
Scottish Grand Chapter - Ongoing Developments
The Grand Treasurer of the Supreme Grand Chapter at this time,
Hector Gairn, was a studious man, He collected as many written copies of Mark
rituals as he could, and consolidated them, in 1845, into a ‘standard’ one. This
was promulgated to the Grand Chapter’s chapters (Cryer:174), and became the
earliest authorised version of the Mark.
Bro Gairn’s integrated degree featured a heptegonal
‘plugstone’, for King Solomon’s ‘secret arch’. This is an indication that early
Mark rituals had to do with a secret underground vault. The secret vault, of
course, is a central feature of the Holy Royal Arch and other degrees; those
worked in South Australia include ‘Select Master’, ‘Royal Master’, ‘Most
Excellent Master’, ‘Super-excellent Master’, "Knight of St John the Evangelist’,
‘The Order of the Red Cross of Babylon’ and ‘Grand Tilers of Solomon’.
A feasible source and application of the secret vault ‘legend’,
so deeply embedded into Freemasonry, has recently come forward. This is the
claim of Lomas and Knight, in The Hiram Key, that beneath Rosslyn Chapel
in Scotland is a secret vault which contains manuscripts found by the Knights
Templar in a secret vault deep beneath Jerusalem’s Temple Mount.
By 1850 Royal Arch Chapters in Aberdeen had been reduced to
two. St George’s Lodge had a chapter which had joined Supreme Chapter in 1817.
It was rated to be the best in the north of Scotland. A Dr Beveridge, however,
decided that even better could be achieved. He therefore had erected a third
chapter, Bon Accord.
By this time there was working a system whereby chapters worked
only the Royal Arch. All the preceding degrees, including the Mark, were worked
in lodges holding (Cryer:220) a chapter. Chapters issued a charter to one of
their members to conduct a lodge in the required degree, which might be the
Mark, and this was done in a St John lodge context. This scheme was to have a
profound effect on Mark Masonry.
General
It is Cryer’s opinion (219) that the Supreme Chapter was the
principle force behind the organisation and growth of the Mark in Scotland. It
achieved the state where English gentlemen would travel to Scotland to receive
the degree.
As the century developed it became apparent that, of the
‘ordinary’ Mark, there were two forms. There was a ‘short’ degree and a ‘long’
degree. Although nowhere near as ‘developed’ as current forms, they left their
marks. Scotland still works a longer and a shorter form of the Mark.
In 1860 a Scottish Grand Lodge examining committee (Cryer:41)
concluded that by then the Mark was, with regard to St John lodges, not being
much worked. It was, however, upheld in the ‘Old’ operative lodges. The
committee also noted that the Supreme Chapter regarded the Mark as the fourth
degree.
ENGLAND
Introduction
The early years of the 1800’s were momentous for England. As
already noted, there was the ever-present threat of political and religious
upheaval, due to the Hanovarian - Stuart rivalry.
Over this hung the great struggle with France, which had, from
1803 to 1805 posed a very real threat to invade England. Only the desperate
Trafalgar sea battle ended that. It was only in 1814, however, that Napoleon
suffered real defeat, and was banished to Elba. Escaping, the pivotal battle
between Wellington and Napoleon at Waterloo, in 1815, saw the end of the French
threat.
Crucial to the Mark’s advancement or suppression in England
(and subordinated Wales), was the Second Article of the Act of Union of the
Antients and the Moderns. Enacted in 1813. it read:
"Pure Ancient Masonry consists of three degrees, and no more,
viz, those of the Entered Apprentice, the Fellow Craft, and the Master Mason,
including the Supreme Order of the Holy Royal Arch. But this Article is not
intended to prevent any Lodge or Chapter from holding a meeting in any of the
degrees of the Orders of Chivalry, according to the constitutions of the said
Orders."
As it reads, the degree or order of Mark Masonry was not
included in the list Some see this as a Hanovarian anti-rocking of the
Protestant Establishment Boat move. It could be slipped in as a prerequisite for
the Chivalric Orders, but it was plain That the Moderns were having their way.
Acceptable Freemasonry was being sanitised.
It must be remembered that politics and religion were at this
time exercising a particularly dominant place in English life. Freemasonry was
much influenced by this. The imported Hanovarian Royal Family, never popular,
always feared the deposed, originally Scottish, Royal Family. The Stuarts were
Roman Catholics. Under the Tudors, who found it convenient to be head of both
State and Church, England had become a Protestant nation.
Prince Charles Edward Stewart, ‘Bonny Prince Charley’, who had
led a Scottish army into England in 1745, had died as recently as 1788. His son,
Prince Edward James Stewart (Gardner, 1996:357), alive and well in Paris, was
ever ready to assume the Throne. (In fact, Prince Michael James Stewart is ready
so at present). The Unlawful Societies Acts of the turn of the century reflected
these fears, as well as those arising from the French Revolution.
To the Hanovarian/Establishment mind the ‘higher degrees’ were
Scottish or French-derived tools of the Jacobites (supporters of the Stuarts),
and were to be put down. To this end two of the sons of George 111 took control
of the two English Grand Lodges and forced their union. This was under Augustus
Frederick, styled The Duke of Sussex. Under him there was a suppression of
higher degrees.
It is also to be remembered that in 1813 the English were in a
life-and-death struggle with the French under Napoleon. At this time, also, the
1812-14 Anglo-American War was raging, basically because the British were
stopping US ships from entering blockaded European ports. English Masonry was
very much restricted to the English alone. As the United Grand Lodge was born in
this atmosphere it can be better understood why English Masonry still regards
itself as supreme in all things Masonic.
Although in England the Mark was getting poor publicity,
elsewhere in the English-speaking world it became of ‘paramount’ (Grantham,
1960:4) importance.
On the Masonic front 1817 saw the formation of the United
Supreme Grand Chapter, to control the Holy Royal Arch Degree. The United Grand
Lodge of England recognised this body; one outcome, as Grantham (3) points out,
was that thereafter the other ‘higher degrees were not recognised. That included
the Mark. From then on, despite the original agreement written into the Second
Article of the union, Craft lodges could no longer officially work any of them.
That, theoretically, should have seen them off stage.
Stifling of the Mark certainly occurred. Springett (1946:2)
wrote, "Little or nothing is heard of working the Degree in England between 1813
and 1851 when the Bon Accord Mark Lodge came into existence...". He, however,
was writing when relatively little sound research had been done. Pick and Knight
later (1953:215) wrote:
"The effect of the Union of 1813 on the additional degrees,
many of which had been worked under Craft warrants, was disastrous. Some
continued for a few years to be performed until they wilted under the cold eye
of that peculiar autocrat, the Duke of Sussex."
Drawing upon evidence collected since, in 1996 Cryer (193) gave
it as his opinion that the English Mark situation was not as bad as was being
made out. Indeed, he claims (192), there was a "...steady will to persist and
its practitioners were spread over as many areas as before."
Thus we enter into a contentious period for the Mark in
England, but also a time of some Mark advancement. Such of the latter which did
occur was often done in defiance, and never with the aid of a overseeing
authority. This was a time when the Industrial Revolution was going full steam
ahead and the British Empire was expanding. The waltz was all the rage in
Europe, and Shelley had written "Queen Mab" in 1813, the same year in which Jane
Austen had published "Pride and Prejudice".
Craft Lodges
Some Craft lodges continued to work the Mark, regardless of the
official line. As the regional strength of new Grand Lodge grew, however, many
caved in and ceased working the old beloved ‘higher’ degrees. But others
persisted.
Cryer (210) notes that the Minerva Lodge at Kingston-upon-Hull
continued as usual. Moreover, it actively promoted the Mark. At Portsmouth,
scene of Dunckerley’s earlier great efforts, Fortitude Lodge has documents which
show that the Mark was still being worked by it a quarter of a century after the
union. It was this year, 1837, that William IV died; as there was no male heir
the Kingdom of Hanover was lost to England. The young Victoria became Queen of
Great Britain.
Development of Mark ‘Lodges’
In an effort to get round the Duke of Sussex’s put-down of the
Mark some Craft lodges convened Mark ‘lodges’. Grantham (3) writes:
"...by 1816 or 1817 groups of Mark Masters in various
localities in England had formed themselves into Mark lodges. In order not to
sever their relationship with their Masonic (Craft or Royal Arch) parent and at
the same time violating the provisions of the Secret Societies Acts, it was
usual for Mark Brethren to convene their Mark Lodge and to meet under the
shelter of the warrant of their Craft Lodge or - in a few instances - of their
Royal Arch Chapter."
Note that these were not separate or independent Mark lodges as
known today, but similar to the present Irish Mark ‘lodges’. The Duke of
Leinster Lodge, 363 IC, in South Australia, is a good example of this old
English strategy at its best.
Those times were colored by the wider English scene. 1817 was
marked by riots in Derbyshire against poor treatment and low wages. The
Industrial Revolution was biting. The following year saw the ‘Peterloo
Massacre’. At that time the vast majority of the people had no vote. Thousands
gathered in St Peter’s Field, Manchester, to hear a speech for democracy. The
Government, still fearing Jacobinism and the people, but mainly anxious to keep
its own narrow-based power, sent in troops, including mounted Hussars with
sabres. They slashed into the unarmed crowd, killing and maiming many, including
women. That was just 19 years before the proclamation of South Australia. Riot
Acts followed, taking away several ancient basic rights.
Typical examples of Mark ‘lodge’ developments of those times
can still be traced. At Portsmouth, on the south coast, the Phoenix Lodge had an
attached Royal Arch Chapter, Friendship. This Chapter, in turn, held its own
Mark ‘lodge’.
The same occurred at Bristol, on the west coast, where the
‘Bristol Mark Lodge’ was in 1857 noted as being ‘old’. Notice that these
centres, as was the case of many others, were great sea ports. This indicates
that merchants and sailors found Freemasonry to be to their advantage. At
Nottingham, in middle England, a Craft Mark ‘Lodge’ - the ‘Newstead Mark Lodge’
- drew candidates from great distances around. Already in existence in 1813 it
was still going strong at mid-century.
Craft Lodges and the Mark in General
Even in London, headquarters of the old ‘Moderns’ and now the
United Grand Lodge, the Mark was still worked. The Old Kent Lodge managed to do
this. The Royal Cumberland Lodge, Bristol, was in 1820 noted as ‘one of the most
distinguished Mark Lodges’ in the country. The Royal Sussex Lodge, at Bath, in
England’s south-east, was originally an Antients lodge. Regardless of the 1813
Union it kept working ‘higher’ degrees, Mark included, at least until 1857.
Many Craft lodges, thinks Cryer (200), were probably working
the Mark, but clandestinely. For this reason the working of non-approved degrees
would not be recorded in the minutes. However, quite a few from time-to-time
did. Three lodges at Bury, near Manchester, north western England, did. The
Union Lodge at Norwich, in the south east, from 1819 on worked a range of
degrees. These included, Mark, Ark, Royal Arch and Knight Templar. Cryer (211)
thinks that other English Craft lodges did the same, but records are missing,
camouflaged or not yet researched.
Near the lower east coast the Humber Lodge worked the Mark as a
‘distinctive part’ (Cryer:210) of the second degree. In this it was continuing
operative practice. Cryer is also of the opinion that this approach was also
fairly common.
Prince George Lodge exists at Bottoms, West Yorkshire, which is
to the north of England. Following the Union of 1813 Mark ceremonies were in no
way altered. By 1838, notes Cryer (207), it was running the Mark separately, and
with separate minutes. It was held in high esteem, and acted as a Mark centre,
attracting a membership from far afield. It was so influential that in 1856 the
London Bon Accord Mark Lodge contacted it regarding the formation of a Mark
Grand Lodge. In context; in 1838 Great Britain had 90 ships of the line, Russia
deployed 50, France 49 and the US 15. Britain ruled the waves.
Another central lodge is known to have existed at Pembroke, in
Wales. The Loyal Welsh Lodge began to administer the Mark from 1827. Freemasons
came from surrounding lodges to be made Mark Master Masons. This continued until
1857, when the new Grand Mark Lodge took over.
Travelling Mark Lodges
In the ‘dark days’ of the Mark in England some lodges sent
their Mark ‘lodge’ or degree team to various localities, there to advance
candidates to the Mark and to demonstrate how to do so. Going to a central lodge
in an area members from nearby lodges would also attend. Cryer thinks (206) that
these travelling ‘lodges’ made an ‘invaluable contribution’ to Mark Masonry.
Please note that in various Orders the same procedure happens
even today. A good example is the travelling South Australian Royal Arch team,
which goes to various areas to work the ‘new’ chapter degrees, Excellent Master
Mason and The Order of the Red Cross of Babylon, introduced in 1985.
One such travelling lodge was based at Oldham, in England’s
north west. What is known of its workings suggest and Antient/Irish flavour. Its
first known workings were in the early 1800’s. It had its own Cypher. It is also
known it used to set out on a Sunday morning, accompanied by a horse and cart
loaded with Mark paraphernalia.
A relatively nearby town, Ashton under Lyne, did the same, and
is well known for it. Its travelling ‘Lodge’ is now the Ashton District T1 Mark
Lodge. Highly mobile, it visited, on Sundays, 20 or more placed on a rotational
basis. It dispensed the Mark and degrees then appendant, It began working in the
latter part of the 1700’s, possibly in the 1770’s, when a regimental officer who
had taken the Mark in India settled there.
Another travelling lodge was probably based at Farnsworth, near
Bolton, in the same region as Bury and Ashton under Lyne. It worked from 1853 to
1855. It seems the idea was spreading. I
It is known that the Friendship Lodge, 202, at Devonport,
Cornwall, produced a Mark lodge which described itself (Cryer:194-5) as
‘independent’. It formed itself into a travelling Mark lodge and went on the
recruitment trail 1846 and 47. Then the authorities found out and stopped its
career. The year 1847 was when a Factory Act restricted the six day working day
of women and children to ten hours a day.
Another travelling lodge, the Newstead Mark Lodge, is known to
have travelled to Birmingham in 1850. There members of local lodges were
advanced. This is the year in which gold was discovered in Victoria.
Ways Around Grand Lodge Suppression
The Lodge of Hope 302 at Bradford, after a submission to the
Grand Master, was told that because it had the authority of the ‘old York
Manuscript Constitution’ it could continue to work the Mark. It claims to have
been originally warranted by the Grand Lodge of all England, York, in 1713. It
further claims (Cryer:99) to have worked the Mark from the start. Its old ritual
is known to have included a Red Cross element, and to opened in the Fellow Craft
Degree. It kept working this right up till the new mark Grand Lodge forced it to
change.
The knightly orders provided another avenue of evasion. They
could insist that there were ‘steps’ to full membership. In this way any degree
at all could be worked, although not in a Craft lodge setting. Chapters and
other assemblies began to take on a new significance. The old Portsmouth Royal
Arch Chapter is known to have done this. The Knights Templar conclave at
Kingston upon Hull, in England’s north west, made it a requirement for
candidates for its knightly degrees to be ‘endowed with the degrees of ‘Mark
Past’, ‘Past Master in the Chair’, "Superintendent’ and Royal Arch’. On the
other hand the St John of Jerusalem Encampment at Redruth, Cornwall, bestowed
the degrees of Mark Man and Mark Master, but did not insist on them being dubbed
a Knight Templar. This is known to have been the case between 1806 and 1826
(Cryer:194). 1826 was the year of the world’s first railway tunnel, constructed
on the Liverpool-Manchester line.
Developments
Regimental lodges continued to have strong influences. The Isle
of Wight, near Portsmouth, housed large army barracks. The Newport Lodge, which
took the name of Albany in 1822, decided to adopt an Irish approach. Sometime
prior to 1848 it established the Albany Mark ‘Lodge’. This was formally attached
to the Minden Lodge, IC. Records from 1848 are still extant (Cryer:198). Amongst
other things these show that between 1848 and 1874 58 soldiers from 20 regiments
and 218 civilians from 53 lodges received their mark from this lodge.
The Albany lodge also produced an apron for the Mark alone
(Cryer:145), probably among the first. Earlier aprons existed, but with the
symbols of several degrees. One such is described as being used in Quebec in
1758. The Albany apron, of which one still exists, is tapered like a keystone.
Of Craft colors, white with blue edgings, it features a large printed keystone
and various inscriptions.
Some perspective on 1848 can be gained by remembering that was
the year Macauly, who advocated parliamentary reform and the abolition of
slavery, had published the four volume masterpiece "History of England". In that
year, also, Marx and Engles brought out their "Communist Manifesto", and serfdom
was abolished in Austria.
As noted, the Scottish Grand Chapter in 1842 decided to charter
Chair Master lodges. One, St Johns, was founded in Manchester, England, in 1846
(Grantham:12). Although the idea was rescinded in Scotland later that year the
Manchester lodge kept its Scottish contacts, and therefore ideas and rituals.
The working, also, seems to have been taken to the Newcastle area (Cryer:171-2)
about 1845, with the Newcastle and Berwick TI lodges working it. The latter body
was reluctant to give it up when it helped found the new Mark Grand Lodge.
It was in 1850 at Nottingham, in the English Midlands, that
Newstead lodge formed a Mark ‘lodge’. It is known (Cryer:142) that its ritual,
from about 1850 onwards, first used the terms ‘East, West and South Gates’.
The Bolton area, in the north west, between 1845 and 1852 is
known to have produced some additions. The four lodges working there would open
in the third degree and then as a Mark lodge. There was no mention of a Mark
apron but they had a Mark jewel. The ceremony came closer to the current English
version.
IRELAND
Introduction
It will be recalled that it is known that early forms of the
Mark were worked in Ireland in the late 1700’s. As the century wore on several
Masonic bodies were found to be fostering Mark-type degrees.
Cryer:(213) points out that in Ireland the Mark "... was either
disguised under various other titles or was divided amongst several other
ceremonies, and these had not so far coalesced as to provide something
recognisable as the Mark we know today."
Grand Craft Lodge
The Irish Craft Grand Lodge said that their warrant covered all
the ‘higher degrees’. for example in a letter of 1822. This included the Mark,
which was mentioned by name in 1844. But soon after that there was a
reorganisation, and thereafter Craft lodges were issued with warrants for
‘Blue Masonry’ (Cryer:217) only.
There were in Ireland so-called ‘Irish Mark Lodges’, but that
were not autonomous. They operated under a particular Craft lodge’s warrant;
those issued before the exclusion. These semi-attached Mark lodges became
clearer in the mid 1800’s. An example of an Irish-warranted Craft lodge was that
of Minden Lodge, 63 IC, on the English Isle of Wight. It ran its own Mark
‘lodge’.
The ancestor of the present Irish Mark degree was started in
Dublin in 1825 (Turnbull, 1956:15). It soon became popular all over Ireland.
Lodges registered Mark Master members in Grand Lodge books until at least 1850.
In that year the Mark was taken over by the Grand Royal Arch Chapter of
Ireland.
In rural Ireland, states Cryer (216), most individual lodges
did not work the ‘higher degrees’. This was probably because it was too hard to
learn a lot of them. Members who wanted to take on particular degree, for
example the Mark, went to a local central lodge for it. An example of this
rationalisation is found in the Comber district of County Down.
Early Grand Encampment
Cryer notes (213) that Stephen Foster wrote that the ceremonies
and degrees worked under the protection of Ireland’s Early Grand Encampment were
not standardised, the specific degree, its ritual and the order in which degrees
were done varied according to the wish of the local encampment.
In general, however, some form of Mark degree appears to have
been associated with Red Cross Degrees - ‘Knight of the Sword’, ‘Knight of the
East’ and ‘Knight of the East and West’.
The Great Priory of Ireland, wrote Pick and Knight (234),
claims descent from the ‘Early Grand Encampment of High Knights Templar’. One
claimed a beginning in 1770, but with its records lost. There is some evidence
of a Knight Templar being made in 1765. It is certain that an Irish encampment
was chartered in Aberdeen, Scotland, in 1794.
By 1820, writes Cryer (214), the encampments ‘were largely
responsible for anything resembling Mark ceremonies’. But the Early Grand
Encampment went into decline, and the scattered encampments fell into
‘disarray’. Thus, the Mark suffered accordingly.
In 1825, however, a John Fowler had imported from Charleston,
USA, a Mark Master Mason degree. This had probably gone over much earlier with a
regimental lodge. This was first used by two lodges in Dublin. Fowler organised
such a workable system that (Cryer:214) it received the ‘semi-official’ blessing
of the Grand Craft Lodge.
It should be noted that, in 1836, there was formed the "Supreme
Grand Encampment of Ireland’. This presumably rose from the ashes of the Early
Grand Encampment, It took over the Red Cross degrees and probably included Mark
ceremonies. 1836 saw HMS Buffalo arrive in the Province of South Australia and
the founding of Adelaide. It was also the year Boer farmers in South Africa
began The Great Treck. In Europe the fashionable dance was the Lancers.
The Supreme Grand Chapter of Ireland
The Mark received the official patronage of the Supreme Grand
Chapter in 1884. A feature by then was the keystone and the completion of the
secret vault. 1844 was the year Daniel O’Connell, named the Liberator of
Ireland, was found guilty of political conspiracy against British rule in
Ireland.
Following stabilisation the Mark was apparently judged to be a
sound degree, and about thirty years after the Grand Chapter’s adoption of it,
became a ‘necessary step’ (Newton:289) to the Royal Arch.
THE WORLD
The New World
The style of ‘Antient’ Masonry prevailed everywhere. There is a
record that in 1821 Loyalty Lodge 358 EC, situated in the Bemudas, borrowed
money (Cryer:225) from its Mark Lodge.
Strong anti-Masonry campaigns were mounted in North America in
the 1830’s. Masonry, including the Mark, survived. It was in 1831 that Charles
Darwin, naturalist, sailed on HMS Beagle to survey nature in the Southern
Hemisphere.
Canada
In 1818 a Canadian Provincial Grand Lodge in Lower Canada -an
English-based organisation, it issued a manual for use of Masons in ‘Lower
Canada". It includes a full exposition of the then Mark Degree.
In 1823 a Simon McGillivray sought to introduce the English
Grand Lodge rules produced at the 1813 union, to Canada. There was some attempt
by some lodges to be aware of and follow these, but overall they fell away.
The dissolution of the old Grand Lodge of Antient York Masons
was not liked in Quebec Province. The lodges wished to remain ‘Antient York
Masons’ (Cryer:226). In particular the fact that lodges of all jurisdictions
except English could work any degree they liked, including the Mark, rankled. In
general Mark was worked anyway.
Letters were sent to London. One sent in 1844 stated
(Cryer:227) that the Mark and other degrees were performed everywhere in Canada,
except for the English Constitution lodges trying to toe the line. The English
Grand Lodge sat on such letters or dealt with them in a superior manner.
A Bro Thomas Harrington (Cryer: 228) wrote from Toronto to the
Earl of Zetland:
"In this section of Canada the disaffection has been gaining
ground principally because of the alleged neglect in London. ... Had their remonstrances
and representations relative to mismanagement, or rather neglect of government,
which has felt to be a growing evil for some time past, been courteously attended to
in some way (they say), and a desire at least evinced to meet the wishes of the
Brethren, and place them upon some satisfactory footing in regard to the management of their
own local affairs, it is exceeding doubtful if such an event as throwing off
allegiance would have been thought of."
The Canadians formed their own, independent, Grand Lodge. The
Mark was in.
India
The strong influence of military lodges was everywhere
evidenced, although almost no records remain. Amongst other things the Indian
Mutiny of 1857-58 saw to that. Many degrees. including the Mark, were
worked.
A newspaper report exists which shows that in Madras, about
1840, Social Friendship Lodge 326 had a ‘Keystone Chapter’ attached, It worked
at least the Mark, Mariner and Royal Arch degrees, which were ‘very
popular’.
Lodges in centres throughout India are known to have worked the
Mark. These include Canote, Calcutta, Cawnpore, Agra and Simla.
A Conclusion
The Masonic Mark ceremony probably evolved in the main from
operative practices. There was probably originally a great number of operative
lodges and the like in the British Isles, each no doubt with ceremonies a little
different from its neighbour. As these transformed into speculative lodges or as
such lodges self generated, the ceremonial presentations would have invariably
widened.
Thus we arrive to the stage examined in the second part of
these papers, with a great variety of Mark rituals being performed. It is also
apparent that they were nurtured or otherwise in two main environments. On the
one hand, that of the Scottish, the Irish and the English Antients, the rich
variety of Mark ceremonies went their own way, with a minimum to no interference
from ‘above’, where an some sort of authority existed or was acknowledged. On
the other hand, with the arrival in 1717 of the English Moderns, the Mark was
virtually banned from Craft lodges. It struggled along in various forms and in
various shelters. Overseas, the Mark was appreciated, with the
Antient/Scottish/Irish forms taking root.
As the Eighteenth Century turned to the Nineteenth it was
Scotland’s turn, at least for a while, to remove the Mark from Craft favour. In
this case, however, various authoritative bodies took it under their wings. The
Mark, in various forms, continued to evolve. The same happened, at a delayed and
slower pace, in Ireland.
1813 saw the beginning of an attempt in England to put the Mark
away for ever. Never-the-less it survived and evolved. Overall, then, by this
time in the British Isle it is clear that there existed a rich variety of Mark
customs and rituals. It is this mix which generated the present day Mark
observances found in the British Isles.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Cryer, Neville: The Arch and the Rainbow, Lewis,
Addelstone, 1996.
Gardner, Lawrence: Bloodline of the Holy Grail, Element,
Shaftesbury, 1996.
Grantham, John: History of the Grand Mark Lodge of Mark
Master Masons of England and Wales and the Dominions and Dependencies of
the British Crown, Lewis, London, 1996.
Handfeild-Jones, RM: A New and Comprehensive History of the
Grand Lodge of Mark Master Masons of England...1856-1968, G Mark L, London,
1996.
Knight, Christopher, & Lomas, Robert: The Hiram Key,
Century, London, 1996.
Newton, Edward: ‘The Mark Degree’, in Ars Quatuor
Coronatum, London, 1954.
Pick, Fredrick, & Knight, Norman: The Pocket History of
Freemasonry, Muller, London, 1953-83.
Springett, B: The Mark Degree, Lewis, London, 1948.
Turnbull, R & Denslow, R: A History of the Royal
Arch, Trenton MO, USA, 1995.
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