Obs. [f. TACKLE sb. + HOUSE.] app. either, A house in which porters employed in loading and unloading ships kept their tackle; or, A house having a tackle or pulley for hoisting heavy goods; a warehouse for lading and unlading merchandise going or coming by sea.
In London each of the twelve great Merchant Companies had formerly the right to have its own tackle-house, with its porter or porters, and in some of them the titular office of ‘tackle-house porter’ or ‘tackle-porter’ still survives: see quot. 1851 in b, TACKLE-PORTER quot. 1909. The tackle-houses at Southwold were on the quay of a creek, evidently for the loading and unloading of vessels lying there; those at London may have been on the river’s brink.
1562. Will, in T. Gardner, Acc. Dunwich, etc. (1754), 214. My Tackle House at the Woods-End [Southwold].
1579. Act Com. Council London, 15 Aug. (Jrnl. 20, II. lf. 506). It is thought convenient yt no other tacklehouses or companie of porters shall hereafter be erected without the especiell licence of ye L. Maior, his brethren, and the Counsell. Ibid. (1606), 27 June (Jrnl. 27, lf. 52 b). Complaintes … by freemen porters of the Tacklehouses of the said citie against others streete porters workinge in the said citie, for interdealinge with worke … touchinge shippinge and unshippinge of goodes … with which business the said street porters have not presumed to deal untill of late time.
1607. in Remembrancia (City of London), II. 288. The peticion enclosed … by the Porters of the Tackell Houses of this Cittie, prayinge … Assistance for the preventinge of much inconvenience to growe uppon them through the erection of an newe Office to be established for the ladinge and unladinge … of all Marchantes goodes not free of the twelve Companies. [The petition follows, entitled in margin] ‘A Peticion concerninge the Tacle Porters.’
1618. in T. Gardner, Acc. Dunwich, etc. (1756), 215 (Southwold). One entire Place, Key or Wharfe, the whole abutting and bounding against … the Tackle-House at the South-East End.
1754. T. Gardner, ibid., 214. The antient Key stood in the Woods-End-Creek; near thereto were Dwelling-Houses, Warehouses, Tackle-Houses, the Blubber-Pans and Carters-Grounds for Ship-Building.
1842–51. [see b].
b. attrib. Tackle-house porter, orig. A porter belonging to or employed at a tackle-house; later (usually shortened to tackle-porter: see next) a porter authorized to act as such by one of the London Companies having this right, as distinguished from a ticket-porter who was licensed by the corporation.
1606. Act Com. Council London, 27 June, in Mayhew, Lond. Labour (1861), III. 365/1. Tackle-house porter, porter-packer of the gooddes of English merchants, streete-porter, or porter to the packer for the said citie for strangers’ goods.
1646. Act Com. Council conc. Tackle-house Porters (1712), 9. Whereas divers Controversies and Differences have heretofore been between the Tacklehouse-Porters of this City, and the Ticket-Porters, otherwise called the Street-Porters of this City in and about several Matters [etc.].
1842. Pulling, Treat. Laws & Customs London, 502. The Tackle-house Porters, who, with their subordinates the Packers’ Porters, originally formed a part of the establishment of the principal trading companies, and were attached to their respective tackle-houses, are employed in lading and unlading goods not subject to metage. Ibid., 504. The tackle-house porters are composed of a few persons appointed by the twelve principal companies, to each of which the privilege belonged of having a tackle-house for lading and unlading goods. Each of the companies appoint one person as their tackle-house porter, and some of them two.
1851. Mayhew, Lond. Labour (1861), III. 366/1. The tackle-house porters that are still in existence, I was told, are gentlemen. One is a wharfinger, and claims and enjoys the monopoly of labour on his own wharf.
