Cornish Worthies: Sketches of Some Eminent Cornish Men and Families, Volume 1 (of 2)Tregellas, Walter H. (Walter Hawken)
History
Cornish Worthies: Sketches of Some Eminent Cornish Men and Families, Volume 1 (of 2)
Tregellas, Walter H. (Walter Hawken)
Cornwall (England : County) -- Biography
Herbert, in his 'History of the Livery Companies of London,' gives the
following particulars of the estates out of the proceeds of which the
above funds were paid, viz.: 'So far as S^r John was concerned, the
annual sum of 16s. 4d. and £13 6s. 8d., issuing from certain messuages
of the Company; and (as regards Dame Thomazine) the sums of 53s. 4d.,
21s. 4d., and 13s. 10d., and 20s. yearly, all of the premises being
situate in the parishes of St. Mary Wolnoth, St. Michael Cornhill, St.
Martin Vintry, and St. Dionysius (or Denis) Back-Church, in Fenchurch
Street.' He also gives an account of the manner in which the said funds
were disposed of: as, good round sums to priests 'for singing for Sir
John;' to priests and clerks for ringing of bells at the obits; for wax
to burn on those occasions; sundry sums for the poor, etc.; for the
'conduct for keeping the anthem;' and, amongst other disbursements, ten
shillings 'for a potation to the neighbours at the said obit.'
The charities left by this benevolent couple are also set out at p. 502
of the same work.
And lastly, the Stratton Churchwardens' Accounts for 1513, show that on
the day on which 'my _lady parcyvale's_ meneday' came round (_i.e._ the
day on which her death was to be _had in mind_), prayer was to be made
for the repose of her soul, and two shillings and twopence paid to two
priests, and for bread and ale.
This, I believe, is nearly all that exists in the shape of documentary
evidence to bear record of the existence of the Cornish girl who forms
the subject of this notice. There are, however, still to be seen in
the remote and quiet little village of Week St. Mary, some five or
six miles south of Bude, in the northern corner of Cornwall, the
substantial remains of the good Thomasine's College and Chantry, which
she founded for the instruction of the youth of her native place.
The buildings lie about a hundred yards east of the church (from the
summit of whose grotesquely ornamented tower six-and-twenty parish
churches may be discerned); and, built into the modern wall of a
cottage which stands inside the battlemented enclosure, is a large,
carved granite stone (evidently one of two which once formed the
tympanum of a doorway) on which the letter =T= stands out in bold
relief. Probably it is the initial of the Christian name of our
Thomasine; at any rate it is pleasant to think it may be such.
The traditions, however, concerning her are not only still numerous
in the neighbourhood, but are as implicitly believed as if they were
recorded by the most unimpeachable of chroniclers. They have been
embodied, not without considerable imaginative embellishment, by the
late Rev. R. S. Hawker of Morwenstow, in a pleasant chapter in his
charming 'Footprints of Men of Former Times in Cornwall,' and they are
somewhat as follows:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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