The Churches of Coventry: A Short History of the City & Its Medieval Remains — John Shaqi
The Churches of Coventry: A Short History of the City & Its Medieval RemainsWoodhouse, Frederic W.
History
The Churches of Coventry: A Short History of the City & Its Medieval Remains
Woodhouse, Frederic W.
Churches -- England -- Coventry; Coventry (England) -- History
After the king's landing at Holderness in 1471 the king-maker,
declining a contest, occupied the town for the Lancastrians, and
Edward passing on to London soon after turned and defeated the earl at
Barnet. After Tewkesbury Edward paid the city another visit, and in
return for its disloyalty seized its liberties and franchises, and
only restored them for a fine of 500 marks. Royal visits still
continued. Richard III came in 1483 to see the plays at the Feast of
Corpus Christi; in 1485 Henry VII stayed at the mayor's house after
his victory at Bosworth Field; and in 1487 kept St. George's Day at
the Monastery, when the Prior at the service cursed, by "bell, book,
and candle," all who should question the king's right to the throne.
The importance of the Gilds is shown by the king and queen being made
a brother and sister of the Trinity Gild; and the part that pageantry
played in the lives of all men is seen in the many occasions on which
kings and princes came hither to be entertained, not only with the
plays "acted by the Grey Friars" but those in which the "hard-handed
men" of, for instance, the Gild of the Sheremen and Tailors, "toil'd
their unbreathed memories" in setting forth such subjects as the Birth
of Christ and the Murder of the Innocents. But although Henry VIII
himself was received in 1511 with pageantry and stayed at the Priory,
royal favours and monastic hospitality availed neither men nor
buildings when the Dissolution came. On 15th January, 1539, Thomas
Camswell, the last Prior of St. Mary's, surrendered. "The Prior,"
reported Dr. London, the king's commissioner, "is a sad, honest priest
as his neighbours do report him, and is a Bachelor of Divinity. He
gave his house unto the king's grace willingly and so in like manner
did all his brethren." The Doctor asks for good pensions for the
dispossessed, not on the plea of justice but so that "others
perceiving that these men be liberally handled will with better will
not only surrender their houses, but also leave the same in the better
state to the King's use."
The yearly revenue had been certified in the valuation at _£731 19s.
5d._ Deducting a Fee-Ferme rent to the Crown, reserved by Roger de
Montalt, and other annual payments, the clear remainder was _£499 7s.
4d._ Bishop Rowland Lee, writing to "my singular good Lord Cromwell,"
implies that he had a promise from him to spare the church. "My good
Lord," he says, "help me and the City both in this and that the church
may stand, whereby I may keep my name, and the City have commodity and
ease to their desire, which shall follow if by your goodness it might
be brought to a collegiate church, as Lichfield, and so that fair City
shall have a perpetual comfort of the same, as knoweth the Holy
Trinity, who preserve your Lordship in honour to your heart's
comfort."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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