Friars, at Stafford, was founded by Ralf, Baron of Stafford, in the reign of Edward III. At Lees the Priory of Rocester maintained a chantry, or cell. The Knights Templars had a Preceptory at Keele. The monasteries and nunneries were usually well endowed, and most of them became possessed of considerable worldly possessions. The records of the Dissolution disclose lists of manors, granges, tenements, water-mills, fulling mills, and salt pans, which produced large revenues. From appropriated livings, tithes and oblations were drawn away from the places where they were paid, for the benefit of the distant monastery. Fees were sometimes paid on admission to the Community. Did a son obtain ordination through the help of the monks, how could the father better show his gratitude than by making them a gift? Lights and masses were endowed. The monks had command of ready money and were able to lend to those who required cash, it might be to those overtaken by sudden necessity or to some desirous of making a pilgrimage. When a verderer of Cannock, in the thirteenth century, rendered himself liable to the severe penalties of the Forest Laws, he fled for his life beyond the seas and sold his manor to St. Thomas’s Priory at Stafford.[7] Corrodies originally were a form of life assurance.[8] For a lump sum Dieulacres sold a corrody to a Jew, consisting of food and clothing for life.[9] It was an attractive though shortsighted method of obtaining money or lands, for the corrodies sometimes entailed a severe strain, and there are complaints of the non-fulfilment of the obligations. In 1294 the Prior of Stone was fined for having wrongfully deprived a man of his corrody, which consisted of a daily loaf of bread and a gallon of ale, with a canon’s habit worth a mark yearly, provender for horse and keep for groom, four cartloads of wood annually, and two candles a night from Hallowmas to Candlemas.[10] Corrodies led to further difficulties. Founders and kings claimed the right of nomination. So early as Edward I’s reign Dieulacres had a contention with the King on the subject. Such demands often became a grave abuse, and there are numberless instances, especially in such reigns as those of Edward II and Richard II, of the quartering on the monasteries of discharged soldiers and worn-out officials. The Bishop of Lichfield once demanded from Tutbury a corrody for his cook, but Archbishop Peckham forbade it to be granted. The practice continued to the very end. Even so late as 1532 we find the servants of the Duke of Richmond, Henry VIII’s natural son, billeted in the English monasteries during their master’s absence on the Continent.[11]