The dissolution of the monasteries : $b As illustrated by the suppression of the religious houses of StaffordshireHibbert, Francis Aidan
History
The dissolution of the monasteries : $b As illustrated by the suppression of the religious houses of Staffordshire
Hibbert, Francis Aidan
Great Britain -- History -- Henry VIII, 1509-1547; Monasteries -- England -- Staffordshire; Monasteries and state
The others were Sir John Talbot, Sir John Gifford, George Audeley,
John Vernon, Walter Wrottesley, George Gresley, William Bassett,
Edward Lyttleton, Thomas Gifford, Thomas Holte, Walter Blounte, John
Grosvenor, and Thomas Moreton. They are the usual names which appear
among the lists of officials. For example, John Gifford, Edward
Lyttleton, and John Vernon had been the Commissioners appointed to
investigate the matter of Wolsey’s dissolutions; and the Commissioners
for Musters in 1539 included John Gifford, John Vernon, Walter
Wrottesley, George Gresley, William Bassett, Edward Lyttleton, and
Thomas Gifford.[59] John Vernon was Sheriff in the nineteenth,
twenty-fourth, and thirtieth years of the reign; John Gifford in
the twenty-second and the thirty-third; Walter Wrottesley in the
thirty-eighth; George Gresley in the twenty-ninth; William Bassett
in the thirty-fourth; Edward Lyttleton in the thirty-first; Thomas
Gifford in the twenty-first. They were eminently “men of affairs,” well
acquainted with public and official work.
Detailed instructions were given them.[60] Dividing themselves into
sub-commissions, with three members as a quorum, they were to examine
upon oath all persons concerned, and to inspect the necessary books and
documents. Only certain specified deductions were to be allowed, and
names and full details were in all cases to be given.
We know from the Returns of the Commissioners which of them
investigated the Rural Deanery of Lapey and Trysull: Sir John Talbot,
John Gifford, Walter Wrottesley, and John Grosvenor.[61] When the work
had been completed in detail all the Commissioners for each diocese
were to meet together and draw up a General Diocesan Return. The
result of their work has been published by royal authority as _Valor
Ecclesiasticus_.[62]
It is a document of very great interest and importance. If the
readiness with which the clergy raised the enormous fine of £100,000
from the Province of Canterbury and £18,840 0s. lOd. from York, for
having acquiesced in Wolsey’s legatine authority, first opened Henry
VIII’s eyes to the financial possibilities of the clergy, as may well
have been the case, it is probable that the data supplied by _Valor
Ecclesiasticus_ showed him how to proceed to further supplies from
the same source. To confiscate the whole of the clerical wealth was
out of the question, but the Returns, by giving it in detail, made it
possible to proceed piecemeal. That the Returns did thus suggest the
suppression of monasteries seems to be indicated by the seventh article
of the Act for the Dissolution of the Lesser Monasteries, which points
out that those which came within its scope could be ascertained from
the Returns which had just been made.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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