The first occupants of this interesting building were Knights Templars, who were succeeded by the Knights of St. John. After the Dissolution of Monasteries it fell into the hands of one Anthony Stoughton, a descendant of whom—Nicholas Stoughton—erected the present building at the commencement of the seventeenth century. The property eventually came into the possession of the Warwick family, and still remains so. The interior of the house is well worth inspection, as it contains a fine Jacobean oak staircase, and a panelled, tapestry–hung room. Of the many churches, stated to have been ten in number, in addition to the Priory, Nunnery, and other religious houses which existed in early times, little is known; but two—those of St. Mary and St. Nicholas—which still survive were, even in the reign of Edward III., found to afford sufficient accommodation for the inhabitants of the town. Indeed, an ancient decree dated 1367 enjoined upon all persons that they should attend the church of St. Mary. The sites of several other churches, it is true, are known, but nearly all visible traces of them have long ago disappeared. Of these aforetime ecclesiastical buildings the church of St. Michael, in the northern part of the town, is nowadays a blacksmith’s shop, whilst that of John the Baptist was formerly near the centre of the market–place, and St. Helen’s was replaced by the Priory of St. Sepulchre. The church of St. Peter, which was pulled down in the reign of Henry VI., stood in the middle of the town, and another dedicated to the same saint was built over the eastern gate, whilst St. Lawrence’s was situated on the western side. Of the religious houses few traces remain, all of them having been dissolved, and many of them entirely pulled down at the date of the Reformation. [Illustration: BEAUCHAMP CHAPEL, WARWICK.] St. Mary’s, the principal and beautiful church, stands upon the site of a much earlier building, which existed prior to the Conquest, and was in 1123 made collegiate by the transferring of the Collegiate Church of All Saints from within the Castle. It is probable that the present building was either rebuilt or very much enlarged by Roger de Newburgh in the reign of Henry I. And Thomas de Beauchamp, in the reign of Edward III., commenced to re–erect the choir; whilst his son, also Thomas, who succeeded him, completed the rebuilding of the whole church in 1394. This undertaking had been necessitated by the damage the building had received from fire during the reign of Stephen. The work was completed at the end of the fourteenth century; and the chapel of Our Lady, now generally known as the Beauchamp Chapel, was added during the middle part of the fifteenth century.