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At the General Dissolution of the Religious Houses (1534-9) the total value of 

 Aconbury Priory and its estates was £75 7s. 6d., but deducting the reprise of 

 £7 14s. 3d., the net annual value was made to be £67 13s. 3d. 



Gibson, in his "Churches of Dore, Holme Lacy, and Hempstead," says 

 "Joanna Scudamore was the last Prioress of this House ; and At/lston Wood was 

 granted to John Scudamore, of Holme Lacy, Esq., when the said Nunnery was 

 dissolved. The Property and Right to the Tithe of this wood descending 

 together with the wood itself to Joh)i Lord Viscount Scudamcre, his Lordship 

 by Act of Parliament gave to the Parson of Little Birch, the Tithe of all the Wood 

 and Wood-ground in Ayhton or Adehton Wood, containing by estimation one 

 hundred and twenty acres." (p.p. 133-4). 



From letters of this John Scudamore, it also appears that in 1541, the repair 

 of the chancel of Wolferlow Church was charged upon the confiscated revenues of 

 Aconbury Priory. The Rev. C. J. Robinson, who notices this fact in the 

 "Mansions and Manors of Herefordshire," gives the following account of the 

 descent of the property of the Priory : — " By Letters Patent, 34 Henry VIII. 

 (1542) the site with the tithes and other property " (the Manor, Rectory, Tithes, 

 and Land, &c., in Aconbury, with the Manor of Rolston, (MS. at St. Michael's 

 Priory,) but doubtless excluding Aylston Wood) "was sold to the Mayor and 

 Burgesses of Gloucester, but it does not appear that they held the property long, 

 as within a few years it was in the hands of Hugh ap Harry, or Parry (a younger 

 son of Thomas Parry, of Poston). His grand-daughter and heiress, Elizabeth 

 Parry, married John Pearle — 1600, 8th January — (Par. Reg. DewsallJ, a member 

 of a family long connected with Aconbury and Dewsall. Mary Pearle, the 

 daughter and heiress, married in 1027 Sir John Brydges, Bart, (son of Sir Giles 

 Brydges, of Wilton Castle, and ancestor of the Duke of Chandos), who about the 

 year 1730 sold Aconbury to the trustees of Thomas Guy, the founder of Guy's 

 Hospital. It was probably by James Pearle that the Conventual Buildings were 

 converted into a Mansion House, which was suflBciently commodious to form the 

 occasional residence of the Lords of Chandos " (p. 4.) "The said John Brydges 

 was father of James Lord Chandos, by whose death the manor came to James 

 Earl of Carnarvon " (MS. of Mr. Biddulph Phillips, at St. Michael's Priory). 



In Mr. Gilbert's return of the poor rates (1776), the estate of Aconbury Priory 

 rendered £6 13s. The property still belongs to Guy's Hospital. 



A note on the MS. at St. Michael's Priory says :— 



" Ab anno 1558 ad an. 1573 



John Yongor, Minister. 

 Do. 1616 William Higges, Curate 

 on to the Rebellion." 



The Priory, Church, Buildings, and Grounds, are said to have been moated, 

 and this probably was so on three sides, but could scarcely have been so towards 

 the west ; for the site is formed by a projecting shoulder from the hill above. 

 There are the traces of three fish-ponds up the valley, and these, with the water 

 near the priory buildings on three sides, would provide an ample supply of fish for 

 the weekly and other fast days of the Church. 



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