Notes on Bermondsey Abbey. 101 
claimed an annual procuration or entertainment for one day; but 
in 1276 this was contested, and a compromise was made that the 
prior and convent, on the first coming of the Bishop of Winchester 
to Bermondsey after his installation, should meet him as their 
diocesan, in procession, and in lieu of the entertainment should 
pay him and his successors five marks in silver for that time at 
his house in Southwark, and in every succeeding year two and a 
half marks at Michaelmas, and, if he went beyond sea, should 
meet him in procession on his return. 
One important connection which the Monastery had with 
Southwark and with present day charity must not be omitted. 
In 1218, Richard, Prior of Bermondsey, with the consent of 
the convent, built adjoining to the walls of the Monastery an 
almshouse or hospital for converts and poor boys, in honour of 
St. Thomas of Canterbury. It was under the government of the 
almoner, and was exempt from episcopal jurisdiction. This was 
the origin of the well-known St. Thomas’ Hospital now at West- 
minster, though no longer the hospital of St. Thomas of Canter- 
bury. There seems to be some little doubt whether the hospital 
we know as St. Thomas’ was thus founded, or whether it was 
founded by the Priory of St. Mary Overie; but I think that at all 
events the credit rests with Bermondsey, though it is possible St. 
Mary Overie had a share in the present foundation, as in 1212 
the monks of St. Mary Overie erected a temporary building after 
their monastery was burnt down, which was subsequently used as 
a ‘hospitium’’; and in the reign of Henry III., Peter des Roches, 
Bishop of Winchester, incorporated it with the almonry founded 
by Prior Richard of Bermondsey, and called it “The Spital of 
St. Thomas the Martyr of Canterbury.” After the dissolution, 
Henry VIII. conveyed the hospital to the Corporation of the City 
of London, who called it St. Saviour’s Hospital; the name 
did not, however, catch on, and eventually a compromise was 
entered into, and the name of St. Thomas retained—but as St. 
Thomas the Apostle, and not that of the “holy blisful martir’’?— 
thus meeting the views of the Protestant portion of the community. 
But I must leave the history of the Abbey, and consider it in 
its more material aspects. 
There is no known engraving which accurately represents the 
Abbey or Abbey Church. I am informed by Mr. Frowde, the 
courteous chief librarian of Bermondsey Free Library, who has 
assisted me in gaining sundry particulars of the Abbey, that the 
plan of the buildings published in many books on Bermondsey is 
imaginary. We know nothing of the architecture of the conven- 
tual church, which probably contained all styles from Norman to 
Perpendicular. In the excavations for the foundations of the South 
Kastern Railway Model Dwellings certain stones were discovered, 
which, before being carted away—no one having sufficient interest 
