RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



minister or warden was at that time Peter de 

 Brigstowe, and the names of five other friars are 

 set forth. 1 



In 1300, when the king was at Bury, he 

 granted 441. for putura or dietary payment for 

 the convent of the Franciscans for three days. 

 A day's food for a friar was always reckoned in 

 these gifts at \d., so that there must have been 

 about forty in the household. 2 



During the riots of 1327, at the time when 

 the town had got the upper hand and the prior 

 of St. Edmunds and his brethren were locked up 

 in the Guildhall, six of the senior friars sought 

 leave to re-establish themselves in the town. 

 The whole convent of the Franciscans, together 

 with the town chaplains, made at this time 

 solemn procession through Bury, a thing which 

 they had never done before, as though to en- 

 courage the populace in their violence against 

 the monks. Moreover, according to the monkish 

 historian, the friars subsequently helped the ring- 

 leaders to escape. 3 



In February, 1328, the warden and Friars 

 Minor of Babwell obtained the royal protection 

 for two years, and this was changed in the follow- 

 ing April to protection. ' during pleasure.' 4 



There was apparently peace between the 

 monks and friars at the beginning of the fifteenth 

 century, for in 14 12, when the general chapter 

 of the Grey Friars was held at Bury, the great 

 abbey made a donation of ^10 towards their 

 expenses. 5 



The popularity of the Babwell friars is proved 

 by the frequency of bequests to them. 6 



Robert, bishop of Emly, by his will of 1411, 

 left his body to be buried in the church of the 

 Friars Minor of Babwell ; he also left to that con- 

 vent six silver spoons, a silver cup, and his lesser 

 maser. 7 Among other burials in this church, 

 Weever mentions Sir Walter Trumpington and 

 Dame Anne his wife, Nicholas Drury and Jane 

 his wife, and Margaret Peyton. 8 



John Hilsey, the ex-Dominican friar, Crom- 

 well's agent, who was then bishop of Rochester, 

 wrote to his master on 27 September, 1538, 

 saying he had been at Babwell talking with the 

 warden ; he had been reported for some treason- 

 able utterances, but expressed his sorrow, and 

 said he was ready to surrender if the king or 

 Cromwell wished it. Hilsey offered to take the 

 surrender on his return from Lynn. There was 

 a bed-ridden friar at Babwell, and he should be 

 used as Cromwell commanded. 9 



1 Reg. Werkcton (Harl. MS. 638), passim. Cited 

 and annotated in Arnold, Memorials, ii, 263-85. 

 1 Lib. Gard. R. 28 Edw. I, 46. 

 s Arnold, Memorials, ii, 335, 349, 352 ; iii, 294. 



4 Pat. 2 Edw. Ill, pt. i, m. 29. 



5 Reg. Croftis (Harl. MS. 27), fol. 109. 



6 Tymms, Bury Wills, 2, 5, 6, 35, 50, 5;, 73, 79, 

 80,83,92,94,95,115,117. ' Ibid. 2. 



8 Weever, Funeral Monuments, 760. 



9 L. and P. Hen. VIII, xiii, pt. ii, 437. 



The actual surrender was, however, made in 

 the following December to another ex-Dominican 

 and special tool of Cromwell in dealing with the 

 friars, Richard Ingworth, suffragan bishop of 

 Dover. 10 



The house of the Grey Friars, Babwell, with 

 its appurtenances, was granted in May, 1541, to 

 Anthony Harvey, at a rental of ioj. 11 



Wardens of the Franciscan Friars of 

 Bury St. Edmunds 



Peter de Brigstowe, 1263 

 Adam Ewell, 12 141 8 



38. THE FRANCISCAN FRIARS OF 

 DUNWICH 



According to Weever, quoting from the 

 ' painfull collections of William le Neve,' the 

 house of the Grey Friars of Dunwich was 

 founded 'first by Richard Fitzjohn and Alice 

 his wife, and after by King Henry the third.' 13 



Its original site was changed and moved 

 further inland (where the ruins and precinct 

 walls still remain) by gift of the burgesses of the 

 town in 1289. An inquisition ad quod damnum 

 of that year returned that it would not be in- 

 jurious to the king to allow the corporation of 

 Dunwich to grant these friars a plot of land for 

 their convent, containing about seven acres of 

 ground, situated between the king's highway on 

 the west and the house of Richard Kilbeck on 

 the north. 14 Accordingly a grant was made in 

 mortmain by the king in August, 1290, to the 

 Friars Minor of Dunwich of the king's dyke 

 adjoining a plot given to them by the com- 

 monalty of the town to build upon and inhabit, 

 with licence to enclose the same. 15 



Licence was granted to the Friars Minor of 

 Dunwich in 1328 to enclose and hold the vacant 

 plot there which they used to inhabit, and which 

 was taken into the king's hands when they re- 

 moved to another place in the town, because it 

 would be indecent that a plot of land dedicated 

 for some time to divine worship, and where 

 Christian bodies were buried, should be con- 

 verted to secular uses. 16 



Further precautions were taken for the pre- 

 serving of the old site in the year 141 5. 17 



The conventual church seems to have been 

 under repair or re-construction shortly before its 

 dissolution, for Katharine Read, by will of 

 16 June, 1 5 14, left 3*. \d. to Friar Nicholas 



10 Ibid. 1 02 1. " Tymms, Bury trills, 5. 



u Reliquary, xxiv, 85. 



13 Weever, Funeral Monuments, 721. 

 " Inq. p. m. 18 Edw. I, 92. 



14 Pat. 18 Edw. I, m. 11. 



16 Ibid. 2 Edw. Ill, pt. ii, m. 19. 

 " Ibid. 16 Hen. IV, pt. i, m. 33. 



125 



