A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



will dated 1504, left her body to be buried in 

 the chapel of Our Lady in the hospital of St. 

 John of Northampton.! 



On 20 August, 1534, five signatures were 

 appended to the deed acknowledging the king's 

 supremacy, those of Richard Birdsall, the master, 

 John Calcot, John N}ccolls, John Atkynson, and 

 Edmund Curtes.^ The clear annual value of 

 the house according to the Valor of 1535 was 

 declared at ;^5 7 i()s. 6^eJ.;^ the return shows that 

 at that time a certain number of aged poor, three 

 men and five women, were maintained in the 

 hospital, and were in receipt of 2d. a day. A 

 certificate of this hospital, in 1546, describes it as 

 founded to maintain a master, two priests, and 

 eight poor people, and to exercise hospitality. 

 The church of the hospital is stated to be no 

 parish church, but only for the company there 

 dwelling.* 



An elaborate charter of Charles I. granted in 

 1 63 1 purports to cite the original foundation 

 deed, from which it appears that the practice of 

 the sixteenth century (continued up to recent 

 times) of using the funds for a master, for two 

 co-brethren or chaplains, and eight resident alms 

 men or alms women, was not part of the original 

 scheme, which was to afford temporary enter- 

 tainment and refreshment for the infirm poor, and 

 for orphans who should be ministered to by resi- 

 dent brethren, whilst the languid: vel kproi'i 

 were excepted as likely to prove a permanent 

 charge upon the establishment. 



It was placed from the first under the imme- 

 diate patronage of the bishop of Lincoln. Grave 

 charges of mismanagement and monopolization 

 of the funds by non-resident masters were made 

 in pre-Reformation days, and this evil materially 

 increased when the town, on the formation of 

 the diocese of Peterborough, ceased to have any 

 connexion with Lincoln. From that date the 

 mastership of St. John's, Northampton, came to 

 be regarded as a lucrative sinecure in the gift of 

 the bishop of London. The evil first came to a 

 head when Bishop Cooper, in 1573, presented 

 Arthur Wake, M.A., to the mastership. Wake 

 resided in the Channel Islands, and refused to 

 return to England, notwithstanding the vigorous 

 protests of various justices of the county and 

 important townsmen who stated in a petition to 

 the Privy Council, in 1584, that 'hardly the 

 xxth part of the revenues were given to the 

 reliefe of any impotent aged or feeble persons.' 

 This is not the place to enter into the grievous 

 post-Reformation abuses of this ancient charitable 

 foundation, and of the constant litigation in con- 

 nexion therewith, which continued down to the 

 death of Richard Pretyman, one of the sons of 

 Bishop Pretyman, the pluralist, who held the 



1 Nicolas, Test. Fet. p. 458. 

 ■ L. and P. Hen. Vlll. vii. 1121 (34). 

 ' Valor Eccl. (Rec. Com.), iv. 317. 

 * Coll. and Chant. Cert. No. xxxviii. 



sinecure mastership from 1 8 14 until his death 

 in 1866." 



The master's house and garden together with 

 the chapel were sold in 1870 to the Bedford and 

 Northampton Railway Company, by whom the 

 chapel was sold to Mr. Mullinger, who trans- 

 ferred it to the use of the Roman Catholic con- 

 gregation. The hospital itself was refounded in 

 1876 at Weston Favell as a convalescent hospital, 

 which at present accommodates 41 inmates. A 

 chapel has also been erected, and a portion of the 

 funds set aside to provide a weekly pension of 

 5 shillings for 8 ' out-pensioners ' over the age of 

 60. The master now discharges the duties of 

 the two co-brethren.* 



The hospital, save in a few special charters, 

 appears simply as St. John's ; occasionally it was 

 described as dedicated to St. John Baptist, and 

 more rarely as dedicated to St. John the Evan- 

 gelist. But the correct dedication is the very un- 

 usual one of the conjunction of these two saints. 

 Sherborne Hospital and the parish church of 

 Groombridge, Kent, are the only other dedications 

 to the two SS. John of which we are aware. 



Masters of St. John the Baptist and St. 

 John the Evangelist, Northampton 



Warner,^ temp. Henry III. 



John of Oxyndon,8 temp. Henry III. 



Richard,^ occurs 1245 



Richard, 1" occurs 1280 



William of Cottesbrok,!* resigned 1291 



Richard of Helmdon,i- appointed 1291, died 



1323 



John of Upton,!' appointed 1323 

 William of Piddington,!* occurs 1334 

 John of Boketon,!^ died 1349 

 John of Whatton,!^ appointed 1349, died 1376 

 John of Grafton,!^ appointed 1376, died 1389 

 Thomas Aldyngton,!* appointed 1389 

 Edmund Buckingham,^' died 1406 

 Henry Pilton,^" appointed 1406 

 William Rote, occurs 1455 

 Richard Cole,"^ resigned 1475 

 Richard Sherd,^^ appointed 1475, resigned 

 1498 



' The history of the hospit.-il in post-Reformation 

 days is set forth with some fulness in Rcc. of the Borough 

 of 'Northampton, ii. 334-339. 



^ Ex inform. Rev. N. T. Hughes, present master. 



7 Cal. Anct. D. (P.R.O.), C. 1584. 



8 Ibid. C. 2059. 



^ Assize R. 614, m. 44. 

 10 Line. Epis. Reg. Inst, of Sutton. 

 " Ibid. f. 49 d. 12 Ibid. 



13 Ibid. Inst, of Burghersh, f. 170. 

 " Close, 8 Edw. III. m. 34d. 



15 Line. Epis. Reg. Inst, of Gynwell, f. I4id. 



16 Ibid. 1' Ibid. Inst, of Bokyngham, f. 206. 



18 Ibid. ii. f. 154. 



19 Ibid. Inst, of Repingdon, f. 224. 20 ibid 

 21 Ibid. Inst, of Rotherham, f. 44. 22 Ibid. 



158 



