A HISTORY OF DURHAM 



offending the pope, revoked all that he had 

 done ; apologized, explaining that he had acted in 

 ignorance of the pope's selection ; and sent 

 Graystanes to seek the favour of Bury.^"^ The 

 proceedings were so serious an infringement of 

 the rights of the convent that the monks would 

 have resorted to litigation, but their resources 

 were so drained by the war that this was impos- 

 sible, and they had no choice but to submit.^"^ 

 Graystanes did not long survive this mortifica- 

 tion ; anxiety and disappointment brought on an 

 illness which ended in his death.^"' His case and 

 that of Henry of Stamford serve to illustrate the 

 power which worldly ambition was beginning to 

 exercise in the cloister. Both these men were 

 learned, upright, and devout ; yet they allowed 

 the disappointment of their hopes of promotion 

 so to prey upon their minds as to produce fatal 

 results. 



In 1338 the battle of Halydon took place, 

 with important results to the convent. The 

 king had vowed that if God gave him the vic- 

 tory he would build a house for thirteen Bene- 

 dictines. Accordingly, the Scots being signally 

 defeated, he granted to the bishop of Durham 

 the advowson of Simonburn church, to endow 

 a house for a prior and twelve monks of the 

 chapter of Durham, to be founded by the bishop 

 in the suburbs of Oxford, with a church and suitable 

 dwellings, at the king's expense, in honour of 

 God and of St. Margaret, on whose eve he 

 gained the victory.^"^ The house, known as 

 Durham College, was refounded by Bishop 

 Hatfield, who, in 1 38 1, granted a licence to the 

 prior and convent to acquire lands, &c., to the 

 annual value of 200 marks for the support 

 therein of eight monks as chaplains and of eight 

 poor scholars.^"* 



The struggle with Scotland continued with 

 unabated fierceness. In August, 1343, the 

 prior was ordered to collect men-at-arms and to 

 proceed to the March to repel an expected in- 

 vasion.^"' Two years later the learned Bishop 

 Bury died, and the pope, at the king's request, 

 at once (May, 1345) appointed Thomas Hat- 

 field to succeed him.^'" This proceeding, utterly 

 unjust and unconstitutional though it was, appears 

 to have been accepted without remonstrance by 



"" Raine, Northern Registers (Rolls Sen), 368, 371. 



"" Jngl. Sacr. 763. 



'" Hutchinson, Hist. Dur. i, 285. 



"" Privy Seals (Tower), 12 Edw. Ill, file 10. The 

 convent already held ten and a half acres and seven 

 tofts in the suburbs of Oxford, granted Jan. I 290-1 ; 

 Pat. 19 Edw. I. Hutchinson s.iys (i, 305), that the 

 house was instituted in 1290 by Prior Hoton ; so also 

 Surt. Soc. Publ. vol. vii, pref. p. x, note. Anthony 

 Wood says (vol. ii, 48) that Bishop Bury finished 

 this college, and Bishop Hatfield enlarged the endow- 

 ment. 



"^ Dur. Curs. Rolls, Rot. Hatfield, ii, m. 13 </. 



'""= Reg. Pakt. Dun. iv, 250. 



"" Arigl. Sacr. 769. 



the monks, either because they were occupied 

 with more urgent matters, or because in the 

 disturbed state of the country they thought that 

 so warlike a bishop would be a real acquisition. 

 At all events, if we may judge from their letters 

 to the bishop during his absence in France in 

 1346, they were on very friendly terms with 

 him. In July of that year Prior John wrote to 

 thank him for the news of the victory at Crecy ; 

 he reported that they were all well at Durham, 

 but the Scots had invaded Westmorland, where 

 they had committed horrible atrocities, and they 

 threatened soon to attack the bishopric, ' which,' 

 exclaims the prior fervently, ' may the Highest 

 avert ! ' !«» 



When next he wrote the threatened invasion 

 had taken place, with a result which he little 

 anticipated. The Scots entered the bishopric, 

 and encamped at Bearpark (' inter civitatem 

 Dunelm et manerium nostrum de Bello 

 Redditu').^«^ 



The archbishop of York with a force of 

 16,000 men under the banner of St. Cuthbert, 

 was encamped in Auckland Park ; ^'^ and on 

 17 October, 1346, the two forces met at the 

 Redhills, just outside Durham, and the battle of 

 Neville's Cross took place, resulting in the com- 

 plete defeat of the Scots and the capture of their 

 king. The monks watched the combat from the 

 top of the church tower, and seeing the Scots 

 in flight, lifted up their voices and praised the 

 Lord, singing the TV Deum so lustily that the 

 sound of their chanting reached the ears of the 

 combatants, inspiring the English soldiers to yet 

 further efforts.^^^ It is said that in memory of 

 this victory a wooden cross was erected on the 

 spot where the monk had stood who had borne 

 St. Cuthbert's banner, and ever thereafter the 

 prior and brethren, going to and from Bear- 

 park in times of recreation, stopped there to 

 offer prayers and thanksgivings.^'^ The church 



"" Cott. MS. Faust. A. vi, 42-3. 



"" Ibid. 47. 



"" Hutchinson, Hist. Dur. \, 302. 



"' Henry of Knighton Chron. (Rolls Sen), ii, 42-3. 

 Tradition says that the prior and his attendants 

 watched the battle from Maiden's Bower, kneeling 

 round the holy corporas-cloth of St. Cuthbert, which, 

 in obedience to a miraculous vision, was elevated on 

 the point of a spear in the sight of both armies ; and 

 that they signalled the victory to the monks on the 

 tower (Surt. Hist. Dur. i, p. I, note) ; but Knighton's 

 account is probably correct. The custom of singing 

 the Te Deum on the church-tower on the anniver- 

 sary of the battle was continued till the civil war of 

 the seventeenth century ; at the Restoration it was 

 revived, the day being changed to 29 May. 



"'Rites 0/ Dur. (Surt. Soc), 25. It has been 

 shown, however, by Mr. LongstafFe, that the banner 

 of St. Cuthbert and a cross known as ' Neville's 

 Cross,' were in existence long before the battle. A 

 very interesting account of the banner, too long to 

 quote here, is given by him in Arci. Jeliana (New 

 Sen), ii, 51-65. 



98 



