CHAPTER IV. 



" Within the chapel, kneel the worshippers ; 

 The censer swings, shedding its grateful incense 

 Down the aisles, and from the groined roof 

 The pendent lamp illumes the altar-piece." 



rilHE original Church at Newchurch was Roman Catholic, and 

 -*- the cost of its erection was, it is probable, contributed to by 

 the Monks of Whalley for the benefit of their forest servants and 

 parishioners chiefly residing about Boothfold. It was served by a 

 secular priest, SirGeorge Gregory, the first incumbent (a). The first 

 Church of Goodshaw, in its inception, was also Roman Catholic. 

 At the time of the Reformation in the reign of Henry VIII., the 

 Churches were stripped of their altars, and became Churches of the 

 reformed doctrine. The scanty congregations either conformed to 

 the new, or sought other places of residence, where they could, 

 though stealthily, follow the rites of the old religion. From the 

 time of the Reformation in England until the end of the last 

 centur}', no Catholic was known to reside within the Valley ; 

 when a family of the name of Booth came to Hareholme and 

 reintroduced the Catholic religion. The Booths were from 

 Dolphinholme, near Lancaster, where the old faith had never been 

 suppressed. The only place of worship they could attend was the 

 domestic chapel of Townley, near Burnley, belonging to the 

 Townley family, which had suffered for its adhesion to the old 

 faith. 



One of the daughters of Mr. Booth married Mr. Ashworth, 

 owner of the Laund estate, which has devolved in course of time 



(a) Ante, page 162. 



