ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY 



argument with such a one as Wriothesley, he added that the houses 

 these sanctuary men occupied were so poor that if they were turned out 

 they would yield no rent. On the following day Dr. Crayford, an 

 agent of Wriothesley, begs his master to obtain the king's protection 

 for such of the Beaulieu sanctuary men as are debtors, an action which 

 would much redound to his credit in the neighbourhood. From some 

 of Cromwell's notes later in the year it is shown that this request in 

 favour of the debtors was granted by the Crown. 1 



The letters of John Crayford and certain of Wriothesley's retainers 

 sent down to look after his rich Hampshire spoils are distressing to read. 

 Crayford (one of Cromwell's sub-commissioners) writes to the controller 

 of Henry's household on 2 January, 1538, as to the extent of the fish- 

 ponds (four of them a mile in length) and other details of the Titchfield 

 monastery, only surrendered the previous week. The greed of the 

 country side to gain some profit is a sorry sign of the times. On the 

 Sunday following the fall of the house half a dozen neighbours from 

 Eastmeon, fourteen miles off, came over to inspect, and promised to buy 

 marble monuments, altars, etc., out of the monastic church. Crayford, 

 himself in holy orders, tells his patron that ' Mrs. Wriothesley nor you 

 neither be no meticulous ne scrupulous to make sale of such holy things, 

 having the example of devout Bishop Alexander of Rome whose 

 epitaph is : 



Vendit Alexander cruces, altaria Christi ; 

 Vendere jure potest ; emerat ille prius. 



He adds that plucking down the church is but a small matter, as he 

 will build a chapel. Directly Beaulieu comes into Wriothesley's hands 

 an army of masons, etc., are turned in to change it into a grand mansion 

 for his residence. The choir and other parts of the church are em- 

 ployed, being useful to protect him from the sea wind ; but all men of 

 taste whom he consults decide against the tower of the church remain- 

 ing. Southwick, which also fell into his clutches, was eventually 

 assigned to one of his unscrupulous servants, John White. The only 

 relief to this sorry business is that the church robbers fell out among 

 themelves. 



Sir Thomas Wriothesley not only obtained possession of the abbeys 

 of Beaulieu and Titchfield on different sides of the Southampton Water, 

 but also of the site and many of the manors of the abbey of Hyde, of 

 which he was actually seneschal or steward. He sold the spoils of this 

 abbey, and personally superintended the rapid extinction of its fabric. 

 No wonder that his case is chronicled in Spelman's History of Sacrilege. 

 His acts as a spoiler, particularly at Winchester, brought about the 

 hostility of Bishop Gardiner, who was his wife's uncle, but Cromwell's 

 patronage secured him against the bishop's displeasure. 



On 21 September, 1538, Wriothesley, with Pollard and Williams, 

 two of the minor monastic visitors, made an end of the shrine of St. 



1 Letten and Papers, Henry PHI. (1538), i. 668, 792, 796, 877. 



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