A HISTORY OF DORSET 



supremacy, and the Act for the Uniformity of Common Prayer and Adminis- 

 tration of the Sacraments which formed the basis of the Elizabethan church 

 settlement.^^" 



As regards the state of feeling in the county generally there is no sign 

 that the violent changes brought about by Henry VIII and Edward VI met 

 with the strong disapproval they evoked in Lincolnshire and the north. -'^ At 

 Poole especially, which afterwards distinguished itself as one of the strong- 

 holds of Puritan feeling and the Parliamentary party, the accession of Mary 

 was attended by religious feuds between the favourers of the new religion 

 and the adherents of the old faith which were largely fomented by the 

 influence of Thomas Hancock, nominated to the living of Poole in 1546, 

 through whose preaching the inhabitants of the town became strong partisans 

 of the new party in the Church, and were said to be ' the first that in that 

 parte of England were called Protestantes.' -^- 



But in spite of strong Protestant sympathy, specially marked in the 

 towns of Poole and Dorchester, there are tokens of deep though latent and 

 suppressed affection for the old religion, especially on the part of certain 

 families whose loyalty survived all the changes of the sixteenth century and 

 later persecutions. Tacit sympathy with recusancy is exhibited as late 

 as 1 59 1, when an order was sent to Thomas Husseye and Robert Ken- 

 nele, esqs., to make inquiry into a report that at the last quarter sessions 

 when the Grand Jury were charged to present recusants and such as refused 

 to come to church secret warning and intelligence was given them not to 

 do this, ' according to the revelation of Mr. Coker of Ashe, and Mr. Seymor 

 of Hanford.' "'' The prevalence of recusancy among the feminine half of the 

 community provoked a query the following year (1592) as to whether the 

 recusant wives of conforming husbands might be committed to prison and 

 whether their husbands should be ' punishable by any pecuniary paine for that 

 offence of their wives ; ' the commissioners for the apprehension of recusants in 

 Dorset being directed by the council to forbear committing these ladies 

 ' until Her Majestie has taken the opinion of judges.' "'* 



At the beginning of Elizabeth's reign, save for the clergy, the Act of 

 Uniformity does not appear to have been rigidly enforced, but the promul- 

 gation of the bull of Pope Pius V in 1570 absolving her subjects from their 

 allegiance materially altered conditions and placed Catholic Nonconformity in 

 the light of a dangerous element in the state. In Dorset with the uncertainty 

 ' in whose diocese the shire was,' no convictions were pressed till the year 

 1582, when an order was sent to Sir John Horsey, knt., and George 

 Trenchard, esq., ' to apprehend and send up one Slade a verie dangerous 

 Papist lurking within the countie of Dorset, and all such superstitious 

 ornaments and tromperie as they can by diligent search find out,' with direc- 

 tions to make search and apprehend from time to time ' anie Jesuit and 

 seminarie priest.' ^^° The examination of John Meere of Dorset, student 



"" Gee, The Elizabethan Clergy, 31. 



*" It was the fear of being put again under the domination of Rome that was productive of disturbance 

 in I 5 54, and in 1557 the authorities were ordered to be fully prepared in the event of a rising, j^cts ofP.C. 

 (New Ser.), 1556-8, p. 87. 



*'* Hutchins, Hist, of Dorset, i, 52, gives an account of the feuds there. 



^ Jets ofP.C. (New Ser.), I 590-1, p. 358. »" Ibid. 1592, p. 182. 



"^ Ibid. 1582, p. 446. The Recusancy Roll 37 Eliz. (1594-5) records that John Slade, late of Manston, 

 gent, was fined £100 for non-attendance at church five months. L.T.R. (Pipe Off. Ser.). 



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