A HISTORY OF BUCKINGHAMSHIRE 



five scholars are in fact recorded as quitting 

 Winchester for Eton. The sixth and senior 

 Winchester scholar who went to Eton had 

 been admitted at Winchester I February 1432-3, 

 and had left the school for some unspecified time 

 before going to Eton. ' Recessit ad obsequium 

 primo, postea ad collegium de Eton.' He had 

 presumably failed to get off to New College, and 

 abandoned the path of learning for secular service 

 of some kind, presumably with some magnate, 

 but now returned to it, on prospect of a fellow- 

 ship at King's College. Also, of the two fellows 

 of New College mentioned by Mr. Kirby, neither 

 went at or near the opening of Eton. One, 

 Foster or Forster, went to Eton not in 1443 but 

 in 1453, and not as fellow but as head master ; 

 the other, Morer, went up to New College as a 

 scholar in 1443, and only became a fellow of 

 Eton in 1465. So that neither of these can be 

 reckoned in the migration. Nor is it at all 

 probable that the number of 35 or anything like 

 it was made up from commoners. As to com- 

 moners proper, commoners in college at Win- 

 chester were limited by statute to ten in number. 

 The hall-books of the time, showing those who 

 dined in hall every week, are extant. They 

 show that there was no clear-out of commoners. 

 Fauley, who appeared for the last time in hall in 

 the second week in October 1441, when, by the 

 way, Mr. William Wayneflete was dining as a 

 guest, showing that he had not yet gone to Eton, 

 though he had ceased to be head master of Win- 

 chester, may probably be identified with Richard 

 Fauley of Dorsetshire, who was elected from 

 Eton to King's on 26 September 1444 at the age 

 of sixteen. Only one other commoner, Lysle, 

 left during the same time. The possible migra- 

 tion of commoners in college is therefore limited 

 to two, and is probably limited to one. There 

 were, however, other commoners attending the 

 school, living in St. Elizabeth's College, next 

 door, and perhaps elsewhere, and there were 

 probably oppidans or town boys attending as day- 

 boys. Of these we have no record. It is not, 

 however, very probable that any, and it is certain 

 that not many, could have gone to the new school 

 as scholars, since only 1 1 scholars in all were 

 sworn to the statutes. They were Thomas 

 Constantin ; John Pay n, a Londoner, of St. Alban's, 

 Wood Street, who had been a Winchester 

 scholar from 1438 ; Thomas Say, a relation of 

 the Dean of St. Paul's ; Thomas Seggefeld ; 

 John Goldsmith, who went to King's next year ; 

 Edward Hancok, who also went to King's next 

 year, whom one suspects of being a relative of 

 Thomas Hancok of Pusey, Berkshire,a Winchester 

 scholar in 1447 ; Richard Fauley, from Dorset, 

 one of the IQ filii nobilium ; William Stock from 

 Warmington, Northamptonshire ; John Plentie 

 from Warwickshire ; and John Brown from 

 Berkshire, who went to King's in 1444 ; and 

 William Wether, who is untraced. However, 



it is really remarkable to find that in a ' tradition ' 

 of this sort there is so much substratum of fact, 

 that it is true to the extent of about one-six- 

 teenth ; and that five scholars, one ex-scholar, 

 and probably one commoner of Winchester did 

 actually go to give Eton a start, and import 

 Wykehamist traditions there. But of the six 

 scholars who went in 1443, only three were ever 

 more than colourably scholars at Eton. For 

 three of them, John Langport, Richard Cove, 

 and Robert Dummer, had already been admitted 

 scholars of King's on 19 July 1443. This was 

 under the second charter for that college, dated 

 nine days before, 10 July 1443, which converted 

 the rector, William Millington, into a provost, 18 

 changed the name from St. Nicholas College to 

 that of St. Mary and St. Nicholas, augmented 

 its numbers from 12 to 70, and bound it to 

 Eton as New College was bound to Winchester, 

 so that only scholars of Eton were admissible to 

 it. John Langport, who came from Twyford, 

 now almost part of Winchester, had been at 

 Winchester someeleven years. Robert Dummer, 19 

 also a Hampshire boy, had been eight years at 

 Winchester, and Richard Cove of Bromham, 

 Wiltshire, had been there seven years. They were, 

 therefore, Winchester 'thicks,' who, in default 

 of being able to get off to New College, Oxford, 

 were thought good enough for ' New College, 

 Cambridge,' as it was often called. Langport 

 became vice-provost of King's. 20 The two other 

 Winchester scholars were John Payn above 

 mentioned, and Richard Roche of Taunton, who 

 must have been a boy of exceptional promise. 

 Admitted to Winchester in 1439, he went to 

 Eton on St. Margaret's Day, 20 July 1443, an< ^ 

 was too young to be sworn to the statutes in 

 December 1443, being only fifteen years old 

 when admitted a scholar of King's, 26 September 

 1444. He afterwards became vice-provost of 

 Eton. 



The statutes cannot have been strictly observed 

 at the first election to King's in July 1 443, as the 

 other two out of five elected were Master Wil- 

 liam Chedworth, M.A., already for 20 years 

 fellow of Merton, Oxford, who three years 

 afterwards became provost of King's, and then 

 Bishop of Lincoln and the founder or endower 

 of Cirencester Grammar School ; and Thomas 

 Rotherham, 21 afterwards Lord Chancellor, Arch- 



18 Mullinger, Univ. of Camb. i, 306. Mr. Mul- 

 linger says that William Millington was ejected because 

 he objected to the exclusive connexion established with 

 Eton by the statutes ; but as this connexion is expressly 

 stated in the charter in which he is named as first provost, 

 the statement cannot be reconciled with the facts. 



19 Misread into Dommetge by Kirby in Annals, and 

 also in Scholars, 57 ; a mistake naturally followed by 

 the Eton historian Mr. Wasey Sterry. 



10 B.M. Cole MSS. 5814-7, fol. 12. 

 " See account of him under Rotherham College 

 in A. F. Leach, Early Torks. Schools, xxvii. 



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