' ESTABLISHMENT OF BLACKFRIARS 63 
It is not vet known whether or not Wiiliam Cornyshe* and 
William Crane* were likewise empowered by their respective sov- 
ereigns Henry VII and Henry VIII. 
But sixty-six years aiter 
the grant to Melyonek by Richard III, Edward VI employed the 
Same means to the same ends in a commission to Philip Van 
Wilder.* Two years later, Jue, 1552, Edward VI gave another 
authorization of similar nature to Richard Bower, Master of the 
Children of the Chapel.* Previous commissions had provided for 
the taking up of both children and men as choristers. But in the 
present case and in all succeeding cases, to the termination of the 
churges coliges chappells houses 
of relegion and al oy*™ [other] 
franchised & exempt plac*®* as 
elliswhere o* colege roial at 
Wyndesor reserued & except may 
take and sease for vs and in o* 
name al suche singing men & 
childre being expart i° the said 
science of Musique as he can 
finde and think sufficient and able 
to do vs seruice Wherfor &c 
yeuen &c at Nottingham the xvj™ 
day of Septemb°” A° secundo 
A®° domini 1484 A® 2° 
[Richard III’s reign began June 
26, 1483. His second year therefore 
is June 26, 1484—June 25, 1485. 
Hence Sept. 16, 2 Ric. III, is Sept. 
16, 1484, not 1485 as Rimbault.- (u. 
s.) has it. Richard III died 22 Au- 
gust, 1485.]_ . 
*William Cornyshe (Cornish) is 
first heard of as Master of the Chil- 
dren in 1493, in Henry VII’s Privy 
Purse Expenses. 
*The date of William Crane’s 
succession is not known. He is first 
heard of as Master of the Children 
_ of the Chapel in 1526, in the House- 
hold Book of Henry VIII. 
°*The patent is to Philip Van 
Wilder, Gentleman of the Privy 
Chamber, Feb., 1550, and empowers 
him “in anie churches or chappells 
within England to take to the 
King’s use, such and as many sing- 
ing children and choristers, as he 
or his deputy should think good.”— 
The Old Cheque-Book (u. s.), viii. 
J.P. Collier,, op: ctt.,,(1831"), I, 
142; (1879°), I, 140°, notes the is- 
suance of this warrant of authority, 
with acknowledgements to Strype, 
Eccl. Mem., II, 839, which I cannot 
verify. But John Strype, Ecclesias- 
tical Memorials (1822), II, ii, 285, 
quotes under erroneous date of 
June, 1551, from King Edward VI’s 
Book of Warrants. 
I have not yet found either Privy 
Seal or Patent. But I quote the 
following from the original MS. 
record :— 
“June 
vj°E vj. A commission to Rich- 
[1552] ard Gowre MT” of the 
Comision Children of the K. Chap- 
ple to take vp from tyme 
to tyme as many chil- 
dren to serve in his 
sayde chapple as he 
shall thinke mete.— _ 
Brit. Mus., MS. Reg. (18. c. 24.), 
fol. 232, entitled “The Note to all 
the Bills signed by the King and 
Councel from Oct. 19, 4 Edw. VI. 
to the 7 Edw. VI.” 
The name here is distinctly writ- 
ten “Gowre.” But in the Latin pat- 
ent to him by Elizabeth, 13 April, 
1559, as printed in Thomas Rymer, 
Foedera (1713), XV, 517, it is 
“Bower.” | It is likewise “Richard 
Bowre” in the Latin Patent to 
Bower as Master of the Children 
of the Chapel, 28 April, 1547, in 
the Public Record Office, Patent 
Rolls, 1 Edw. VI, Part 9. Never 
yet printed. His salary is fixed at 
401. per year. 
See also infra, 64". 
177 
