A HISTORY OF 
BEDFORDSHIRE 
HOUSE OF KNIGHTS HOSPITALLERS 
12. THE PRECEPTORY OF 
MELCHBOURNE 
The preceptory of Melchbourne was 
founded in the reign of Henry II. by 
Alice de Claremont’; other benefactors, 
including Roger de Clare, Earl of Hert- 
ford, Hugh de Beauchamp of Eaton, and 
William, Archbishop of York, added gifts of 
land and churches? Richard de Clare, the 
son of Roger, confirmed the gifts of his 
father andof Alice de Claremont ;* and after 
the suppression of the Templars some of their 
property in Bedfordshire was transferred to 
Melchbourne.* A general chapter was held at 
this preceptory in 1242, under the presidency 
of Brother Terricus de Nussa, prior of the 
hospital in England® ; but beyond this very 
little is known of the history of the house. 
On two occasions the Hospitallers of Bed- 
fordshire came into collision with the canons 
of Dunstable, on account of one of the cus- 
toms of their order. They were allowed by 
a special privilege of the pope to grant Chris- 
tian burial to all those who had given alms to 
their fraternity, whatever the manner of their 
death. So in 1274,”7 when the canons of 
Dunstable refused to bury a suicide, the 
Hospitallers impleaded them, and they had to 
pay afine for the sake of peace. Again in 
1282,° when one of the servants of John 
Duraunt, a merchant of Dunstable, commit- 
ted suicide by jumping into a well, and his 
body in consequence was flung into a ditch 
1 Dugdale, Mon. vi. 803, 834. 
2 Tbid. 834 and Chart. R. 1 John (Rec. Com.) 
The church of Melchbourne was also granted by 
Roger de Clare to the priory of St. Neot’s. In 
1176 a suit between the Hospitallers and St. Neot’s 
ended in the church being resigned to the former 
(Gorham, History of St. Neot’s, I}. cxiii.) It was 
finally appropriated in 1378 (Pat. 2 Rich. II. m.g 
and Cott. MS. Nero E. vi. f. 12). The church of 
Souldrop was also disputed in 1198 (Hunter, Feet 
of F. 9 Rich. I. 17). 3 Ibid. 806. 
“e.g. the church of Langford, granted to the 
Templars by Simon de Wahull and Sibyl his wife 
in the reign of Stephen, was the property of the 
Hospital in 1329 (Nero, E vi. f. 137), and their 
lands in Sharnbrook confirmed to them by John 
(Chart. R. [Rec. Com.], 16) belonged to Melch- 
bourne at the dissolution. The church of Little 
Stoughton was in the gift of the Hospitallers in 
1413, and had previously belonged to the Temp- 
lars (Linc. Epis. Reg.). 
5 Dugdale, Mon. vi. 803. 
6 Pat. 4 Edw. I. m. 32d. 
7 Ann. Mon. (Rolls Series), iii. 260. 
8 Ibid. 298. 
outside the town, the Hospitallers found him 
and buried him in their cemetery. 
The Hospitallers, like other religious, re- 
ceived boarders into their houses from time to 
time. In 1527 a certain William Browne 
received a grant of board and lodging in the 
preceptory of Melchbourne, from the prior of 
the hospital. References to this house are 
very few and far between: except in a few 
notices of leases, it is not mentioned in the 
large chartularies of the order. 
The date of the dissolution of the pre- 
ceptory is not known.® It was refounded for 
a very short time in 1557 by Queen Mary, 
and again made a part of the endowment of 
the order.'® 
The preceptory received at its foundation 
the manor and church of Melchbourne, and 
the churches of Dean, Riseley, Souldrop, 
Eaton Socon, with Hargrave (Northants), and 
Eakring, Ossington and Winkbourn (Notts), 
as well as parcels of land and wood in Riseley, 
Souldrop, Blakesley (Northants), Ossington 
and Winkbourn (Notts).'* The prior of the 
hospital held in Bedfordshire in 1302‘? one 
knight’s fee and a half in Clifton, and 1 hide 
in Pulloxhill; in 1316** the vill of Melch- 
bourne, half a fee in Podington, one fee in 
Clifton, and small portions in Souldrop, Sharn- 
brook and Sandy ; in 1346** Melchbourne, 
half a fee in Ickwell, Clifton and Harrold, 
and one quarter in Souldrop, Steppingley and 
Sharnbrook, with a smaller portion in Stan- 
ford; in 14287*° the vill of Melchbourne, half 
a fee in Sharnbrook, Harrold, Ickwell and 
Clifton, and a quarter in Souldrop. At the 
dissolution the property of the preceptory was 
worth £241 gs. 10$d.,!° including the manors 
of Melchbourne, Ickwell, Eaton, Langford 
and Blakesley, and rectories of Melchbourne, 
Eaton, Riseley, Langford, Blakesley, and lands 
called the Temple in Sharnbrook.1” 
® The first report of the Crown Bailiff is dated 
32 Henry VIII., the year of the dissolution of the 
order generally. 
10 Dugdale, Mon. vi. 803. 
11 Ibid. 834. This property in Notts seems to 
have been afterwards transferred to a commandery 
at Ossington (Cott. MS. Claudius E. vi. f. 24b). 
1a Feud. Aids, i. 12, 13. 13 Tbid. 17, 18, 20. 
14 Ibid. 26, 28, 29, 30, Bo. 
15 Ibid. 38, 39, 40, 42, 46. These knight’s fees 
are only said to be held by the prior of the hos- 
pital; and it is possible that they may not all have 
belonged to the preceptory of Melchbourne. 
16 Dugdale, Mon. vi. 803. 
17 List of Min. Accts. after 
M the suppression of 
the monasteries at P.R.O. 
394 
