A HISTORY OF SURREY 



unto the scole house,' undertaking to build 

 a house on it by 1522 ' as goode as Mowntery 

 house,' to pay a pepper corn rent for his life, 

 and ' after hys dysceace ' to ' remayne to the 

 town for evermore.' 



In the account of the expenditure in 1544-5 

 is the item — 



L '■ d. 

 Money payd to the Scholemaster the 

 same yere . . . . .600 



The school was not far from St. Mary's 

 church. Austen cites a deed * of 3 September 

 1520, by which the corporation, the mayor 

 and approved men granted to Robert 

 WintershuU and others in trust for the school, 

 a piece of land shaped like a coffin, 140 feet 

 long, 1 29 feet broad North and East, where it 

 abutted on the ' highway,' 60 feet broad in 

 the middle, and only 28 feet broad at the 

 south end, where it abutted on the castle 

 ditch. This land he describes as ' formerly 

 used for the Scholehouse and the habitacion 

 of the Scholemaster.' 



This Guildford School held a high position 

 in the annals of sport, furnishing as it does 

 the first authentic mention in the mother 

 tongue of the game of cricket as played there 

 in the reign of King Edward VI. A trial 

 took place in 1597 as to the inclosure of a 

 piece of the town waste in the north tovm 

 ditch, about an acre in extent, when evi- 

 dence was given to the effect that for over 

 fifty years it had been known as waste ground 

 and that boys at the Free School of Guild- 

 ford ' did runne and play there at Creckett 

 and other Plaies,' and also that the same was 

 used for the baiting of bears.' 



An early distinguished scholar, when the 

 old school was in St. Mary's, was John Park- 

 hurst, Bishop of Norwich, the son of George 

 Parkhurst, of Guildford. According to 

 Anthony Wood he was at Magdalen College 

 School. But as he gave ;C20 to build the 

 present Guildford School, and by his will ' 

 gave all his books to its library, and Guildford 

 has always claimed him as one of the five 

 bishops who in one century issued from the 

 school, it may safely be assumed that, if he 

 did not spend all his school life at Guildford, 

 he was certainly there in his early days. 

 Born about 15 12,* he would have been at the 

 school in its first decade. 



Austen represents the passing of the 

 Chantries Act in 1548 as the occasion for 



• No longer forthconiing. 



' See Article on Cricket, F.C.H. Surrey. 



* Austen, p. 50. 



♦ Diet. Nat. Biog. 



the additional endowment procured for the 

 school in the reign of Edward VI. The cor- 

 poration, ' finding the Rt. Hon. William, 

 Marquess of Northampton, the Lord Cham- 

 berlain, greatly to favour the said town, 

 who was much resident at the King's manor 

 house of Guildford within the park of Guild- 

 ford, became humble suitors to him to effect 

 the same, and he being kept in remembrance 

 by Sir William More, now of Loseley, 

 knight, then attending upon the said Lord 

 Marquess, obtained of him letters of great 

 favour ' for 20 marks yearly out of two 

 chantries charged upon the lands of the 

 Archbishop of York in Battersea and Wands- 

 worth, and £6 ly. ^d., out of the lands of the 

 late chantry in Stoke D' Abernon, or ' D'Aborne,' 

 as Austen always calls it. 



Lord Northampton did not, however, 

 become keeper of Guildford manor house 

 till 1 55 1, and the charter for the school was 

 not obtained till by letters patent of 27 

 January 1553, 



On the humble petition of the mayor and 

 approved men of Guldeforde and many other 

 our subjects of the whole country near, 



it was granted that there should be a Grammar 

 school 



' to be called the Free Grammar School of 

 King Edward the Sixth to endure for ever, 

 for the education and instruction of boys and 

 youths in grammar,' and that Grammar 

 School ' to consist of a master or teacher and 

 an usher or undermaster (uno magistro seu 

 pedagogo et sub-magistro seu hipodidas- 

 culo).' 



An annuity of £6 13^. /^d. charged on 

 farms, called High PoUesden farm in Great 

 Bookham and Champneys, in Stoke D'Aber- 

 non, part of the dissolved chantry of Stoke 

 D'Abernon, and another of £1^ 6s. Sd. 

 issuing out of the lands of the Archbishop 

 of York in Battersea and Wandsworth 

 (Batrechesey and Wandlesworth) were then 

 granted. The appointment of the master 

 and usher was given to the mayor and 

 approved men, subject to the advice of 

 William, Marquess of Northampton, keeper 

 of the manor of Guildford and his successors 

 in that office. Statutes were to be made 

 by the mayor and approved men with the 

 advice of the Bishop of Winchester for the 

 time being. The patent is much shorter 

 than usual, as the mayor and approved men, 

 bemg already a corporation, no incorporation 

 and no license in mortmain were considered 

 necessary. 



166 



