A HISTORY OF NOTTINGHAMSHIRE 



Amiens, but was subsequently made subsidiary 

 to Halesowen on account of the distance from 

 the father's house ; and when that arrangement 

 proved unsatisfactory owing to its poverty- 

 stricken and desolate condition, this small Welsh 

 abbey was transferred to the guardianship of 

 Welbeck.'" Welbeck's seven direct children, 

 naming them in the order of their birth, were 

 Dureford, Sussex, c. 1160; Hr naby, Lin- 

 colnshire, 1175 ; Leiston, Suffolk, 1183 ; Beau- 

 chief, Derbyshire, 1 183; West Dereham, 

 Norfolk, 1 1 88; Torre, Devonshire, 1 1 96; 

 and Halesowen, Salop, 1218. There must have 

 been indeed a most marvellous vitality and 

 fervour in this Nottinghamshire abbey, to have 

 been able to send out seven swarms into distant 

 parts of England within less than half a centurj'. 



The abbots of Premonstratensian houses, 

 though exempt from diocesan visitation, usually 

 made submission to their diocesan after election, 

 promising canonical obedience in all things- 

 saving the rights of their order. Many of these 

 submissions of the abbots of Welbeclc to their 

 diocesan appear in the archiepiscopal registers of 

 York. 



The entr\- recording the obediencei of John 

 de Duckmanton on his electioriin 1309 states 

 that he was a canon of the Austin Order.'^ 

 When William de Kendall was elected in 13 16 

 the see of York was vacant, but the abbot duly 

 proceeded to that city and made his promise of 

 obedience to the dean and chapter on 25 July 

 of that year.'^ 



A commission was appointed in 1334 on the 

 complaint of Elizabeth widow of the late 

 Thomas Furnival, alleging that John de Not- 

 tingham, Abbot of Welbeck, with one of his 

 fellow canons, his chamberlain, and several 

 others, had broken into her park at Worksop, 

 and there hunted and carried away deer.'' 



Robert de Spalding, one of the canons of the 

 house, was elected abbot in 1 34 1. Whereupon 

 the Abbot of LanL'don, as commi^sary of the 

 Abbot of Pr<^montrd, wrote to the Abbot of 

 Sulby stating that Spalding had lately been con- 

 victed of conspiracy and other crimes before 

 him and other visitors in the church of Welbeck, 

 and tliat iie was to be peremptorily cited to 

 appear before him at Langdon. A certificate 

 was in due course forwarded to the commis- 

 sary that on 21 July the new abbot of Spalding 

 had been ser\'ed with the citation in his own 

 chambers, which was exhibited and read to him 

 by two canons of Sulby, in the presence of 

 three of the discreet canons of Welbeck, John 

 de Retford, John de Blyth, and William de 

 Gedling.'* We know nothing further of these 



""Harl. MS. 3640, fol. i8d. 



" Ibid. 6970, fol. 145. 



'Mbid. fol. 156 d. 



" Pat. 8 Edw. Ill, pt. ii, m. 34 d. 



" Coll. Angb-Premon. ii, 167-9. 



charges, but at all events Abbot Robert was 

 allowed to continue in office until he was carried 

 ofiF by the plague in 1349- 



There is no necessity for entering here at 

 any length into the general question of the dis- 

 putes at the beginning of the 14th century be- 

 tween the Abbot-General of Prcmontri and the 

 houses of the English province, for Welbeck 

 took no exceptional part in this prolonged dis- 

 pute.'* Suffice it to say that Prdmontri made 

 three claims from the English White Canons : — 

 (i) The attendance of the abbots at the general 

 annual chapter at the mother house ; (2) The 

 appointment of a visitor to report to the abbot- 

 general ; (3) The taxation of the houses for the 

 benefit of the order in general and of Pr^mon- 

 Xxk in particular. It was the last claim that 

 was the source of so many disputes. A royal 

 proclamation of 1306 forbade the payment of 

 any subsidy by religious orders in England to a 

 foreign superior. The English abbots, however, 

 were all summoned in 1 310 by Adam de Crecy 

 (abbot-general from 1304 to 1327) to Prcmon- 

 txk and strictly ordered to bring with them the 

 arrears of tallage. Thereupon the English 

 abbots met, including John de Cesterfeld, Abbot 

 of Welbeck, and sent word to the abbot-superior 

 that they could not obey him, for Parliament 

 had forbidden them to leave the kingdom, and 

 if they disobeyed they would certainly be out- 

 lawed and unable to return to their respective 

 houses. Two of their number, the Abbots of 

 Newhouse and Sulby, were, however, permitted 

 to go as proctors of their brethren. Eventually, 

 at a general chapter held in 1 316, an agreement 

 was arrived at whereby the English abbots, 

 owing to their distance from the foreign centre, 

 were permitted to be represented at the annual 

 chapter at Pr^montri by certain delegates, and 

 the question of apport or tallage to the mother 

 house was held in abeyance until the law of 

 England should be changed. Subsequently 

 during both the 14th and 15th centuries no 

 impediment was placed in the way of the dele- 

 gated Premonstratensian abbots crossing the 

 seas, provided the Crown licence was obtained 

 in each case. The entries on the Patent Rolls 

 granting permits of this kind to successive abbots 

 of Welbeck are sufficiently frequent to show the 

 importance of this abbey. 



The granting of corrodies to royal pensioners 

 by this abbey was insisted on by the autocratic 

 Edward III. John de Norton was sent by the 



" The matter has been dealt with at some length 

 in the account of Sulby {V.C.H. Northants, ii, 1 38-42). 

 It is fully discussed and all the documents cited at 

 length in Abbot Gasquet's three valuable volumes, 

 Collectanea Anglo-Premomtratensia (1904-7), where 

 Bishop Redman's register (Ashm. MS. 1 5 1 9) and 

 Peck's collections in the B.M. are folly set forth. 

 Future references in this survey of Welbeck will be 

 given to these volumes instead of to the MSS. 



132 



