A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



The great chamber has a ceiling panelled with 

 moulded wooden beams and light ribs crossing the 

 panels diagonally, the beams being slightly cambered. 

 This room has been lined with sixteenth-century 

 wainscot, full of good detail, and in it were inserted 

 two elaborately carved panels with figures in low re- 

 lief said to represent Henry \"III and his wives. Only 

 one of these panels now remains, leaning against the 

 wall. 



The rest of the south wing is gutted, and ends in a 

 plain brick gable. 



The north wing has been nearly rebuilt, and re- 

 tains nothing of its old fittings, its eastern half being 

 now used as a farmhouse. On the north are some 

 picturesque brick farm buildings, built by Sir Francis 

 Anderton in I 744. 



To the south of the hall in an open field stands 

 the ruined chapel called ' Lydiate Abbey.' It was 

 dedicated in honour of St. Catherine. Its plan is of 

 the simplest form, a rectangle 46 ft. 9 in. long by 

 16 ft. 4 in. wide, internal measurement, with a small 

 west tower. Weather and the arch-enemy of ancient 

 buildings, ivy, are slowly destroying its ruins. It 

 has had an east window of five lights, and four three- 

 light windows on the south side, with stepped but- 

 tresses between the windows, formerly capped by 

 pinnacles, which, with an embattled parapet, are 

 shown in Pennant's view, noted below. There are 

 no windows on the north side. There are north 

 and south doorways near the west end, with a south 

 porch, over the outer arch of which are the arms of 

 Ireland, and on the dripstones of the label the initials 

 LI and CI. There are stone seats on both sides of the 

 porch, and in the north-east angle is a holy-water 

 stone, while the remains of a niche and corbel, 

 formerly over the outer arch, lie near by. The 

 tower is of three stages with diagonal buttresses, and a 

 three-light west window. In the belfry stage are 

 two-light windows with tracery, and the tower has an 

 embattled parapet with angle pinnacles. 



Parts of a broken altar-slab lie in the church, 

 enough remaining to show that the altar was 3 ft. 4 in. 

 high by 8 ft. 6 in. long and 2 ft. 6 in. wide. 



The date of the building is probably fixed by the 

 initials on the porch of Lawrence Ireland, ob. before 

 i486, and Catherine (Blundcll) his wife, though 

 the details would suggest a later date, especially the 

 absence of cusps in the window tracery. 



Pennant thus describes it in 1 773 : 'A small but 

 most beautiful building, with a tower steeple, with pin- 



nacles and battlements venerably overgrown in many 

 parts with ivy." Gregson also notices the building, 

 but was of opinion it was never completed.' This 

 however, is a mistake, fragments of stained glass and 

 roofing flags having been found within the walls. 



The chapel was no doubt dismantled when the 

 worship for which it was erected was prohibited 

 by law. Four alabaster groups attributed to the 

 Nottingham school, and representing the story of 

 St. Catherine, probably formed the reredos ; they 

 were preserved at the hall, and are now in the pulpit 

 of the church opposite. An alabaster figure of 

 St. Catherine, which has been supposed to have occu- 

 pied the niche over the porch, has also been transferred 

 from the hall to the church.^ The interior of the 

 chapel was used for burial occasionally— five priests 

 lying there.' 



No details are known as to the continuance or 

 revival of the Roman Catholic worship in Lydiate, but 

 Francis Waldegrave, S.J., was in residence at the hall 

 in 1 68 1. Margaret Ireland of Lydiate, widow, and 

 many others, occur in a list of recusants fined or 

 outlawed in 1680.' The mission was served by 

 the Jesuits down to 1860," when the late Thomas 

 Ellison Gibson, a secular priest, was appointed.' He 

 was a diligent antiquary and author of the work 

 frequently quoted in this account — Lydiate Hall and 

 its jlssociations, issued in 1876. He also edited the 

 Cavalier's Note Book, Crosby Records, and N. Blundell's 

 Diary. Edmund Powell, appointed in 1885, must 

 also be mentioned.' 



Gregson in 1816 records that ' the neighbourhood 

 still abounds with Catholic families, and mass is 

 regularly performed in the old hall.' ° This domestic 

 chapel has been superseded by the church of St. Mary 

 (commonly called 'Our Lady's'), built in 1854 by 

 the late Thomas Weld Blundell, and consecrated in 

 1892. A burial ground was opened in i860. Be- 

 sides the alabaster groups and statue already mentioned 

 the church has the figure of a bishop seated (said to 

 have been brought from Halsall), a pre-Reformation 

 chalice, and an ancient processional cross. A roadside 

 cross, found buried in the neighbourhood in 1870, 

 has been erected as the cemetery cross.'" 



MELLING 



Melinge, Dom. Bk. ; Melling, 1224, usual; 

 Mellinge, common ; Mellyngg and Mellyngge 

 I 292. 



* Tour to Alston AIocTy 51, An en- 

 graving of the chapel is given. 



^ Fragments (cd. Harland), 219; with 

 an engraving ; see also Gent, ^i'^g- 

 1821, ii, 597. *In the work of excavating 

 the sanctuar)' ... a curious confirma- 

 tion of the fact of the chapel having been 

 used for Catholic worship was met with. 

 About six feet in front of the altar, and 

 about three feet from the surface, some 

 dark mould was found mingled with fine 

 sand, which had evidently been brought 

 there, as it did not belong to the natural 

 soil. . . On my mentioning the discovery 

 to the bishop (Dr. Goss) he at once re- 

 ferred it to the well for the deposit of the 

 sacrarium (or piscina), which it was cus- 

 tomary to place in front of the altar ; he 

 believed that a communication would be 

 tound with the spot occupied by the 

 sacrarium on the south side. This con- 

 jecture proved to be correct, and a little 



channel could be traced leading to the 

 position indicated ' ; Gibson, Lydiate Hall^ 



I74-S- 



*• Ibid. 175-9. ^^^ material makes 

 the supposition unlikely, alabaster being 

 ill-suited for exposure to the weather. 



■* The earliest record of a burial is of 

 interest. It occurs in a report from one 

 Thomas Bell, who had turned informer, 

 and is dated about 1590 : * Mr. Blundell, 

 of Crosby, kept many years one Small, a 

 Seminary priest, who at his death was 

 buried in the chapel of Lydiate, where 

 never was any buried before.' Christopher 

 Small had been fellow of Exeter Coll. 

 Oxf. till 1575 ; Bihort Account of Lydiate 

 {1893), 8 5 quoted from the Archives of 

 the archdiocese of Westminster, iv, n. 38, 



433- 



^Lydiate Hall, 284. 



^ An account of each will be found in 

 the work just quoted, 274-95. 



208 



7 He was born in Manchester in 1822, 

 and educated at Ushaw. Ordained in 

 1847 he served on the mission in Liver- 

 pool, in the Fylde, and at Lydiate. He 

 retired from active work in 1879, and 

 died 29 January, 1891, at Birkdale, but 

 was buried at Lydiate. From the Memoir 

 (with portrait) in Li'uerpool Catb, Ann. 

 1892. 



^ He was the son of a Liverpool com 

 merchant; born in 1837, educated at 

 Everton, Eichstadt, and the English Col- 

 lege, Rome ; and ordained in the Lateran 

 Basilica, 1862; he laboured in Liverpool 

 and its neighbourhood. He was an an- 

 tiquary also, and edited the Scarisbrick 

 charters for the Historic Society's Tram- 

 actions. He died 26 Dec. 1901. There is a 

 memoir with portrait in Li'verpool Catb. 

 Annual, 1903. 



^ Fragments, 219. 



"^^ Lanes, and Ches. Anti'^. Soc. xlx, 168. 



