A HISTORY OF LANCASHIRE 



although on 6 November letters were sent from Aske to Lancashire and 

 other parts moving them to insurrection — letters w^hich were followed in the 

 middle of the month by rumours that Kendal intended to come into Cartmel 

 and Furness, and possibly to march through Lancaster to Preston — no further 

 movement followed."' 



As far as Lancashire is concerned the Pilgrimage of Grace was of small 

 importance. Only the wild northern borderland was affected by it, and its 

 duration was a mere matter of weeks. The earl of Derby's forces were in 

 arms for not more than five days at the outside. Nor were the subsequent 

 proceedings of much note as far as the county is concerned. The reinstated 

 monks were still in possession of Sawley in December, but early in the following 

 year, 1537, they were seized, and after a trial at Lancaster William Trafford, 

 the abbot, was executed in March. After similar proceedings John Paslew, 

 abbot of Whalley, and William Haydock, one of the senior monks, were also 

 executed in the same month. Whilst the movement was thus insignificant in 

 extent it is also clear that its basis was as much social as religious. The 

 economic effect of the Dissolution touched the laity as closely as, if not more 

 so than, the religious effects. This general conclusion is borne out by the 

 survey of the action of the clergy themselves. 



For the wider evidence of the attitude of the latter towards the course 

 of the Reformation in the years covered by these events we are obliged to 

 fall back on the broken and not very trustworthy testimony of the statistics 

 of the incumbents. At the time of the Valor Lancashire contained sixty 

 rectories or vicarages, and within these parishes there were contained in addition 

 ninety-three chapelries and sixty-nine chantries or stipendiary priests. 



Arguing, unsafely as ever, from silence it would seem that during the 

 first period of the Reformation — that of the divorce, supremacy, and suppres- 

 sion—the clergy of the county of Lancaster conformed easily and almost 

 universally to the wishes of the king, and that in the southern parts of the 

 county the laity also were equally docile. Such a conclusion is equally 

 applicable to all the succeeding years of Henry's reign. The numerous 

 religious changes which followed each other swept in successive waves over 

 the county without leading to any recorded disturbance or removal of the 

 clergy or to any persecution of the laity. 



The simple fact of course is that except sentimentally and economically 

 the suppression of the religious houses did not in most cases affect the people 

 the laity that is, as parishioners."' It did not touch the secular priests or the 

 ordinary ministrations. But when towards the close of his reign Henrv cast 

 covetous eyes on the chantries,'<« a very different result ^n.„eH T7.^u.„ 



CUVC.OUS eyes on tne chantries,- a very different result ensued. Fo^ they 

 were supplied by secular priests, who in many cases performed the ordinary 

 rninistrations of baptism, marriage, and burial, and to lay hands on them was 

 to touch the parishioners themselves in a most vital spot. It is a sp^akrg 



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