RELIGIOUS HOUSES 



John of Cokan', elected 1367-"'' 

 * John of Bolton, occurs 1389, 1404^" 

 William of Dalton, occurs 14.07. died 



i4i6-7 2« '' 



Robert, elected c. i/^i"], occurs 144 1 "^ 

 [Thomas or William Woodward] ^^ 

 John Turner, occurs 1 443-60 °'" 

 Lawrence, occurs 1461-91 "' 

 Thomas Chamber, elected 1491, occurs 



1496-^' 

 (Alexander Banke, occurs 1505, 1531 *^* 

 (John Dalton, occurs 1514-16^'"' 

 Roger Pele, elected 1531, surrendered 

 1537^=" 



6. THE ABBEY OF WYRESDALE 



The Cistercian abbey of Wyresdale, an ofiF- 

 shoot of Furness, was founded towards the close 

 of the twelfth century, on land perhaps given by 

 Theobald Walter, lord of Weeton, and (from 

 about 1192) ofall Amounderness. Between 1193 

 and 1196 Theobald, with the consent of the 

 archdeacon of Richmond, appropriated to the 

 new house the church of St. Michael-on-Wyre, 

 subject to the appointment of a vicar.^" But 

 some years later (before 1204) Theobald re- 

 moved the monks to Wotheney, on his Irish 

 lands in Munster, in the present county of 

 Limerick.^^^ The site of the short-lived house 

 in Wyresdale is not known, but is supposed to 

 be indicated by the name Abbeystead in Over 

 Wyresdale near the confluence of Tarnbrook 

 Wyre and Marshaw Wyre. 



^" Beck, op. cit. 274. '" Coucher, 1^, 351. 



'" Beck, 95 ; Coiuher, 226. A brief-roll of 

 1 8 March, 141 7, refers to the late Abbot William ; 

 it is addressed by Robert ; Surt. Soc. xxxi, 102. In 

 Anct. D., L. 396, is a document dated 1410 in 

 which a Robert, abbot, appears. The Coucher stops 

 with Dalton's reign. 



**' See last note, and Beck, op. cit. 289 ; Anct. D., 

 L.S. 116 ; Pal. Lanes. Plea R. 3, m. i. 



^" Given in the older lists, upon authority not 

 traced by Beck or Atkinson ; cf. Introd. p. liii. 



'" Beck, op. cit. 296 ; Anct. D., L. S. 128. 



^" Beck, op. cit. 296 ; Coucher, 13. 



™ Beck, op. cit. 299 ; Hist. MSS. Com. Rep. x, App. 

 iv, 228 ; Duchy of Lane. Misc. Bks. xxi, a, 26 li. 



'■" Beck, op. cit. 300 ; Lanes. Pkad. i, 68, 98 ; 

 West, op. cit. 154. 



'*' Lanes. Pkad. i, 98 ; L. and P. Hen. VIII, ii 

 (2), p. 1529 ; Beck, op. cit. 311. 



»=° L. and P. Hen. Fill, v, 657. The last three 

 abbots had disputes about tithe ; and John, though 

 he got papal support, did not maintain his hold. An 

 inventory of the goods of Roger Pele, ' late parson of 

 Dalton,' was made 24 May, 1 541 ; Richmondshlre 

 Wills (^MiA. Soc), 21. 



'*' Farrer, Lanes. Pipe R. 336. For the interesting 

 agreement between the abbey and the vicar, see ibid. 

 337 and above, p. 14. 



^" Ibid. 340 ; Dugdale, Mon. ii, 1025, 1034. 



7. ABBEY OF WHALLEY 



The abbey of Stanlaw, afterwards of Whalley, 

 was founded by John, constable of Chester (died 

 1 1 90) on a site of more than Cistercian aus- 

 terity in the mud-flats, at the confluence of the 

 Gowy with the Mersey, a spot until then in the 

 parish of Eastham. The founder's charter, in 

 which he expresses a wish that the place should 

 be re-named 'Benedictus Locus,' is dated 1 178.^'' 

 Several chronicles, however, ascribe the foun- 

 dation to 1172, which may be the date when 

 the first steps towards the creation of the new 

 monastery were taken.^^"* The monks were 

 doubtless drawn from Combermere Abbey, of 

 which Whalley was afterwards considered a 

 filiation.^" 



Besides the two vills of Great Stanney and 

 Meurik Aston,^''' and a house in Chester, the 

 founder gave them exemption from multure in 

 his mills and from toll throughout his fief. 

 Hugh, earl of Chester, confirmed his gifts, and 

 added freedom from toll on goods purchased in 

 Chester for their own use.^*' 



Earl Ranulf de Blundeville ratified his father's 

 grants, freed the monks from all toll, even that 

 on salt, throughout his lands, and disafforested 

 the site of the abbey and its grange of Stanney.^^* 

 Cheshire tenants of the constable and earl added 

 further endowments, including the whole vills of 

 Acton (Acton Grange) ^'^ and Willington.^^" 



But the rising fortunes of its patrons were 

 already transferring the centre of the abbey's 

 interests to Lancashire. The constables of Chester 

 had long held a fief in the south-west of that 

 county, and Roger, the founder's son, in or before 

 1205, gave Stanlaw the vill of Little Woolton in 

 his Widnes fee.^'^ The abbey's rights were, 

 however, contested, and ultimately with success, 

 by the knights of St. John.^^^ Roger's inherit- 



"' Coucher, i. The extant 'Coucher Book' or 

 chartulary of Whalley was drawn up in the time of 

 Abbot Lindley. A few later deeds were inserted. 

 It was edited by W. A. Hulton for the Chetham 

 Society, 1 847—9, in four volumes. A large number 

 of documents, many of which are not in the Coucher, 

 were transcribed by Christopher Towneley (d. 1674) 

 into a manuscript volume now in the possession of 

 W. Farrer. Another of Towneley's MSS., now also 

 in the same hands, contains the original accounts of 

 the abbey bursars for the years 1485-1506 and 

 1509—37. References to other materials may be 

 found in Tanner's Notitia Monastica. 



''* Jnn. Mon. (Rolls Ser.), i, 187 ; Tanner, op. cit. 

 sub Stanlaw. One MS. carries the foundation back 

 as far as 1163 ; Whitaker, Hist, of Whalk'^ (ed. 4, 

 1872),!, 83. 



'"•' Ormerod, Hist. ofChes. iii, 403, 



"° Probably Aston Grange ; Ormerod, op. cit. i, 



730- 



*'' Coucher, 8-9. "'' Ibid. 10-12. 



''' Ibid. 385. '•'Mbid. 467. 



^'=' Ibid. 801. ''' Ibid. 809. 



131 



