254 The Churches of Devizes. St. Mary's. 



an obit, celebrated in the above church, on the Friday after the 

 Epiphany, of the foundation of Richard Gobett of Devizes, see 

 page 252. 



Nicholas Coventre, Chaplain, was 1 Henry IV. (1399) presented 

 by the king to the government of the hospital of St. John the 

 Baptist, Devizes. 



John Coventre, Jun. One of the procurators of the church of 

 St. Mary, 2 Henry Y. (1415), and mayor of Devizes 1436. He 

 founded and endowed a chantry or chantries in the south side of 

 the church of St. Mary, (see above p. 251) and died before 1475, 

 leaving two sons, Thomas and John. 



Thomas Covyntre. This name occurs in 1420. He founded an 



almshouse in Devizes (probably that on the north side of St. 



John's church now known as the new almshouse, 1 which name 



it has doubtless borne for no less than four centuries). His Will, 



of which the following is a copy, is preserved in the Prerogative 



Will Office, London. 



44 $n Bit mimtnc gmttt. XV. die mensis Iunii 1451. Ego Thomas 



Covyntre de Devyses corpore testamentum meum in hunc 



modum. Imprimis lego et beate Marie corpusque meum 



ad sepeliendum in coemeterio Sti Johis Bapt: de Devyses. Item lego see 

 eccles. Sar. xij d - It. lego dee eecle Sti Johis Bapt: vj s - viij d - It. lego bte 



Marie de eadem villa xij d - Item lego It. do et lego 



Alieie uxori mee unum tenementuni inter ten : eccl. Sti Johi pred. exparte 



1 This building having become dilapidated, was a few years since taken down 

 and rebuilt. On some of the stones from the foundation were discovered 

 mouldings of the Norman style, corresponding with those remaining in the 

 original parts of the adjacent church of St. John, thus clearly showing that the 

 almshouse was erected, or partly so, with the stone from the Norman walls of the 

 nave of the church, which were removed at the time when its aisles were added. 



The aisles of the church are of the Perpendicular style, and appear, from their 

 plain character, to have been erected about the middle of the fifteenth century, 

 which, being in the lifetime of this Thomas Covyntre, tends to confirm the 

 supposition that the "domus elemosynar" alluded to by him in his Will, made 

 a.d. 1451, was none other than the building above mentioned, and now known 

 as the new almshouse. 



It is also, from these circumstances, very probable that Thomas Covyntre was 

 a considerable contributor to, if not (like his friend and contemporary William 

 Smyth, by whom the greater part of the sister church of St. Mary had been 

 shortly before rebuilt, and whose son he appoints as one of his executors) the 

 very person at whose cost the aisles were added to the church. 



