LON 
Bellini} tills part of St. George’s parifh, to the eaft, is 
that of St. Mary Magdalen, Bermondfey, which lias ufu- 
ally been defcribed by the hiftoriographers of London as 
part of the Borough, with which, however, it is wholly 
wnconnefted. The church is of very great antiquity, it 
appearing, from a furvey made by William the Conqueror, 
to have been founded during the time of the Saxons. It 
received the addition of Bermondfey, from its fituation in 
or near the royal manor called Bermond’s Eye, corruptly 
Bermondfey. Adjoining to the fpot where this church 
now (lands, was founded a priory of Cluniac monks, de¬ 
dicated to St. Saviour, by Alwine Child, a citizen of 
London, in the year 1082. In 1094, William Rufus en¬ 
dowed it with the manor of Bermond’s Eye, which was 
confirmed by Henry I. in 1127, who at the fame time 
gave to this priory the manor of Rotherhithe and Dul¬ 
wich ; and William Maminot gave them a moiety of the 
manor of Greenwich. In 1159, Henry II. confirmed to 
them the donation of the church of Camberwell, and 
others. And Henry III. granted thefe monks a market 
every Monday at their market of Charlton, in the county 
of Kent 5 and a fair on Trinity Sunday yearly. 
The manor of Bermond’s Eye was an ancient demefne 
of the crown, and all the lands and tenements belonging 
to it, among which were Camberwell, Rotherhithe, the 
hide of Southwark, Dulwich, Waddon, and Reyliam, 
with their appurtenances, were irnpleadable in the court 
of this manor only, and not at the common law : though 
this lioufe was no more than a cell to the priory of La 
Charite, in France ; and therefore accounted a priory 
alien till the year 1380, when Richard II. in confideration 
of two hundred marks paid into his exchequer, made it 
a denizen ; it was alfo then made an abbey, and Attlebo¬ 
rough became firft abbot. At the general fupprefTion of 
monafteries, this houle was furrendered to Henry VIII, 
by whom it was granted to fir Robert Southwell, Mafter 
of the Rolls, who fold it to fir Thomas Pope ; the latter 
pulled clown the church, and built a large houfe upon its 
iite, which afterwards became the pofleflion and refidence 
of the earls of Suffex, who were obliged to build a place 
for public worfhip, which was done in or near the place 
where the church now Hands. Some remains of the ab¬ 
bey, we are told, are Hill to be feen in St. John’s Court, 
on the fouth fide of the church. 
The prefent edifice, which was built in 1680, at the 
charge of the parifh, has been often repaired iince, and 
lias fuffered material changes. It is a plain ftrufilure, 
feventy-fix feet long, fixty-one feet broad, thirty feet high 
to the roof, and eighty-feven feet to the top of the ltee- 
ple, which is a low fquare tower. The walls are brick, 
covered with ftucco, and the door-cafes and arched win¬ 
dows are cafed with Hone. The weft front has been 
adorned of late with a piazza and wooden columns of the 
Tufcan order. On each fide is a iron railing, through 
which the church-yard and the tomb-ftones are feen ; and 
at the north end the engine-houfe, anfwering to the watch- 
houfe at the fouth end.—This church is a reftory, the ad- 
vowfon of which, having belonged to the monaftery, has 
undergone various alienations, and is now in private hands. 
There are 1 'ome very fingular entries in the regifter- 
book of this parifh, one of which occurs in 1604, and is 
entitled “The forme of a folemne vowe made betwixt a 
man and his wife, havinge bene longe abfent, through 
which occafion the woman beinge maried to another man, 
he took her again as followeth.” Then come the decla¬ 
rations of the man to the woman, and of the woman to 
the man, of their determination to take each other again ; 
after which is a fhort prayer 5 and the entry concludes 
thus : “ The firft day of Auguft, 1604, Raphe Goodchild, 
of the parifh of Barkinge, in Thames-ftreet, and Eliza¬ 
beth his wife, were agreed to live together, and therefore 
gave their hands one to another, makinge either of them 
a folemne vow fo to doe, in the prefence of us, William 
Stere, parfon ; Edward Coker; and Richard Eires, clerk.” 
To the entry of the marriage of James Herriott, efq, on 
D O N« 5li 
the 4th of January, 1624-5, a N. B. is added, “ This 
James Herriott was one of the forty children of his father, 
a Scotchman.” 
In this parifh is a free-fchool, founded in the year 1718, 
in purfuance of the will of Joiiah Bacon; citizen and 
merchant of London, who bequeathed feven hundred 
pounds for purchafing the fite and ereifting the f'chool, 
which he endowed with.an annual income of one hun¬ 
dred and fifty pounds. It is for the education of poor 
boys, not more than fixty, nor fewer than forty, of the 
parifli of St. Mary Magdalen, Bermondfey. 
Here alfo was a place of entertainment in the furnmer 
feafon, called Bermondfey Spa, from a chalybeate fpring 
difcovered there about the year 1770. Previous to this 
difcovery, the premifes had been opened by the name of 
Bermondfey Gardens, for tea-drinking, &c. and had ob¬ 
tained great celebrity from the paintings with which Mr. 
Keyfe, the proprietor, a l'elf-taught artift, had decorated 
them. About thirty years ago, having obtained a licence 
for that purpofe, he opened his gardens with mufical en¬ 
tertainments, fireworks, See. but all thefe have difappeared, 
and the fpa is turned into a private houfe and gardens. 
Bermondfey-ftreet may at prefent be called the great 
wool-ftaple of the kingdom, molt of the weaving counties 
being fupplied with that commodity from hence.—The 
various preparations of (kins are alio carried on to a great 
extent in this parifh. The tanners are incorporated by a 
charter of queen Anne, dated July 5, in the fecond year 
of her reign, by the name of “ The Mafter, Wardens, and 
Commonalty, of the Art or Myftery of Tanners, of the 
Parifh of St. Mary Magdalen, Bermondfey.” 
To the eaft of Bermondfey is Rotherhithe , which con- 
fids chiefly of one ftreet of great length, running along 
the fliore, and following the bend of the river, nearly as 
far as Deptford. Henry I. gave the manor to the priory 
of Bermondfey, by the name of Rederhitha ; whence it 
may be inferred, that its name is of Saxon origin, al¬ 
though it does not appear in the Conqueror’s Survey. 
There is no account extant of the foundation of the 
original church, which, from the ftatement of the pa- 
rifhioners, when they applied to have a new one for this 
parifli included among the fifty built by authority of par¬ 
liament, had flood upwards of four hundred years. Their 
application failing, the prefent church was erected at the 
charge of the parifh, aflifled by a brief, and fome liberal 
contributions, amounting together to near three thoufand - 
pounds. It is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and, from 
its fituation, is called St. Mary, Rotherhithe. This edi¬ 
fice is built with brick, and ornamented with (lone. It 
is lighted by a double range of windows ; and the cor¬ 
ners, both in the tower and body, are flrengthened with 
a handfome ruflic. The tower confifts of two ftages : in 
the lower are a door and window; in the upper a window 
and dial ; and the whole is terminated by a baluftrade, 
from which rifes a circular bafe, that fupports a kind of 
lantern, very elegantly conftructed with Corinthian co¬ 
lumns: over thefe are urns, with flames; and from the 
roof of this lantern rifes a well-conltructed f pi re, termi¬ 
nated by a ball and vane. In the veilry is a-portrait of 
king Charles I. in his robes, kneeling at a table, and 
holding a crown of thorns: this formerly hung in the 
fouth aide. It is a reftory, the advowfon of which was 
anciently in the abbey of Bermondfey ; but, fince the lup- 
preflion of that monaftery, it has palled through various 
hands, and now belongs to Clare-hall, Cambridge. 
There is a free fchool in this parifh, founded in 1612, 
by Peter Kills and Robert Bell, for educating eight ions, 
of poor feamen. The fchool-houl'e was rebuilt by lub- 
feription in 1745 ; and the endowment has been fo aug¬ 
mented by donations and bequefts, that, at prefent, thir¬ 
ty-three boys and twenty-twogiris, are not only educated, 
but alfo clothed. 
An attempt was made, in Eaft-lane, in this parifh, 
about the year 1720, to reftore the cultivation of the vine, 
which, whether from the inaufpicious climate of our 
3 . ifland. 
