44 
JOURNAL OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
THE HISTOEY OF NONCONFORMITY IN 
PLYMOUTH. 
BY R. N. WORTH, F.G.S. 
HONORARY MEMBER OF THE PLYMOUTH INSTITUTION. 
(Read November 2nd, 1876.) 
The dawn of the Reformation sheds little light on the religious 
history of Plymouth. We can only infer, not trace, the course in 
this town of the religious conflict of the sixteenth century. There 
is no evidence whatever that Plymouth contained any sympathisers 
with Wickliffe ; that Lollardry ever obtained a footing within its 
walls. But there is evidence inferential, if not direct, that the 
Reformation was welcomed in the Western town, and developed 
into its extremer phase of Puritanism. At first the spirit of the 
Yicar of Bray must have been widely prevalent. There is no 
record of disturbances arising in connection with the dissolution of 
the monasteries, or the declaration by Henry VIII. of his supreme 
headship of the Church. No sympathy was shown with the great 
Western rebellion of 1549 against the new owners of the Abbey 
Lands, and for the restoration of the old faith. On the contrary, 
Plymouth afforded an asylum to the refugees, and was assailed 
unavailingly, on their retreat from Exeter, by the Cornish insur- 
gents, though they burnt the " steeple " with the town's evidence. 
Perhaps it was in set-off for this that one rebel was subsequently 
" burnt" at the town's expense. But all this did not prevent 
Plymouth from moving with the times when Mary came to the 
throne. If Protestantism was really much in favour here, its 
professors must have been very lucky or very circumspect. Ply- 
mouth furnished no martyr to the Marian fires ; she has no place 
in the bloody record of Pox ; and the only indication of religious 
persecution at this time of which I know is the deprivation of the 
vicar of St. Andrew, John Peryn, in the last year of Philip and 
Mary. And yet when Elizabeth came to the throne Plymouth 
readily acquiesced in the new policy ; and since the corporation 
