THAMES VALLEY PAPISTS: From Reformation to Emancipation (The First Missionaries)

In the aftermath of the papal bull of 1570 came a legislative backlash. A new act made it treasonable to call the Queen a heretic. Another act made it illegal to bring papal bulls into the country, or to bring in Catholic devotional aids, such as rosaries. The 1571 Act Against Fugitives Over The Sea forbade Catholics to leave the country or to be trained overseas for ordination. Those who had already gone were given six months to return repentant or forfeit their goods and estate incomes.

There was also an attempt to stamp out Catholicism within the legal profession. Members of the Inns of Court suspected of Catholic sympathies were asked formally whether they regularly attended Anglican services, whether they received Communion according to the Anglican rite at least three times a year, and whether they had attended Mass or any other Catholic ceremonies.

Those who did not make outright denials used their legal skills to give evasive answers. For example, John Greenwood of Oxford said he had been so overloaded with work that he had not been able to get to church. But not all were able to talk their way out of trouble. James Braybrooke of Sutton Courtenay (2 miles S. of Abingdon) was expelled from the Inner Temple and later spent fourteen months in the Fleet prison for his refusal to conform to Anglicanism.

In 1573 the Privy Council ordered that all pro-Catholic books in Oxfordshire should be seized. But in the Hundred of Pyrton and Binfield no resident justice could be appointed because all the local gentry were Catholic.

In the same year the first missionary priests from Dr William Allen's seminary at Douai landed in England. Within seven years a hundred Douai priests had been smuggled into the country.

By 1580 about a seventh of the members of the Inns of Court were still strongly Catholic. Among those listed as 'recusants' - people who refused to attend Anglican services - were Edmund Plowden of Shiplake Court, his nephew Humphrey Sandford (who acted as an international courier communicating with the outlawed exile Sir Francis Englefield) and Sir Walter Curson of Waterperry (7 miles E. of Oxford). Another recusant, John Yate, was listed as a fugitive at Louvain. There were several related John Yates alive at this time. This one was probably a son of the John Yate of Buckland previously mentioned.

The Yates of Buckland were actively supporting the underground Catholic clergy. At Candlemas 1577 Buckland Manor was raided by a priest-hunter named Hodgkins. Fr William Hopton, who lived with the Yates, hid in a priest-hole and only narrowly avoided capture. The priest-hunter found Fr Hopton's gown which was still warm under the armpits.

John Yate senior died less than a year later. He left five sons and seven daughters, whose images are etched in brass on his tombstone in the parish church at Buckland. His eldest son Edward inherited Buckland Manor and soon afterwards married Jane Giffard, sister of the Archbishop of Rheims. Edward Yate, like his father, had been a student at the Middle Temple and the authorities had noted his absence from Anglican services.

By now Catholicism had significant support from people in the book trade. In the summer of 1577, at the instigation of the University authorities, Roland Jenks, an Oxford stationer and bookbinder, was convicted of speaking against Anglicanism. His sentence included being nailed by the ears to the pillory.

At about the time the sentence was passed a strange illness spread through the court and beyond. It killed two judges, the clerk, coroner, sheriff, under-sheriff and most members of two juries. In all, several hundred people died and the court proceedings became known as the Black Assizes.

Strangely the epidemic had little effect on women, children, apothecaries or doctors. In the popular view it was either a judgement from God on Protestantism, or the result of a (literally) fiendish Catholic plot. Roland Jenks seems not to have contracted the illness and was still in jail the following year. The Black Assizes were soon the subject of popular jingles which were promptly banned, such as:

The Anglican bishops were now concerned that 'The papists do marvellously increase, both in number and in obstinate withdrawing of themselves from church.' Archbishop Grindal of Canterbury wrote to the Chapter of Oxford saying that he was 'informed that the Diocese of Oxford is more replenished with such recusants ... than any other diocese of this realm.'

The Privy Council therefore ordered the bishops to send in lists of all taxable recusants, together with estimates of their revenues. The bishops were given just one week to compile the lists and hence only the most prominent Catholics were named.

The 1577 Oxfordshire list included three Stonor widows. At Stonor lived Dame Cecily, widow of Sir Francis Stonor, daughter of Sir Leonard Chamberlain of Shirburn Castle, niece of the Carthusian martyr Sebastian Newdigate and a cousin of Cardinal Pole's executed mother. Her income was assessed at £500 a year (= £540,000 today), the highest figure for any Catholic in the county. Dame Cecily's brother-in-law's widow, Marjorie Stonor, lived by the Thames at North Stoke (2 miles S. of Wallingford). Less than a mile downstream, at Littlestoke, lived Dame Cecily's sister-in-law, Margaret Hildesley, née Stonor.

In the ninth century the Saxons defeated the Danes on the Berkshire Downs nine miles north of Newbury. The area became known by the Anglo-Saxon word for battlefield, Hildes-laeg. The name became transmuted into some eighteen different forms, including Hildesleigh, Hilsley and even Yelsley. Today the villages adjacent to the battlefield are known as East and West Ilsley.

The Hildesley family were probably early settlers in the area. By the time of Henry VIII their holdings included Ilsley Farm (later known as Manor Farm) which they retained until the early eighteenth century.

It was noted earlier in this book that the martyred Cardinal Fisher's successor as Bishop of Rochester was a Hildesley descended from the Beenham branch of the family. Another Beenham Hildesley, John, was Henry VIII's Yeoman of the Longbows. John Hildesley's elder brother Edward became head of the East Ilsley line, by which time the family had a considerable connection to Crowmarsh Gifford on the Oxfordshire bank of the Thames facing Wallingford. They held nearby Howbery Farm until about 1605.

Edward Hildesley's son William married Margaret Stonor of North Stoke, two miles downstream of Crowmarsh. William died in 1576, the year before the first recusant list was compiled. William and Margaret Hildesley produced thirteen children, of whom four sons and four daughters survived their father. A brass in the parish church at Crowmarsh Gifford shows William Hildesley with his four sons on one side of him and a space on the other where once were the four daughters. This family was to play an important role in the survival of Catholicism in western Berkshire and southern Oxfordshire.

One who avoided being listed as a recusant was William Wollascott II of Tidmarsh, a nephew of the Catholic lawyer Edmund Plowden. The year before the first recusant list was compiled a tell-tale note was written on the fly-leaf of a fifteenth century Book of Hours, once part of the great library of Reading Abbey. It asks for prayers for Thomas Thomson, probably an underground Catholic priest, 'that he swerve not from the faith nor renounce holy church, that he may avoid the sorrow of sin and dissimulation, that he may die with general repentance, and receive the real sacrament.' The writer, probably Thomson himself, goes on to add that these sentiments are also 'meant for the worshipful William and Susan Wollascott ...'. This Book of Hours is now at Downside Abbey near Bath and is thought to have been discovered with other books of Thomson's at Shinfield House in a secret hiding place in 1792. This was a Wollascott residence from about 1587 when William Wollascott II's son William married Anne Martyn, heiress of the manor of Shinfield.

It seems then that William Wollascott II was a church papist, practising Catholicism in private, while outwardly conforming to Anglicanism. So too was Arthur Pitts who held the rectory and manor of Iffley, two miles downstream of Oxford. His wife kept a Catholic priest hidden in the house but, although a convinced Catholic himself, Arthur Pitts outwardly conformed to Anglicanism. He died in 1579 while entering St Mary's, Oxford. Uncompromising Catholics saw it as a fitting judgement on a church papist to be deprived 'by sudden death, or other obstacles, of sacramental confession.'

But, like many church papists, Arthur Pitts left behind him a strongly Catholic family. His widow Margaret became a leading recusant and three of his sons became priests. The family estate was forfeited to the Crown when two of the sons went abroad without a licence, presumably to study for the priesthood.

Owen Oglethorpe, squire of Newington, on the River Thame (2½ miles NE of Dorchester) was also a church papist. His son Owen was a recusant but in 1585 became Sheriff of Oxfordshire. The Oglethorpes were of Yorkshire descent and were related to the only Catholic bishop to take part in the crowning of Queen Elizabeth.

The Jesuits were founded in 1534, the year Henry VIII broke with Rome. During their first forty-five years they did not operate in England, although a number of Englishmen joined them to work in foreign missions. One of these was John Yate of Lyford, a hamlet on the River Ock (4 miles N. of Wantage). The Yates of Lyford were related to the Yates of Buckland who lived only four miles away. John Yate became Fr John Vincent and went to Brazil to work as a missionary.

Dr William Allen, founder of the English College at Douai, felt that brave young Jesuits such as John Yate would be better employed in England. Therefore, about the time that Yate sailed for Brazil, Dr Allen travelled to Rome and obtained an agreement that the Jesuits would start sending priests into England from the newly established English College at Rome. The first to go would be Robert Persons and Edmund Campion.

Robert Persons was a Somerset man and had been a Fellow of Balliol College, Oxford. He had taken the Oath of Supremacy and become a tutor but was subsequently expelled. On his way to study medicine at Padua he visited Louvain and became a Catholic. He eventually abandoned his medical studies and joined the Jesuits in Rome.

Edmund Campion, a Londoner, was six years older than Robert Persons. He had studied at St John's College, Oxford, taking the Oath of Supremacy and becoming the University's proctor and public orator. After a short time as an Anglican deacon Campion converted to Catholicism. In 1578 he was ordained priest while professor of rhetoric at the Jesuit school in Prague. Subsequently he was recalled to Rome to join the first Jesuit mission to England.

Travelling separately and in disguise Fr Campion and Fr Persons entered England during June 1580. Fr Persons wore a mercenary's uniform lent to him by George Chamberlain, exiled brother of Dame Cecily Stonor. The two priests met in London early in July. There they held a secret briefing for the capital's leading Catholics. At this so-called 'Synod of Southwark' they outlined their mission, discussed matters of church discipline and reinforced the official view that attendance at Anglican services was not permissible.

Fr Campion spent the late summer and early autumn of 1580 on a missionary tour of Berkshire and Oxfordshire. One of his guides was John Stonor, Dame Cecily's younger son. Fr Campion received a great welcome from those of the Thames Valley gentry who had remained loyal to the old faith. He wrote 'I ride about some piece of the country every day. The harvest is wonderful great.'

One of the charges later made against him was that 'in a certain room within the manor house of Great Coxwell being vested in alb and other vestments according to papistical rites and ceremonies [he] did say and celebrate one private and detestable mass in the Latin tongue, derogatory to the blood of Christ and contrary to his due allegiance.' Great Coxwell is a village a mile and a half south-west of Faringdon in the Vale of White Horse, noted for its fine medieval tithe barn. The manor house was the home of the Morris family who also owned Little Coxwell Manor. Thomas Morris, who sheltered Fr Campion, was sent to the Fleet prison in London the following year. He died there three years later, leaving an eight year old son.

Another Mass which may have been celebrated by Fr Campion was said that August less than five miles to the south at the chapel of Ashbury Manor. This is a fifteenth century moated farmhouse. Like Great Coxwell, it was a former monastic grange; Great Coxwell having belonged to Beaulieu Abbey, Ashbury to Glastonbury. The widow Alice Wicks was among those indicted for attending the service. During the previous year, a mile and a half to the east, the wife of the exiled Sir Francis Englefield had died at Compton House.

In the autumn of 1580 Fr Persons and Fr Campion met again in Uxbridge where they spent a few weeks resting. Fr Campion then went to Lancashire to write a theological book for distribution at Oxford University. In the meantime Fr Persons began establishing a secret printing press. This was first set up at Greenstreet, between East Ham and Barking. Later it moved to the London house of Sir Francis Browne. He was the brother of Lord Montague, the staunchest Catholic in Elizabeth's first parliament. Sir Francis had a country house, Henley Park, which according to government spies 'was never without three or four priests'. This was probably the Henley Park three miles south of Stonor, although there is another between Aldershot and Woking.

The arrival in England of the two Jesuits resulted in tougher anti-Catholic legislation. The 'Act to retain the Queen's Majesty's subjects in their due obedience' made it treasonable to convert anyone if the intention was to absolve them from allegiance to the Crown. Similarly, anyone so converted was guilty of high treason. Harbouring priests was also made illegal. Fines for celebrating Mass were increased to 200 marks (= £14,400 today) and a year in jail. For merely attending Mass the fine went up to 100 marks (= £7,200 today) and a year in jail. And for refusing to attend Anglican services the fine rose to £20 a month (= £2,200 today). Anyone over sixteen years of age absent from the parish church for a year now had to produce two sureties for at least £200 (= £21,600) until he or she conformed to Anglicanism.

The 'Act against seditious words and rumours uttered against the Queen's most excellent Majesty' raised the penalty for starting slander against the Queen to loss of both ears followed by indefinite imprisonment. For merely repeating the slander the penalty was increased to the loss of an ear followed by three years in jail.

Meanwhile Fr Persons was having great difficulty establishing the secret printing press. He therefore accepted an invitation to site it at Stonor House. This offer came from Dame Cecily Stonor, who was then living nearby at Stonor Lodge. By early 1581 the press was operational.

Stonor House was an ideal site. It was very private, being then surrounded by beechwoods. It was only a few miles from the Thames, giving an easy route to and from London. And it was only twenty-two miles by road from Oxford, the primary target for Fr Campion's new book.

Introduction

Map 1 (1000 x 827 pixels) Although not as easy to read as the map below, this version is quick loading and gives a good appreciation of the area covered.

Map 2 (2058 x 1701 pixels) Four times the size, and therefore much clearer, this map will open in a separate window making it easier to correlate with the text. You will need to use your vertical and horizontal scroll bars.

How Christianity Came to the Thames Valley (3rd-7th cent.)

Lollard Influence (1382 onwards)

The Thames Highway (16th-19th cent.)

The Early Catholic Martyrs (1534-1539)

The Religious Changes (1534-1558)

The Elizabethan Settlement (1558-70)

The First Missionaries (1570-1581)

The Press at Stonor (1581)

The Mission Becomes Established (1582-1588)

Thomas Belson (1583-1589)

Elizabeth's Later Years (1589-1603)

The Gunpowder Plot (1604-1606)

The Jacobean Period (1606-1625)

Charles I (1625-1642)

The Civil War (1642-1646)

The Commonwealth (1646-1660)

The Restoration (1660-1685)

The End of a Dream (1685-1700)

When Alexander Pope Lived in Berkshire (1700-1715)

Twixt Fifteen and Forty-Five (1715-1745)

Low Ebb (1745-1770)

A Little Relief (1770-1792)

The French Exiled Clergy (1790-1808)

Emancipation (1808-1829)

Appendices:

Do I sense someone trying to balance the Foxe's "Book Of half truths and lies martyrs". Mankind"s Christian love for one another. Then to do it in the name of our Christ. Both sides of the aisle.

My Grandmother saw her relatives killed in Northern Island. Because they had a Mass At 4:00 o'clock in the morning. Then the modern IRA. The madness on both sides.

She came over 1911 before south Ireland was free.

People would ask her "have you been back". She said "never". She had family over there. Never went back. Never regretted it.

Thank you for the History. We should never forget the madness.

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