Downside: The History of St. Gregory's School from Its Commencement at Douay to the Present Time

Front matter

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Contents

CHAP. PAGE

I. Beginnings and Early Days ... i

II. House Chronicle during the Seventeenth

II • Map of the City of Douay, dated 1627

/acinjr

Old St, Gregorys^ Dottay (1627)

Old St, Gregorys, Douay (1789)

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School Build ittgs from tlx N.E.

* In iJje Slyruhberies ....

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' A View across the North Transept

• • • •

Acton Bnrnell Hall . . . .

Scl)ool Buildings^ sJjetvin^ the " Old House "

in tlje Foreground

^ The Old Oxipel, now the Museum

^General View of Sclx)ol Buildings

/acing

The 1854 Quadrangle

< Tlje Study-Room ....

Downside Abbey and the Petre Cloister

• • • •

' Tlje Boys' Dining-Hall .

'Tlx North Transept

Path leading from the Playground lo the Bat hing Pond .

Tlje " Palace;' slxwing the Stage

Scljool Cloisters

' The Petre Swimming Bath

• Tlx Petre Library ....

Cricket Ground and Pavilion

• • • •

TJje Ball-Place

Dorn Leander de Sto. Martina .

Xv

Chapter I

Preliminary explanations — Commencement of the school — The first boys — The reconstruction of the school list.

St. Gregory's School — now for close on one hundred years at Downside, near Bath, previously at Acton Burnell in Shropshire, and at Douay in Flanders — has, during the three centuries of its existence, been always attached to St. Gregory's Monastery. There is no need to give a full and minute account of the foundation of the monastery; but some reference to it is necessary, to enable those who have no acquaintance, or only a slight one, with the school, to understand terms which will constantly recur during the course of the narrative; and which, unless explained, may mystify if not mislead the uninitiated.

Elizabeth came to the throne of England in 1558, and at once threw in her lot with that of the Reformers. As year after year wore on, and the measures to stamp out the Catholic faith increased in number and severity, counter-measures became imperative to avert the total extinction of the faith. The need produced the man, and Cardinal Allen founded a school abroad for the training of priests to fill up the rapidly dwindling ranks of the old clergy. In course of time, as the education of Catholic children became more and more a matter of impossibility at home, other schools were founded abroad, with their scope enlarged so as to include lay scholars. The schools in England were closed to the children of Catholics, and statutes made it penal to harbour a Catholic tutor, so that if an educated Catholic laity was to be preserved their education could only be obtained abroad. It was equally penal for Catholics to send their children across the seas ; but, as public and private records shew, every danger was braved, every expedient adopted, to prevent the extinction of the lamp of faith in the spes gregis. The English schools abroad, therefore, were opened to lay scholars as well as to those who had dedicated themselves to an ecclesiastical career.

But the sons of St. Benedict had as yet no part in the good work. The ancient order which had flourished exceedingly in the olden days in England had dwindled dow^n by the end of Elizabeth's reign to two or three old and enfeebled representatives. The only known survivor, the Venerable Dom Sigebert Buckley, had been professed at Westminster during its short-lived restoration under Queen Mary, and throughout Elizabeth's long reign had endured an unremitted martyrdom of imprisonment. As years rolled by, many secular priests yearned for the old Order of St. Benedict, which was entwined in the history of England, and whose traditions and spirit were so racy of the soil. Several entered its ranks in foreign monasteries, and early in the seventeenth century the number of these English monks was largely augmented by accessions of scholars from different colleges, that of Valladolid furnishing by far the largest contingent. These Englishmen, under the jurisdiction of foreign superiors, and belonging, by their profession, to foreign branches of the order, felt that from where they themselves had found security they could aflbrd no help to their persecuted countrymen at home. And yet England was their natural sphere of labour by every tie of tradition, blood, and love ; and to say nothing of the tugging of their own heart-strings, their sorely-stricken countrymen were beseeching them, saying, like the man of Macedonia, " pass over and help us." These mutual longings resulted in certain Englishmen professed in Italy and Spain obtaining leave in 1603 to proceed to the English mission; and later, two secular priests who received the Benedictine habit from them were affiliated to the ancient English congregation, thus securing the continuity.

Certain fathers, also, principally Dom Augustine Bradshaw, alias White, and the Venerable Dom John Roberts, or de Mervinia, resolved to found a monastery where they could gather together their English brethren, till then scattered in various monasteries throughout Spain. Hence they founded a community late in 1605, selecting for its site Douay, a university town much frequented by English recusants and " fugitives," where Cardinal Allen's famous English College of the secular clergy was already established. In spite of much unworthy misrepresentation and opposition, they finally overcame all obstacles, and, by the munificent charity and liberality of Dom Philip de Caverel, Abbot of St. Vaast's at Arras, were provided with a monastery, dedicated to St. Gregory the Great, into which they moved in the October of 161 1. On the 15th of the same month the Chapter of Arras, in which diocese the city of Douay was then situated, granted a licence upon the petition of Dom Bradshaw, the prior, for the transfer of the convent from its temporary premises to the new buildings, with the right to celebrate the Divine Office publicly, erect altars, ring bells, &c. Soon after this first establishment in Douay these English monks founded another house at Dieulouard in Lorraine, a third at Paris, with a cell at Chelles, and later added yet others at Lambspring and Rintelin in Westphalia, and at St. Malo in Brittany. These houses, all under one common jurisdiction, formed the '^ English congregation " of the Black Monks of St. Benedict. Moreover, they constituted the real continuation and were the actual representatives of the ancient English congregation consisting of the abbeys and houses and cathedral chapters which covered the land before Henry VIII.'s suppression of the monasteries. The term "congregation/' as applied to the Benedictine form of religious life, may be best explained by the briefest summary of the Right Rev. Abbot Gasquet's "Introduction" to the latest English edition of Montalembert's Monks of the West,

In the ordinary course of human affairs great and widereaching results are achieved by the concentrated effort of a directed organisation ; and yet on a review of the enduring impress which Benedictines have made on the religious and social history of Europe, it is remarkable that these results have been attained without definite organisation. There can be no doubt that St. Benedict clearly meant that the mode of life he instituted should exist for its own sake, and by so doing distinguishing it from what may be called specifically the religious orders which have essentially some special work or aim, demanding special views, special systems of training, special spiritual and scientific methods. But St. Benedict left it to the discretion of local superiors to suit his directive regulations to local wants, for it looks as if he foresaw that his institute was to spread to other lands, and be under conditions wholly different from those of his native Italy. This adaptability to new surroundings is a marked characteristic of Benedictinism ; and few things in ecclesiastical history are so noticeable as the perpetual renewal of the Benedictine spirit, springing up within the order itself under various forms. The genius of Cardinal Newman has caught the very spirit of St. Benedict's followers, as manifested in the history of the past, when he recognises that the spirit of St. Benedict's Order is "ever one, but not its outward circumstances. It is not ... in form one and the same everywhere and from first to last . . . but it is an organisation, diverse, complex, and irregular, and variously ramified, rich rather than symmetrical, with many origins and centres and new beginnings and the action of local influences, like some great natural growth. . . . Instead of progressing on plan and system, and from the will of a superior, it has shot forth and run out as if spontaneously, and has shaped itself according to events, from an irrepressible fulness of life within, and from the energetic self-action of its parts. . . ."

One of these manifestations was that of the Cluniac system; that is, the dependence of a number of houses upon one central house. A recoil from this system arose in the first half of the twelfth century, by the introduction of a certain union and mutual support between separate houses, which was more in accordance with the real spirit of St Benedict, who intended each house to be a separate unit, based on the idea of the family with its own independent head — the father of the family. The abbots of a number of monasteries, therefore, while retaining their independence, arranged spontaneously, that is, not compelled by external authority, to meet together in chapter for mutual counsel and support. In the fourth Lateran Council, held under Innocent III. in 12 15, a canon was promulgated approving of the purpose of these voluntary meetings; and recognising their good results, the Pope enjoined that similar groups of superiors should be formed in every country. The English Benedictines at once adopted and followed these provisions, carrying them out with regularity up to the time of the suppression of their houses. But the English monks alone appear immediately to have taken the Council seriously, and thus the English monasteries were the first to form themselves into a national "congregation," and hence take their place, and are acknowledged to rank as the most ancient of all the congregations of which the Benedictine Order is to-day composed.

When the English congregation was revived in 1605 it derived its connection and identity with the pre-Reformation body through the only surviving member, Dom Sigebert Buckley, and it was re-established with the avowed purpose of labouring for the restoration of its country to the unity of the faith. The conditions that faced the revived congregation were wholly different from those of Catholic times, and needed corresponding changes, especially in the mode of government A brief sketch of these will make certain references in the following pages intelligible. A distinctive feature in the structure of the restored congregation was the separation of the '* missioners," those who were actually at work for the good of souls in England, and their erection into corporate bodies distinct from the monasteries of their profession abroad, as long as they should be so employed. This was a new departure in Benedictine life, and, by the special sanction of the Holy See, was adopted as the best means under the peculiar circumstances of the time for carrying out the arduous work; for it was realised that the fathers in England could not be conveniently ruled and superintended by the superiors of their houses of profession, considering the distance and the extreme difficulty of communication. These distinct corporate bodies in England were called the Provinces of Canterbury and York, named after, and corresponding in extent with, the pre-Reformation ecclesiastical division of England, which is retained to this day by the Established Church. Each province was presided over by a prelate termed a ** provincial," whose authority and jurisdiction over his subjects was the same as that of an abbot or prior over his monastery. Over the whole congregation, composed of the various houses abroad and of the provinces, was the president-general, the superior of superiors, who held the highest position of honour and jurisdiction. Another distinctive feature adopted in the seventeenth century was that of temporary superiors instead of superiors for life, so that all offices were held only from one general chapter to the next, a period of four years, and each of these periods was known as a '* quadriennium/'

These departures from normal Benedictine lines of government were necessary under special, peculiar, and abnormal conditions.

With the return of the monasteries to England, and the introduction of rapid communication, the existence of provinces and the office of provincial were no longer either necessary or advisable, so that the Holy See directed a return to pre- Reformation ideals. In 1891 the provinces were abolished, and the missions were divided between the existing houses, whose superiors at the same tiYne took over the duties hitherto discharged by the provincials. This slight sketch of the monastic internal economy of the English Benedictine congregation will put the reader in possession of all the information necessary to understand the references in the following pages.

As soon as the English monks were solidly established in Douay, their reputation for learning was recognised, and they were at once called upon to provide professors of philosophy for Marchienne College in that town, and to occupy Chairs in the University. Under these circumstances also it is not surprising that English parents naturally desired to ei;trust their sons to the training of the English monks.

The actual foundation or starting-point of the school attached to St. Gregory's Monastery is unfortunately lost in obscurity; most of the archives of St. Gregory's perished or disappeared in the pillage and confusion of the French Revolution, and it is to be feared that small chance remains of recovering the information they would have yielded, except piecemeal, here and there, from other sources. The bulk of the papers belonging to St. Gregory's was entrusted to a worthy citizen of Douay for safe keeping ; but, in the height of the disorders, the custodian, thinking that the documents might compromise him with the revolutionary authorities, rid himself of them by making a bonfire in his garden. It is, therefore, impossible to assign, as in the case of the great English secular college at Douay, the precise day or even year for the commencement of St. Gregory's honourable career as a school ; we can only approximately fix the date.

And here we get help from a very unexpected quarter. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries paid spies and informers of the English Government, under pretence of conversion, obtained admission to the various English schools abroad. After having learnt whatever they could about the inmates — their names, families, conditions, and destinations — they returned home, and either under plea of re-conversion to Protestantism, or simply appearing in their true colours, they gave such information as they chose. Lewis Owen, one of these contemptible though dangerous rascals, published an account of what he claimed to have picked up in this fashion. He entitled his book, " The Running Register : recording a True Relation of the English ColledgeSy Seminaries^ and Cloisters in all Forain Parts. Together with a Briefe and Compendious Discourse of the LiveSy Practices^ Coozenagesy Impostures^ and Deceits of all our English Monks^ Friers^ Jesuits^ and Seminarie Priests in generall. By Lewis Owen. 1626."

Such a source of information, vitiated by all manner of lies,

must be looked upon with considerable suspicion and distrust ;

and, indeed, most of Lewis Owen's lucubrations impugn their

own veracity. In dealing with St Gregory's, however, Lewis

Owen may be to a certain degree trusted, for he was the

brother-in-law of one of our founders, having married Blanche,

the sister of the Venerable Dom John Roberts, and when

writing of Fr. Roberts and his doings, he betrays a certain

pride in recounting matters connected with his relative's

career, and consequently treats St. Gregory's with an unwonted degree of tenderness: in his allusions to its history there is on the whole a marked abstention from the abuse which he so freely flung upon others, notably upon those who offered opposition to his brother-in-law.

Writing in or before 1626, Lewis Owen informs his readers in the pages of the Running Register that St. Gregory's community " have many scholars which are beneficial unto them, and many gentlemen's sons (which are their friends and benefactors in England) do diet in the cloisters, but not in the same part where the monks live, but in the other side of the cloister." He further states that " they receive every year ten or twelve young students into their order, and send as many monks, when they are made priests, into England." It will be perceived that Owen does not state whether all these boys were intending to be monks, or how many of them were lay scholars. In the former supposition ten or twelve would be too high a number ; but if he referred only to the lay school, it was probably near the mark. But working backwards from Owen's statement, we may appeal to other evidence.

In the year 1625 questions arose between the community of St. Gregory's and Abbot Caverel concerning contemplated additions and improvements to the property and buildings; and the prior, Dom Leander de Sto. Martino (Jones) refers to the ceiiuiae (small rooms) *' for our young English boarders."

Father Rudesind Barlow, the president-general of the English Benedictines, makes an interesting reference to the school in a letter written in Spanish not earlier than August 8, 1624, to the general of the Spanish congregation of Valladolid. The original is here rendered in English : " The Lord Abbot of St. Vedast at Arras gives us yearly a pension of 8000 reals, and the novices, who are all sons of knights or gentlemen, bring with them enough for their support, but in many cases their parents in England lose all their possessions on account of being Catholics, and then we suffer here. The said abbot also gives us free use of a new house, wherein is room for fifty monks and as many youths of good family {gentilhombres maiorasgos\ who come to learn Latin, singing, and music, and then return to their own country." In another part of the same letter Fr. Barlow gives a glimpse of the dangers and difficulties that surrounded the sending of English children abroad for their education. Describing the persecution then raging in England, he states that " lately," as one of the fathers (unfortunately not named) was going over with four youths for St. Gregory's and as many young ladies for Cambray, the whole party was captured, and all of them were put in gaol for a considerable time until they paid a fine of 6000 reals to obtain their freedom.

In an inventory drawn up for the inspection of the president-general, in October 1622, mention is made of a "Schollers* Refectorie," distinct from that used by the monks, containing " two longe tables ; one short one ; one cubbord ; twentifore cups ; thirtie spones ; five salt sellers ; a lamp ; three formes ; four trenchers to set pots on." That the " schollers " were lay students is clear from the fact that in other inventories their refectory is called "the secular refectory" and "the secular students' refectory," and in the acts of the English Benedictine Chapter, in 1641, they are spoken of as nobiles commensales.

On the 20th of October 16 19, on the occasion of the

solemn acceptance of Abbot CaverePs foundation for St

Gregory's, Fr. Leander Jones, then president-general of the

English Benedictines, made the following statement: "Nor

in truth have you, most beloved patron and most religious

fathers, extended your benefits to those of your own age only,

but you have assisted our poverty by a large annual revenue

for all future time for ever. Aided and supported by this great help, we maintain, in the magnificent buildings of your college at Douay, a community of four-and-twenty monks and some forty countrymen, exiles for the Catholic faith . . . and with overflowing liberality [you] have hitherto supported, and do still support in your house a hundred of God's servants disinherited and exiled from their own nation." If wc put aside the twenty-four monks, there remain seventy-five or seventysix of whom we should wish to learn very precise and minute details.

One thing, however, is clear: that with :he monks there dwelt within the walls of St.

Gregory's forty " countrymen, exiles for the faith." These without doubt were (onviciores, scholars living under the same roof ; and the floating balance of thirty - six represents

servants or poverty- fa^-adb of old st. gregobv's, douav stricken pensioners— (f„„ , „„/,/ „^, i,/„, u, ^™,ft„„)

Englishmen who had

lost their all for conscience' sake when they forsook their native land.

About this same period also we lind another reference to the school at St. Gregory's; for on July 9, 1618, Fr. I,eander Jones, writing to their patron, Abbot Caverel, says : " Necessity compels us to have as boarders with us some English youths committed to our care, whom their parents confide to us solely for the purpose of being brought up in good manners and learning."

Earlier still, in the September of 1614, a letter was drawn up by the monks of Douay for transmission to the president of the Valladolid congregation of Benedictines. This prelate was accepted as the ** general " of the Anglo-Spanish monks in consideration of the large-minded liberality shewn by the superiors of the sister Spanish congregation in the share they took in the re-establishment of the ancient English congregation. Those who signed this document appended to their names the offices which they then held ; and, amongst the rest, Fr. Thomas Green described himself as " Coilegii Gregoriani Regens^ et S. Theologiae LicentiatusP It may be of interest to mention that this degree of *' Licentiate '' had been obtained at Pont-k-Mousson University, and the original certificate of its bestowal, or rather, of the conferring of the " Baccalaureate," is extant amongst the Silos MSS. In several documents of the period Fr. Thomas Green styles himself in this fashion, " Rector of the College," and his post is not to be confounded with the rectorship of Marchienne College, held both before, during, and after the same time by Fr. John Barnes.

From the instances here adduced, it is clear that by 1625

a school was well established at St. Gregory's. It is an

ascertained fact that no sooner had other Catholic schools

been opened abroad, whether the secular college at Douay

or the Jesuit colleges at St. Omers or Valladolid, than numbers

flocked to their doors, and taxed to its fullest capacity the

accommodation they provided. St. Gregory's School came

into the field after the most pressing and urgent demands

had been met, and therefore could not be expected to fill

up so rapidly. Hence, if it could muster thirty-six or forty

students within its walls by 1625, it must have enjoyed a

vigorous existence for some time before that date. Although

its size might appear insignificant if measured by modern standards, or even by its contemporary rivals, yet, taking all things into account, it would be reckoned a no mean establishment for the period, and one which must have taken some years to work up to the pitch of prosperity it had then attained.

Amongst our archives is preserved a book known as the Liber Graduum, In this volume are registered the dates of the taking of the habit, the profession, and other events in the careers of the monks of St. Gregory's. The entries in the earlier years are merely copies, but duly-attested copies, from a yet older book, or possibly from loose sheets. Every page so copied is separately certified to be an exact transcript of the original. Among the earliest entries may be read the following : " R. F. Paulinus Greenwood de Brentwood Essexiae. Suscepit habitum sub R. P. Augustino de S. Joanne circa mensem Decembris, anno 1611 ; professionem primus emisit in hac domo Sti. Gregorii, &c, &c. Unus ex alumnis ordinariis hujus domus." Thus, Fr. Paulinus Greenwood, who was the first to receive the Benedictine habit and to make his monastic profession in the new buildings, is here definitely stated to have been " one of the ordinary students " of the house. To have received the habit at the end of the year 161 1, he must have been at Douay for at least one, and more probably two or three years, so that we get with some certainty to the year 1608 as the date of the beginning of St. Gregory's School

We shall now endeavour to ascertain who were the boys entrusted to the care of the monks. The lists are lost, and any result can only be obtained by a minute process of investigation. For some kind of rough reconstruction we have, after 1666, account books which yield about 700 names : but from many indications, it is clear that the roll so obtained is not exhaustive. The " sodality book," of which more presently, supplements, but does not complete this list.

'3

For the earlier period only vague ideas can be formed, leading to merely tentative results and surmises. At least two early names have survived. In 1633 Dom Augustine Baker, a saintly religious affiliated to the monastery of St. Lawrence, but never in residence there, was summoned to Douay from his post of confessor to the Benedictine nuns at Cam bray, which he had filled for nine years, to become a conventual at St. Gregory's. Dom Cressy, in his Life of Fr, Baker^ records that two boys derived much benefit from Fr. Baker's guidance, llieir names were Francis Gascoigne and Joseph Errington.

At that period only two schools in Flanders were available for the sons of English Catholics : Cardinal Allen's foundation in Douay, and the college of the Jesuit fathers at St. Omers. The school lists of these two establishments fortunately exist. The names of known Catholics and family names which do not occur on the matriculae of these two schools, or on those of Rome, Valladolid, or Seville, will furnish some clue to the identification of our students, more especially if such names or families can be recognised as " affecting " the Black Monks of St. Benedict, or as those whose sons joined that order. The results, at least up to 1666, can be but tentative, and liable to future correction by addition or subtraction. By the process here indicated and outlined, a starting point will have been found, from which further successful researches may be made. The apparatus has yet, in a large measure, to be created, and until this has been done, the construction of a catalogue of Alumni Duaceno- Gregoriani must remain in abeyance.

We may fairly surmise that many of those who became English Benedictines, and especially those professed for St. Gregory's, and whose names are absent from other school lists, or whose place of education cannot otherwise be identified, were boys who received a vocation to the

Benedictine life while under the care and training of the monks of St. Gregory's. Little distinction need be made between monks of St. Gregory's and those professed for other houses of the congregation up to about 1680^ for it is known that for some time St. Gregory's supplied its sister houses with vocations. It is difficult to determine whether the selection of a house of profession was a matter of choice only, or whether in the earlier days certain boys were not educated at Douay for one of the other houses. Take the case of the monastery of St. Lawrence at Dieulouard, in Lorraine. SL Gregory's, immediately after its foundation, met with violent opposition : influence was brought to bear upon the archdukes, the nuncio, and even the Pope, for its suppression or expulsion ; the position of the monks was rendered intolerable, so as to provoke voluntary departure or forcible ejectment. These machinations were so nearly successful, and so hopeless did the position of the monks at one time appear, that Fr. Bradshaw, then superior, felt constrained to look out for some other spot to which the community might retire, and be permitted by their implacable opponents to follow their vocation unmolested. In these straits he heard of the possibility of obtaining as a gift the old church of St. Lawrence, at Dieulouard, in Lorraine. He lost no time in making application for it, and with such success that by the end of 1606 the necessary legal formalities had all been completed, and the property passed into the hands of the monks of Douay. Here, through Fr. Bradshaw's foresight and determination, they felt that they had a place of refuge in case they should be, after all, turned out of Douay, for at Dieulouard they would come under the patronage and protection of Charles of Lorraine, Archbishop of Nancy, who shewed himself to be friendly towards them. No further steps, however, were taken at the time to make a start at Dieulouard, for the monks had no intention of abandoning their house at

Douay unless actually forced to do so, and meanwhile contested for their right to stay. The dispute, which had gone for arbitration to Rome, took long in settlement; and the delay made the monks fear that after all they might have to leave Douay, so they determined to make a beginning at Dieulouard, and commenced conventual life there on August 9, 1608. In the December of the same year the establishment of Douay was confirmed by Papal decree, renewed in the April of 1609. The strength, vigour, and earnestness of the reviving congregation was found equal to the task of continuing the new foundation at Dieulouard, and the opposition thus defeated its own ends ; for in place of extinction it brought expansion. The development of this sister house is no part of the history of St. Gregory's ; St. Lawrence's struck its roots deep in a congenial soil, and pursued its course with varying fortune till the French Revolution drove away the community, which, after many vicissitudes, became finally settled at Ampleforth, in Yorkshire, where it has fructified and flourishes. Until a few years before its ejection from Dieulouard, St. Lawrence's had no school in the ordinary acceptance of the term. The summaries of the condition of St. Lawrence's, drawn up for the information of the president and the general chapter, are still in existence : they commence about 1632, and continue almost unbroken to 1784. The highest number of scholars recorded in these interesting returns was reached in 1780, when eleven were in residence: the general average does not exceed two or three. To assign any unclaimed schoolboys of the seventeenth century to St. lAwrence's is, therefore, practically out of the question ; and the same conclusion applies to St. Edmund's house in Paris. Hence, we may assume, as a working hypothesis, that when the names of monks at St. Lawrence's or at St. Edmund's are the same as those of monks who belonged to St.