Wykehamica : a history of Winchester college and commoners : from the foundation to the present day

Front matter

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Preface

T^HE authorities, written and oral, from whom I have learned the particulars contained in the following pages, are mainly as follows : —

For the history and description of Winchester— Milner, Woodward, and T. Warton, together with some ancient maps of the town.

For the life of the Founder — the biographies of Chaundler, Martin, and Lowth ; also the old records in New College and Winchester libraries.

For the description and history of the College from its foundation to the eighteenth century — Cockerell's " Essay on William of Wykeham," the old records of the College, Wilkins's " Concilia," Dugdale's " Monasticon," and occasionally, Strype. . ^j j

For the records of Old Commoners before Dr. Burton's time, I am chiefly indebted to the researches of F. J. Baigent, Esq., of Winchester. I desire also to acknowledge the valuable information he has given me on other points.

For the few particulars I have been able to learn respecting Dr. Burton, I have to thank

VI PREFACE.

Burton Forster, Esq., of Holt, Trowbridge, a member of the same family as the Doctor.

For Dr. YVarton's life, I have consulted Wooll's " Life of Warton," as well as the biographies of Bishops Burgess and Mant, Lord Sidmouth, Sydney Smith, &c. The history of the Rebellion of 1793 has been derived partly from the official account in New College library (drawn up, I imagine, by Warden Huntingford), and partly from the narrative of the boys, published in Mr. Collins's " Public Schools."

For what I have been able to collect concerning Dr. Goddard, my thanks are due to F. Gale, Esq., of 43, Parliament-street, a connection of the Doctor's by marriage.

Respecting Dr. Gabell, and more particularly in the matter of the Rebellion of 1818, I have received most kind and valuable help from the Bishop of Salisbury, Lord Hatherley, Sir Alexander Malet, the Dean of Winchester. Canon Sackville Lee, the Rev. H. B. Williams, and others.

As regards Dr. Williams, I have to acknowledge the same kind assistance from the Bishop of Lincoln, Lord Selborne, and the Rev. J. P. A. Morshead. I have also made full use of Sir W. Erie's short biographical notice of him.

I much regret that the notices of Warden

PREFACE. Vll

Barter are not more adequate to the subject ; but I have found very great difficulty in learning particulars respecting him. I am here indebted to some members of his family ; and also, particularly, to the Rev. W. H. Bigg- Wither, of Hardwicke, and the Rev. W. Escott, of Staysden.

Lastly, I have derived occasional help from Mr. Mansfield's " School Life at Winchester," and Mr. Collins's " Public Schools ;" the former a very truthful picture of the Winchester of his day, the latter the work of a practised and able writer. I must further express my thanks to the Wardens of New College and Winchester ; to the Rev. G. Richardson, Second Master of the College, the Revs. H. J. Wickham, and H. E. Moberly, Assistant-masters; but above all, to my two former colleagues in Commoners, the Rev. C. A. Griffith, and the Rev. H. G. Merriman, D.D., who have given me the benefit of their recollections of old School-days, to supplement my own.

COTHILL-HOUSE, ABINGDON,

Aztgust, 1878.

Table Of Contents

Chap. page

I. The Place and the Founder . . i

II. St. Mary Winton. — The Fabric . . 25

Chapter I. The Place And The Founder

IN a work of such small dimensions as the present, the reader will not expect an elaborate history of either William of Wykeham, or the city of Winchester, in the immediate environs of which he built his College. A brief notice of these is all that space will permit of, as introductory to the proper subject of the book — "Winchester College and Commoners."

The historians of Winchester, so far as my acquaintance with them extends, claim for their city an antiquity, and an historical importance, which, in the words of Milner, are not exceeded "by any other city within the compass of the island." These pretensions may be well founded. Nothing, I believe, has been recorded, which disproves their possibility, or even their likelihood ; but, on the other hand, there is no trustworthy evidence of their

B truth. I do not speak now of Lud Hudibras, and Malmutius, whose history is as fabulous as the stoiy of Aladdin; or even of King Lucius, and the cathedral he is related to have built. I refer to the more sober, and more generally accredited statements made by Milner, and those whom he follows. He relates how, when the Romans arrived in Britain, and invaded Hants, they found, nestling in a hollow of the downs between the West and St. Giles's hills, an ancient British town called " Caergwent," or the "White City." This they Latinized as "Venta," adding "Belgarum3" to distinguish it from the "Venta Icenorum " and "Venta Silurumb" of the east and west. Subsequently, he tells us, it was fortified after the Roman fashion by Ostorius Scapula ; whose "aestiva castra," according to old tradition, were constructed on the summit of St. Catherine's, where their remains were thought to be still traceable. After the departure of the Latin conquerors (he proceeds), Venta continued to be a thriving city under its native British princes, among whom is reckoned Uther, the father of the renowned Arthur : until, early in the sixth century, the city was attacked, taken after a brave resistance, and almost destroyed, by Cerdic, the leader of a new Saxon invasion.

All this (or rather it would be more proper to say, much of this) may be true, but it rests on no sure authority. No writer, who lived anywhere near a The British Belgas are generally regarded as an offshoot of the Gallic tribe of the same name. Caesar's statement to that effect is plain enough (B. G., v. 12). He mentions them as occupying parts of Kent and Sussex ; Ptolemy, as inhabiting Hants, Wilts, and Somerset. Probably, in the interval between these two writers, the Belgse had advanced further westward.

b Caistor in Norfolk, and Caerwent in Monmouth.

I.] History of Winchester. 3

the times in question, states any of these facts. It is of course possible that the assertions of historians, who wrote many centuries afterwards, may be founded on oral traditions of more or less authority ; but that is the most that can be said for them. Previously to the narrative of Bede, all that is stated by ancient writers of credit, is comprised in two or three sentences. Ptolemy, the Geographer, (whose work was probably completed early in the second century) reckons three cities of the Belgae in Britain, v\ayaki$ (identified with Ilchester), r'T8ara OepjjLci, or Bath ; and OvevTa. Antoninus in his Itinerarium (drawn up, it is believed, under the Antonines, but not finally put forth until the time of Diocletian), reckons among- the British cities " Venta Belgarum." The same statement is repeated by the anonymous geographer of Ravenna, in the seventh century; who calls the city " Venta Velgarum."

But although these, the sole records of any trustworthy historians on the matters under consideration, do not establish any of Milner's conclusions, neither do they disprove them. As regards the name "Gwent" for instance, as the presumed root of "Venta" — the chalk downs overhanging Winchester render it likely enough that any British town, situated there, would be so called. There is no reason why there should not have been an important British city on that spot ; nor why it should not have remained under native rulers, when the Romans left the island. But a confusion has evidently here been made, by imperfectly-informed historians, between the Caergwent of Monmouthshire, and that of Hampshire, which has been the cause of inextricable difficulties.. Uther, and Arthur, and his Round Table, have been transferred from their own proper regions in the west, to the southern coast of Hampshire ; Camelot has been identified with Winchester ; and all that is trustworthy in the history of the great British king has been rendered doubtful, by its transportation to a locality with which it has no connection.

Again, as regards the fortification of Winchester by the Romans, it is highly probable that it really took place. Undoubted evidences of Roman occupation exist at Winchester. The rude quadrangular shape of the ancient walls coincides with the usual plan of fortification among the Romans ; and it was their well-known practice to fortify any considerable town in which they had established themselves. But it could hardly have been Ostorius Scapula who executed the work. From the narratives of Suetonius and Tacitus, his campaigns seem to have been carried on wholly against the Silures. Unless the " Antona Fluvius c " of Tacitus is to be identified, not with the Avon, but the Itchen (which would be a very large assumption), he never had any connection with Hampshire at all. The general by whom the southern parts of Hampshire and the Isle of Wight were subdued, was not Scapula, but Vespasian, some years before d ; and if the fortification of Winchester could be assigned with reasonable likelihood to any of the Roman conquerors, it would be to him. But there is not the slightest evidence of such a fact.

Once more, as regards the capture and sack of Winchester by Cerdic, that also may be true ; but

I.] History of Winchester. 5

again, the chroniclers of those times do not say so. All that they record on the subject is as follows : —

A.D. 514. This year the West Saxons came to Britain in three ships, at a place which is called Cerdicsore ; and Stuf and Wihtgar fought against the Britons, and put them to flight.

A.D. 519. This year Cerdic and Cynric obtained the kingdom of the West Saxons, and the same year they fought against the Britons, where it is now named Cerdicsore, [Saxon Chron., 514, 519].

It is, however, plain enough that there must have been a special time and occasion on which Winchester fell into the hands of the Saxons, and that the occurrence must have taken place considerably before the middle of the sixth century. It is no way unlikely that Cerdic was its conqueror, and that his victory was bloody and merciless ; but there is no proof of this having been so. It is not until we come to the narrative of Bede, in the seventh century, that the authentic history of Winchester begins. He tells us how, A.D. 641, Cynegil, king of the West Saxons, became a convert to Christianity, and thereupon the celebrated Birinus was consecrated as the first Bishop of Wessex; though his see was established not at Winton, but Dorchester. In 664 the bishopric was divided, and Wini made the first Bishop of Winchester. Troubles ensued ; and Wini having been expelled in 666, was succeeded by Eleutherius, and he again by Hedda ; who finally fixed the see at Winchester (683), and began the series of Bishops, which has continued to the present day.

Among these prelates have been many distinguished not only for learning, piety, and liberal bounty, but for the important parts they have acted in the history of the realm. Among these should be noticed : Daniel (a.D. 705), the first Bishop after the see had been peaceably established, a man of great learning, to whom Bede was largely indebted ; after him Swithin (852), the tutor of Alfred e; Denewulf (879), the friend and able coadjutor of the same great king ; Athelwold, the architect (963) ; Alphege of our calendar, afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury, and martyred by the Danes (984) ; Walkelyn, the rebuilder of the cathedral (1070) ; Edyngdon, its renovator (1345) ; Wykeham, the glory of his own and all after times (1366); Beaufort, cardinal and four times chancellor (1404) ; Waynfleet, chancellor, first Provost of Eton, Founder of Magdalen College, Oxford (1447) ) Fox, Founder of Corpus Christi College, Oxford (1501) ; Wolsey (1528); Gardiner, chancellor (1 53 1) ; Andrewes, the theologian (1619); Morley, founder of the Widows' College and the cathedral library (1662) ; and Samuel Wilberforce (1869).

From the middle of the ninth, to the end of the twelfth century, were the palmy days of Winchester, as it was now called f. Whether it has rightly been styled the "capital of England" at this time, is doubtful ; but it was certainly second in importance to no English city. The most renowned of the Saxon kings, Egbert and Alfred, Athelstane and Edgar, held their courts in their palace near the north-western corner of the cathedral yard. The early Norman sovereigns, the Conqueror, Rufus, and Beauclerc, made the Castle on the west hill their principal

e In his time Winchester was captured by the Danes, and the inhabitants massacred, A.D. 860 : there was a second massacre 873.

1 The Saxons called it " Winton-ceast^r," a manifest corruption of "Ventae Castra," whence by gradual change "Winchester."

I.] History of Winchester. 7

place of residence. Stephen and Henry II. bestowed especial marks of favour on Winchester. Richard I. was received there by his assembled nobles, and crowned for the second time on his release from captivity. " This city," say the ancient City Tables, so far speaking not untruly, "hath given place of birth, education, baptism, marriage, michelgemots, gemots, synods, and sepulcre, to more kings, queens, princes, dukes, earls, barons, bishops, and mitred prelates, before the year of our Lord 1239, than all the cities of England together could do."

It was not until the reign of King Richard L, that the growing importance and wealth of the great commercial city of London induced its citizens to dispute the right of precedency with those of Winchester. Nor did they succeed in establishing the claims thus advanced for a century afterwards ; when, during the reign of Edward I., the citizens of Winchester were compelled to yield up some of their exclusive privileges as the capital city, and take confessedly the second place g. But though no longer accounted the Metropolis of England, Winchester long continued to hold a conspicuous place in public estimation. Some of the royal line were born, some were married, there ; courts were held, and Parliaments met to deliberate within its walls ; scarcely any of the Plantagenets failed to pay it long and frequent visits. It suffered a heavy loss by the Act of Edward III., removing the wool staple to Calais, from which it never recovered ; but the severest blow

* A curious evidence of this fact is to be found in the manner in which the body of David of Wales was disposed of, after his execution. The four quarters were sent to be exhibited at Winchester, Bristol, Northampton, and York ; but the head was transmitted to London, shewing that it, and not Winchester, was now regarded as the capital.

dealt to it, was the dissolution of the monasteries in the sixteenth century. The loss of the rich revenues, which were wont to be expended freely among the citizens, together with the disappearance of the great ecclesiastical dignitaries, whose rank and influence shed lustre on their place of residence, were injuries which nothing could repair. It suffered again, though after a somewhat different fashion, during the Great Rebellion, in the mutilation and defacement of some of its finest architectural monuments. Finally, after the Revolution, it gradually diminished in importance, until it became — what it is now — a place of great interest to the Churchman and the Antiquary, but otherwise a mere provincial townh, scarcely to be distinguished from any other of the English cathedral cities.

Even to the lovers of the picturesque, the old city is not what it was wont to be, so lately as fifty years ago. In those days it was surrounded on every side by the broad chalk downs, except where the rich valley of the Itchen opened, to afford a passage for the clear and sparkling waters, as they flowed onwards to the sea. Beyond the West-gate, which terminates the High-street, and the barracks adjoining, scarcely a house was to be seen ; where now a new town is continually on the increase. These additions have rendered confused and shapeless what was once a complete and harmonious whole. At the date I speak of, Winchester resembled some quaint old mosaic, set in a broad ring of emerald. Now it has rather the appearance of the same mosaic shattered by a

h It can hardly now claim to be called the capital of Hampshire : its population is not half that of Southampton, nor a quarter that of Portsmouth.

I.] Description of Winchester. 9

heavy blow, and its fragments scattered in all directions round.

Nevertheless, the view from St. Catherine's steep — a Wykehamist may be forgiven for preferring that to all others — is still strikingly beautiful. The hills stand round the city as round Jerusalem of old — on the east the precipitous heights of St. Giles's, with the high lands extending to the north ; on the opposite side the Castle-hill, crowned by the great hall of the old Gothic building, now used as the law-courts, and the modern palace converted into barracks ; beyond, southward, the long bare range of " Oliver's battery," with the rich valley of the Itchen, and its countless rills of clear water lying between the lofty slopes on either side. Immediately in front, embowered in its woods, rise the square tower and Norman church of St. Cross, one of the most interesting relics spared to us from the past. When the eye has been sated with the picture thus presented, it wanders back to the summit of the Castle-hill, essaying to trace out the bounds of the ancient city, as distinct from its modern environs.

We will follow the same course ourselves, and endeavour to reproduce Winchester as it was, when Wykeham laid the foundations of his college immediately outside its walls l.

The latter had been levelled to the ground, or at least greatly shattered — possibly by the Saxon conquerors circa 516, but, if so, certainly again by the

5 The walls were kept in repair by the city, and a tax known as " murage " was levied for the purpose. The kings were on particular occasions induced to allow, in addition to this, a portion of a fee-farm rent payable to the Crown, and the appropriation of the duties paid at the city gates, for merchandise brought in.

I o Wykeha m ica. [c H.

Danes in 871. They had been rebuilt, however, on the ancient foundation, and at the outset of the fourteenth century were in a sound condition. They presented the appearance of an irregular square, as was generally the case with Roman fortifications. We will endeavour to follow it out.

Beginning to the west, where the Romsey and Stockbridge roads separate, we have first the West-gate, the only one of the four principal gateways which the " improving " hands of Pavement Commissioners have spared. Immediately to the south of this lay the Castle-moat, a rude oval in shape ; in the centre of which stood the Castle itself. From thence the wall, protected on the outside by the city ditch, trended eastward to Wolvesey, crossing Gold-street (now Southgate-street), at the end of which, across the Southampton-road, stood the Southgate — then Calpe-street, (the present St. Thomas-street,) and Simmonds-street, skirting St. Swithin'sstreet, until it reached the King's-gate over the road leading to St. Cross. Then it ran between what is now the Cathedral Close and College-street, along the enclosure of Wolvesey Palace ; turning thence to the Weirs, and crossing High-street a little below Colebrook-street. Here was the East-gate, upon the road leading by Alresford to London. Passing the High-street, the wall proceeded towards WTinnal ; after which it, again turning in, ran along the roadway still known as the North-walls, crossing in succession Tanner-street, Wongar, and Shulworth (now Lower, Middle, and Upper Brooks). Parchment-street, Fleshmongers' (St. Peter's) street, to Jewry-street. This was the site of the North-gate, which guarded the road running by Hyde Abbey to Basingstoke. On account of the great interval between the north-

I.] Description of Winchester. 1 1

ern and eastern gates, a postern called the Durnegatek, was sometimes opened for traffic. Not far beyond the North-gate, the wall once more turned southwards, skirting the Tower-house, and the King'sfishponds, until it reached the West-gate again.

The area contained within these walls is somewhere about 140 acres ; and, considering how closely crowded together, and densely inhabited were the houses of cities in the olden time, it probably contained a very large population, — treble, at least, the numbers now enclosed within the ancient walls1. The total number of churches included in its bounds bears out this statement. Setting aside Milner's exaggerated estimate of ninety churches, (in which, doubtless, buildings existing only at widely different dates, buildings called by more than one name, and buildings outside the city are included, as well as private chapels and oratories), there is reason to believe that Winchester did once contain something like half that number. The Register of Pontissara, made not long before Wykeham's birth, enumerates twenty-nine churches, and does not include ten or eleven, more, known to have been in use, though not as parish churches. There were also many monasteries and other religious houses scattered up and down the city, or in its environs.

One of the most interesting of these was Hyde Abbey, built by Edward the son of Alfred, near the Cathedral Close, and removed in Henry the First's time to its present site, outside the North-gate. Here, in a meadow called the Danemarke,

k The Durne-gate was made in 1259, by licence of Henry III., only for the use of foot-passengers.

1 From a careful estimate which has been made of appointments to livings, it appears there were 22 churches inside, and 20 outside the city.

the ancient legend places the famous combat between Guy, Earl of Warwick, and Colbrand the Dane, said to have been witnessed by King Athelstane from an angle in the city wall. Of still greater importance was the Priory of St. Swithin, situated to the south-east, between Wolvesey and Simmonds-street. The Abbey of St. Mary, a sisterhood of Benedictine nuns, stood in the lower part of the town near Colebrook-street. There were also the houses of the four Mendicant Orders : of the Dominicans, adjoining the East-gate ; the Franciscans, near Winnal ; the Augustines, outside the Southgate ; and the Carmelites, on the road to St. Cross. There was again, the college of St. Elizabeth ; the collegiate chapel of the Holy Trinity ; at the end of the Middle and Lower Brooks, St. John's house, and the Sustern spytalm outside the King's-gate. There seems to have been but one school in Winchester, that maintained in the Priory of St. Swithin n, situated at the southern end of Minster-street. To that, no doubt, was consigned the great man whose history we are now about to record, when he was brought, probably somewhere about his eleventh year, to be educated in the cathedral city of the diocese.

William, called " of Wykeham," was born in the autumn of 1324, in the village of Wykeham, not far from Fareham, in the county of Southampton. His surname has been a fruitful source of contro-

m For some account of this foundation, see Chap. vii.

n That there existed a school of some celebrity at Winchester from the earliest times, is abundantly proved. Egbert sent his son, Ethehvolf, to be educated there by St. Swithin ; De Blois, the founder of St. Cross, directed that thirteen poor scholars from this foundation should receive their daily victuals from his college ; Alfred also was educated there. This was, of course, the Prion- of St. S with in' s school.

versy among his biographers. Lowth has produced evidence that his father went by the name of "Longe0;" but that, in all likelihood, was only a sobriquet conferred upon him — after a fashion very general in those times, and not wholly extinct in some parts of England now — on account of his great stature. No evidence has ever been produced that any other of his family was so called. Godwin, Collier, and others, affirm that his name was "Perot;" but as Simon Perot married his sister's daughter, Alice, it is improbable that he was a blood relation of Wykeham's p. Harpsfield labours to prove that the family name was "Wykeham," but with little success q. It is true that the bishop is as frequently called, and as frequently calls himself, "Wykeham," as "de Wykeham," but that proves little in Harpsfield's favour. Previously to the time

0 In an ancient Register preserved at Winchester College, we find, — "Alicia, soror Johannis Longe, patris Domini Wilhelmi, episcopi Wintoniensis, &c," (quoted by Lowth).

So, again, in Christopher Johnson's Metrical life of the Founder,

Johnson was a scholar, and therefore probably used the word cognomen in its strict sense of " appellatio ab ingenio, fortuna, habitu corporis, aliisque causis fere sumpta, et alicui addita praeter nomen ac praenomen proprium." — Face. Lex.

p In a French list of the English Chancellors, Wykeham is called " Perot." But I think the compiler and other writers have been misled by the fact, that some of Alice Perot's sons took the name of " Wykeham " in compliment to their illustrious kinsman.

q In the Liber Albus, as the first Register at New College is called, a note has been added at the bottom of the last page, in a different handwriting to the rest, " yt ys well to be proved that Wyllym Wykeham, Bysshope of Wynton, was borne in a towne in Hampshire, called Wykeham, and that his grandfather's name was Wykeham, although there hath been some doute of hys father's name." But no one knows the date of this note ; and Lowth, who quotes it, does not consider it to be of any weight in determining this question.

of Edward III., the "de" was almost invariably prefixed to local names ; after that of Richard II. hardly ever. Wykeham's was the transition time, when local names were written indifferently either way. On the other hand, Harpsfield's supporters have still to prove that " de " was ever prefixed to any but local titles.

If any decision could be arrived at on a point so obscure, it would be that the name of his family was "As," or "Aas," for it is spelt indifferently either way. For this there is respectable testimony. " Henricus Aas," was certainly the name of Wykeham's paternal uncle r. Letters dimissory were granted in 1366 to Ricardus As, and Henricus As, who are described as " consanguinei domini episcopi Willielmi \Vykehams." There is a "Gulielmus Aas" on the roll of the Fellows of New College, in 1404 ; and a "Johannes Aas " was admitted Scholar of Winchester in 1 42 1, and afterwards Fellow of New College, who is expressly said to have been so elected because of his relationship to the Founder1. All this tends to prove that " Aas " or " As," was Wykeham's family name. Anyway we are justified in assuming "Wykeham" to have been a name adopted from his birthplace. " It was a fashion of those days," wrote Holinshed, "little more than a century after Wykeham's death, from a learned spirituall man to take away his father's surname, and give

r " Item, secundum alios, Johannes Longe, pater Fundatoris, fratrem habuit, nomine Henricum Aas, qui Henricus Aas habuit tres filios, &c." — Vet. Registr. Winton.

s See Lowth, Appendix, No. XYIII.

him for it the name of the town he was born in." With this agrees the evidence of the Liber Albus before referred to, "Wykehamus .... a loco nomen assumpsit, et nomen cum loco perpetuo elogio decoravit."

His parents0 were of the yeoman class, but not bondmen ; "honesti generis," says Chaundler, " opibus tamen non affluebant." His mother, Sibyl Bowade, had even some mixture of gentle blood in her veins, which would have rendered marriage with a bondman impossible. The boy must early have shewn unusual ability and industry, as he attracted the notice of the lord of the manor of Wykeham, Sir John de Scures1, who was also Governor of Winchester Castle. The latter placed him at the priory school y in Winchester, where he studied French, logic, canon law, and divinity, as well as arithmetic and

u The Founder mentions his parents in endowments made for Masses to be said for their souls ; but he only gives their Christian names, "John" and " Sibyl." Stat. Rub. 29.

x All Wykeham's biographers represent Sir Nicolas Uvedall as having been his early patron ; but this is an error. The Uvedalls were not lords of Wykeham till nearly the end of the fourteenth century, and no Uvedall was Governor of Winchester Castle before 1535. (See Appendix to this chapter.) Lowth says that it is "rather from a common tradition than any authentic account," that Uvedall has been assumed to have been his benefactor. The coat of arms and inscription over the walled-up door of the chapel, " Uvedallus Wiccami Patronus," put up by the Rashleighs in the eighteenth century, under the prevailing error, has doubtless encouraged it.

y Lowth and others say that the school at which Wykeham was placed, stood on the very same spot where he afterwards built his college. This appears to rest on the sole authority of an MS. in the Winton College Library. I suppose one ought, as a loyal Wykehamist, to accept this ; but it is difficult to believe that the brethren of St. Swithin would have placed their school in a spot so exposed to continual danger ; and if the " messuage " which stood in Dummer's Mead had been used "for many generations" as a school, it must surely have been the property of the religious house which had maintained it. How, then, could Devereux have claimed it as his wife's inheritance ?