Page:Men of Kent and Kentishmen.djvu/116

  them. He surprised and took John Mercer, a Scotch pirate, who had greatly destroyed the trade of the city, together with fifteen sail of Spanish ships richly freighted, of which he made prizes. The wealth thus acquired he placed at the king's disposal, to maintain a thousand men in his war with France. He died in the year 1385, bequeathing many charitable legacies to the poor. He was buried with his wife, Lady Jane Stamford, in the Grey Friars Church, London.

[See "Stow's Survey of London," by Strype, and "Hasted's Kent."]

SIMON MEOPHAM,

ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY,

Is said by Fuller to have been born at Meopham. He was elected Archbishop of Canterbury in 1327, and the appointment was, in the following year, though not without difficulty, confirmed by the Pope. He had received his education at Oxford, where he was a Fellow of Merton, and was preferred a Prebend of S. Paul's, and to the living of Tunstall. "He was famous," says Fuller, "for two things, his expensive suit with the monks of Canterbury, and his magnificent visitation in person of the diocese south of the Thames." His death was hastened by vexation at the loss of his suit with the monks; he died in 1333. He was accounted well-learned in the learning of the times. He rebuilt the church of his native parish.

[See "Fuller's Worthies," "Lambarde's Perambulation," "Hook's Archbishops."]