Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 9.djvu/578

 476 NOTES AND QUERIES. [12 S. IX. DEC. 10, 1921. .finish it as a hospital for disabled seamen* which it remained till 1870. In, 1873 it was re- opened as a College for Naval officers ; as such it still remains. STUART E. BE AX,. Stubbington House, Fareham, Hants. The Royal Hospital at Greenwich is built on the site of and partly incorporates the old Palace of Placentia. There appears to have been a royal -residence here as early as the reign of Edward I., though little is known of this building. In 1433 the manor passed into ,the hands of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, who obtained a licence from the Crown " to embattle and build with stone " the Manor of Greenwich. The palace, which was accordingly erected, stood where the west wing of the Royal Hospital now stands. From its agreeable position on the riverside, it was called Plesaunce or Placentia, though probably not till a date subsequent to its erection. After the assassination of Duke Humphrey the manor and palace reverted to the Crown, and from this date the palace became a frequent royal residence. Edward IV. made con- siderable additions to the original building, and succeeding monarchs, notably Henry VII. and VIII., Elizabeth and James I., all added to its magnificence and grandeur. It was during the Tudor period that Green- wich Palace witnessed some of the most magnificent fetes' and tournaments ever held, while it was also the birthplace of Henry VIII. and his children Mary and Elizabeth. At the time of the Restoration, the Manor of Greenwich again reverted to the Crown. The old palace, however, which had now been standing for over 200 years, was found to be in a very bad state of repair, and Charles II. determined to rebuild it entirely on a most magnificent scale. One wing only of this new building was completed, at a cost of 36,000, and was later incorporated in the new hospital for seamen begun in the reign of William III. At the present time it forms, with certain later additions, the west wing of that hospital. A. R. M. The Manor of Greenwich was granted by Henry VI. to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, who set about the erection of a palace, which, with its gardens, extended from the river to what is now Observatory Hill. Later Humphrey was granted 200
 * acres to make a park, and a few years after

a similar gift was made to him, whereupon he pulled down his old palace and rebuilt it on the spot now occupied by the hospital and called it Pleazaunce or Placentia. But a palace must have existed at Greenwich in earlier times, for Henry IV. dated his will from his Manor of Greenwich. Edward IV. greatly added to this palace, and in 1465 granted it to his queen, Elizabeth, but Henry VII. forfeited her lands in 1487 for the perfidy she was alleged to have shown in 1484. Henry VII. enlarged the palace and built an Observant Friary ad- joining it. Henry VIII., Edward VI., Mary and Elizabeth were all born there. Henry VIII. married Katharine of Aragon and Anne of Cleves there. Edward VI. died there. James I. and Charles I. resided there for considerable periods. Charles II., finding it in a decayed condition, ordered it to be pulled down and a new palace to be begun. Only one wing was built at this time, 1661-6, at a cost of 36,000. Sir John Denham was the official architect, but he employed John Webb, who used the designs of his father-in-law, Inigo Jones. In this wing Charles II. occasionally dwelt. Greenwich Hospital as it now stands was completed by Wren. JOHN B. WAINEWRIGHT. HATCHMENTS (12 S. ix. 310, 337, 377, 397, 433). A hatchment hangs high up on the wall of the Chapel of St. John the Baptist in Westminster Abbey, above the tomb of Sir Thomas Vaughan. H. A. PlEHLER. I remember seeing hatchments on two houses in London about the eighties or early nineties. One was on a house in Grosvenor Place, near the Wellington Club, and the other on a house close to St. James's Palace. I think the former referred to a Duke of Northumberland and the latter to an Earl Sydney, who held an appoint- ment at the Court. ALFRED MOLONY. FAMILIES OP PRE -REFORMATION PRIESTS (12 S. ix. 290, 335, 453). Much light can be got from ' The Law of Illegitimacy ' (W. Hooper, London, 1911), especially at pp. 38-49 (' Sacerdotal Celibacy ') and 86-99 ('The Clerical Bastard'). 'The Passing of the Bastard Eigne ' (C. Sweet in The Law Quarterly Review, October, 1918), was very favourably mentioned. ROCKINGHAM. Boston, Mass.