Page:VCH London 1.djvu/610

 A HISTORY OF LONDON Margaret de Badlesmere, who was living in the nunnery in 1323,-* was not the only widow of her position to find a retreat from the world there ; for Margaret Beauchamp, after the death of her husband, the earl of Warwick, had an indult from the pope in 1398 to reside there with three matrons as long as she pleased,^' and two of the abbesses had taken the veil after widowhood, Katherine wife of John de Ing- ham,** and Eleanor Lady Scrope, daughter of Ralph de Neville.^' Henry earl of Lancaster in 1349,^" and Matilda Lady de Lisle in 1353," received leave from the pope to visit the convent with a limited namber of attendants. The relations between the nunnery and the family of Thomas de Woodstock, duke of Gloucester, appear to have been of the closest kind. It was the duke who obtained for the nuns in 1394 the advowson of Potton church from the prior and convent of St. Andrew, Northampton, and arranged for its appropriation without expense to the abbey .^' His house adjoined the conventual church, and the abbess and sisters allowed him to make a door between the two buildings so that he could enter the church as he pleased, a privilege they were not prepared to extend to the lady who took the house after the duke's death.'^ The duchess died in the nunnery,'* and one of the daughters, Isabel, who had been placed in the nunnery at a very youthful age,'' though she had permission from the pope to leave if she would, chose to remain,'^ and in the end became abbess. '' All the nuns could not have '^ Cal. of dose, 1323-7, pp. 46, 48. " Cal. Pap. Letters, v, 177. " Cal. of Close, 1 339-41, p. 266 ; Lansd. MS. 205, fol. 21. '^ Ibid, and ^rch. xv, 104. '" Cal. Pap. Pet., 166. He was allowed to enter with ten persons. " Cal. Pap. Letters, iii, 488. She was allowed to enter once a year with two matrons. '' Add. Chart. 1995 i. " Cal. Pap. Letters, v, 544. " Trokelowe and Blaneforde, Chron. et Ann. (Rolls Ser.), 321. By will she left to the abbess and convent £ I y. d. and a ' tonell ' of good wine ; to her daughter Isabel, minoress, then in her sixteenth year, various books, among them a French Bible in 2 vols, with gold clasps enamelled with the arms of France. Nicolas, Test. Vet. 147. '' The papal mandate says ' she was in infancy placed in the monastery and clad in the monastic habit.' Cal. Pap. Letters, v, 385. ^ The pope's permission to depart was given in 1401. In 1403 the king pardoned one of the ser- vants of the Minories at the supplication of the abbess and his kinswoman Isabel de Gloucestre. Cal. of Pat. 1401-5, p. 248. " Fly, ' Some Account of an Abbey of Nuns,' Arch. XV, 105. Henry V in 142 1 or 1422 author- ized Henry archbishop of Canterbury and others to pay to the abbey of the Minories an annual rent of 26 marks from the manor of Wethersfield during the lifetime of the abbess, Isabella of Gloucester. 5 been as contented with their lot, for in 1385 the king had ordered his serjeant-at-arms to arrest an apostate minoress, Mary de Felton, and deliver her to the abbess for punishment.'^ This connexion with the Gloucester family would in itself be sufficient to account for the favour shown to the minoresses by Henry IV, who almost immediately after his accession gave them the custody of the alien priory or manor of Appuldurcomb during the war with France, with permission to acquire it in mortmain from the abbey of Montebourg in Normandy,'' and in 1 40 1, in a confirmation of privileges granted to them by his predecessors, added another, that no justice, mayor, or other officer should have any jurisdiction within the precinct of the house except in the case of treason or felonies touch- ing the crown.*° The nuns did not succeed in purchasing Appuldurcomb,*'^ and they had the custody*' only until in 1461 Edward IV granted them the manor in mortmain.*' He did so 'on account of their poverty,' though during the preceding century they must have acquired a good deal of property by bequests** and in other ways.*' Either therefore the house must have had special difficulties at that time, or, as is more probable, its income was always rather small for the number it supported. In 15 15 twenty- seven of the nuns died of some infectious com- plaint,*^ so that there could hardly have been less than thirty or thirty-five before the outbreak. The sum expended there on food*' in 1532 was very little less than had been spent on the food of convent and guests at Holy Trinity Priory. It must have been shortly after the outbreak of plague that the convent buildings were de- stroyed by fire. The mayor, aldermen, and citizens of London contributed 200 marks besides the benefactions of private persons, but at the special request of Cardinal Wolsey to the Court of Common Council, it was decided in " Cal of Pat. 1385-7, p. 86. »• Ibid. I 399-1401, p. 34. *" Ibid. 543. the purchase. Cal. of Pat. 1422-9, p. 504. " The Act of Resumption in 145 I was not to be prejudicial to the nuns as regards this manor. Pari. R. (Rec. Com.), v, 224a. " Cal. of Pat. 1 46 1 -7, p. 88. 388, 397, 452, 496. All these bequests were made between 1368 and 1 441. " Cal of Pat. 1377-81, p. 432 ; ibid. 1382-92, p. 491 ; ibid. I 392-6, p. 530. " CAron. of the Grey Friars (Camd. Soc), 29. The chronicler simply says : * This year was a great death at the Minories, that there died 27 of the nuns.' Stow, Surv. ofLond. (ed. Strype), ii, 14, says 27 of the nuns besides servants died of plague. count for victuals, 1532, was ^^64 9/. d. i.e. about 2 5/. a week. The weekly bills for guests and con- vent at Christchurch Priory in 1 5 14 amounted to L^ 6/. 5^^. 18
 * ' In 1429 they are said to be still negotiating for
 * Sharpe, Cal. of ffills, ii, 119, 208, 225, 382,
 * ' L. and P. Hen. Vlll, v, 1663. The year's ac-