The parish church and tower bear on the exterior an appearance of
antiquity. Internally, much decoration was displayed, and especially
by a rood-loft which has been recently taken down. These alterations
of our ancient churches are justly lamented by all persons capable of
admiring the beauty and imposing splendour of Gothic architecture, but
they seem to have almost inevitably grown out of the change of purpose
to which churches are applied. Originally, the chancel, protected by
the rood loft and by a veiled entrance, was destined for the
astounding miracle of repeatedly transforming bread and wine into the
actual body and blood of Christ, while the outward or less sacred part
of the edifice, was used for processions and scenic exhibitions;
accompanied by dirges or by triumphant choruses, adapted either to the
death or to the resurrection of our Saviour. In modern times, on the
contrary, a room is required so constructed as to admit of whole
congregations joining with an individual in prayers, or of listening
to his instruction.
The monastery has so completely disappeared, that its precise locality
was not remembered; but a gentleman of the neighbourhood having taken
considerable pains to ascertain whatever could yet be discovered
about it, made the following communication to the Gentleman’s Magazine
in 1822.
“The ancient priory of Tywardreth has long been so entirely
levelled with the ground, that it is not very easy even to
ascertain its site. Some time ago the present vicar obtained
leave to dig the ground on its supposed site in search of stones
for erecting a vicarage house. The place where he made an
excavation for this purpose appears to have been the east end of
the priory chapel; and as some measurements were taken at the
time, and I have, with the permission of the landlord, opened the
ground in several places, partly with the hope of ascertaining
the form of the chapel, and partly of throwing some light on its
architecture, the following particulars may not be unacceptable.
“The chapel appears, so far as could be ascertained by
measurement, to have been eighty feet long, by fifty-seven wide,
with a semicircular end towards the east, strengthened by four
buttresses of wrought Pentewan stone, two feet wide, and
ornamented by four pilasters; within the shafts are a single
half-column, fourteen inches in diameter. At each angle was a
handsome piece of architecture, as it was described to me, of
which pilasters, resembling those already described, formed a
part, but with the base five inches wide, and the mouldings in
proportion.
“In the vicarage garden, adjoining the west end of the chapel, a
fragment of a stone arch was found, with a fleur-de-lis elegantly
carved in deep relief; the same devise appears on the church
stile, and in a coat of arms in one of the windows of the church,
and appears from Tanner to have been part of the arms of the
priory. The wall of the chapel is the south wall of the
churchyard.
“The chapel was paved with beach pebbles, and was built partly of
common clay slate raised on the spot; the wrought stones were of
compact hard porphyry, from Pentewan Quarry in the parish of St.
Austell, and hornblende from the cliff between Duporth and
Charlestown in the same parish. All the carved work is executed
with much skill and taste.”
Several charters granted to this monastery are preserved in Dugdale’s
Monasticon. The earliest is in the 19th year of Henry the Third, A. D.
1234, as follows:
“Henricus Dei gratia Rex Angliæ, Dominus Hiberniæ Dux Normandiæ
et Aquitaniæ, et Comes Andegaviæ, omnibus Archiepiscopis, &c.
salutem. Inspeximus cartam Roberti de Cardinam, in hæc verba:――
“Robertus de Cardinam omnibus Sanctæ Matris Ecclesiæ filiis
salutem. Sciatis me, pro Dei amore et animæ meæ salute,
concessisse et præsenti carta mea confirmasse ecclesiæ sanctorum
martyrum, Sergii et Bachi Andegavi, et ecclesiæ Sancti Andreæ de
Tywordrait et Monachis ibidem Deo servientibus et servituris,
omnes donationes et concessiones quas antecessores mei, seu
quicunque fideles de feodo meo ipsis fecerint,” &c.
The seal of the convent is understood to have been a saltire, or St.
Andrew’s cross Or, between four fleurs-de-lis, which accounts for the
sculptures noticed above.
St. Andrew became the patron saint of Scotland, and popular throughout
the whole island, after an Abbat, said to have borne the name of
Regulus, had brought some of his relics to a place then called
Abernethy, but where a Monastery, a University, and a city, have since
arisen to commemorate the Apostle.
The priory of Tywardreth appears to have been suppressed with the
other alien houses, but afterwards to have been re-established as an
independent society, or made denizen according to the legal phrase,
having at the time of the general dissolution the Priory of Minster
attached to it as a cell, which had been originally dependent with
itself on the Abbey of St. Sergius and St. Bacchus at Angiers, the
former capital of Anjou, and now of the department of the Maine and
Loire.
A very curious correspondence between Thomas Cromwell, Vicar-General
and Vicegerent of the King’s Supremacy on the one part, and Thomas
Collyns the last Prior on the other, is said to exist among the
papers and documents preserved by the Arundells of Lanhearn, and of
Wardour Castle in Wiltshire.[14]
In one of the letters Cromwell is understood to have complimented the
Prior on the possession of every active virtue, especially as
displayed in the good government of his convent; he assures him that
the King is fully sensible of his merits; and in consideration of his
great age and faithful services, the King out of special grace and
favour would allow him not only to resign the painful office of
governing such a society, but would admit of his recommending a
successor.
Collyns’s answer is full of thanks to the Lord Vicegerent, and of
gratitude to the King, whose approbation he esteemed above all worldly
matters, and next to the conscious satisfaction of having discharged
faithfully his duties towards the Almighty in the station to which it
pleased God that, without any merits of his own, he should be
advanced. He offered his most humble and grateful thanks to the King
for the great favours profferred to him; but that, feeling his health
and strength sufficient for enabling him to continue the discharge of
duties which the King had approved, he owed it to his conscience not
to withdraw from them.
This brought a letter from Cromwell, declaring that the horrible
savour of his sins, his crimes, and his iniquities had ascended before
the Lord; and that, unless he immediately relinquished an office which
he had most grossly abused, an ecclesiastical commission would proceed
to inquire into his misdeeds, and to punish him accordingly. This
latter is understood to have produced either an immediate surrender of
the priory, or Collyns’s resignation preparatory to it. He was elected
in 1506, and died in 1539, as appears from his tombstone in the
chancel.
The site of this priory was granted in 1542 to Edward Seymour, then
Earl of Hertford, afterwards Duke of Somerset, and Protector. It
subsequently became the joint property of the St. Aubyns and the
Pendarveses of Roscrow. The late Lord Dunstanville inherited the
latter portion, and acquired the former by purchase.
It seems that a manor of Tywardreth, which in early times must have
been paramount over the others, passed from Ricardus Dapifer to the
Cardinhams. Mr. Lysons says it was sold towards the latter part of the
13th century, by Isolda de Cardinham to the Champernownes, for a
hundred pounds. From this family it passed to the Herles and
Bonvilles, and fell to the Crown on the attainder of the Duke of
Suffolk in 1554. It belonged to the family of Rashleigh, in the early
part of the subsequent century; with whom it still remains, including
the entire impropriation of the great and small tithes.
Menabilly has been the seat of that distinguished family for a period
of at least two hundred years. At the last visitation of the Heralds
in 1620, Jonathan Rashleigh of Fowey, who married Alice, daughter of
―――― Bonithan of Kertleowe, is said to be alive, having two sons. The
eldest John Rashleigh, aged 34, and Jonathan Rashleigh the second.
John Rashleigh, ancestor of these two brothers, in the fifth degree,
is stated to have been of Barnstaple.
Individuals of this family have represented Fowey during the reign of
Queen Elizabeth, Charles the First, Charles the Second, and King
William; and since the accession of King George the Second, up to very
recent times, scarcely a Parliament has been assembled that could not
count a Rashleigh among its members.
Mr. Jonathan Rashleigh was elected Member for Fowey in 1728, and
continued to represent that town in eight successive Parliaments, and
in the last with his eldest son.
This gentleman married Mary, daughter of Sir William Clayton of
Surrey, and died in 1764, leaving a very numerous family, all of whom
have been distinguished as persons of ability, of integrity, and of
honour, followers of the best advice said ever to have been given by a
parent.
Αιεν αριστευειν, και ὑπειροχον εμμεναι αλλων,
Μηδε γενος πατερων αισχυνεμεν.
Mr. Philip Rashleigh, the eldest brother, represented Fowey during a
length of time almost equal to that of his father. He greatly improved
the family seat, but especially distinguished Menabilly by placing
there the most extensive and magnificent collection of Cornish
minerals, enriched by others from every part of the known world, that
could any where be seen. And Mr. Rashleigh has given to the public, in
two thin quarto volumes, fifty-three coloured plates, with
descriptions of the most choice or rare specimens. The work is
entitled, “Specimens of British Minerals, selected from the Cabinet of
Philip Rashleigh, with general descriptions of each article,” printed
by Bulmer and Co. the first volume in 1797, and the second in 1802. At
the end of the second volume is added a Geological Plate, being a
section of the stream work at Porth in the parish of St. Blazey, about
a quarter of a mile from high water-mark, containing the position and
measurement of ten distinctly marked deposits, with subdivisions,
accompanied by descriptions of each; the whole extending to a depth of
44 feet: and what adds to the value of this section, the stream work
was destroyed by a very high tide about the period when the volume was
published.
In addition to this scientific collection, Mr. Rashleigh constructed a
grotto at some distance from the house, encrusted on the inside by
some common but splendid minerals, exhibiting also the position of
lodes, their heaves, their slides, &c. and this was liberally thrown
open to all persons applying for admission.
Mr. Rashleigh married very late in life, and dying without children,
left his ample estate to William, the eldest son of his next brother,
the Reverend Jonathan Rashleigh, Rector of Silverton in Devonshire.
Mr. William Rashleigh succeeded his uncle in the representation of
Fowey, but voluntarily retired from public life to enjoy domestic
happiness, with the esteem and regard of every one who has good
fortune to be numbered among his acquaintances.
Polkerris, a small harbour near Menabilly, as indeed is indicated by
the first syllable of the name, has been improved, perhaps as a matter
of fancy, by the Rashleigh family. Mr. Jonathan Rashleigh built a pier
capable of giving shelter to coasting vessels and boats; and his son
the late Mr. Philip Rashleigh continued a sean fishery for the benefit
of the neighbourhood.
Kilmarth, which formerly belonged to a family called Baker, is also
the property of Mr. Rashleigh; the house is placed on a very elevated
piece of ground near the road leading from St. Austell to Fowey.
Treveryan once belonged to a branch of the Courtenays: it passed by a
purchase to John Thomas, esq. by whom the house was built. Mr. Thomas
devised it to the Reverend John Thomas Thomson, who died at Penzance
in 1811; and the estate now belongs to his son Henry Thomson, esq.
resident at Lostwithiel, a magistrate, and late a captain in the
Cornwall militia.
Tywardreth measures 2967 statute acres.
Annual value of the Real Property as £. _s._ _d._
returned to Parliament in 1813 4539 0 0
Poor Rate in 1831 735 15 0
Population,――{ in 1801, | in 1811, | in 1821, | in 1831,
{ 727 | 741 | 1238 | 2288
giving an increase of nearly 215 per cent. in 30 years.
This great increase in the number of inhabitants is occasioned by that
parish and the neighbourhood becoming a mining district.
Present Vicar, the Rev. Thomas Pearce, presented by W. Rashleigh, esq.
in 1820. The net value of the living, as returned in 1831, was 135_l._