side was occupied by a long building, measuring 166 feet by 24 feet
wide, on the first floor of which was the dormitory. This position
(west of the cloister) is of very unusual occurrence, though it is
to be found at Durham, Worcester, and in a few other instances. The
southern end of this building, adjoining the church, has quite gone;
but, further north, the base of the outer or west wall was traced to
the end of the building and the northern wall duly located. In two
places, one course of ashlar facing in Caen stone was found _in situ_,
fixing the date of the structure as late in the twelfth century.
There is little doubt that the ground floor was vaulted, in two spans,
with a central row of columns, but no trace of these or of external
buttresses was found. The twelfth century piers and capitals in the
north aisle of the parish church were undoubtedly brought from the
abbey; and, in all probability, they belonged to this building.
The rere-dorter, a building of the same date as the dorter, was
situated a short distance to the west, on the line of the great culvert.
The infirmary lay to the north-east of the chapter-house and was
approached by a passage starting some 12 feet north of that building.
This passage ran in a north-easterly direction, the walls, 2 feet 3
inches thick, remaining just above the floor level. A considerable
portion of plain tile paving was found _in situ_. The arrangements
of the infirmary building are somewhat obscure, as half the site is
covered by the playground of the adjoining school, and could not be
examined.
The great hall stood approximately north and south. It was 38 feet wide
and a long stretch of the west wall was uncovered, terminating in a
massive square pier adjoining the angle-buttress of the chapter-house.
This probably represented the original southern termination of the
hall; but, in the fifteenth century, it appears to have been shortened
by a few feet, and traces of this later end were found. At the point
of its junction with the west wall, a small portion of a tile-on-edge
hearth was discovered. The opposite or east wall of the hall formed
also the west wall of the infirmary chapel, the floor of which was
about one foot lower than that in the hall.
The chapel was a fifteenth century building, 19 feet wide and about 45
feet long, though the east wall (being under the school-house garden)
was not precisely located. The south wall was heavily buttressed, being
divided into three bays. At the south-west corner, a large angular
buttress impinged on the area once covered by the original infirmary
hall. The chapel was paved with tiles; but, though the screeding and
bed on which they lay was practically intact, every tile had gone. The
stone altar-step was found _in situ_, but only a few fragments of the
north wall remained.
From the north-east corner of the warming house, a wall was found
running in an easterly direction and evidently communicating with the
infirmary hall. It was apparently the south wall of a small hall,
about 48 feet long, lying east and west, of which the north side had
been completely destroyed. At the west end was a screen-wall and,
immediately within it, there were traces of a large hearth. It is
probable that this building was the misericorde, which is generally
found in direct communication with the infirmary.
It is unfortunate that the position of the infirmary group lying
partially under the playground should render its complete examination
impossible, as the walls of these buildings were found to be in a
better state of preservation than those of any other part of the abbey.
—A. W. C.
ABBOT’S HOSPITAL, GUILDFORD,
AND ITS PREDECESSORS
[Illustration: FIG. 89.—FRONT OF HOSPITAL.]
XIV.
ABBOT’S HOSPITAL, GUILDFORD, AND ITS PREDECESSORS.
The close alliance which exists between architecture and national
history is a commonplace, and a review of its connection in each of
the several departments into which it is divided is an unfailing and
fruitful source of study. The larger classifications of domestic,
ecclesiastical, and military building will always absorb the energies
of our chief writers, and in them we can see the more important and
national movements portrayed, and in no small measure explained. But
there are many other ways of pursuing this interesting inquiry, and
one of the most attractive is by the examination of a single type of
building allocated to a special purpose, which can be traced through
succeeding periods, and in which we can see the effect of the larger
changes step by step. These sidepaths of architectural history differ
from one another in their relative interest and importance, and
some lead us only a certain distance, having been deserted by those
generations for whom they have had no further use—the blind alleys of
a former pilgrimage. Others, however, continue with us to the present
day, and furnish in their history a complete and connected story of
ancient and modern times.
One of the most complete series of buildings in our own country is
furnished by those familiar groups of cottages which we know as
almshouses, and which persist even at the present time, impatient
though we be of the early traditions with which they are linked. The
claims that the almshouse makes upon our attention and our interest
are very many. Yet beyond the occasional sketch or monograph, and the
modest note in a town or county history, these beautiful buildings have
received little of the study and appreciation which they deserve.
From the time of the Norman kings and in almost all the succeeding
years the almshouse, or its ancient precursor the hospital, has
handed down to us the most charming specimens of the domestic
architecture of each period. More than that, the almshouse, being
essentially a home for a number of people, furnishes us with examples
of the grouping of several units of building and of the methods of
composition and arrangement which were successively in vogue. Nor was
it merely a domestic structure even after the secularising influence
of the monastic dissolution, for in the majority of cases it had its
chapel—reminding us of the private chapels which were once in every
mansion—and again it partook of the nature of a public building with
its common rooms and dining hall. The very nature of the almshouse and
the perpetuity of its endowment was a safeguard against the careless
destruction to which private property is so often subject, and the
humble station of its occupants averted the ruthless hand of the
“improver” until the lamented advent of the Charity Commissioners.
This same humble conservatism has preserved for us in many cases that
most notable mediæval idea of community of living, which was of the
essence of monasticism, and the little families or societies, each
with its warden, brethren, and sisters, have not yet been wholly swept
away, but survive here and there in the very homes which saw their
first gathering. With the persistence of the idea remain also many of
the objects which were most intimately connected with its ritual or
ceremonial: the courtyard with its gatehouses to isolate and defend
it, the cloister and the chapel for common life and worship, beside
such insignia and furniture as its gowns and corporate seal, its plate,
stained glass, pictures, and books. In a hundred different details
we can recognise the wonderful story of the past which has not quite
died in the midst of the present. Here is the history of an important
institution which, in its successive modification or development,
and in the gradual secularisation of its early character, provides a
running commentary on English social life. It is also the history
of an interesting type of building which in the beauty and variety
of its forms provides a significant index to the changing modes of
architecture and the allied arts.
The pre-Reformation hospital, maison-dieu, bedehouse, or almshouse
has had a careful and generally well-informed historian in Miss R. M.
Clay, whose work entitled _English Mediæval Hospitals_ was published
by Messrs. Methuen in their Antiquary’s Library. Miss Clay’s work is
valuable in its examination of the typical life of the hospital and of
its status as compared with the monastic institutions of the Church;
but beyond the interesting glimpses which she gives into the customs
of this earlier period we are still without a proper comparative
study of the whole subject. As is so often the case with a settled
institution of this kind, the architectural problem contains the key
to many outstanding features of its constitution, and until a complete
collection of plans is available we shall not have the material for
an exhaustive history. Happily, however, enough is known to allow
an intelligible outline to be drawn, in which it is probable that
most of the examples will be found ultimately to have their place.
In the present paper I shall attempt to set down this outline only
in its barest form, making of it a slight introduction to a note on
the Jacobean hospital of Archbishop Abbot at Guildford, and a further
comment on the types which followed the buildings here illustrated.
The aim and purpose of the mediæval almshouse—to afford rest and help
to the needy traveller, the sick, and the aged—was an essentially
Christian idea, and was from the first definitely associated with the
Church. And, indeed, if it had not been officially identified with the
Church it could not have avoided the influence and direction of the
great spiritual organisation that absorbed the generous impulses of the
period. The monastic orders themselves were at first the chief vehicles
for charity, and the giving of alms being one of the first principles
of Christian life, the nobles and wealthy ecclesiastics seconded
the efforts of the monks by their liberal gifts and constantly open
tables, as we may read in the pages of John Stow and other writers. But
at the same time there were instituted societies of the poor alone,
following in a measure the monastic orders, and endowed by individual
philanthropists. It was not necessary for these men to subscribe to
the vow of poverty (though sometimes required of them), for they were
already destitute, and dependent entirely upon the charity of their
founders, and no doubt this very circumstance made their foundations
have a more deeply religious aspect in the eyes of the mediæval
Church. Thus we find the first hospitals formed into small companies
of brethren, each with a master or chaplain elected from their number,
each clothed with a special gown and under some rule of religious
observance.
F. T. Dollman in his _Examples of Domestic Architecture_ (1858) was
one of the earliest writers to point out the two chief models upon
which the hospital plan was formed. The original type, and that more
convenient for the sick and disabled, followed the plan of the monastic
infirmary—an aisled hall with a chapel generally at the east end,
looking for all practical purposes like the aisled nave of a church
with its chancel. The aisles, or, where they were absent, the two sides
of the nave, formed two dormitories along which were ranged the beds
for the sick, who could thus hear and enjoy the services without rising
from their couch or passing the door of their little cubicles. In large
hospitals the nave was divided into two floors, the chapel being taken
the total height of both, and being divided from them by a double
screen. This may be conveniently termed the dormitory plan, from its
central and distinguishing feature. The hall itself was not, however,
an isolated building, but, like its prototype the infirmary, had its
own outbuildings, its kitchen and stores, occasionally its cloister,
and sometimes a separate master’s house.
[Illustration: FIG. 90.—PLANS OF INFIRMARY TYPES:—BEAMSLEY HOSPITAL,
YORKS; ST. MARY’S HOSPITAL, CHICHESTER; THE BEDE HOUSE, HIGHAM FERRERS;
BROWNE’S HOSPITAL, STAMFORD.]
The second method of arrangement was based upon the Carthusian plan
of separate dwellings or cells, generally grouped around a cloister
or courtyard, and this proved not only the most useful provision for
inmates who were not bedridden, but a popular compromise, as it were,
in that it afforded a way of dispensing with the stricter monastic idea
without losing the benefits of communal life. Thus arose the recognised
almshouse plan of post-Reformation days, which persists to our own time.
The dormitory plan seems at first sight a somewhat primitive method,
and the thirteenth-century building of St. Mary’s Hospital, Chichester,
where the almspeople still live under the one wide roof of their great
hall, is looked upon as a singular survival from another age. The idea,
no doubt, in its communal aspect, is a distinctly mediæval one, but a
little reflection will show that it was also a perfectly sound one. Our
hospitals for the sick of the present day have their wards with a large
number of beds side by side, and the up-to-date Rowton lodging-house is
composed of long apartments divided by dwarf partitions into cubicles
not dissimilar to those of the ancient hospitals. Mr. Edward S. Prior
has long shown that the Middle Ages had their own very sound ideas
on sanitation, and there is no reason to believe that these lofty
infirmaries were not perfectly clean and wholesome. For the sick, at
least, they formed practically the only satisfactory arrangement, and
we know that in many foundations the sisterhood was the nursing staff
for the aged and bedridden poor. The greater number of these infirmary
halls have been destroyed. Wigston’s Hospital, Leicester (1513), must
have been a building of wonderful size and beauty with its two storeys
and chapel to the east. Its sister establishment, Trinity Hospital
(“The Newarke”) reconstituted in 1355, the buildings of which still
exist, included a dean, 12 secular canons, 12 vicars, 3 clerks, 6
choristers, 50 poor men, 50 poor women, and 10 nurses. Examples of
surviving halls are to be found in the Bede House, Higham Ferrers
(1423); St. John’s Hospital, Northampton (founded 1140); Browne’s
Hospital, Stamford (c. 1485); St. John’s Hospital, Sherborne (1437);
St. Mary Magdalene’s, Glastonbury (thirteenth century); St. Nicholas,
Salisbury (1214); St. Saviour’s, Wells (1436). The beautiful hospital
of St. Giles, Norwich, called also the Great Hospital (founded 1246),
with its cloister and master’s house, is attached to the church of St.
Helen, part of the latter being divided up into wards after the ancient
manner, the women in the Eagle ward (the chancel) to the east, and the
men in the nave towards the west. Browne’s Hospital, Stamford, has a
fine “audit” room over the dormitory which occupies the usual position
west of the chapel. (See plan, p. 221.)
[Illustration: FIG. 91.—QUADRANGLE, LEICESTER’S HOSPITAL, WARWICK.]
[Illustration: FIG. 92.—GREAT CHAMBER, WHITGIFT HOSPITAL.
_Drawn by W. H. Godfrey._]
The examples of the second type of plan—the group of separate dwellings
round a courtyard—date chiefly from the fifteenth century and onwards.
Courtyards and quadrangular forms of building had, of course, been
connected with the dormitory type, for this was the recognised method
of mediæval planning (_cf._ Browne’s Hospital, Stamford, and St. Cross,
Winchester), but the new quadrangle was a departure in principle from
the older plan, and, as noted above, it followed the establishments
of the Carthusian order. An early instance of a new foundation with
quadrangle and cloister walk is the well-known hospital at Ewelme
(Oxon), founded by the Duke and Duchess of Suffolk—the latter a
granddaughter of Geoffrey Chaucer—in 1434. Here the almshouses are
situated close to the parish church, to which they are connected by a
passage at the tower, and, as the south aisle was specially allocated
to the brethren, the presence of a separate chapel was rendered
unnecessary. The second of the two foundations connected with the Great
Hospital of St. Cross seems to have been responsible for the beautiful
stone cottages which still stand, having been probably erected by
Cardinal Beaufort in 1445, and here the noble church of the older
hospital performs the function of the chapel. With St. Cross should
be compared such foundations as the Vicar’s Close at Wells (which has
many similarities to the almshouse or hospital) and the colleges of
chantry priests, one at least of which—the college at Cobham in Kent
(1362)—was in 1597 converted into an almshouse proper under the title
of New College. Occasionally the quadrangle was so small as to be
scarcely more than an “area” in the building, each room of which was
the home of a different occupant. Such is Ford’s Hospital, Coventry
(1529), commonly called the Grey Friars, a specimen of Gothic woodwork
which has often been illustrated on account of its great richness.
Timber-built almshouses are not infrequent, and the Earl of Leicester’s
fine hospital at Warwick (1571) has a quadrangular plan of two storeys,
each with a graceful cloister of wooden arcading.
[Illustration: FIG. 93.—LEICESTER’S HOSPITAL, WARWICK.]
[Illustration: FIG. 94.—LEICESTER’S HOSPITAL.
_Drawn by W. H. Godfrey._]
These hospitals with their separate dwellings show many minor
differences of plan. A dining hall, a “great chamber” or common room,
and a kitchen, were often included in the range of buildings or were
annexed to it. The gatehouse or simple gateway, the master’s rooms,
the muniment room, and the outside staircases, gave opportunity for
variation in grouping; and the hospital chapel, when present, invested
the whole block with its chief distinction. At Warwick the hospital
has the use of the old Guild Chapel over the west town-gate that still
survives.
The influence of the Reformation was most decidedly in favour of
those institutions which, like the last considered, adopted only
semi-monastic customs. Prejudice against the monasteries had sunk
too deep to allow of the older establishments remaining unharmed,
and many were reconstituted so as to conform to the later ideas.
The independence of thought fostered by the Reformation, and the
individualism which directed the Renaissance, both made for the
confirmation and extension of the system of separate dwellings.
Occasionally we get a reversion to the old type, as in the curious
little building of Beamsley Hospital, Yorks (1593), which is circular,
the chapel being in the middle and lighted by a clerestory, while seven
cubicles surrounding it form an ambulatory, very much like the circular
aisle of the nave to the Temple Church. (See plan, p. 221.) Exceptions
though there may be, the principle of community of interest remained
sufficiently familiar to the people in their trade guilds and companies
to prevent their dispensing with the hospital idea and substituting
what in modern times we call outdoor relief. So the incorporated
hospital continued, and quadrangles were still planned, but now in the
manner of the courtyards of the rapidly advancing domestic architecture
of the day.
[Illustration: FIG. 95.—WHITGIFT HOSPITAL.
_Plan by W. H. Godfrey._]
[Illustration: FIG. 96.—ABBOT’S HOSPITAL.]
The dissolution of the monasteries had made the necessity for
almshouses even greater than it had been before, and we find that
the problem of the poor had assumed serious proportions by the
reign of Elizabeth, and led to a great increase in the number of
hospitals. They continued to become augmented, and the records of
the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are crowded with the names
of the new foundations. The Whitgift Hospital, Croydon (1597); Jesus
Hospital, Lyddington (1602); Sackville College, East Grinstead (1608);
Weekley Hospital, Northants (1611); Chipping Campden (1612); the three
hospitals of the Earl of Northampton—Trinity Hospital, Greenwich
(1613); Trinity Hospital, Castle Rising (1614); and Trinity Hospital,
Clun (1614)—Coningsby Hospital, Hereford (1614); Eyre’s Hospital,
Salisbury (1617); Abbot’s Hospital, Guildford (1619); Wyatt’s Hospital,
Godalming (1622); Penrose Almshouses, Barnstaple (1627); and Jesus
Hospital, Bray (1627)—these are a few of the interesting buildings of
about the time of James I., and the Guildford example is in many ways
typical of them all, although the contemporary enthusiasm for design
found in them wide opportunities for variation. Archbishop Abbot
had before him the fine example of his predecessor, John Whitgift,
whose hospital at Croydon attracted wide notice, if we are to believe
the contemporary testimony of John Stow, and probably Whitgift’s
work inspired many of the later benefactors to imitate him. The two
buildings are curiously similar in plan, although there is a marked
difference in their architectural treatment, the work at Guildford
being more pretentious than that of the earlier hospital. In both cases
the administrative block or rather that containing the principal and
common apartments, was placed on the side opposite to the entrance with
its gatehouse, the cottages of the pensioners occupying the rest of
the courtyard. In this they were following in effect the usual plan of
the larger country houses of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries,
the same rooms being provided in the main block as were required for
private occupation, while the usual quarters of the domestic staff are
here transferred to the almspeople. The common hall or dining-room
occupied a position near the centre—at Croydon to the left, and at
Guildford to the right of the passage and archway into the gardens. In
each building the kitchen is placed in the extreme left-hand corner,
and the chapel in a similar position to the right. The house of the
warden or master, however, is at Croydon placed over the common hall
and kitchen, and contains the “audience” or great chamber as its
principal apartment, whereas at Guildford the master occupies a part
of the street front, the great chamber (called here the library) being
placed, as before, over the hall.
[Illustration: FIG. 97.—ABBOT’S HOSPITAL. COURTYARD.]
[Illustration: FIG. 98.—ABBOT’S HOSPITAL. LOWER HALL.]
[Illustration: FIG. 99.—ABBOT’S HOSPITAL. UPPER HALL.]
Abbot’s Hospital provides for some twenty-five inmates, including the
master, as compared with forty at Whitgift; but, as already remarked,
it is more ambitious in its architectural treatment. The quadrangle
is entered by a fine brick tower with four octagonal turrets, in the
centre of the street front. The tower is of three storeys, and like
the rest of the building is of brick with stone dressings, the turrets
being taken up a good height above the parapet, and finished with
excellent lead-covered cupolas, and vanes. The two opposite lateral
blocks which enclose the courtyard are projected towards the street to
form wings, and are finished with Dutch gables. The windows on the
ground and first floors vary from four to five lights in width and
are divided by transomes. The quadrangle itself is quietly treated; a
shallow stepped gable on the side opposite to the tower gives space for
a clock and a tablet below is inscribed with the name of the founder,
while an octagonal cupola is raised above the roof. Perhaps the finest
external features are the cut brick chimney-stacks with separate
octagonal shafts and finely moulded caps and bases. The internal
work in the chief rooms and in the master’s house is of a sumptuous
character, and points to the fact that Archbishop Abbot—like Whitgift
before him—intended as much to leave a “monument of his own time”
behind him as a noble work of charity. The Jacobean fan-treatment of
the doorways is very well executed, and all the woodwork is substantial
and well made. Both the hall and the great chamber above—the latter of
which is panelled—have good chimneypieces and overmantels, and there is
much excellent furniture.
In this self-contained and well-appointed building is housed a little
community which differs very slightly from those of the pre-Reformation
hospitals. The ideas of the early part of the seventeenth century
have relaxed the severity of the monastic rule somewhat, and have
given to the architectural features much of the new character of
the Renaissance. Enough, however, of the old conception, both of
establishment and of fabric, remains to link it definitely with its
predecessors, and to witness to the continuity of the old conception of
a charitable refuge for the poor.
[Illustration: FIG. 100.—ABBOT’S HOSPITAL, DETAIL OF DOOR.