Prior, headmaster of Repton School, died on June 16th of that year; a
grave was being prepared in the chancel, when the grave-digger suddenly
disappeared from sight; he had dug through the vaulted roof, and so
fell into the crypt below! In the south-west division of the groined
ceiling, a rough lot of rubble, used to mend the hole, indicates the
spot.
During the year 1792 “a restoration” of the church took place; the
church was re-pewed in the horse-box style! All the beautifully
carved oak work on pews and elsewhere, described by Stebbing Shaw in
the _Topographer_ (May, 1790), and many monuments, were cleared out
or destroyed. The crypt seems to have been the receptacle for “all
and various” kinds of this “rubbish.” In the year 1802, Dr. Sleath,
headmaster of Repton, “discovered” the steps and door on the north
side of the chancel, and having cleared out the one and opened the
other, found the crypt filled up to the capitals of the pillars with
“rubbish,” which he removed, and restored the crypt as it is now.
There are three ancient register books of births, baptisms, marriages,
and burials, and one register book of the churchwardens’ and
constables’ accounts of the parish of Repton. They extend from 1580 to
1670.
The register book of the churchwardens’ and constables’ accounts
extends from 1582 to 1635, and includes Repton, and the chapelries of
Foremark, Ingleby, and Bretby. It is a narrow folio volume of coarse
paper (16 in. by 6 in., by 2 in. thick), and is bound with a parchment
which formed part of a Latin Breviary or Office Book, with music and
words. The initial letters are illuminated; the colours inside are
still bright and distinct.
In vol. i. of the _Journal of the Derbyshire Archæological Society_
(1879) there is an article by Rev. Dr. Cox on these accounts, and
he writes: “It is the earliest record of parish accounts, with the
exception of All Saints’, Derby, in the county.” Space alone prevents
me from making extracts from them and the other registers; they are
full of local interest.
About the year 1059, a Priory of Canons Regular, of the order of St.
Augustine, dedicated to St. Giles, was founded at Calke by Algar,
Earl of Mercia. Here they dwelt till _c._ 1153, according to the old
Chronicle written by one Thomas de Musca, Canon of Dale Abbey, when
Serio de Grendon, lord of Bradley, near Ashbourne, “called together the
Canons of Kale, and gave them the place of Deepdale; here they built
for themselves a church, a costly labour, and other offices.” These
buildings became known as Dale Abbey, and here they lived for a time
“apart from the social intercourse of men, but they began too remissly
to hold themselves in the service of God; they began to frequent
the forest more than the church, more to hunting than to prayer or
meditation, so the King ordered them to return to the place whence they
came,” viz., Calke. During the reign of Henry II. (1154–1189), Matilda,
widow of Randulf, fourth Earl of Chester, who died A.D. 1153—with the
consent of her son Hugh—granted to God, St. Mary, the Holy Trinity, and
to the Canons of Calke, the working of a quarry at Repton, together
with the advowson of the church of St. Wystan, at Repton, on condition
that as soon as a suitable opportunity should occur, the Canons should
remove to Repton, which was to be their chief house; Calke Priory was
to become subject to it.
“A suitable opportunity” occurred during the episcopate of Walter
Durdent, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield (1149–1159).
Copies of the original charters are given in Bigsby’s _History of
Repton_, Dugdale’s _Monasticon_, and Stebbing Shaw’s article in vol.
ii. of the _Topographer_. The charters containing grants extend from
Stephen’s reign (1135–1154) to the reign of Henry V. (1413–1422), and
include the church of St. Wystan, Repton, with its eight chapelries of
Newton Solney, Bretby, Milton, Foremark, Ingleby, Tickenhall, Smisby,
and Measham; the church at Badow, in Essex; estates at Willington,
including its church; and property at Croxall.
Very few events have been handed down to us in connection with the
story of the priory. In November, 1364, Robert de Stretton, Bishop
of Lichfield, was holding a visitation in the chapter house of the
priory of Repton. For some reason unknown, the villagers, armed with
bows and arrows, swords and cudgels, with much tumult, assaulted the
Priory Gatehouse. The bishop sent for Sir Alured de Solney and Sir
Robt. Francis, lords of the manors of Newton Solney and Foremark, who
came and quickly quelled this early “town and gown” row without any
actual breach of the peace. The bishop soon after proceeded on his
journey, and on reaching Alfreton issued a sentence of interdict on
the town and parish church of Repton, with a command to the clergy in
the neighbouring churches to publish the same under pain of greater
excommunication, and publication was to be continued until they merited
the grace of reconciliation.
By the advice of Thomas Cromwell—_malleus monachorum_—Henry VIII.
issued a commission of inquiry into the condition, etc., of the
monasteries of England. An Act was passed in 1536 suppressing those
which had revenues less than £200 a year. Those notorious men, Doctors
Thomas Leigh and Richard Layton, had visited Repton the year before,
and gave the amount of revenue as £180 per annum; they reported that
the canons were not living up to their vows, and added a note to their
report; but all competent historians agree that these reports are quite
untrustworthy.
Under the heading of _superstitio_ the visitors made the interesting
entry that pilgrims came to the Priory of Repton to visit (a shrine of)
St. Guthlac and his bell, which they were wont to place on their heads
for the cure of the headache. This relic formed an interesting link
between the early pre-Conquest Abbey and the Norman Priory.
On June 12th, 1537, John Yonge, or Young, was re-appointed prior by
the Crown; letters patent were granted exempting the priory from
suppression on the payment of a fine of £266 13s. 4d. But this only
delayed the surrender, which happened on October 26th, 1538. Prior
Yonge died three days before that event. Ralph Clerke, sub-prior,
signed the deed handing the priory and contents to Dr. Leigh, who,
writing to Thomas Cromwell from Grace Dieu, said, “On coming to Repton
they found the house greatly spoiled, and many things purloined, part
of which they recovered.”
In the Public Record Office there is a very full inventory of the goods
and possessions of the Priory. A transcript of this inventory is given
by Mr. W. H. St. John Hope in vol. vi. of the _Derbyshire Archæological
Journal_, 1884. This inventory affords a very good and detailed account
of the Priory and its contents. It is termed a list of—
“all suche parcells of Implements or houshould stuffe, corne, catell,
Ornamments of the Church & such other lyke found within the said
late p^irory at the tyme of the dyssolucon therof sould by the Kyngs
Commissioners to Thomas Thacker the xxvj day of October in the xxx
yere of o^r sov’agn lorde Kyng henry the viij^{th}.”
A memorandum added to the list recounts that—
“(Thomas) Thacker was put in possession of the scite of the seid late
priory & all the demaynes to y^t apperteynyng to o^r sov’aigne lorde
the Kynges use.”
Thomas Thacker died in 1548, leaving his property to his son Gilbert;
the latter, according to Fuller,
“being alarmed with the news that Queen Mary had set up the abbeys
again (and fearing how large a reach such a precedent might have) upon
a Sunday (belike the better day, the better deed) called together the
carpenters and masons of that county, and plucked down in one day
(church-work is a cripple in going up, but rides post in coming down)
a most beautiful church belonging thereto, saying ‘he would destroy
the nest, for fear the birds should build therein again.’”
The Priory differed in no marked way from the usual plan of conventual
building—a square cloister, surrounded on all its sides by buildings.
Owing to the river being on the north, the cloister was on the north
of its church, instead of the south; the Refectory, or Fratry, on
the north side, the church on the south; the chapter house and
calefactorium, with dormitory over them, on the east side; the
kitchens, buttery, and cellars, with guest hall over them, on the west
side. Admission to the Priory precincts, which were bounded by the
existing walls, was obtained through a gate-house, the outer arch of
which forms the present entrance. The Trent formed a boundary on the
north. The stream which flows down the village entered the precincts at
the south-eastern corner of the boundary wall through an arch, still
_in situ_, and supplied the fish-ponds, mill, and Priory with water for
domestic, sanitary, and other purposes.
The Priory church consisted of nave, with north and south aisles,
central tower, north and south transepts, choir, with aisles, a south
chapel, and a presbytery to the east of the choir. In the inventory the
following chapels are named: St. John, Our Lady of Pity, St. Thomas,
St. Syth (St. Osyth), Our Lady, and St. Nicholas. Many beautiful
fragments of painted canopies, tabernacle work, etc., were found among
the débris when digging foundations for the Pears School in 1885; no
doubt many of the shrines, such as those of SS. Guthlac and Wystan, had
been robbed of their relics and ornaments long before the Priory was
destroyed in the year 1553.
[Illustration: Repton: The Priory Gateway and School.]
Leaving the church, we enter, through a door at the east end of the
north aisle, the cloister. Passing along the eastern side we come to
the Chapter House, with _slype_, or passage, through which the bodies
of the canons were conveyed for interment in the cemetery outside.
The _slype_ is still intact, with plain barrel vault, without ribs,
springing from a chamfered string course; adjoining the slype was the
calefactorium, or warming house.
Over the Chapter House, slype, and calefactorium was the dormitory,
with its cells or cubicles.
The Fratry or Refectory occupied the north side, with rooms underneath
used for various purposes, and a passage leading to the infirmary, an
isolated building, now known as the Hall.
On the west side were the Prior’s Chamber and five others, devoted to
guests who visited the Priory. Underneath was the cellarium, which
included “the Kychenn,” “larder,” and “bruehouse.” The cellar was a
long room 89 feet by 26 feet, divided by a row of six massive Norman
columns, four of which are still _in situ_. Besides these, there were
three other houses mentioned: “the yelyng house,” _i.e._, brewing
house; the “boultyng house,” where the meal was sifted; and the “kyll
house,” by which term is possibly meant the slaughter house, but more
probably the kiln house.
The following is a more perfect and fuller list of the priors of Repton
than has hitherto appeared:—
Robert, _c._ 1155; Nicholas, _c._ 1175; Albred, _c._ 1200; Richard,
_c._ 1208; Nicholas, _c._ 1215; John, _c._ 1220; Reginald, _c._ 1230;
Peter, _c._ 1252; Robert, _c._ 1289; Ralph, 1316–36; John de Lichfield,
1336–46; Simon de Sutton, 1346–56; Ralph de Derby, 1356–99; William of
Tutbury, 1399; William Maynesin, _c._ 1411; Wystan Porter, died 1436;
John Overton, 1436; John Wylne, 1438–71; Thomas Sutton, 1471–86; Henry
Prest, 1486–1503; William Derby, 1503–8; John Young, 1508.
The fourth section of these outline memorials of Repton belongs to the
school, which has this year (1907) celebrated its seventh jubilee. The
founder of Repton School was descended from Henry Porte, a merchant
of Westchester (_i.e._, Chester, west of Manchester). He had a son,
also Henry, a mercer, of the same city. His son John was a Justice of
the King’s Bench in the reign of Henry VIII., who conferred upon him,
after the dissolution of the monasteries, the manor, together with the
rectory and advowson of the vicarage of Etwall; these passed to his
son, Sir John Porte (created a Knight of the Bath at the coronation
of Edward VI.), the founder of Repton School. He was educated at
Brasenose College, Oxford, in which his father is said to have provided
“stipends for two sufficient and able persons to read and teach openly
in the hall—the one philosophy, the other humanity,” one of which
“stipends” or lectureships was conferred on his son. Like his father,
he was married twice. His first wife was Elizabeth, daughter of Sir
Thomas Giffard, by whom he had two sons, who predeceased him, and
three daughters, Elizabeth, who married Sir Thomas Gerrard, knight of
Bryn, co. Manchester; Dorothy, who married George Hastings, Earl of
Huntingdon; and Margaret, who married Sir Thomas Stanhope, knight,
of Shelford, co. Nottingham. From these three daughters the present
hereditary governors of Repton School, Lord Gerard, Earl Loudoun, and
Earl Carnarvon, trace their descent. By his second wife, Dorothy,
daughter of Sir Anthony Fitzherbert, of Norbury, he had no children.
In the year 1553 Sir John was one of the “knights of the shire” for the
County of Derby, and served the office of High Sheriff for the same
county in 1554. In 1556 he sat with Ralph Baine, Bishop of Lichfield,
and the rest of the Commissioners, at Uttoxeter, in Staffordshire, “to
search out heresies and punish them.”—Strype, _Memorials_, vol. iii.,
part 2, p. 15.
On the 6th of June, 1557, he died, and was buried in Etwall church.
Built against the south wall in the chancel is “a comely and handsome
tomb of pure marble,” under which lie the bodies of Sir John and his
two wives. “Set and fixed, graven in brass,” are portrait figures of
Sir John, his wives, and children.
By will, dated the 9th of March, 1556, Sir John gave and devised to
his executors, Sir Thomas Giffard, knight; Richard Harpur, Esquire;
Thomas Brewster, Vicar of Etwall, and others, certain estates in the
counties of Derby and Lancaster for the foundation and maintenance of
an almshouse at Etwall, and a grammar school at Etwall or Repton.
As we read in the report made to the Charity Commissioners in 1867—
“Sir John had no property at Repton. His executors were probably
induced to establish the school there, rather than at Etwall, by
finding the refectory of the building of the dissolved priory well
adapted to the purpose. By indenture, dated 12th June, I Eliz.
1558, Gilbert Thacker, the grantee of the site of the priory, in
consideration of £37 10. ‘bargained and sold to Richard Harpur,
serjeant-at-law, John Harker, and Simon Starkey, three of the
executors of Sir John Port ... one large great and high house near
the kitchen of the same Gilbert Thacker, in Repton, commonly called
the Feringre (Fermery or Infirmary of the priory) ... upon which the
schoolmaster’s lodgings were then newly erected, together with all
the rooms, both above and beneath, of the same long house, ... also
one large void room or parcel of ground upon the east part ... lately
called the Cloyster, and one other room thereto adjoining, lately
called the Tratrye (Fratry), as the same was then inclosed with a new
wall, to the intent that the same should be a schoolhouse, and so used
from time to time thereafter.’”—(See page 43 of the Report.)
The erection of “schoolmaster’s lodgings, with rooms above and below,”
on the ruins of the Priory, referred to above, makes it very difficult
to identify the present Priory with the original building. As Mr. St.
John Hope writes in the 1884 volume of the _Journal of the Derbyshire
Archæological Society_:
“The western side of the claustral buildings consisted of the block
under the charge of the cellarer, called the _cellarium_. It is here
complete to the roof as far as the structure is concerned, but the
original round-headed windows (with the exception of one) have been
superseded by larger ones, and sundry partitions and insertions have
quite destroyed its ancient arrangements. The _cellarium_ appears to
be the only remaining part of the original Norman monastery, built
when the canons migrated from Calke, in the middle of the twelfth
century.”
The ground floor consisted of a large room, divided by a row of six
massive Norman circular columns, with scalloped or plain capitals; four
of these remain. At the southern end of the west side is a slype or
entrance to the cloister; at the northern end are three rooms, probably
the kitchen larder; and from the appearance of the third—with its
groined roof, the ribs of which were intended to be ornamented with the
dog-tooth moulding, which was begun and never finished—it was used by
the cellarer as a “plate house,” etc.
The “causey” at the south end was erected to form an entrance to the
school.
By Royal Letters Patent, dated June 20th, 19 Jac. I. (1622), a Charter
of Incorporation was granted, by the style and title of “The Master of
Etwall Hospital, the School Master of Repton, Ushers, Poor Men, and
Poor Scholars.” The charter is quoted at length in the Report, and
consists of twenty-four ordinances, which refer to the appointment,
duties, salaries, and stipends of the said masters, ushers, poor men,
and poor scholars.
The Thackers and the school seem to have lived amicably together for
many years; but as the school increased in numbers, that state of
affairs was not likely to last. When Gilbert Thacker sold the remains
of the Priory to the executors of Sir John Porte, he little thought
what a rookery he was making for his descendants! The boys in their
“recreation” extended the bounds, and ventured too near the inner
courtyard in front of Thacker’s house, much to the annoyance and
inconvenience of the dwellers there, as we can easily imagine. At last,
in the year 1652, a case known as “The Master, &c., _v._ Gilbert
Thacker and others,” was commenced. It was settled out of court by the
appointment of two arbitrators, Sir Francis Burdett, Bart., and Sir
Samuel Sleigh, Knight, with Gervase Bennett as referee. They pronounced
“theire award by word of mouth about the year 1653.” Thacker was to
build a wall across the courtyard, beyond which the boys were not
allowed to pass. This he refused to do, so the alleged trespass and
annoyances went on for another twelve years, when, owing to the conduct
of Thacker, the school brought an action against him. The High Court
of Chancery appointed four gentlemen as commissioners to try the case:
William Bullock, Daniel Watson, Esquires; Thomas Charnells, and Robert
Bennett, gentlemen. They met “at the house of Alderman Hugh Newton, at
Derby, there being at the signe of the George.”
In the year 1896 I found an account of this case in the school muniment
chest. It consists of two rolled-up folios, lawyers’ briefs, with
interrogations, depositions, etc., which were taken on April 15th,
1663, and fill sixty pages of folio. The interrogations for the school
administered to the witnesses—of whom there were fifty, twenty-five
on each side—referred to their knowledge of the school buildings,
schoolmasters and boys, Thacker’s ancestors, rights of way, the award
of Sir Francis Burdett and Sir Samuel Sleigh, the Thackers’ conduct,
the value of the land, former suits at law, and the use of the yard
for recreation by the boys, etc. For Thacker the questions referred
to the knowledge of prohibitions by his ancestors and himself, and
complaints made to the schoolmasters, etc. The depositions are most
interesting, as the knowledge of some of the witnesses extended back
to within forty years of the founding of the school. I wish I could
quote them at length. Again “the differences between the parties”
were settled out of court; “they were referred to the Right Honorable
Philipp, Earl of Chesterfield, to be finally determined if he could,”
which proved a difficult task, for Thacker would not come to terms;
so another writ was issued on January 11th, in the eighteenth year of
the reign of Charles the Second, calling upon Thacker, “his Counsel,
Attorneys, &c., &c., to fulfil each and every thing contained and
specified in the aforesaid order, and in no wise neglect this at your
imminent peril.” Thacker pleaded ignorance of the order, “as it was
written in short Lattin, some of the words written very short, he did
not well understand it, nor could say if it was a true coppy.” His plea
was allowed, and a settlement was arrived at; a wall was built, part of
it still _in situ_, “by both parties, from the Chancel N.E. corner to
the north side of the door of the Nether School House,” below which the
boys were not allowed to pass. A receipt for £14 19s. for half the cost
of the building of the wall, signed by Wm. Jordan, proves that it was
built before or during the year 1670.
For over two hundred years the school consisted of the Priory, and a
room called the “writing school,” now destroyed, which stood on the
east side of the “causey,” a paved passage between the walls, with
steps leading into the old “big school,” now the school library. The
“schoolmaster’s lodgings” were at the north end; the usher’s at its
south. The other “ushers” had their “lodgings” in a building, also
destroyed, in what is now known as the “Trent gardens.”
During the headmastership of Dr. Prior (1767–79) the number of boys
attending the school had greatly increased; those who came from a
distance used “to table,” that is, lodge, in the village. “For the
better acomodation of boarders,” the governors of the school rented the
Hall from Sir Robert Burdett, Bart., of Foremark, who had succeeded
to it on the death of Mary Thacker, who died on January 8th, 1728.
An order was issued by the governors, the Earls of Huntingdon and
Chesterfield and W. Cotton, on the 31st day of August, 1768, that
the Hall “should be considered in all points as the master’s house,
the rent and all other expenses attending it being defrayed by the
Corporation”; from that date the Hall has been the residence of the
headmasters of Repton School. Originally it consisted of an isolated
brick tower, two storeys high, with hexagonal turrets in the upper
storey, and was built by Prior Overton in the reign of Henry VI.
(1422–61). When the Thackers obtained possession of it, they added to
it at various dates. The lower storey of the tower, now used as the
kitchen, has a fine oak ceiling, divided into nine square compartments
by oak beams; at the intersections there are four carved bosses,
bearing (1) a name device or rebus of Prior Overton, a tun or cask
encircled by the letter O, formed by a vine branch with leaves and
grapes; (2) a capital T ornamented with leaves; (3) an S similarly
ornamented; (4) a sheep encircled like No. 1. The oaken staircase
is lit by a stained-glass window, with the armorial bearings of the
founder and three hereditary governors, the Earls of Huntingdon and
Chesterfield, and Sir John Gerard.
With varied fortune the school continued till Dr. Pears was appointed
headmaster in the year 1854, when there were only forty-eight boys in
the school! The numbers rose rapidly, and other houses had to be built.
The tercentenary of the school, held in 1857, proved to be a fresh
starting point in its history. On August 11th of that year, the late
Honourable George Denman presided over a meeting of Old Reptonians and
others. Speeches were delivered, and a sermon was preached by the late
Dr. Vaughan, headmaster of Harrow School. As a lasting memorial of the
day, it was proposed that a school chapel should be erected; hitherto
the school had worshipped in the parish church. A liberal response was
made to the appeal, and in the year 1858 Earl Howe laid the foundation
stone. Since that time it has been enlarged no less than four times to
accommodate the number of boys, which now exceeds three hundred. From
1860 to 1885 seven school houses have been built, additional form
rooms and playing fields have been added, and crowning them all is the
Pears Hall, which bears the following inscription:—
IN HONOREM PRÆCEPTORIS OPTIMI
STEUART ADOLPHI PEARS S.T.P.
SCHOLÆ REPANDUNENSI PROPE VIGINTI ANNOS
PRÆPOSITI
UT INSIGNIA EJUS ERGA SCHOLAM ILLAM ANTIQUAM
BENEFICIA
MONUMENTO PERPETUO IN MEMORIAM REVOCARENTUR
HOC ÆDIFICIUM
AMICI ET DISCIPULI EJUS EXSTRUENDUM CURAVERUNT
A.S. MDCCCLXXXVI.
THE OLD HOMES OF THE COUNTY
By J. A. Gotch, F.S.A.