The particular spot where Caxton exercised his business, or the place
where his press was fixed, cannot now, perhaps, be exactly ascertained.
Dr. Dibdin, after a careful examination of existing testimonies, thinks
it most probable that he erected his press in one of the chapels
attached to the aisles of Westminster Abbey; and as no remains of this
interesting place can now be discovered, there is a strong presumption
that it was pulled down in making alterations for the building of Henry
VII.'s splendid chapel.
It has been frequently asserted that all Caxton's books were printed in
a part of Westminster Abbey; this must be mere conjecture, because we
find no statement of it from himself: he first mentions the place of his
printing in 1477, so that he must have printed some time without
informing us where.
With all possible respect for the opinions of Dr. Dibdin, and the
numerous writers on our early typography, I have very considerable
doubts as to whether Caxton really printed _within the walls of the
Abbey_ at all. I am aware that he himself says, in some of his
colophons, "Emprinted in th' Abbey of Westmynstre," but query whether
the _precincts_ of the Abbey are not intended? Stow, in his _Annals_
(edit 1560, p. 686.), says,--"William Caxton of London, mercer, brought
it (printing) into England about the year 1471, and first practised the
same in the _Abbie_ of St. Peter at Westminster;" but in his _Survey of
London_, 1603 (edit. Thoms, p. 176.), the same writer gives us a more
full and particular account; it is as follows:--
"Near unto this house [i.e. Henry VII.'s alms-house], westward,
was an old chapel of St. Anne; over against the which, the Lady
Margaret, mother to King Henry VII., erected an alms-house for
poor women, which is now turned into lodgings for the singing
men of the college. The place wherein this chapel and alms-house
standeth was called the Elemosinary, or almonry, now corruptly
the ambry, for that the alms of the Abbey were there distributed
to the poor; and therein Islip, abbot of Westminster, erected
the first press of book-printing that ever was in England, about
the year of Christ 1471. William Caxton, citizen of London,
mercer, brought it into England, and was the first that
practised it _in the said abbey_; after which time the like was
practised in the abbeys of St. Augustine at Canterbury, St.
Albans, and other monasteries."
Again, in the curious hand-bill preserved in the Bodleian Library, it
will be remembered that Caxton invites his customers to "come to
Westmonester _into the Almonestrye_," where they may purchase his books
"good chepe."
From these extracts it is pretty clear that Caxton's printing-office was
in the Almonry, which was within the precincts of the Abbey, and not in
the Abbey itself. The "old chapel of St. Anne" was doubtless the place
where the first printing-office was erected in England. Abbot Milling
(not Islip, as stated by Stow) was the generous friend and patron of
Caxton and the art of printing; and it was by permission of this learned
monk that our printer was allowed the use of the building in question.
The _old_ chapel of St. Anne stood in the New-way, near the back of the
workhouse, at the bottom of the almonry leading to what is now called
Stratton Ground. It was pulled down, I believe, about the middle of the
seventeenth century. The _new_ chapel of St. Anne, erected in 1631, near
the site of the old one, was destroyed about fifty years since.