INTRODUCTION
Westminster was a diocese for a mere ten years. Henry VIII established it by
letters patent of 17 December 1540, in accordance with the statute 31 Hen. VIII
c. 9, when the former monastery of St. Peter, Westminster, was reconstituted as a
cathedral church, with a bishop, dean and twelve canons. Thomas Thirlby was
named as the first bishop. The dean, William Benson or Boston, had been abbot
of Westminster before the Dissolution, and the former prior and five other monks
were among the new canons. The town of Westminster was to be known as the
city of Westminster. The new diocese was to consist of the whole county of
Middlesex, formerly in the diocese of London, except for Fulham, and the
archdeacon of Middlesex was transferred to the jurisdiction of the new bishop. (fn. 1)
The next month the endowment of the bishopric was described and that of the
dean and chapter on 5 August 1542. (fn. 2) The deanery and all the prebends were in
the king's gift.
In 1550 the diocese of Westminster was reunited with that of London.
Thomas Thirlby surrendered the diocese to the Crown on 30 March and was
translated to Norwich, while Nicholas Ridley was made bishop of London and
Westminster by letters patent of 1 April. (fn. 3) An act of parliament of 3 March 1552
confirmed the position of Westminster as a 'cathedral church and episcopal see to
the bishop of London'. At least one royal presentation to a prebend was directed
to the bishop of London for institution. (fn. 4) Further upheaval followed the
accession of Mary, when no fewer than nine of the canons were deprived by the
queen's commissary on 30 March 1554 and replaced by others. Two years later,
on 26 September 1556, the chapter was abolished and the monastery restored by
Cardinal Pole, archbishop of Canterbury, and on 10 November the endowments
of the dean and chapter were transferred to the monastery by royal letters patent.
The dean was moved to the deanery of Windsor to make room for the new abbot,
John Feckenham, and the canons were to receive annual pensions. (fn. 5)
A fresh start was made in 1560. An act of parliament annexed to the Crown
all the monasteries which had been restored by Mary. The monks of
Westminster were obliged to surrender their house to the Crown in July 1559 and
by charter of 21 May 1560 Elizabeth I founded 'the college or collegiate church
of St. Peter, Westminster ... on the site of the monastery of Westminster'. A
new dean and canons were appointed, they were incorporated with the same
liberties as held by the 'late dean and ... chapter of Westminster cathedral', and
their endowment was restored. Not surprisingly, none of those who had
surrendered their prebends in 1556 was reappointed, but two of those deprived in
1554 received grants of prebends. The new presentees were inducted and
installed by special commission to the archbishop of Canterbury and others. (fn. 6) Henceforward new canons were not instituted by the bishop of London after
royal presentation but simply installed. The term 'Westminster cathedral' was
replaced by 'the collegiate church St. Peter, Westminster', but already by 1579
the expression 'St. Peter's abbey, Westminster' is found, and this became the
frequent description. (fn. 7)
Until the Civil War the prebends were referred to by their numbers, and are
given in this way in this volume. From 16 November 1645 the abbey was
governed by a committee of Lords and Commons while the dean and canons
were dispersed. (fn. 8) Four canons survived the Interregnum and their number was
rapidly restored to twelve by royal grants at the Restoration. Four new canons
were installed on 5 July 1660 and four more by 1 September. They were no
longer appointed to specific numbered prebends, however, and at subsequent
vacancies the prebends were described merely in terms of the previous holder.
Therefore in these lists the canons from 1660 are listed in order of appointment,
giving their predecessors and successors.
A prebend at Westminster was a plum of the ecclesiastical establishment, and
the canons' status is evident from the speed with which vacant prebends were
always filled and the fact that it has been possible to discover the dates of death
(or at least burials) of almost all of them, as being persons of national
importance. Besides the value of the prebend, it was also very convenient to
have a prebend at Westminster. (fn. 9) Several bishops, particularly if their sees were
poor ones, retained their prebends at Westminster, and it was not unusual, in the
sixteenth century as well as in the nineteenth, for three or four bishops to be
present in chapter. (fn. 10) For 140 years, from 1666 to 1802, the bishops of Rochester
held the deanery of Westminster, as the income from the latter was worth twice
that of the bishopric. (fn. 11) Of the fifteen deans after 1660, eleven were or became
bishops; of the 147 canons twenty became bishops (nine of them continuing to
hold their prebend), ten became deans elsewhere, and ninety-nine held their
prebend to death as resignations (apart from promotion to a bishopric) were
unusually rare. Other distinguishing features of the Westminster chapter were
the close links with Westminster school, thirteen of whose headmasters were
canons, and the fact that eleven members of the peerage or baronetage were at
various times members of the chapter.
The Reports issued by the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in 1835 and 1836,
embodied in the statute 3 & 4 Vic. c. 113, called for a reduction in the number of
canons from twelve to six. Two of the remaining prebends were to be united
with the rectories of St. Margaret and of St. John, Westminster. The procedure
by which the prebends were to be suspended is illustrated in a table in the
Appendix, and the requisite number was reached by 1859.
When John Le Neve published his lists of the deans and canons in 1716, he
relied almost exclusively on Richard Newcourt's Repertorium Ecclesiasticum
(London, 1708-10). Details on individuals before 1660 are scanty and
conjectural: from then until 1715 they consist mainly of installations which
Newcourt had apparently gathered from the chapter minutes, followed by an
unsubstantiated mention of the man's death or subsequent career. Thomas
Duffus Hardy's revision and continuation of Le Neve (published in 1854) adds
little to the pre-Civil War lists, and drops even the few references which Le Neve
gave. After 1660 he merely inserts the predecessor of each canon on
installation, but otherwise reproduces Le Neve verbatim. For two brief periods,
1689-1701 and 1822-33, he gives the royal presentation from the patent rolls, but
otherwise supplies only the installations, without any references.
The sources for compiling Fasti of Westminster are in fact normally fairly
adequate. The royal presentations are to be found on the patent rolls, and
from the eighteenth century are published in the London Gazette. Installations
are recorded in the chapter minute books, consistently from 1660. Most deaths
are recorded in national sources: other canons were buried in Westminster abbey,
and in only a relatively few cases has it been necessary to search for their burial
in a parish benefice.