HOUSE OF TRINITARIANS
16. THE PRIORY OR HOSPITAL OF EASTON (fn. 1)
Stephen of Tisbury, son of Sir Adam of Easton,
incumbent of Easton church from the year 1210
and later Archdeacon of Wiltshire, founded at
Easton in 1245 a hostel in which three priests
should serve and poor travellers should be received.
The site lay, probably, on a Roman road from Old
Salisbury which crossed the Vale of Pewsey on its
way towards Cirencester. The patronage of Easton
church had been in dispute between Bradenstoke
Priory and the abbey of Mont-Ste-Catherine, near
Reims, (fn. 2) and Robert Bingham, Bishop of Salisbury,
was at length accepted as arbitrator. He resolved
the dispute, and confirmed the establishment of the
hostel, by an interim award and by his ordinance
of 9 May 1246. (fn. 3) He directed that Stephen, his
heirs and assigns, should present to the bishop from
time to time one of the three chaplains as master
and rector of the 'hospital'. He awarded to Bradenstoke the tithes of wheat, hay, and cheese on its
demesne, and to the hospital the patronage and
remaining income of the church. The master was
to promise obedience to the bishop. The Minister
General of the Trinitarian Order had recommended one of his friars as master or minister, and
the bishop had admitted him on Stephen's presentation. The ordinance was approved by the king at
Marlborough on 1 July 1251, (fn. 4) and the priory or
hospital of the Holy Trinity, Easton, became the
sixth English Trinitarian house.
Stephen had two sisters, of whom one married
Henry Esturmey and the other Sir William
Drueys. The Esturmeys, hereditary wardens of
Savernake Forest, inherited for nearly two centuries the advowson of the hospital; (fn. 5) in 1250 Sir
Geoffrey Esturmey gave to it 50 acres of wood in
the forest, and in or after 1254 his son Sir Henry
confirmed his gifts of the wood, of a messuage and
1½ virgate of land in Easton, and of a rent of 10s. (fn. 6) At
some date before 1257 Geoffrey Drueys, Sir William's son, quitclaimed to the brethren Stephen's
property at Easton, and he and his brother confirmed the archdeacon's gift of houses and land. (fn. 7)
About 1261 the leper hospital of St. Mary Magdalene outside Hertford was occupied by the friars of
Easton, and in 1287 the same man became minister of the two houses. (fn. 8) The grant of a wood in
Amwell (Herts.) to Easton was authorized in
1301. (fn. 9)
In 1308 John of Backham sold to the hospital,
for £10 silver, a messuage and 2 virgates of land
in Easton. (fn. 10) Robert Drueys, Sir William's grandson, had licence in 1324 to grant the reversion of
2 messuages and 2 virgates of land in Easton; (fn. 11)
he also gave a rent of 12s. and 200 sheep, and built
(or rebuilt) a chapel on the north side of the church,
to be served by a chaplain from the hospital. (fn. 12)
Licences were granted in 1331 to Vincent of
Tarrant, Parson of Everley, to cede to the hospital
an acre of land at Tidcombe 'Huse' (worth 3d. a
year) and the advowson of the church (worth £4
a year, with leave to appropriate); (fn. 13) and to Sir
Robert de Hungerford in 1336 to grant a messuage
and a carucate of land and rents of 3s. 6d. a year
in Grafton, worth in all £1 os. 4d. a year. Hungerford contracted for the maintenance and payment
of an additional priest brother to pray for his late
wife Geva and others; for daily refreshment for
seven poor persons; for £3 a year to himself for
life; and for penalties on breach of the conditions.
He stated that the house then maintained six
priests and one lay brother. (fn. 14)
The Trinitarian Order was founded for the
ransom of Christian captives in pagan lands, and
each convent was bound to devote a third of its
income to this purpose. Duty to the sick and the
wayfaring poor was also emphasized in the Constitutions. The mother house was at Cerfroy, near
Château-Thierry. It must be assumed that until
the passing of the Statute of Carlisle in 1307—or
perhaps until the invasion of France in 1337—the
English houses sent their dues to Cerfroy; there is
no evidence that they took any personal share in
the work of ransom. During the Hundred Years
War and the Great Schism their surplus income
was probably spent on the poor and the wayfaring.
In 1334 Walter of Kingsettle quitclaimed to
the hospital the 2 messuages and 2 virgates in
Easton given by Robert Drueys in 1322. (fn. 15) Sir
Henry Esturmey and three others had licence in
1349 to grant a messuage and a carucate of land
in 'Middleton' (Milton Lilborne) and Easton,
worth 33s. 4d., and William of Urchfont and three
others to grant 13 acres in East Grafton worth
2s. 6d. (fn. 16)
The Black Death, which fell heavily on the
Trinitarians of Knaresborough and wiped out the
community at Oxford, probably did not do great
harm at Easton. Edmund of Pollesden had been
prior or minister since 1344, and his surname was
taken from a farm on the Esturmey properties.
During the winter of 1363-4 Henry Esturmey
presented to the bishop for institution as minister
a secular priest, Robert England; he stated that
Edmund had left the house, after wasting and
embezzling its revenues, and he assumed a voidance. The bishop, after long and careful inquiries,
found that masses and hospitality had been suspended for fifteen years; Edmund had wasted the
priory's revenues, had built in it a stable for his
horse, and departed to Hertford four years ago,
with the common seal. The bishop and Esturmey
agreed that Edmund had forfeited his office; the
brethren had deserved expulsion, but should be
restored to their house under disciplinary safeguards. Robert England resigned his rights; one
of the brethren, Robert Pilkington, was presented
by Esturmey and instituted by the bishop. Edmund appealed to the Holy See, and obtained
definite support from the minister general of the
Order. The bishop, the patron, and the brethren
did not give way. The new statutes and ordinances
were issued by the bishop in 1368, and they included a direction to follow the Use of Sarum. (fn. 17)
Apostasies were noted in 1366 and 1378, (fn. 18) and
in 1368 Easton and Hertford obtained the king's
order for the arrest of false questors, who had
collected and embezzled great sums of money by
the use of forged letters of procuration. (fn. 19)
Easton church was pulled down by the brethren
in 1369, and the material used to enlarge their own
church, barely 60 yards away. The parishioners,
reduced in numbers and unable to maintain the
building, had asked for its demolition, but they
undertook to maintain the conventual nave, chancel, and cemetery if they might use them. The
archdeacon, the patron, the bishop, and the dean
and chapter agreed. (fn. 20)
The patron was still active on behalf of Easton.
Sir Henry Esturmey had licence in 1371 to grant
to it 2 messuages, a toft, a mill, 3 carucates and
20 acres of land, 6 acres of meadow and 8 of pasture and 30 of wood, with £4 6s. rent, in or arising
from Wootton Rivers, Milton Lilborne, Pewsey,
Upavon, and Little Bedwyn, worth in all £10 a
year, on condition of prayers for the royal family
and the donor. He described the brethren as
canons in these proceedings. (fn. 21) In 1372 he again
defied the mother house of the Order. An office
of provincial minister had been created by Clement IV in 1267; Edmund of Pollesden had been
described as provincial of England by the minister
general in 1364; the minister of Mottenden (Kent)
was now appointed provincial, and when he claimed
authority over Easton Esturmey caused him to be
attached in the Common Pleas. The same provincial, in 1382, cited the minister of Easton to a
chapter in London. (fn. 22) The subsequent proceedings
do not seem to be recorded in either case. But
Urban VI granted to the English houses the choice
of their own provincial.
Sir William Esturmey, in 1389, ratified his
uncle Henry's grant to Easton of all his lands and
tenements at Puthall (in Little Bedwyn) on
minutely detailed conditions as to distributing
pence and halfpenny white loaves, and washing
the feet of the poor, and as to providing candles
and celebrating obits. (fn. 23) In 1390 Sir William had
two licences: the first, for £5 which the Prior of
Easton paid, to grant the advowson of Tidcombe
in exchange for the manor of Wyke; the second,
to cede to the hospital the manor (worth £4) and
advowson (worth £5) of Froxfield in exchange for
Crofton Braybeuf Manor (in Great Bedwyn) and
lands and tenements in Burbage. (fn. 24) But the brethren were still able to plead poverty and buildings
out of repair owing to poor harvests, murrain, the
increasing expenses of hospitality, and the severity
of taxation; on these grounds they obtained in
1392 the bishop's leave to appropriate Tidcombe
church. (fn. 25) They borrowed £40 from the Dean
and Chapter of Salisbury, and compounded in
1412 by an undertaking to pay 13s. 4d. a year, in
perpetuity, to two chaplains celebrating certain
obits on St. Luke's Day in the church of St.
Thomas. (fn. 26) They obtained from John XXIII in
1414, in consideration of their heavy expenses,
leave to appropriate three churches, to a value not
exceeding 100 marks, and to serve them in person. (fn. 27) A widow at Salisbury left £2 in 1414; John
Chandler, Bishop of Salisbury, bequeathed to them
10s. in 1427, John Chitterne, Canon of Salisbury,
a legacy in 1419, and John Frankes £2 in 1434. (fn. 28)
John Benger had licence in 1444 to grant to them
the advowson of Stapleford church. (fn. 29) They kept
faith with Sir Robert Hungerford and his house:
in 1410 they presented Brother John Exeter to
Sir Walter as his chantry priest, and in 1426 their
'prior', Stephen Yateley. (fn. 30)
The 'prior and convent' obtained in 1424 a
general amnesty, granted (it was said) at the request of the last Parliament, but excepting certain
felonies; and they were included in a general
pardon of 1446. (fn. 31) There seems to be no evidence
of recent offences.
Sir William Esturmey died in 1427 and was
buried in the priory church. He bequeathed inter
alia to the priory a volume of Decretals and two
volumes of Higden's Polychronicon. (fn. 32) The advowson of Easton passed, with Sir William's younger
daughter, to the Seymours (fn. 33) and their cousins the
Ringebornes. (fn. 34) The house at Hertford had become
independent of Easton by 1448. (fn. 35) In 1459 William Bradker of Debenham Market (Suff.), proctor of the hospital, gave his bond to the prior and
convent for £200, to be repaid in ten years by
half-yearly instalments. (fn. 36) The transaction remains
obscure; but the Trinitarian house of Thelsford
was active in collecting alms in the churches, and
Easton apparently had its own collector. The
Order continued its first duty, the ransom of
Christian captives, and Robert Gaguin, who ruled
it from 1473 to 1507, did his best to revive its
ancient fervour. The English houses did no more
than contribute money; it is doubtful whether
they did as much, for the Statute of Carlisle was
still in force.
In 1493 the whole priory—the church with its
vestments and ornaments, the houses and buildings, the brethren's possessions—was swept by
fire and destroyed. The Archbishop of Canterbury
gave a letter certifying the facts, and an indulgence
of 40 days to benefactors during the next twelve
months; the king gave protection without term to
the proctors of the prior and convent; the vicar
general of the diocese issued notarial copies of both
documents. (fn. 37) The church and buildings were described as ruinous in 1535.
On a voidance in (apparently) 1499 Henry VII
wrote to the patrons recommending for appointment as minister his chaplain, the minister of
Hounslow. Hounslow was wealthier than Easton,
and plurality may have been intended. The patrons
and the vicar general seem to have refused the
king's request, in spite of a second letter from
Henry, and John Topping, a secular priest, received the office. (fn. 38) The next, and last, minister
was presented by Sir John Seymour in 1528. (fn. 39)
The return of endowments made in 1535
showed an income from spiritualities (the rectories
of Easton, Stapleford, Tidcombe, and Froxfield)
of £32 17s. 6d.; from the manors of Easton and
Froxfield and property in Grafton and Milton
Lilborne, £22 16s. 10d. From the gross income
of £55 14s. 4d. pensions were paid of £5 to the
Bishop of Hereford and 13s. 4d. to the church of
St. Thomas, Salisbury; fees of £1 6s. 8d. to the
steward and £2 to the receiver; and other dues and
rents £4 2s. 4d. The clear income was therefore
£42 12s. 0d. (fn. 40) The house at Hertford had become
independent before 1448, (fn. 41) and in the end it was
reckoned as a cell of Mottenden.
The priory or hospital was dissolved 'by virtue
of' the Act of 1536. (fn. 42) The surviving Trinitarian
houses were all in the category against which the
Act was aimed; if they were friaries, they were not
within its scope, but none of them questioned their
fate. Easton was described by the county commissioners in 1536 as a 'hedde house of crosse
channons of Seint Augustynes rule', worth
£45 14s. 0d. a year with £4 11s. 8d. for the
demesne, containing 2 priests (by report, of honest
conversation, desiring to continue religious), 6
hinds, and 2 women servants; their church and
mansion in ruin, in default of covering, and the
outhouses in great decay; their movable assets
worth £144 6s. 8d., their 50 acres of wood in
Savernake Forest and their 6 acres of coppice
worth £17 13s. 4d.; their lead worth £6 (but the
bells in the steeple belonged to the parish); their
indebtedness £22 2s. 2d. (fn. 43) Sir Edward Seymour,
Viscount Beauchamp, had a grant in tail male of
their property; and the 'prior' had a pension of
£6 13s. 4d. (fn. 44)
The brethren at Easton seem always to have
been English, and usually Wiltshiremen. Their
number was fixed by Stephen of Tisbury at three;
there were (without the minister) five in 1364, (fn. 45)
and four in 1473. (fn. 46) They proceeded to the priesthood in the regular course of ordination; (fn. 47) in
March 1428 one of them was ordained acolyte,
and in December St. Margaret's Priory at Marlborough presented him for deacon. (fn. 48) They were
authorized by John XXIII in 1414 to appropriate
three churches not exceeding £66 13s. 4d. in
value, and to serve them in person; (fn. 49) Sixtus IV
authorized the prior in 1483 to serve a church,
and he served Stapleford from 1487 to 1491. (fn. 50)
Their Order was brought in 1308 into direct
dependence upon the Holy See; but Robert Bingham's direction to obey the bishop held good in
1364, when the bishop, the patron, and the convent refused to comply with the minister general's
ruling.
Ministers or Priors of Easton
Nicholas of Norfolk, instituted 1245. (fn. 51)
William, occurs 1287. (fn. 52)
John of Titchfield, occurs 1308-28. (fn. 53)
William Beccles, instituted 1329. (fn. 54)
Edmund of Pollesden, occurs 1344-64. (fn. 55)
Robert England, nominated 1364. (fn. 56)
Robert Pilkington, instituted 1364. (fn. 57)
Robert Newington, occurs 1389. (fn. 58)
John of Hacklestone, occurs 1391-1412. (fn. 59)
Stephen Yateley, occurs 1427, resigned 1448. (fn. 60)
John Charlton, instituted 1448, occurs 1459. (fn. 61)
William Marshall, instituted 1474, occurs to
1493. (fn. 62)
John Topping, instituted about 1498, died
1528. (fn. 63)
Henry Bryan, instituted 1528, retired 1536. (fn. 64)