1831:]

MR. URBAN,

Priory of Hurley, Berkshire.

clesiâ Deo imperpetuum servientium." -For the support of the religious order serving God perpetually in this church. And after some terrible imprecations, in imitation of Ernulphus Bishop of Rochester, against all persons who shall violate or diminish this his foundation, he concludes with these words:

Ex hac vero dona

Jan. 1. THE parish of Hurley, in Berkshire, is beautifully situated on the banks of the Thames, about thirty miles from London. In the Norman survey, commonly called Domesday, it is said to have lately belonged to Efgen, probably a Saxon or Danish family, but to be then in the possession of Geoffry de Mandeville. This tione meâ et institutione, concilio properson had greatly distinguished him- borum sumpto virorum tria acta sunt self at the battle of Hastings, in which Brevia, unum apud Westmonasterium, King Harold was defeated, and re- aliud apud eandem ecclesiam de Hurceived this estate from William the leia, tertium mihi et hæredibus meis Conqueror, among other spoils, as the succedentibus, pro loci integritate reward of his valour and attachment. æternâ et stabilitate reposui." Towards the end of the Conqueror's reign, that is A. D. 1086, Geoffry de Mandeville founded here the Priory of St. Mary, to this day commonly called Lady Place, and annexed it as a cell to the great Benedictine Abbey of Westminster.

The charter of the foundation is still preserved in the archives there. In this instrument the founder calls himself Gosfridus de Magnavilla, and recites the motives of his donation: Pro salute et redemptione animæ me, et uxoris meæ Lecelinæ, cujus consilio, gratiâ divinâ providente, hoc bonum inchoavi, et pro animâ Athelaise primæ uxoris meæ (matris filiorum meorum) jam defunctæ, necnon et hæredum meorum omnium mihi succedentium."-For the salvation of my soul, and that of my wife Lecelina, by whose advice, under the providence of divine grace, I have begun this good work, and also for the soul of Athelais my first wife, the mother of my sons, now deceased; and also for the souls of all my heirs who shall succeed me. He then recites the particulars of his endowment, and its object :-"Ad sustentationem monachorum in eadem ec

William the Conqueror approved and confirmed the endowment of the founder of Hurley Priory; and afterwards Pope Adrian IV. in a Bull dated 1157, confirmed, among other possessions, to the Abbey of Westminster, "Cellum de Herleya cum eadem villâ, cum omni obedientiâ et subjectione, et pertinentiis suis.'

It may not be improper to observe, that the first subscribing witness to the charter, and indeed the person who consecrated the new convent, was Osmund Bishop of Salisbury, originally a Norman nobleman, Count of Seez, in that province. He was, in the sequel, made Earl of Dorset, and Lord High Chancellor of England; and, finally, Bishop of Salisbury, which diocese he governed with remarkable goodness and assiduity from 1078 to 1099. He is commonly reputed to be the author of the Ritual, called the use of Sarum, and was canonized long after his death.

Gilbert, Abbot of Westminster, another subscribing witness, was also of a Norman family, which had produced several great men; among the rest, his grandfather and uncle, who were

The Vale of Hurley, containing the town of Great Marlow and Bisham, Hurley, and Medmenham, ancient monastic establishments, (the latter on the Buckinghamshire side of the Thames, within less than two miles of each other, and interspersed with gentlemen's seats, farms, and all the variety of cultivation, and bounded by sylvan hills, between which the river winds in picturesque meanders,) is unquestionably one of the most charming scenes, though of limited extent, in England. See Moritz's Travels through England in Mayor's British Tourists, vol. iv. p. 67.

+ In the splendid edition of Dugdale's Monasticon, lately published, vol. iii. p. 488, we find a copy of the charter of the foundation, with some slight variations, chiefly, verbal, and sometimes literal: "Ex Regist. de Walden penes comitem Suffolcia, an. 1650, hodie MS. Harl. Mus. Brit. 3697, fol. 51, b.

"Omnes infractores seu diminutores hujus meæ elemosina excommunicari, ut habitatio illorum perpetua cum Juda maledicto proditore Domini, et viventes descendent in seternbe proditionis baratrum cum Dathan et Core, cum maledictione æterna," &c.

Lady Place, Hurley, Berkshire.

particularly distinguished. He had been educated in the Monastery of Bec, in Normandy, under Lanfranc and Anselm, successive Archbishops of Canterbury, with the latter of whom he kept up a constant correspondence, founded on a sincere friendship. He was repeatedly employed in embassies by Henry I., and is said to have been a very honest and good-natured man, and learned in all the sciences of the times. Some of his theological writings are still extant. He died in the year 1117, and lies buried under one of the three old stone effigies which still remain in the pavement of the great cloisters in Westminster Abbey, near Mr. Pulteney's tomb. In his time, Geoffry de Mandeville himself was interred in the little cloisters of Westminster Abbey, in a chapel, now a court yard, belonging to the house of the receiver of the Abbey rents. Geoffry, the son of the founder, created Earl of Essex, was likewise a benefactor. He married Roisia, sister to Aubrey de Vere, first Earl of Oxford. This lady caused a subterraneous chapel to be cut out of the solid chalk, near the centre of the present town of Royston, in which she was buried. This chapel, on the walls of which many rude figures are still to be seen in relievo, after being lost and unknown for ages, was accidentally discovered by some workmen in 1742, and an account of it was published by Dr. Stukeley. It is well worthy the attention of tourists; and being perfectly dry and easily accessible, is often visited by strangers passing between London and Cambridge.

To return from this digression. The Earl of Essex was Standard-bearer of England, in the times of the Empress Maud and of King Henry II.

The

family seems to have acquired considerable possessions, and probably gave rise to several distinguished individuals, who, in their posterity, may still be existing in honorable stations.

[Jan.

As to Hurley Priory, except that Godfrey, the prior in 1258, exchanged the greatest part of the tithes belonging to the original endowment, with the Abbot of Walden for the church of Streatley, in Berkshire, it remained nearly in the same condition for about 450 years. It was suppressed, among the lesser monasteries, in the 26th year of Henry VIII. 1535, when the annual income, according to Dugdale, amounted to 1217. 18s. 5d.; according to Speed, 1347. 10s. 8d.t

E2

In the 33rd year of Henry VIII. the Priory of Hurley became the property, by grant, of Charles Howard, Esq., and three years afterwards, the site, then and ever since called Lady Place, from the convent having been dedicated to the Virgin Mary, as al- t ready mentioned, became the property of Leonard Chamberleyn, Esq. From him it passed the same year to John Lovelace, Esq., who died in 1558.‡ The son of that gentleman went on an expedition with Sir Frances Drake against the Spaniards, and with the money acquired in this adventure, built the present house on the ruins of the ancient convent.

Of the original buildings belonging to the Priory, the only visible parts remaining are the Abbey yard,§ behind the parish church, on the North side, and some parts of a chapel, or rather, as it is generally supposed, of the refectory, (now stables) of which the window arches, though formed of chalk, are still as fresh as if lately erected. The durability of chalk, indeed, is wonderful, when once it becomes indurated by the sun and air, and fixed in an erect position. In the house itself, however, some remains of the form of the convent may still be traced. Under the great hall, which strikes every spectator for its grandeur and proportions, is a vault or cellar, in which some bodies in monastic habits have been found buried, probably some of the priors, as

It appears from a deed executed in the 15th of Richard II. that Edith, sister of Edward the Confessor, had been buried at Hurley, on which and some other claims the prior and mouks obtained the appropriation of the church of Warefeld from the King.

In the valuation of Pope Nicholas we find this entry, "Ecclesia de Hurle cu' vicar? indeci'abili, Prior Rector, 107. Taxatio decima, 11."

It has been supposed that Lovelace the poet, who died in 1658, was of the same family.

In the walls bounding this quadrangle a former proprietor of Lady Place, Joseph Wilcocks, Esq. has put up tablets with inscriptions, recording some eminent persons connected with the foundation of the Priory.

1831]

Lovelace, Wilcocks, and Kempenfelt Families.

is indicated by the staff on the stones Covering their remains. This hall, and the cross rooms at the East end, seem to have been the church, not of the parish, but of the convent; and the numerous small apartments at the west end, forming the boundary of the parish cemetery, appear to have been the dormitories of the monks.

Respecting the Lovelace family, long the proprietors and occupiers of Lady Place, it is proper to notice that it soon grew rich and powerful in this country, and was ennobled in the reign of Charles I. under the title of Lord Lovelace, Baron of Hurley. In the succeeding reign it lived in great splendour. Two or three ceilings, painted by Verrio, probably at the same time with those in Windsor Castle, and more particularly the landscapes by Salvator Rosa, in the great room, attest the magnificence and wealth of the family.

During the short reign of James II. private meetings of some of the leading nobles of the kingdom were held here, in the subterraneous vault under the Great Hall, for calling in the Prince of Orange; and it is said that the principal papers which brought about the Revolution, were signed in the dark recess at the extremity of that vault. It is certain, that after King Wiliam obtained the crown, he visited Lord Lovelace at Lady Place, and descended with him the dark stairs to see the place. Inscriptions recording this visit, that of George III. and of General Paoli, in 1780, to the same vault, as the cradle of the revolution, were put in it by a worthy proprietor, Joseph Wilcocks, Esq., who will again be mentioned in the sequel.

On the decline of the Lovelace family, which speedily followed, the estate was sold under a decree of Chancery-one part of it, by far the most valuable, the manorial rights, the impropriate rectory, and the adVowson of the vicarage, became the property of Robert Gayer, Esq., who, according to Bishop Tanner, possessed various accompts, rentals, and charters of the Priory; though no register of it is known to exist, nor any regular list of the priors. This estate, with its appurtenances, was subsequently purchased of the Gayer family by the late Duke of Marlborough, who died in 1817. His Grace afterwards exchanged them for lands in Oxfordshire

with Thomas Walker, Esq. of Woodstock, from whose granddaughter and sole heir, Miss Freind, married to Henry Lord Viscount Ashbrook, it has lately descended to their only surviving son, the Hon. Henry Flower, who on coming into its possession, assumed, by royal authority, the name

of Walker.

The remaining part of the Lovelace estate, consisting of Lady Place and the Woodlands, was purchased by Mrs. Williams, sister to Dr. Wilcocks, Bishop of Rochester, which lady in one lottery had two tickets only, and one of them came up a prize of 500%. the other of 20,0001, with which she purchased the property here. The daughter of Mrs. Williams, married to Dr. Lewin, Chancellor of Rochester, possessed it from her mother's death in 1745; and dying without issue, bequeathed it to her relative, Joseph Wilcocks, Esq., son of the Bishop, who on succeeding to it in 1771, and not being able to let the house to a tenant, came to inhabit it himself, and died at an advanced age. He was the author of a posthumous publication under the title of "Roman Conversations," written when a young man, but suppressed from a modesty of disposition, for which, as well as every amiable virtue, he was distinguished through life.

*

The next person in the entail was the brave and unfortunate Admiral Kempenfelt, who went down in the Royal George, as is well known, in Portsmouth harbour. His brother, Gustavus Adolphus Kempenfelt, Esq. succeeded to Lady Place, and made it his residence; but dying unmarried, as his brother and Mr. Wilcocks had been, and being last in the entail, he left the property to his relative, the late Mr. Richard Troughton, of the Custom House, who resided only occasionally here, and whose representatives sold the estate in lots, about three or four years ago. The mansion called Lady Place, and part of the estate, were purchased for the Hon. Henry Walker; and the re

It has been said, but the writer of this knows not on what authority, that the Kempenfelts were descended from the Will Wimble of the "Spectator." The portrait of the Admiral in his uniform, is, or was lately, to be seen in the Great Room occupying the east side of Lady Place.

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Notices of the Family of Copinger.