After the suppression of the monasteries the site and remains of the church were granted about 1542 to the Mayor and Corporation, and, as was the case with many other similar buildings, the partially ruined church served for a long period as a quarry from which the inhabitants appear to have drawn building materials for their own houses.
STONELEIGH ABBEY.
Fortunately, however, the elegant tower escaped. It was ultimately and for many years surrounded by an orchard, which belonged to a nurseryman who turned the lower portion of the tower into a piggery, and who used to laughingly boast that he possessed the tallest pig–sty in the country. In the early years of the last century the idea of building on a new church to the old tower presented itself to the minds of some Coventry people, and the Corporation released their rights to the tower for the purpose. The work, which was commenced in 1829, was finished three years later. The idea, we believe, was to erect this church in the style of the original, but one can scarcely credit that this intention was carried out if one may at the same time accept the statement that the ancient building was of such elegance and beauty as chroniclers have recorded.
In St. Michael’s Church one has, however, an early and remarkably beautiful example of Perpendicular architecture, the tower and spire of which is almost world–famed.
In the reign of King Stephen a grant was made to the prior of the neighbouring Benedictine monastery, and this constitutes the earliest mention of the church. Of the original building, which was of Norman design, only a few fragments have from time to time been discovered, and the first church was superseded in the thirteenth century by one of Early English design, of which nothing except some portions of the walls, the south–west doorway, and the south porch remain at the present day.
The present beautiful church was probably erected between the year 1373 and the first half of the next century, its founders being members of a family named Botoner. William and Adam Botoner were not only prosperous merchants and notable citizens of Coventry, but had each of them the unusual distinction of filling the office of Mayor three times. The munificence of the family, tradition asserts, was perpetuated by a brass tablet which was formerly affixed in the church, and bore the following inscription:—