DEERHURST.[ToC]
Deerhurst, or Deorhurst—the wood or grove of wild beasts, as its etymology implies—lies close to Tewkesbury, and the visitor to the latter must on no account omit to pay a visit to the older building. It may be reached by a pleasant walk through meadows on the left bank of the Severn, by the road or by a path across the fields.
The Priory church of Deerhurst is one of the oldest buildings of any importance that yet remain in use in England. Its exact date is more or less a matter of conjecture, but it seems certain from documentary evidence, which is still accessible, that in the ninth century the Abbey or Priory was in a prosperous condition—the document referred to above being a grant of lands in Gloucestershire and Worcestershire to the Abbey in 804. No earlier authentic evidence than this exists, though a lapsus calami of Leland (who credits the Venerable Bede with an acquaintance with Deerhurst about the year 700) would seem to give it an earlier date. From the earliest time Deerhurst—situated where it is, so near that great highway the Severn, and occupying a position on the direct line of traffic by road between Worcester and Gloucester, must have had an important part to play. Legend has it that Edmund Ironside and Canute, intent on fighting a duel after Essendune, met at Olney in 1016, but settled matters without coming to blows, and later tradition affirms that this meeting took place in the meadow—once an island or eyot, hence its present name—called the Naight.
Tradition, again, has it that the Abbey suffered from the Danes, and this seems likely enough, seeing that they were encamped at Cirencester for fully a year. Werstan, one of the monks who escaped from the Danes, is said by Leland to have founded a cell at Malvern, and was later murdered by the Danes in his own chapel there. In the windows of Malvern Priory he is described as "Sanctus Werstanus Martir," but little else is known about him.
The Abbey, though small, was richly endowed with land, and is said to have been possessed of nearly forty thousand acres. Its wealth in landed property was the cause of its being transferred by Edward the Confessor in 1054-56 to the great French Abbey of St. Denis; and what was not so transferred was mostly given by the King, together with the Manor of Pershore and other possessions, to his Abbey of St. Peter at Westminster, which was then building.
The Abbey lost its importance when it became an alien priory, and its landed possessions, which had once surpassed those of the abbeys at Gloucester and at Winchcombe, were dwarfed to very scanty dimensions. It suffered, too, in prestige, having become a priory, and was constantly being harried by successive monarchs.
We find that the Conqueror confirmed the grant of the Abbey of Deerhurst to St. Denis, but that King John confiscated its revenues. In 1225 Pope Honorius III. by a Bull approved that the Priory should be perpetual and conventual. In virtue of this the Prior could claim not to come into the King's hands, but it was many years before this claim was barely recognised. In this same year the Prior was again in possession of the Priory and its lands; but in 1250 (temp. Henry II.), the Priory was sold to Richard, Duke of Cornwall, who seems to have driven out the monks and destroyed the greater part of their buildings. Later in the same reign, 1260, the Abbot of St. Denis again got possession of the Priory.
In 1295 Edward I. took possession of all the existing alien priories for the sake of the revenue they would bring into his exchequer. Edward III.[29] again despoiled the monks of what was theirs, and his grandson, Richard II., followed in his steps.
The Priory had a respite from such continued harryings with the accession of Henry IV. (1399). This king took possession of it as an alien Priory, but immediately handed it over to William Forester, the then Prior, with the stipulation that in the event of a war with France the King should receive a sum of money equal to that which in time of peace would be paid to the Abbey of St. Denis. With halcyon days like these the Priory set about rebuilding what had been destroyed, and works were undertaken—much of which is standing at the present time.