Chapter XIII.
THE DOWER OF ANN OF CLEVES.
At the Reformation, when the monastery of St. Pancras, at Southover, was destroyed, by order of Henry VIII., on its being surrendered to that monarch, by Prior Robert Crowham, November 16th, 1537, the manor of Southover, Lewes, which included the priory, was granted to Thomas Cromwell, Earl of Essex, who also held one moiety of the manor of Brighthelmston-Lewes:—
4. Hen. VIII. One moiety of this manor, with several other possessions in Sussex, was recovered by petition, by Thomas, Earl of Surrey, they having been devised by the Marquis of Berkeley, to Henry VII., and an act passed in the 7th of that king, whilst the petitioner was absent on the king’s business in the north, and ignorant of it till the said parliament was ended. The answer is “Soit fait come il est desiree.”
The petition is contained in the Burrell MSS. 5637. Folios 36 and 37.
On the attainder and execution of the Earl of Essex, Sir John Gage, of Firle, was appointed chief steward of Southover and other manors forfeited by that nobleman within the county of Sussex. But on the 20th of January, 1541, they were granted to Ann of Cleves, one of the injured queens of Henry VIII. The Burrell MSS. record:—
32. Hen. VIII. The King granted this manor (Brighthelmston-Lewes) and advowson to Ann of Cleves; with a great many others in Sussex, including the manor of Falmer (originally Fald-mer), which, on her death, again reverted to the crown, and after various successions and alienations, was purchased of Sir John Shelley, of Michelgrove, by Thomas, Lord Pelham, on the 2nd day of May, in the year 1770. It still continues in the possession of the Pelham family, being held by the Earl of Chichester, of Stanmer, the manor adjoining.
Miss Strickland, in her “Lives of the Queens of England,” says:—“The marriage was dissolved by mutual consent; and she being content to abide in this realm, and to yield to its laws, and to discharge her conscience of that pretended marriage, the king, of his especial favour, granted to her certain manors and estates in divers counties, lately forfeited by the attainder of the Earl of Essex,—Cromwell, whose spoils formed the principal fund for the maintenance of this princess,—and Sir Nicholas Carew, to be held without rendering an account from the Lady-day foregoing the same grant, which was dated on the 20th of January, 1541.”
These grants were made to Ann by Henry VIII., on her assent to the invalidity of her marriage with that monarch, who refused to consort with her. On the 8th of August, 1540, Henry married Catherine Howard. The manor of Falmer was also part of Ann’s dower, and in seclusion there she resided some time; though on her divorce she took up her abode at Preston House, in the village of Preston, where still, in one of the rooms, is a large and well executed portrait of her, by some considered the work of Holbein. It was seeing this portrait which induced the king to desire an union with hor. She landed at Dover, December, 1538. Henry met her there, and such was his dislike to her, from her beauty not being equal to Holbein’s portrait, that he spoke of her as a “Flander’s Mare,” and used other expressions respecting her of an equally contemptuous character.
Ann died on the 17th of July, 1557, at the Palace of Chelsea, and was buried on the 3rd of August, near the high altar, in Westminster Abbey, near the old portraits of Henry III. and King Sebert.
The manor formerly belonged to the Shirley family, several monumental tablets to the members of which remain within Preston church. Mary, the second sister of Sir Richard Shirley, Bart., was married to Thomas Western, Esq., of Ravenhall, in Essex, who died April 1st, 1733, leaving an only child, Thomas Western, who married Ann, the daughter of Robert Callis, Esq., and died in May, 1766, leaving Charles Western as his heir. Charles Western, Esq., married Frances Shirley, only daughter and heiress of William Bolland, Esq. His end was of the most melancholy character. Whilst riding with his eldest son, Charles Callis, a child then about four years of age, along the road by Goldstone Bottom, the horse stumbled, and they were precipitated from their carriage, the father being killed on the spot. The life of the child was preserved by his being thrown into a furze bush, by the roadside. This occurrence took place on the 24th July, 1771. The widow, with her two children, Charles and a younger brother, Shirley, about three years old, shortly after left Preston, where none of the family ever after returned, and the estate eventually was purchased by William Stanford, Esq., for £20,000. His grand-daughter, a minor, is his heiress; and so improved is the estate, through the favourable circumstance of the railroad from Brighton to London passing through it, that the portion alone used for the formation of the line realized £30,000.