The Survey of London

by John Stow

At the north corner of this street, on the same side, was sometime an hermitage, or chapel of St. James, called in the wall, near Cripplegate: it belonged to the abbey and convent of Garadon, as appeareth by a record, the 27th of Edward I., and also the 16th of Edward III. William de Lions was hermit there, and the abbot and convent of Geredon found two chaplains, Cistercian monks of their house, in this hermitage; one of them for Aymor de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, and Mary de Saint Paule, his countess.

Of these monks, and of a well pertaining to them, the street took that name, and is called Monks’ well street. This hermitage, with the appurtenances, was in the reign of Edward VI. purchased from the said king by William Lambe, one of the gentlemen of the king’s chapel, citizen and cloth-worker of London: he deceased in the year 1577, and then gave it to the clothworkers of London, with other tenements, to the value of fifty pounds the year, to the intent they shall hire a minister to say divine service there, etc.

Again to the high street of Cheape, from Fauster lane end to St. Martin’s, and by that lane to the shambles or flesh-market, on the north side whereof is Penticost lane, containing divers slaughter-houses for the butchers.

Then was there of old time a proper parish church of St. Nicholas, whereof the said flesh-market took the name, and was called St. Nicholas’ shambles. This church, with the tenements and ornaments, was by Henry VIII. given to the mayor and commonalty of the city, towards the maintenance of the new parish church then to be erected in the late dissolved church of the Grey Friars; so was this church dissolved and pulled down. In place whereof, and of the churchyard, many fair houses are now built in a court with a well, in the midst whereof the church stood.

Then is Stinking lane, so called, or Chick lane, at the east end of the Grey Friars church, and there is the Butchers’ hall.

In the 3rd of Richard II. motion was made that no butcher should kill no flesh within London, but at Knightsbridge, or such like distance of place from the walls of the city.

Then the late dissolved church of the Grey Friars; the original whereof was this:

The first of this order of friars in England, nine in number, arrived at Dover; five of them remained at Canterburie, the other four came to London, were lodged at the preaching friars in Oldborne for the space of fifteen days, and then they hired a house in Cornhill of John Trevers, one of the sheriffs of London. They built there little cells, wherein they inhabited; but shortly after, the devotion of citizens towards them, and the number of the friars so increased, that they were by the citizens removed to a place in St. Nicholas’ shambles; which John Ewin, mercer, appropriated unto the commonalty, to the use of the said friars, and himself became a lay brother amongst them. About the year 1225, William Joyner built their choir, Henry Walles the body of the church, Walter Potter, alderman, the chapter house, Gregorie Rokesley their dorter; Bartholomew of the Castle made the refectory, Peter de Heliland made the infirmitory, Bevis Bond, king of heralds, made the study, etc.

Margaret, queen, second wife to Edward I., began the choir of their new church in the year 1306; to the building whereof, in her lifetime, she gave two thousand marks, and one hundred marks by her testament. John Britaine, Earl of Richmond, built the body of the church to the charges of three hundred pounds, and gave many rich jewels and ornaments to be used in the same; Marie, Countess of Pembroke, seventy pounds. Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester, bestowed twenty great beams out of his forest of Tunbridge, and twenty pounds sterling. Lady Helianor le Spencer, Lady Elizabeth de Burgh, sister to Gilbert de Clare, gave sums of money; and so did divers citizens; as Arnald de Tolinea, one hundred pounds; Robert, Baron Lisle, who became a friar there, three hundred pounds; Bartholomew de Almaine, fifty pounds. Also Philippa, queen, wife to Edward III., gave sixty-two pounds; Isabell, queen, mother to Edward III., gave threescore and ten pounds. And so the work was done within the space of twenty-one years, 1337. This church was furnished with windows made at the charges of divers persons. The Lady Margaret Segrave, Countess of Norfolk, bare the charges of making the stalls in the choir, to the value of three hundred and fifty marks, about the year 1380. Richard Whittington, in the year 1429, founded the library, which was in length one hundred and twenty-nine feet, and in breadth thirty-one, all sealed with wainscot, having twenty-eight desks and eight double settles of wainscot; which in the next year following was altogether finished in building, and within three years after furnished with books, to the charges of five hundred and fifty-six pounds ten shillings; whereof Richard Whittington bare four hundred pounds; the rest was borne by Doctor Thomas Winchelsey, a friar there; and for the writing out of D. Nicholas de Lira, his works, in two volumes, to be chained there, one hundred marks, etc. The ceiling of the choir at divers men’s charges, two hundred marks, and the painting at fifty marks; their conduit head and water-course given them by William Tailor, tailor to Henry III., etc.

This whole church containeth in length three hundred feet, of the feet of St. Paule; in breadth eighty-nine feet, and in height from the ground to the roof sixty-four feet and two inches, etc. It was consecrated 1325, and at the general suppression was valued at thirty-two pounds nineteen shillings, surrendered the 12th of November 1538, the 30th of Henry VIII., the ornaments and goods being taken to the king’s use. The church was shut up for a time, and used as a storehouse for goods taken prizes from the French; but in the year 1546, on the 3rd of January, was again set open. On the which day preached at Paule’s cross the Bishop of Rochester, where he declared the king’s gift thereof to the city for the relieving of the poor. Which gift was by patent—of St. Bartholomew’s Spittle, lately valued at three hundred and five pounds six shillings and seven pence, and surrendered to the king; of the said church of the Grey Friars, and of two parish churches, the one of St. Nicholas in the shambles, and the other of St. Ewines in Newgate market, which were to be made one parish church in the said Friars church; and in lands he gave for maintenance for the said church, with divine service, reparations, etc., five hundred marks by year for ever.