The #Hospital of St Cross#, the oldest almshouse in England, lies one mile to the south of the town on the Southampton Road, and may be reached from Winchester across the fields for part of the way. Situated in the hamlet of Sparkford, it was founded originally by Bishop Henry de Blois in 1136, on the site of a small monastery destroyed by the Danes. The founder's wish was to give refuge to "thirteen poor men, feeble and so reduced in strength that they can hardly or with difficulty support themselves with another's aid"; while a meal was daily to be provided for another hundred poor men. The Knights Hospitallers, in the person of their Master, Raymund, were in 1151 A.D. put in charge of the foundation. They agreed so ill, however, with the bishops of the neighbouring cathedral that, about 1200, the Pope appointed a commission which transferred to the bishops the right of choosing the master. The new arrangement did not work well, for a little more than a century and a half afterwards the master was found to be robbing his charge to such an extent that the scandal was intolerable. William of Wykeham turning his attention to the matter, a Papal Bull was procured ordering the use of the revenues for the benefit of the poor. The next bishop, Cardinal Beaufort, added to the buildings by the foundation of the "Almshouse of Noble Poverty," for the maintenance of two priests, thirty-five brethren, and three sisters. The master of the hospital was to be at its head, otherwise the institutions were to be distinct; but by the middle of the sixteenth century the hospital had practically absorbed the almshouse. At the end of the next century, in 1696, the master and brethren of the hospital made a public repudiation of their duties, and commenced either to destroy the buildings or to convert them to other than their original uses; and shortly after the southern side of Beaufort's quadrangle was pulled down. The abuses were rectified in the middle of the present century, and now a body of trustees, under the control of the Charity Commissioners, has the management of the two institutions. All the endowments of the hospital are still intact.
