The closing scene in the monastic story was not, however, to be reached for some century or so longer. In Henry VIII.’s time, however, monasteries had drifted so hopelessly from the general stream of national life, that it was evident their existence could not be indefinitely prolonged on existing lines, and Wolsey, with an insight and high zeal for reform which is rarely done sufficient justice to, conceived the plan of closing them and diverting the funds thus set free to other religious and kindred purposes, the endowment of schools, colleges, etc. Henry VIII. availed himself of Wolsey’s suggestion, and Thomas Cromwell, the supple and unscrupulous instrument of an equally unscrupulous master, carried it out,—not, however, with any view of a right-minded diversion of funds set aside for religious purposes, but with the intention, barely veiled, of selfish misappropriation, and the satisfaction of personal greed, and in the general scramble for plunder, not only did the monastic property, as such, get swallowed up, but the parochial endowments—where vicars were in being, at least—were swallowed up also.
The actual closing was carried out by two commissions. In 1536 some of the smaller Winchester houses were suppressed, including the Sustern Spital and the various friaries. Then in 1537 a second commission was appointed, and the larger houses began to fall. At Hyde, Abbot Salcot proved ‘conformable’ and surrendered the abbey, and in 1538 Cromwell’s commissioners, with the notorious Thomas Wriothesley, afterwards Earl of Southampton, acting the part of ‘leading villain’ of the piece, visited it to carry out the work of demolishment. In a letter to Cromwell they thus describe their work at Hyde:—
About three o’clock (A.M.) we made an end of the shrine here at Wynchester.... We think the silver thereof will amount to near two thousand marks. Going to our beds-ward, we viewed the altar, which we purpose to bring with us. Such a piece of work it is that we think we shall not rid it, doing our best, before Monday next or Tuesday morning, which done we intend, both at Hyde and at St. Mary’s, to sweep away all the rotten bones that be called relics, which we may not omit lest it be thought that we came more for the treasure than for avoiding the abominations of idolatry.
The words are significant, and the hour 3 A.M. tells its own tale. The abbot and other inmates received pensions, very modest ones, and the manors fell into various lay hands. Wriothesley secured the lion’s share. The abbey buildings were sold for the material they were built of, and so rapidly did most of it disappear, that Leland in 1539 says in his well-known Itinerary: “In this suburb stood the great abbey of Hyde, and hath yet a parish church.” Camden, writing shortly after, speaks of the “bare site, deformed with heaps of ruins, daily dug up to burn into lime.” In 1788 what still remained of the ruins was nearly all rooted up to make a County Bridewell. No thought of Alfred, or the other mighty and illustrious dead buried within the precincts, seems to have stayed the Vandal hands; numerous relics, patens, chalices, rings were found. A slab of stone bearing Alfred’s name was taken away, and is still preserved at Corby, in Cumberland. It was not part of Alfred’s tomb, as it bears the date 891. So far all attempts to locate the position of Alfred’s tomb have been unsuccessful. Like Moses of old, “no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day.”
The suppression of St. Swithun’s had results less drastic. Hyde Abbey was simply swallowed up in the catastrophe. St. Swithun’s was transformed into the capitular body of the Cathedral, the Prior, Sub-prior, and monks disappeared, and in their places succeeded the Dean, the Chapter, and Canons of Winchester.
The new establishment thus formed was at first composed of the Dean, twelve prebendaries, and six minor canons. The Prior, William Kingsmill, proved ‘very conformable,’ and became the first Dean of the new collegiate body. The commissioners, here as at Hyde, stripped the Cathedral of its ornaments. The silver shrine of St. Swithun disappeared, and various other shrines, and the glorious treasures of gold and silver, and precious stones, the gifts of Cnut, Bishop Stigand, and many another pious donor, which had graced the high altar, were all swept away by the greedy hands of the spoilers.
The domestic buildings have almost all now disappeared. The chapter-house was pulled down in 1570 by Bishop Horne, largely for the sake of the leaden roof; and the cloisters later on suffered a similar fate. Part of one of the convent kitchens remains in one of
MEMORIAL GATEWAY, WINCHESTER COLLEGE
The Memorial Gateway, opening on to Kingsgate Street, was erected recently in memory of Wykehamists who fell in the South African War.