Persevir in his most holie wayes.
A. Dom. 1577.
The old priory, or, as it was more commonly called, the “Friary,” stood in Maiden Street. It was a house of the Dominican Friars, dedicated in the name of St. Winifred, although Speed gives Dominic as the dedicatory saint. Leland writes of it as “a fayre house of Freres in the est part of the town.” The ancient chair now in the Guildhall came from this priory, and it was said to possess miraculous powers of healing the sick, and otherwise blessing the devout who were privileged to sit upon it. The priory shared the fate of the other monastic foundations at the Dissolution.
Of churches which can be rightly considered as memorials, Weymouth has no example, as the oldest is that of St. Mary, the parish church. The foundation-stone was laid on October 4th, 1815; this church was erected partly on the site of a former church. It is a large, simple, and unpretentious building, of which some hard things have been said and written, but it is at least well built and free from sham, although of its architecture the less said the better. It is, however, somewhat redeemed by an excellently designed cupola containing one bell. Inside, an altar-piece by Sir James Thornhill, a native of the town, whose daughter married his pupil Hogarth, claims attention; as also does the following curious inscription, in which the artist, by contracting the word “worthiest,” has conveyed the very opposite estimate of the deceased’s character to that intended:—
UNDERth LIES Ye BODY OF
CHRISr. BROOKS ESQ. OF JAMAICA
WHO DEPARd. THIS LIFE 4 SEPr. 1769
AGED 38 YEARS, ONE OF Ye WORst. OF MEN
FRIEND TO Ye DISTRESd.
TRULY AFFECTd. & KIND HUSBAND
TENDER PARt. & A SINCr. FRIEND.
An old chalice belonging to the former church which stood on this site was in the possession of Mr. Ellis. It was made of pewter, weighed (without the lid, which was missing) 4½ lbs., and held four pints. On the front was engraved:
HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD,
ZACH. XIV., VER. 20.
JOHN STARR,
CHURCHWARDEN,
1633.
About the middle of the eighteenth century a gentleman of Bath, Ralph Allen (the original of Fielding’s “Squire Allworthy”), having been recommended sea-bathing for his health, found the shore of Melcombe so suitable for his purpose that he spoke of it to the Duke of Gloucester. His Royal Highness came, sampled the salt water, and built Gloucester Lodge, to which house he shortly afterwards invited the King, George III., who spent eleven weeks here, with his Queen and family, in the summer of 1789. The result of this and subsequent visits was that His Majesty purchased the house and converted it into a royal residence. A great stimulus was thus given to the town, which entered upon a period of prosperity; for here George III. held court, and heard the news of some of Nelson’s and Wellington’s victories. Very gay, indeed, was the life of those days, with music, feasting, and dancing, which took place in what is now called “the Old Rooms” (formerly an inn), across the harbour. It was at Gloucester Lodge that His Majesty received his ministers, and from whence he and Queen Charlotte used to walk to the little theatre in Augusta Place to witness the performances of Mrs. Siddons and her contemporaries. Queen Charlotte’s second keeper of robes was Fanny Burney (Madame D’Arblay), the chronicler of George III., and the author of Evelina and Camilla, for which last she received 3,000 guineas, with which sum she built Camilla Cottage, at Mickleham, near Dorking.
At Weymouth, in 1785, was born Thomas Love Peacock, the author of The Monks of St. Mark, and other works. He was Under-Secretary to Sir Home Popham, and afterwards Chief Examiner and Clerk to the East India Company, from which post he retired in 1856 with a pension of £1,333 per annum. He was a friend of Shelley, whom he had met on a walking tour in Wales in 1812. He died in 1866, aged eighty years.
In the long list of eminent men who have represented the towns in Parliament we find the names of Francis Bacon (Lord Verulam), Sir Christopher Wren, and the celebrated political adventurer, Bubb Dodington.