Bell's Cathedrals: Wimborne Minster and Christchurch Priory A Short History of Their Foundation and a Description of Their Buildings — Text and Context

enlarged, and rebuilt at various times, and at the restoration, when the rood screen was unfortunately destroyed, the organ was placed in the south choir aisle.

All the lower windows are now filled with painted glass; all of which, with the exception of a few fragments, is nineteenth-century work.

Martin Pattislee or Pattishull appointed 1224 Ralph Brito " 1229 John Mansell " 1247 John de Kirkby " 1265 John de Berwick " 1286 Stephen de Mawley " 1312 Richard de Clare " 1312 Richard de Swinnerton " 1334 Richard de Merimouth " 1338 Richard de Kingston " 1342 Thomas de Clopton " 1349 Reginald de Bryan " 1349 Thomas de Bembre (founder of the chantry) " 1350 Henry de Buckingham " 1361 Richard de Beverley " 1367 John de Carp " 1398 Roger Tortington " 1408 Peter de Altebello " 1412 Walter Medford " 1416 Gilbert Kymer " 1427 Walter Herte " 1467 Hugh Oldham " 1485 Thomas Rowthel " 1508 Henry Hornby " 1509 Reginald Pole " 1517 Nicholas Wilson " 1537

COLLEGE DISSOLVED " 1547

ST MARGARET'S HOSPITAL

About a quarter of a mile to the north-west of Wimborne stands the chapel of #St Margaret's Hospital#. The date of the foundation of this hospital is uncertain; tradition has it that it was founded by John of Gaunt, son of Edward III., but this is without doubt wrong, as documents--the character of which seem to indicate an early thirteenth-century date--have been found, from which it appears that this hospital existed at that time, and was set apart for the relief and support of poor persons afflicted with leprosy. This disease was at one time so common in England that a great number of lazar-houses were erected in the country, and many were well endowed; but when, after a time, the disease became less violent, many abuses crept in, persons not really suffering from the disease pretended to be lepers in order to get pecuniary benefits, and hence in many cases the leper hospitals were suppressed, or converted to other purposes. At the present day we find in many places, as here at Wimborne, that they are used as almshouses.

This hospital, however, was not one of the well-endowed. It appears from a deed, dated in the sixteenth year of Henry VIII., that the hospital was chiefly maintained, not by endowments, but by the gifts of the charitable who were willing to contribute to its support; and to encourage the benevolent to give, the deed recites that "Pope Innocent IV, in the year 1245, by an indulgans or bulle did assoyl them of all syns forgotten, and offences done against fader and moder, and all swerynges neglygently made. This indulgans, grantyd of Petyr and Powle, and of the said pope, was to hold good for 51 yeres and 260 days, provided they repeated a certain specified number of Paternosters and Ave Marias daily." The date of this indulgence proves the antiquity of the hospital, as it shows that it was in existence before the middle of the thirteenth century. A chantry was also founded in the chapel here by John Redcoddes of one priest to say masses for his soul. To this chantry, according to a deed dated in the sixteenth year of Henry VI., many tenements in Wimborne belonged. In later times the Rev. William Stone, who has been mentioned before as the founder of the Minster Library, by his will left his lands and tenements in the parish of Wimborne Minster to be applied to the benefit of almsmen only who should live in St Margaret's Hospital.

There is a further endowment, but how it came to this hospital has not been discovered. The advowson and tithes of the Rectory of Poole were, in the reign of James I., granted to the Mayor and Corporation of Poole for forty years, on the corporation undertaking to find a curate to discharge the duties lately discharged by the vicar, and to pay a rent to the crown of £12, 16s. per annum. In the reign of Charles I., the advowson and tithes were granted to two men, Thomas Ashton and Henry Harryman, and their heirs for ever, on the same conditions; but they are now again held by the Corporation, who pay out of the revenues--to St Margaret's hospital £9, 16s.; to the churchwardens of Wimborne Minster, for the maintenance of the Etricke tomb, £1; and to the fellows of Queen's College, Oxford, to be spent in wine and tobacco on November 5th, yearly £2.