22. THE CARMELITE FRIARS OF NORTHAMPTON
The order of the Carmelites or White Friars,
driven from Mount Carmel by the Saracens in
1238, reached England in 1240. Their friary
at Northampton was founded in 1271 by Simon
Montford and Thomas Chitwood. The house
is mentioned in an inquisition held at Northampton in 1275 respecting certain men who arrived
by night in the town and left a package in the
custody of the brothers of Mount Carmel, but
sought a lodging for themselves in the house of
a certain Alice Baron. The town bailiffs, suspecting them to be robbers, sent to seize them at
the house of the said Alice, but the strangers
anticipated the authorities and escaped before
day. The package deposited at the friary was
opened and found to contain two coats of mail.
Sir William de Lymar, knight, then appeared
and claimed the harness and horses which the
robbers had left, stating that they were his property of which he had been robbed. (fn. 1) In the
same year the town jury of Northampton found
that the brothers of Mount Carmel had for four
years past defrauded the town of 28d. a year due
to the ferm of the king for tenements they had
obtained in free alms from Simon de Pateshill
and others, to the injury of the king and his
bailiffs of Northampton. (fn. 2)
The friars applied to Edward I. in 1278 for
leave to enclose a portion of the town wall that
adjoined their close and to block up its crenelles.
A jury was impanelled to ascertain what damage,
if any, would ensue if such a licence were
granted. The return found that it would be to the
damage and nuisance of the town of Northampton to enclose the wall and fill up the crenelles,
inasmuch as the burgesses of the town, and especially the sick, often walked on the wall from
one gate to another to take the air, and that in
the winter time they used the same route for the
sake of cleanliness, instead of the noisome and
muddy way under the wall, between it and
the place of the Carmelites. The proposed
action of the friars would interfere with these
uses. Moreover, the night watchmen going
their rounds on the town walls were in the habit
of using the crenelles to watch for malefactors
approaching the town, and if these openings
were closed, as proposed, various misdeeds and
stratagems might pass undetected. (fn. 3) Licence was
obtained by the Carmelite Friars in 1299 to retain
in mortmain a plot of land east of their dwelling-place, acquired by them since the statute,
without licence, and to enclose it with a wall for
the enlargement of their close. (fn. 4) A further enlargement of their site was sanctioned in 1363. (fn. 5)
In 1380, on payment of half a mark, the friars
obtained a grant for a third enlargement of their
close by the alienation to them of a plot of land
29 perches long by 16 broad, the gift of John
Sauce and Robert Lincoln. (fn. 6)
The church of St. Mary of Mount Carmel,
Northampton, must have been of considerable
size, for in 1310 Bishop Dalderby granted a
licence to the friars to have five fixed altars in
their church; he also licensed the dedication of
an altar to St. Catherine. (fn. 7) In 1363 Bishop
Bokyngham granted an indulgence in connexion
with the image of the Blessed Virgin in the
outer chapel of the Carmelite friars of Northampton, next the entrance of their church. (fn. 8)
William Tomson in 1512 left 12d. by will
'to the blessyd ymage of or lady in the house of
the Friers Carm. wtin the town of Northampton.'
Agnes Haywarde left her second ring to this
same image just before the dissolution. Richard
Packman, in 1528, desired to be buried 'att the
Whyte Freirs before saint Katerin.' (fn. 9) A commission was issued in 1400 to inquire into a report
that the friars were giving shelter to evil-doers,
and that William Hawk, John Carpenter, and
six others lately arrested on suspicion of larceny
and other felonies, and committed to gaol in the
castle of Northampton, had escaped and were
then in the church of the friars of the order of
St. Mary of Mount Carmel in the same town. (fn. 10)
Two of the more celebrated writers among
the English Carmelites were connected with
this house. John Avon, who was born at Northampton, and became a Carmelite friar of that
town, was a doctor of divinity and distinguished
mathematician. His chief work, in addition to
sermons, was 'The Philisophical Ring,' or 'a
perpetual almanack to find every year for ever,
the moveable feasts, the immoveable, the aspects
of the heavens, the changes of the moon, and all
things relating to the ordering of the divine
offices according to the several solemnities
throughout the year.' He died about 1350,
probably of the plague, and was buried in the
friary at Northampton. William Beaufeu, doctor
of divinity, of the university of Oxford, and a
considerable theological writer, was sometime
prior of this house. He died in 1390, and was
buried in the friary. (fn. 11) Of the heads of this house
few names have been preserved, but Nicholas
Cantelowe may be mentioned as having been
prior in 1471. (fn. 12)
The dissolution of the Northampton friaries
has been already described. The Carmelites
surrendered their house on 20 October, 1538.
The deed was signed by John Howell, prior,
William Harrison, sub-prior, and seven other
friars. (fn. 13) John Walklynge and Thomas Gyfte
were appointed attorneys to deliver the property
to Dr. London for the king's use. The report
of Dr. London nine days after the surrender, to
the effect that the friary was a beggarly place
and all that it contained would not suffice to
pay its debts, (fn. 14) is very much to the credit of this
mendicant house. A memorandum of Dr. London, drawn up early in 1539, states that the
chancel of the White Friars' church had a new
fair roof covered with slate, and that it was meet
for the king's use at Grafton Regis. (fn. 15)
The pointed oval fifteenth-century seal of this
house represents a saint lifting up the right hand
and holding in the left a long cross under a tree;
a worshipper kneels before him; there is a bird
on a branch. (fn. 16)
Legend : + S COMMU . . NORHAM . . IE.