CHAPTER 5:
MONTAGUE CLOSE
Montague Close covers the site of the cloisters and conventual
buildings of St. Mary's Priory. The records of the priory have all disappeared
and as its property, apart from the church, passed into private hands immediately after the dissolution, little written information is available about the
original disposition of the buildings. The whole area is now covered with
warehouses and wharves, but some parts of the old fabric, including the
east and north side of the cloister and the refectory, were still standing in
1795. (ref. 72) A view of the gateway into the close in 1811 is reproduced on
Plate 39. The history of the priory cannot be given in full, but it is interesting
to note that St. Thomas's Hospital had its origin there in the 12th century
(it was refounded on the east side of Borough High Street as a separate
institution by Peter des Roches in 1215) (ref. 34) and that John Gower, the poet,
ended his days as a guest of the prior. (ref. 73) His tomb with his effigy is still
preserved in the church (Plate 5).
Within a year or two of the dissolution, complaints were made in the
manor court of Southwark that Sir Anthony Browne had opened a public
bowling green in the close and was allowing gambling there. (ref. 21) The site of
the priory with its houses, gardens and orchards was formally granted to
Sir Anthony Browne, in 1544/5. (ref. 74)
Browne, although he was a staunch Roman Catholic, became possessed
of much monastic property and remained a close friend of Henry VIII. His
eldest son, Anthony, was created Viscount Montague after the marriage of
Queen Mary with Philip of Spain. (ref. 75) It seems probable that Lord Montague
lived in what had previously been the house of the prior of St. Mary Overy
and utilised the other buildings for stabling, etc. (fn. a) He died in 1593, leaving
to his wife, Magdalen, his mansion house of "St. Mary Overies," for her life,
with reversion to his grandson Anthony. (ref. 76)
Lady Montague continued to reside in the close after her husband's
death. In 1599 she came under suspicion as a recusant and her house in
Southwark was searched, but neither gunpowder nor weapons were found. (ref. 77)
Tradition has it that the Gunpowder Plot was discovered by the delivery of
an anonymous letter to Lord Monteagle in Montague Close, but the story
appears to have arisen from a confusion between the names of Monteagle
and Montague. Viscount Montague was committed to the Tower on 15th
November, 1605, but was released in the following August on payment of
£200. There is no evidence of his being concerned in the plot, though he
wrote to his father-in-law, the Earl of Dorset, that "the bluddy executioner
of that woefull tragedie," Guy Fawkes, had been his servant for four months,
and had waited at his table about the time of his marriage (1591). (ref. 75)
In 1625, Viscount Montague and William, Lord Petre, a trustee,
sold (ref. 78) Montague House and all his messuages, wharves and ground "in the
close of St. Mary Overies between the middle gate of the close and the outer
gate next unto Southwark" to Robert Bromfield and Thomas Overman. (fn. a)
Bromfield had had a lease of a wharf there since 1601 (ref. 79) and as soon as he
got possession of the close he proceeded to build there, putting up in place
of "meane Cottages and habitacons for the poorer sort of people that crouded
themselves there togeather" houses "fit for men of better ability." (ref. 80) These
are probably the houses shown in the engraving reproduced on Plate 40a.
In 1692/3 Montague House became the subject of a Chancery suit
between Elizabeth Cressett, widow of Thomas Overman, and others. (ref. 81) From
the description there given it appears that the "capitall messuage," that is
Montague House, was then used for a pothouse. The property included a
great hall with a staircase in the N.E. corner, and cellars below it, a counting
house, "the fratree house conteining in length ninety foote and in breadth
twenty and seaven foot and a half," the "fratree yard," a shed for soap making,
"a colour house" and "a killnehouse of old building" abutting on the church
wall. The vestry minutes record that a fire broke out there some years later
causing great damage to the church and William Overman's encroachments
were ordered to be removed. (ref. 16)
In 1775 there were sixty messuages and four wharves in the close, (ref. 17)
most of them let from year to year and becoming ruinous. Many of these,
including the eight almshouses erected by Mrs. Alice Shaw Overman in 1771,
were taken down in 1830 in connection with the formation of the approach
to new London Bridge.