Did you know… The surrender of Southwick Priory in 1538

In April 1538, Prior Noxton (sometimes mistakenly called Norton), together with 12 canons, signed the surrender of his Priory, Our Lady of Southwick, to King Henry VIII, together with its manors and rectories in Hampshire - including the church of St Thomas in Portsmouth. This was part of the process we call the Reformation.

The Reformation brought about profound changes in English life. The break with Rome resulting from the Act of Supremacy of 1534, which declared that Henry VIII had replaced the Pope as Head of the Church in England, enabled Henry to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn; it also led to a sustained attack on the power and wealth of the monasteries, whose loyalty was to the Pope in Rome.

Prior Noxton had been in charge of Southwick Priory since 1521. The stained glass window in the south aisle of our cathedral is an artist’s impression from 1909, depicting him as distraught at the loss of the Priory. In fact, he received a large pension of £66-13s-4d – possibly between £25,000 & £30,000 in today’s money - probably because he signed so quickly! He was perhaps prompted by the accusations of one of his canons, James Gunwyn (also a signatory to the surrender), for his failure to perform chantry masses, as well as for ‘neglect of the book of yearly rents which was not in all points made truly’. Gunwyn added: ‘I send you this information in discharge of my oath of obedience, and would have done it earlier if I could have had a trusty messenger, for if my master knew of my writing he would convey away the plate, money and jewels in his keeping.’

Canon Gunwyn had made this contact secretly with Thomas Wriothesley, a career diplomat on Thomas Cromwell’s staff. Wriothesley (pronounced Risley, as readers of Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall trilogy will know) was made Secretary to the King in 1530, later Baron Titchfield, and in 1547 Earl of Southampton.

He supervised the ‘smooth’ takeover of Southwick Priory, previously a place of pilgrimage, in 1538; unsurprisingly, his ‘servant’ or staff member John Whyte, who it is believed was trained in the law, bought the priory and the farmland surrounding it. Purchase of monastic buildings at that time required the buyer to alter or demolish them within two years, so that they could not be recognised or reused as a religious building.

If this was not done, the property reverted to the Crown. John Whyte immediately pulled down the beautiful priory church - where King Henry VI had married Margaret of Anjou - moving his household into the prior’s house and using adjacent buildings. His descendants occupied the property until 1750, when it was destroyed in a fire. Stone from the Priory was used in the building of Southwick House (where the D-Day preparations were organised). Today all that remains of the monastery is one low section of wall.

The dissolution of Southwick Priory directly affected the church of St Thomas: the patronage - the right to appoint the Vicar of St Thomas’s, together with that of St Mary’s, Portsea - was purchased from the Crown by Winchester College in June 1543, and this arrangement lasted into the 20th century.

The images show: the existing remains of Southwick Priory, and the early 20th century stained glass depiction of the downcast Prior Noxton.