|
|
When, in 1527, Henry VIII applied to the Pope for permission to divorce Catherine of Aragon, to whom he had been married "by arrangement" in 1509 when he was only eighteen years of age, he was refused time and time again. This enraged him so much that in 1529 he began to move against the Roman Church in England. In 1531 he made the clergy acknowledge that the King was the supreme head of the church, and he made them pay the sum of £118,000. In 1532 he married Anne Boleyn without a divorce, and passed a bill declaring that his marriage with Catherine was null and void. This brought a threat of excommunication from Rome, which he countered in 1534 by annulling the Papal Authority in England and passing the Act of Supremacy which declared himself to be the head of the English Church. In 1535 Henry appointed his chief minister Thomas Cromwell as Vicar-General in Ecclesiastical Affairs. In this year a valuation of monastic property throughout the kingdom was carried out. The value put on Combe Abbey was £211 15s 1d per annum. In 1536 an act for the dissolution of the smaller monasteries was passed, and it was soon followed by acts for the larger monasteries. Cromwell sent out Commissioners to visit the monks and nuns, to report on their irregularities and supervise the dissolution of their Houses.
Early in 1538 Abbot Oliver Adams of Combe resigned and was replaced by Abbot Kynner, alias Bate, who was put in under Cromwell's influence to secure a voluntary surrender. In December 1538, Dr. London, one of Cromwell's Commissioners was on a visit of suppression to the Carthusian Monastery at Coventry when he wrote to Cromwell reminding him that Combe was close to Coventry and that the Abbot and his friends were at Cromwell's commands and that he would be glad to "go through" with their house also. On the 21st of January 1539, the abbey, together with all its possessions in the counties of Warwick, York, Leicester and Northampton, was surrendered by Abbot Kynner, by Oliver Adams the ex-Abbot and by thirteen other monks, to Dr. London and his men for the King's use. Dr. London gave the very large pension of £80 to Abbot Kynner, £6 to each of five monks, £5 6s 8d to each of seven monks and £5 13s 4d to the other monk. Ex-Abbot Adams received nothing. Writing to Cromwell, London says that he gave these huge pensions so that "so doyng shall geve occasyon to other the more rather to make lyke surrendre".
It was not until some days later that Dr. London found that he had been tricked by Abbot Kynner, who, it was said, had hidden £500 of the abbey's money in a feather bed at his brother's house. London searched the bed, but could only find £25. The Abbot's story was that he had placed it there to pay certain debts at Candlemas (in February), as he had no servant he could trust. It is recorded that the Abbot and six of his monks had their pensions paid them in the year 1553.
Plan showing the recorded
walls of the Cistercian abbey, in relation to the present building
| Previous Chapter | Contents page | Next Chapter |
|
Coventry Walks |
|
|