A LETTER TO THE EARL OF PEMBROKE

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XI, Issue 6, 1 June 1883, Page 23

A LETTER TO THE EARL OF PEMBROKE

i j (From the Labourer* 1 Chronicle.) KINO Hbnby VIII. to confiscate the property held by the ' abbeys and monasteries. According to Sir Edward Coin, an eminent i authority, Parliament was informed that if it would pass an act for I the purpose the proceeds should go towards filling the King's I treasury and relieving his subjects of taxation, for he promised that } he would take care that the ancient revenues of the monastic houses I' should never be converted to private uses. Parliament took the King at his word, but no sooner had it passed the required act than King Henry began to distribute the abbey lands right and left among his courtiers. There is hardly an acre in Wiltshire which you own but was intended by Parliament to relieve the burden of taxation. Amongst the courtiers who obtained grants of Church lands from the King was William Herbert, his Blice being Wilton Abbey. • . I suppose that you are aware that Wilton Abbey was one of the most I ancient monastic houses in the kingdom. It was founded more than la thousand years ago by King Egbert, and was re-constituted by Alfred the Great. It is upon the site of- Wilton Abbey that Wilton • House— your houte—in built. As for the lands belonging to the g Abbey, they included the manors of Avon Washerne, North Bur- ■ combe, Ditchampton, Wily, Little Langford, South Newton, Little iWishford, Stoford, Burden's Ball, Ugford, Chilhampton, Swallow ncliffe, Forant, Chilmark, Berwick, St. John, Aston, Broadchalke. etc., 3J with lands at Whiteparish and other places. This certainly was a S royal gift indeed, save that in making it King Hemy broke faith ¥ with his Parliament. m The Herberts afterwards bought 'Little Langford and Flam- # stone, and sundry lands in three other parishes, and acquired Stoke KVerdon by marriage ; but with these exceptions your lordship's Si 39,600 acres are derived from a grant of the King for which not a M siugle penny was paid. As was promised to Parliament, these lands § ought to have gone to relieve our taxes, but the Herberts stepped in <£ and swallowed the whole. And this was not all. There were no less L than nine rectories which belonged to Wilton Abbey ; the Herberts M came in for the great tithes of these rectories, aud for the right of Jg appointing the vicars, which they hold to the present day. What a <M nice thing it is to be the descendant of a courtier ! W At tbe time when William Herbert came into possession of the *v Wilton Abbey lands their estimated value was £652 ; your Wiltshire tf rent-roll is now £43,000. Knock off £13,000 for what your family ,1 has acquired by purchase and marriage (and that is a very liberal 'J estimate), and there remains £30,000 a year derived from King 5* Henry's fraudulent grant. When King Henry died he left a son — a f mere boy — and your ancestor became a member of his Government, k The oppressive conduct of the nobles goaded the people of the X West of England into a rebellion which he helped to put down. To % repay the cost, Herbert and his colleagues put a quantity of bad J money into circulation, H fb tc's share of the transaction amounts ting to £7,000, a much greater sum of money in thos^s days than in .*? these. His next step was to get himself created Earl of Pembroke by the boy-king. During Edward's short reign he obtaiued fresh V" grants of church land in half a dozen different counties, which have &■■ subsequently passed out of the hands of his descendants. When * Edward died and the Catholic Queen Mary succeeded him the nuns \, ' were restored to Wilton Abbey. Your ancestor, the Earl of Pem- •. ' broke, came to Wilton and fell upon his knees before the Lady 1 Abbess begging her pardou fur aIL that he had done ; but when v* Mary died and Elizabeth came to the throne the fawning hound „', came back to Wilton like a tiger, exclaiming, " Get out, ye harlots 1 £ To work, to work ; go spin I" p! In this brief history of your house, my lord, Ido not think that ''V there is anything extenuated or aught set down in malice. It is simply ■ a plain, unvarnished tale which can be substantiated by Wiltshire > v county histories. You owe almost everything you possess to an Act '', of Parliament which was obtained under false pretences. If the - \ promises of King Henry VIII. had been carried out, you would not * \ have obtained your forty thousand acres of land in Wiltshire. ;.; Surely this consideration ought to have some weight with you. '.1 Compated with most Wiltshire peasants you are an interloper and a '{ mushroom. How much does a farm labourer earn on your estates ? i\. I presume twelve shillings a week would be about the average. Is it < safe for jou and your order that the men who till your fields should J vegetate on such a wage ? It was you, my lord, who, not long ago . * tpeaking as a landlord, said " There are too few of us." That is true, ; >. my lord, as you and other landlords know to your cost in Ireland. ■»V Do you think that you will always leave your own way in this country ? ' ) * HOWABD EVANB.