Humbug: and History

New Zealand Tablet, Volume L, Issue 33, 23 August 1923, Page 45

Humbug and History

On Saturday last (says the London Catholic Times for June 23) there was a "commemoration service for Dame Agnes Mellers, the founder of the Nottingham Boys' High School," in St. Mary's Anglican Church, Nottingham. It would not at all have commended itself to Dame Agnes, a staunch Catholic of some 400 years ago. Much capital was made of the fact that the Mayor of Nottingham received Gd for attending the service, and that the Mayor, Corporation, and school governors afterwards partook of bread and cheese and ale, the latter being poured into tankards out of earthenware jugs. These customs/ it was stated, had been in abeyance for 200 years, although provided for by the founder of the school, Dame Agnes Mellers. Catholics who took the trouble to read the foundation deed of the Nottingham High School smiled a wry smile at all this, for the pious Dame Agnes penned the following words hi the foundation deed of her school: "Know ye, that I, remembering how that by the universal faith Catholic, by clergy and Commons most firmly corroborated, and by learning, the public weal commonly is governed, ardently have designed, to the honor of Almighty God, laud and praise to the elect, and chosen Mother of Mercy and Virgin, Our Lady St. Mary, to begin, erect, found, establish and create a Free School, everlasting to endure, and to be kept in the parish of Our Blessed Lady St, Mary the Virgin, within the town of Nottingham." She then went on to ordain that "the schoolmaster for the time being, or his 'usher, ■shall daily, when he keeps school, cause the scholars in their schoolhouse, ere they begin their learning, to say with a high voice the whole Credo in Deum Fat rem, etc." She made careful provision for keeping on June 16 the obit of the said" Agnes Mellers and that of her husband, and left 20s annually to be expended amongst those taking part. If the vicar of St. Mary's was present "from the beginning of the dirge and Mass of the said obit to the end thereof," he was to receive 3s for his attendance "and for his lights at the time burning." Any residue was "to be distributed amongst the poorest scholars of the said Free School to pray for the souls of the foundress of the school, her husband, and friends." To make, as she thought, assurance doubly sure,. Dame Agnes Mellers added a clause to the effect that, should the Mayor, Aldermen, and Council of Nottingham be negligent in finding and choosing a schoolmaster and usher, or use the grants she had made for any other purpose, then the prior and convent of the monastery of the Holy Trinity at Lenton should assume responsibility for and control of the school. The abbey, a Cluniac foundation, was suppressed in 1544, 31 years after the High School was founded. The Mayor got his 6d on Saturday, the Aldermen and governors their cheese and ale, but Dame Agnes Mellers did not get her Mass. According to the press report: "The service was plain Matins." Would it be ungenerous to add that an unprejudiced witness might observe, in view of the foundation deed, that "the service was plain humbug"?