Tag: Bristol Times and Mirror

Parochial Pencilling: Or Bristol, Old and New, being a few current notices of the past and the Present: … (review of the Augustines in Bristol) … … Connected with the dissolution of the religious houses, there is an interesting circumstance particularly relating to St. Mark’s or the Mayor’s chapel. St. Mark’s, or the Chapel of the Gaunts, was a hospital established by one of the Berkeleys, for the celebration of prayer and the distribution of bread to pilgrims, and was, I think, at one time served by as many as six brethren. The master, or head, or prior, of this religious fraternity then resided in a large house which occupied the site of the present Grammar School in Unity Street, and was subsequently inhabited by Sir Walter Denys, eminent citizen. Whether it was that the fraternity had dwindled down or not I can’t say, but when Henry the Eighth issued his order to “drive out the drones,” as the phrase was, the last of the priests of the hospital of the Gauuts resided in little snug house to which there was a snug little garden in St. Mark’s-lane close by. The old man would not join the new faith and had lived too long a priest’s life to be able to earn his bread. His name, the Chamberlain thinks, was Pinsent, and he was a worthy, good-natured old creature, who never troubled himself about other’s belief, when some of his neighbours on the opposite side of the Green were far from indulgent: so the Corporation very considerately left the old man his house and garden in Mark’s lane, with an allowance of six pounds per annum. Here the last of the priests of St. Mark’s lived to be an old man, passing peaceably in and out of his little garden wicket, when burnings and persecutions were going on, training his espaliers and pruning his wall trees, and sharing his fruit with the children, who were his favorites. He lived years and years to hear the bells of St. Augustine’s and his own old cherished Gaunts call the people to “a new worship,” but he entered not their porches, and was content to pray in his own house as he had done in former times, until one fine morning he was called away to heaven from amongst his apple-trees and his flowers, and all that was left for the worthy Corporation was to find a grave for old Pinsent. The critical eye of the antiquarian may still trace the site of the house and garden of the last priest of the Gaunts in the little out-of-the-way secluded lane of St. Mark.

Transcribed in whole or part from scanned originals: Presented with or without modified text and punctuation. For absolute accuracy refer to the original newspapers. Source: The British Newspaper Archive.

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