John de Rutherwyk seems to have met with favour from Edward II. and his queen. In 1308 he obtained a pardon from the Crown for a debt of £10 of his predecessor, and in 1310 a licence to acquire lands and rents to the value of £50. In the same yeare the king notified the barons of the Exchequer that by request of 'notre treschere compagne,' the Queen of England, he had pardoned the abbot of Chertsey the service which he owed the king for the war in Scotland, and that this release is to be inscribed on the rolls of the Exchequer. In connection with the same war, the following December the king acknowledged his indebtedness to the abbey for £22 7s. 6d. for 5 quarters of wheat and 100 quarters of malt, being part of the supplies levied by the king for the war. In July 1322 Edward II. called upon the abbot to admit a married couple as royal life pensioners, sending to them John de Ardern of Chobham, who had long served the Crown, together with Agnes his wife. They were to receive as much as Gunnora de Windsor, then deceased, had for her maintenance at the late king's request. A relative of the abbot's, William de Rutherwyk, who had granted to the monastery all his goods and chattels in Egham and Thorpe, also received a life pension with Alice his wife.
The rule of Abbot John was marked by the erection of two chantries within the conventual church. In 1318, in return for the sum of £100 granted by Philip de Barthon', archdeacon of Surrey, the abbot arranged that a monk should be specially deputed to celebrate masses at the altar of Holy Cross for the good estate of their benefactor, and for the souls of Richard his brother, his parents and all the faithful dead; and that the two brothers, Philip and Richard, should be had in remembrance by the brethren in all their masses, and their names inscribed on each missal of the church and in their martyrology, and named daily in the chapter with other benefactors. Also that the sacrist should distribute yearly on the anniversary of the said Philip 20s. to the brethren and 6s. 8d. to the poor, and that both he and his brother should be participants in all the spiritual privileges and exercises of the house.
When Philip de Barthon' died in 1327, he bequeathed a sum of £250 to the abbey for the augmentation of the two chantries already founded within the conventual church. By a covenant with his executors the abbot and convent agreed to provide two secular chaplains in their house, and to maintain them in food and lodging and everything necessary for divine service; to pay them 5½ marks a year, and to provide them a fitting chamber near the great gate of the garden within the abbey, and to keep the same in repair, and to find them a clerk to minister to them, sufficient bedding, and two cartloads of firewood, when provision was made for the chamber of the abbot. The chaplains were to officiate, one at the altar of St. Leonard in the nave, and the other at the altar of St. Thomas the Martyr. One mass was to be celebrated early in the morning before the mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the other at a fit hour at midday between the end of the mass of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the celebration of high mass. They were to take the oath of obedience to the abbot, and to be removed if found unfit or disobedient. 'And always in the principal mass, they should turn to the people who were hearing mass, and should say a paternoster for the souls of Philip de Barthon', his brother, and his family and the faithful departed.' The former distribution of 26s. 8d. on the anniversary of Philip de Barthon' was to be kept up. By another agreement, in 1314, with the rector of the church of Coulsdon the abbot and convent consented, in return for a certain tenement in Coulsdon, to provide a secular chaplain to celebrate for the good estate of the donor when living, and for his soul and that of Geoffrey de Conductu his brother, when dead.
In February 1342, on the strength of recent legislation, John de Rutherwyk obtained an important concession that on the voidance of the abbey the prior and convent should retain the custody and full and free administration of the temporalities (saving to the king knights' fees and advowsons) at a rent to the Crown of 50 marks for each four months, or part of four months, of such voidance. No escheator, sheriff or other bailiff or minister of the king, was to intermeddle in the custody, further than that at the beginning of each voidance the escheator or his minister should take a simple seisin within the gates of the abbey in the name of the king, and not stay there more than one day.
The abbey is said to have been attacked in an insurrection of 1381 during the abbacy of John de Uske; the record states that the court rolls and other muniments were burnt by the malice and rebellion of the insurgents against the peace of the king. In consequence of complaints of great dilapidations committed by Thomas Angewyn, who was elected abbot on the death of John de Hermondesworth in 1458, an inquiry was instituted by commission of the Bishop of Winchester to William Wroughton, a monk of Winchester, and the abbot was compelled to resign. The bishop at the request of the convent selected Wroughton to fill the vacant place in March 1461-2. In 1464 Wroughton himself was deposed, and on 12 February Edward IV. granted a licence to the abbot and convent to elect a head in the place of William Wroughton deprived, whereupon they re-elected Angewyn. The bishop, however, on the grounds of a lack of due formality in the election, collated John May to the vacancy on the 19 March 1465. During his rule the abbey was called on to give a resting-place to the remains of Henry VI. The body of that unfortunate king 'found dead' in the Tower was shown for some days in St. Paul's in order to disarm suspicion, after which it was taken on a barge to the abbey of Chertsey to be buried, where it remained till removed to Windsor by Henry VIII.
In comparison with the abundance of material for the external history, there is but scanty information as to the internal condition of this house. It is probable, however, that as the abbots were held in so high esteem their rule was satisfactory, and as we hear of no scandal touching the abbey it may be inferred that its condition was good. It was diligently visited during the administration of Bishop Wykeham of Winchester, either personally or by commission, but no comment throws light on this point. During the abbacy of John de Rutherwyk, a dispensation was applied for on behalf of John de Winton, priest, a monk of Chertsey for wounding a thief. The petition recounts that a thief at night time broke into the infirmary where the monk was lying ill in bed. A struggle took place between the robber and some servants who were roused, in which the thief received deadly wounds on the head, but by whom the blows were struck was uncertain in the confusion. The monk, suddenly aroused from sleep by the noise of this conflict, and hardly conscious of what he was doing, leapt from his bed and seizing a sword from one of them struck the thief on the ear and jaw; but in the opinion of the medical men and others this particular wound was not a deadly one. The abbot suspended the monk from celebrating mass and sought counsel of the bishop, who, inasmuch as John de Winton had not mutilated any member of the thief, nor, in the judgment of the medical men, been the cause of his death, decided that he need no longer abstain from celebrating mass.
Certain regulations made in the thirteenth century mention the various officers of the monastery and illustrate their duties. Abbot Adam by the consent of the convent assigned certain rents for the celebration of his anniversary, to be received by the almoner, and distribution made to the brethren of bread, wine and fish, and of bread to the poor. The same distribution was to be made on the anniversary of Abbot Alan, and the almoner should also on the Feast of Blessed Mary Magdalene, according to ancient custom, distribute bread, wine and curd cheese-cakes. Among other customs we read that the cellarer was bound to provide cheese for the refectory of the convent; the chamberlain was to receive £20 from the cellarer for clothing for the brethren, and grease to anoint the shoes of the preaching brethren seven times in the year; the chamberlain had to provide towels for the lavatory and for the ceremony of the washing of feet, and on the Vigil of All Saints he was to find the abbot and convent sandals of white cloth. The office of the pittancer is not mentioned till the time of John de Benham, and it is stated that he founded it.
When the abbey was visited on 28 April 1501, by Thomas Hede, commissary of the prior of Canterbury, during the voidance of the sees of Canterbury and Winchester, the number of the inmates had fallen, and it would seem, in spite of conflicting witness, that the house was largely in debt. The abbot testified to the due performance of all their religious duties, both in the day and night offices; that there was not the full statutory number of monks; that the rents of assize amounted to eighty marks; that the seal was kept in the treasury under four keys, which were in the respective custody of the abbot, the prior, the sub-prior, and one of the senior monks; and that the monastery was not in debt, nor had it any valuables pledged. Robert Pendu, the prior, stated that silence was observed by the monks in the proper places and times, and that the officials rendered annual accounts of their respective offices. Thomas Grey, the almoner, said that the constitutions of the order of St. Benedict were not read in the chapter house, and that he had heard it said that the house was £1,000 in debt. John Parker, the sub-prior, testified that the house was in debt, but to what extent he knew not, as the abbot during the preceding years had omitted to render his accounts. Thomas Marshall, a monk, returned omne bene, save that there was a debt of 100 marks for the bull permitting the abbot to be bishop of Bangor. William London, sub-chanter, had heard it said that the house was in debt, but he knew not to what extent. John Batyn, a professed monk in acolite's orders, considered that omne bene save that the constitutions were not read in chapter. Other monks had either nothing to depose or returned omne bene.
The Valor of 1535 gives the clear annual value of the abbey as £659 15s. 8¾d.
Dr. Legh was Cromwell's agent in the visitation of this abbey during the rule of John Cordrey, who was elected on the resignation of John Parker in 1529. Writing on 29 September 1535, he takes exception to the report made at a recent visitation of the Bishop of Winchester and Sir William Fitzwilliam, undertaken by the king's orders, stating that all was well. He forwarded his 'compertes' in which he alleged that seven were incontinent, four guilty of unnatural offences, and two apostates. It is difficult to reconcile this account with the report of the Bishop of Winchester, an experienced monastic visitor, reinforced by Sir W. Fitzwilliam, the treasurer of the king's household, little likely to err on the side of indulgence towards such gross irregularities in a religious house, nor did succeeding events bear out the probability of the existence of such immorality. It is impossible to believe that the king would have translated the abbot and convent of Chertsey to so important a new foundation as he eventually did, if he had given general credence to the report of Cromwell's agent. Moreover Cordrey was placed on the commission of the peace for Berks in 1537, so soon as he had removed to Bisham.
On 5 July 1537, a charter was granted for a new foundation of the late priory of Bisham. It was to consist of an abbot and thirteen monks of the Benedictine order, who were to pray for the good estate of the king, and of his consort, Queen Jane, and its style was to be 'King Henry the Eighth's new monastery of Holy Trinity of Bustelesham.' Of this foundation John Cordrey was to be the first abbot with the privilege of wearing a mitre.
The following day, 6 July, Chertsey Abbey was surrendered by John Cordrey, the abbot, William the prior, and thirteen of the brethren. Their deed of surrender recites unmistakably that they did so on the understanding that the king intended to re-establish them at Bisham.
On 18 December 1537 the late community of Chertsey entered their new home, endowed with the lands of their late abbey as well as those of the dissolved priories of Cardigan, Beddgelert, etc. Six months later Richard Layton, writing to Cromwell, describes the state of poverty in which he found the house of Bisham. It had not existed long enough to receive the new revenues. 'Plate and household stuff very little, I had to borrow a bed from the town for Dr. Carne and myself. Cattle none, but a few milch kine; grain none; vestments few. The abbot has sold everything in London, and doubtless within a yeare would have sold the house and lands for white wine, sugar, burrage leaves, and 'seke,' whereof he sips nightly in his chamber till midnight. For money to despatch the household and monks we must sell the copes and bells, and if that will not suffice, even the cows, plough oxen and horse; the church we stir not. The grain crop is the fairest I have seen, and there is much meadow and woodland. Because of the hay harvest we retain the carters and ploughmen. To-day we despatch the monks who are desirous to be gone. Yesterday when we were making sale of the vestments in the chapter house, the monks cried a new mart in the cloister and sold their cowls. Bissham, 22 June.'
In the same letter Dr. Layton refers to John Cordrey as 'a very simple man, the monks of small learning and less discretion.' Whatever the cause the king's royal foundation was doomed, and on 19 June 1538, only six months after his establishment, the abbot again made surrender. With this broken man ended the long line of the abbots of Chertsey.
Abbots of Chertsey
Erkenwald, 666
Ceolnod, occurs 787
Beocca, occurs end of ninth century
Ordbright, 964
Daniel, circa 1025
Siward, consecrated bishop of Rochester 1058
Wulfwold, occurs 1072, died 1084
Odo, 1084-92 deposed
Ralph Flambard, 092
Odo, 1100 re-elected
William, circa 1106
Hugh, 1107
Daniel
Aymer, occurs 1166
Bertan
Martin, 1197
Adam, circa 1206
Alan, 1223
John de Medmenham, 1261-70
Bartholomew de Winton, 1270-1307
John de Rutherwyk, 1307-46
John de Benham, 1346-61
William de Clyve, 1361-70
John de Uske, 1370-1400
Thomas de Culverdone, 1400-19
John de Hermondesworth, 1419-58
Thomas Angewyn, 1458-61-2
William Wroughton, 1461-2, 1464 deposed
Thomas Angewyn, 1464-5, re-elected
John May, 1464-79
John Peket or Pigot, 1479-1504
John Parker, 1504-29
John Cordrey, 1529-37. Afterwards abbot of Bisham for six months.
An eleventh century oval seal, showing the north side of the conventual cruciform church with central tower of three decreasing stages, and with round-headed windows, north and west porches, and east apse. Legend: + SIGILLUM · SANCTI · PETRI · CEROTIZ ·ÆCL'E; the 's' in 'SANCTI' is angular; the 'C' in 'SANCTI' and 'ÆCL'E' is of square form.
A thirteenth century oval seal. Obverse: Damaged; remains of same legend as on previous seal. Reverse: A small pointed oval counter seal; St. Peter crucified head downwards. Legend: SOLUE · JUBTE · DEO · CULPAR' PETRE · CATENAS.
Pointed oval seal of John Medmenham, abbot (1261-70). Obverse: Full length of abbot on a corbel under a trefoiled canopy, in right hand a crozier, in left hand a book. Legend: + Johannis . . . CERTESEYE. Reverse: Same as in the previous seal.
Pointed oval seal of Bartholomew de Winton, abbot (1270-1307). Full length of abbot on a corbel under a trefoiled canopy, in right hand a crozier, in left hand a book; on each side a small niche containing a saint's head, on the left St. Peter with the keys, on the right St. Paul with the sword. Legend: s' BARTHOLEMI : DEI : GRA : ABBATIS : Certeseye.
Fragments of pointed oval seal of the Sacristy, 1466. St. Peter under trefoiled niche; below a half length kneeling figure, probably of the sacrist. Pointed oval seal of Thomas Pigot, abbot 1489. The abbot full length in enriched canopied niche, right hand raised in blessing. Legend defaced in each instance. Imperfect pointed oval seal of John Parker, abbot, 1520. The abbot standing in enriched niche, a crozier in right hand. Legend: . . . batis DE Chertsey.
Very imperfect seal of John Cordrey, abbot, 1531.
Benedictine Houses:
'House of Benedictine monks: Abbey of Chertsey', A History of the County of Surrey: Volume 2 (1967), pp. 55-64.