Printed and Published at the Dover Express Works. 1916.

TO BE FORMATTED

ANNALS OF DOVER.
SECTION FOUR.
THE HISTORY OF RELIGION.
IV. TWO ANCIENT HOSPITALS.

Seventeen years after the dedication of ^he Dover Priory,
two Brothers of that Monastery, named Osborne and Godwine,
undertook, with the sanction of the Prior and with the
encouragement of Archbishop Theobald, the founding of a
hospital for lepers, on the green hill overlooking the Dourside
Meadows at Buckland. The hospital was seated, probably
for sanitary reasons, on a hill, but its lands extended down
the slope as far as the river, for at that time the London
Road which now intersects the estate did not exist. The
main building being on the hill-top, on the sloping ground
below it was St. Bartholomew's Chapel, after which the
place is still called Chapel Hill. The disease of leprosy
became a terrible scourge in England from the Eleventh to
the Fifteenth Century, therefore this hospital met one of
the great wants of that time. Lepers, owing to the danger
of infection, had to be isolated, and were not allowed to
enter an ordinary church or dwelling house, and it was only
in countries where Christianity prevailed that any provision
was made for these poor outcasts. Such outcasts from the
town of Dover and the outlying parishes of East Kent found
St. Bartholomew's Hospital a place of refuge.

There is a manuscript copy of the rules of St. Bar-
tholomew's Hospital in the Boflleian Library, Oxford, from
which it appears that the Society consisted of e'ght brethren
and eight sisters, on whom, as a return for the gift of the
buildings and lands, was imposed the condition of praying
for all the monks of St. Martin. A small contribution was
made by each leper for admission ; and they yjledged
themselves to sobriety and usefulness, and at their deaths to
leave half of their property to the Hospital. The inmates
were substantially provided for; pr)rk, barley and beer was
their common fare, but at Church festivals they enjoyed extra
luxuries. The Brethren and Sisters were agriculturists ami
dairy farmers, and shared in common the profits of their
crops, dairy, poultry and pigs. The head of the house was
called the Warden, whose duty it was to see that no one
departed from the premises without leave, and that the



1 82 ANNALS OF DOVER.

brethren and sisters behaved with modesty and decorum.
As far as possible, the Httle Society was shut out from the
world, their dwellings having no windows that commanded
an outward view. To recruit their funds, the Brethren
were given a roving commission to beg, and until the dis-
solution they were granted the annual profits of St. Bar-
tholomew's Fair, which was continued annually long after
the Hospital ceased to exist. The disease of leprosy had
disappeared from Dover in the reign of Henry VHl.,
therefore the dissolution of this Hospital took place at the
same time as the Priory and the Maison Dieu ; and its land
and houses, which were of considerable value, were taken
over by the Crown ; but the Hospital building and cha])el,
together with the land on which they stood, were bestowed
by Henry VHI. on John Bowles (who was Mayor of Dover
in 1539-40, the year of its dissolution) for the term of his
natural life. This man only lived three years to enjoy the
King's gift, but during that short time he demolished the
whole of the buildings and is said to have rifled the graves
and plundered the dead. Mr. Lyon, in his history of Dover,
says that the Mayor did this without any commission, but it
appears from a grant of the Bartholomew lands made by
Edward VI. in 1542, that Henry VHI. made a grant of the
lands to John Bowles for his life.

The Maison Dieu, the venerable remains of which are
incorporated with the Dover Municipal Buildings, was one
of the ancient religious houses of Dover generally known by
its Latin designation, the Domus Dei. Founded by a
Constable of Dover Castle, Hubert de Burgh, A.D. 1203, it
was enlarged after the canonisation of Thomas a Brcket,
when the flood-tide of pilgrims to his shrine at Canicrbury
rendered it necessary to afford, at Dover, hospitality to
devotees coming across from France. A part of tlic addi-
tional buildings was a chapel, which was dedicated with
great pom}) in July, 1227, in the presence of Henry HI.
This house does not appear to have existed under the
name of the Domus Dei until 1229, when it received a
Charter from the King granting large pri\ileges. In the
Charter of 1227, in which the King confirms the grant of
the Manor of Eastbridge, the gift of Hubert de Bur;:;h, the
institution is referred to as the Hospital of Dover. At that
time the Hu.spital had been in existence on a smaller scale
twenty-four years, and during that time it seems to ha\c been



THE HISTORY OF RELIGION. 183

referred to as St. Mary's Hospital. On this point William
I.ambarde wrote, in 1570; "There was lately in Dover,
also, an hospital of St. Maries, founded by Hubert de
Burghe, Earle of Kent, and rated at fifty-nine pounds ;
another house of the same sorte, called Domus Dei (or
Maison Dieu), reputed worth one hundred and twentie
pounds." This passage, which was written by Lambard
soon after the dissolution of the Maison Dieu, with the full
facts at his command, seems to suggest that the original
Hospital of St. Mary, founded by Hubert de Burgh, was
amalgamated with the Maison Dieu in the time of Henry HI.,
but that the accounts of the two branches were kept separate
until the end.

In the later years of the Maison Dieu the duty of
entertaining Royal personages and pilgrims seems to have
been seldom exercised; and in the reigns of Henry VH. and
Henry VHI. the Masters appear to have been men of leisure
who uiterested themselves in the affairs of the Town and used
their influence in inducing those two Tudor Kings to assist
tlic Corporation in building the Harbour at Archcliffe Point.
When the house was dissolved, its land and other sources
(jf revenue were taken by the Crown, including the building
which still stands at the top of Biggin Street ; but St.
Mary's Church, which had lieen a Parsonage connected with
the Maison Dieu ever since its establishment in 1203, was
given by Henry VI II. to the inhabitants of Dover. The
Master and two of the Brethren were providerl with j)ensions
for life, but two other brethren and the Bailiff, John Guyver,
and his wife, who was the Matron, were left to shift for
themselves. The Maison Dieu Building was retained by the
Crown, and has, c\'cr since the dissolution, been used lor
public purposes.



184 ANNALS OF DOVER.