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Three Jesuits at Plowden Hall in Shropshire in the Eighteenth Century

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 September 2015

William Price
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Extract

Plowden Hall, probably the house portrayed in the once widely-read novel John Inglesant by J. H. Shorthouse, is about four miles distant from the small town of Bishop's Castle in Shropshire. The family papers are still at the Hall, but the letters upon which this account is based were found at Archbishop's House, Westminster. They were written between 1747 and 1763 by three successive chaplains to the Plowden family. Very few such letters appear to have survived, and they provide invaluable and vivid details about the daily lives of priests on the English Mission. The letters were written to local Jesuit superiors of the Residence of S. Winifrid at Holywell in Flintshire. Until 1761 the Superior was Fr. John Williams, and after that Fr. Thomas Daniel or Watson.

Type
Research Article
Information
British Catholic History , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , October 1969 , pp. 165 - 175
Copyright
Copyright © Catholic Record Society 1969

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References

1. Shorthouse, J. H., John Inglesant (new edn. 1882) i, 1,Google Scholar “... on the borders of Shropshire towards Wales… . That part of Shropshire partakes somewhat of the mountain characteristics of Wales, combined with the more cultivated beauties of English rural scenery”. The house portrayed bears in part a strong resemblance to Little Malvern Court (Worcs.), but its intended setting is without doubt Plowden.

2. My thanks are due to Mr. William Plowden for permission to see them, and to Miss Judith Telfer for much assistance in transcription.

3. The letters were found by Miss Elisabeth Poyser, archivist to the Archbishop of Westminster, in a trunk of papers labelled Cardinal Vaughan, c. 1900, wrapped in old newspapers. My thanks to Miss Poyser for much enthusiastic help.

4. Plowden was from 1676 in the Jesuit Residence of S. Winifred, which covered North Wales and Shropshire; Foley, H., Records of the English Province of the Society of Jesus (1877-1883), vol. iv, ser. X, pt. ii, 491.Google Scholar

5. Foley, op. cit., vii, pt. ii, 846.

6. Ibid, vii, pt. i, 192. His true name appears to have been Daniel, but he used aliases of West and Watson, and is addressed as Watson here.

7. Ibid, vii, pt. ii, 569. His letters have been numbered in the series 155/7/0.

8. Ibid, vii, pt. ii, 674. His letters are numbered 155/8/0.

9. Ibid, vii, pt. ii, 791. His letters are numbered 155/9/0.

10. Archives of the Archbishop of Westminster (cited henceforward as A.A.W.) 155/9/6.

11. After education at Manchester Grammar School he became a ship's surgeon on the South American route. Converted to Catholicism when seriously ill, he entered the Paraguayan branch of the Society, had to leave Paraguay when the Jesuits were expelled from South America in 1767/8, and at Plowden wrote a geography of Patagonia which was published at Hereford, later translated into Spanish and published at Buenos Aires: Foley, op. cit., vii, pt. i, 243; Kirk, J., Biographies of English Catholics, 1700-1800 (ed. Pollen, J. H. and Burton, E. H., 1909), 77–78.Google Scholar

12. Baptismal Register of the Catholic Chapel at Acton Burnell, 1769-1838, penes the parish priest, Acton Burnell, Shrewsbury. Transcribed very inaccurately in Shropshire Parish Register Society (Roman Catholic Registers) (Shrewsbury, 1913), 61-80.

13. For examples, see Kirk, op. cit., 185-6.

14. Records of the Plowden Family, ed. B.M.P. (1887), 94-115.

15. Ibid. 115-139.

16. A.A.W. 155/9/1. Orthography has not been modernised in quotations.

17. Ibid.

18. A.A.W. 155/7/11.

19. A.A.W. 155/7/15.

20. Ibid.

21. A.A.W. 155/7/11.

22. A.A.W. 155/7/2, 9.

23. Catholic Record Society, 13, 174.

24. A.A.W. 155/7/2.

25. A.A.W. 155/9/1.

26. A.A.W. 155/8/1, 3.

27. Ibid.

28. A.A.W. 155/8/2.

29. A.A.W. 155/8/12.

30. Ibid.

31. A.A.W. 155/9/1.

32. A.A.W. 155/8/5.

33. Ibid.

34. A.A.W. 155/7/6.

35. A.A.W. 155/8/5, 16. Ludlow is about 12 miles from Plowden, and in 1970 roles are altered, and Plowden is served from Ludlow: Shrewsbury Diocesan Year Book 1970, 102.

36. A.A.W. 155/8/12. Tenbury Wells is in Worcestershire.

37. A.A.W. 155/7/13, 155/8/16, 155/9/2. The Welshpool congregation met at Buttington, 2 miles north of the town.

38. A.A.W. 155/7/3.

39. 6 Nov. 1747: ibid.

40. 1 Sept. 1747: ibid.

41. A.A.W. 155/7/11.

42. A.A.W. 155/7/2.

43. A.A.W. 155/7/7.

44. Ibid.

45. A.A.W. 155/8/3.

46. Ibid.

47. In June 1748: A.A.W. 155/7/3.

47a. A.A.W. 155/8/5. For a brief account of 18th-century Mawley, see my “Some Recusant Shropshire Families and their Worcestershire Connections” in Worcestershire Recusant no. 11 (June 1968), 13-16.

48. A.A.W. 155/8/5.

49. Ibid.

50. A.A.W. 155/8/12.

51. A.A.W. 155/7/16.

52. A.A.W. 155/8/16.

53. Ibid.

54. A.A.W. 155/7/3.

55. A.A.W. 155/8/15.

56. A.A.W. 155/8/9.

57. A.A.W. 155/9/4.

58. A.A.W. 155/9/2.

59. A.A.W. 155/9/5. Madeley is about 30 miles from Ludlow.

60. Ibid.

61. A.A.W. 155/9/6.

62. For what follows see ibid.

63. Not used.

64. Not used.

65. Hereford Diocesan Archives: Incumbents' Returns of Papists 1767 (bundle).

66. Ibid. The (non-resident) Vicar of Morville, which is near Bridgnorth, wrote that his “fingers itch to be at them” (the papists).

67. Ibid. The Vicar of Cleobury Mortimer regretted that he had to report a great number of papists in Cleobury parish, but he was glad to report that in his other parishes of Bockleton (Worcs.) and Laysters (Herefs.) there were no papists — “No Gentleman dwells there, nor wily Jesuit. Tenants seldom make Converts. Plenty of Meat & Drink, with well timed Benefactions, will make shipwreck of good Communications, & drown Faith & Reason”.

68. A.A.W. 155/7/9.

69. A.A.W. 155/7/3. A journey to Ludlow on 28 February 1748 cost him 3s. 6d.

70. Ibid.

71. A.A.W. 155/7/11.

72. Presumably Mr. Thomas Pryce of Llanfyllin, Montgomeryshire. For an account of the Pryce family see T. B. Trappes-Lomax “Roman Catholicism in Montgomeryshire since 1559” in Montgomeryshire Collections (1957), 10-31, especially pp. 27-29 for the Pryce family.

73. A.A.W. 155/7/13.

74. No evidence of this devotion has been found at any mission chapel in 18th-century Shropshire.

75. A.A.W. 155/7/17.

76. A.A.W. 155/8/16.

77. A.A.W. 155/7/17.

78. A.A.W. 155/7/1.

79. A.A.W. Series A, vol. XXXII, p. 477 gives a lengthy list of the books kept at Holywell in 1664. There was, of course, ample opportunity in almost a century for these to disappear.

80. A.A.W. 155/7/2, 5, 9, A.A.W. 155/8/2, 7, 9, A.A.W. 155/9/7, 8.

81. Fr. Royal complained that he had not received £5 a year since he had been atPIowden: A.A.W. 155/8/12.

82. A.A.W. 155/8/2.

83. A.A.W. 155/8/3.

84. Not used.

85. A.A.W. 155/8/16.

86. A.A.W. 155/7/3.

87. Ibid.

88. Ibid.

89. Ibid.

90. A.A.W. 155/7/4.

91. A.A.W. 155/7/3.

92. A.A.W. 155/9/6.

93. A.A.W. 155/7/9.

94. A.A.W. 155/8/5.

95. Ibid.

96. Ibid.

97. A.A.W. 155/8/3.

98. A.A.W. 155/7/5.

99. Plowden lay in the Midland District.

100. A.A.W. 155/9/1.

101. “If anything like this happens again I desire you will remember I am under Mr. S r”: A.A.W. 155/7/8. The Superior must have thought that Plowden was in the Western District.

102. See Confirmation Register (Birmingham Archdiocesan Archives, C. 667). The earliest recorded confirmation at Plowden appears to have been on 14 Apr. 1782.

103. A.A.W. 155/9/2.

104. His true name was John Hervey, or Harvey, and he used the alias Rivett at times: Kirk, Biographical Dictionary, 112-3. His register is printed in Catholic Record Society, 14.

105. A.A.W. 155/7/5.

106. Ibid.

107. A.A.W. 155/7/10.

108. A.A.W. 155/7/5, 13.

109. A.A.W. 155/7/13.

110. A.A.W. 155/7/10. In this letter Fr. Parker refers thus to Mr. Hervey, “He is a surprising Man; may be as you wont find such another in an Age”.

111. Ibid.

112. Catholic Record Society, 14, 342-3.

113. A.A.W. 155/8/. 15

114. A.A.W. 155/8/14. Talacre is in Flintshire. Fr. Parker also hinted in 1753 that he would like to go to Buttington, as the bishop was prepared to allow the Jesuits to serve the mission: A.A.W. 155/7/13.

115. I regret that I have been unable to trace the original source for this often-quoted fact.

116. A.A.W. 155/9/1.

117. A.A.W. 155/8/10.

118. A.A.W. 155/8/11.