Finding the hidden world of Spalding Priory
Once life in Spalding revolved around the town’s priory, but now very little remains of that great institution - or so you might think.
There are still little glimpses into this aspect of Spalding’s past, provided you know where to look of course.
Curator of Archaeology at Spalding Gentlemen’s Society Richard Buck is one such person as he has spent a lot of time researching the Priory.
From a ‘correctional’ house for monks to the remains of a staircase tower in a prominent part of town which had been removed as it was deemed to have no ‘historical merit’, it gives us an insight into this lost part of Spalding’s history.
Richard said: “The Priory is gone but if you dig beneath the surface it is not totally lost.”
Spalding Priory was founded in 1052AD by monks from Crowland Abbey and held an important role in the town’s economic and social fabric until it was dissolved by King Henry VIII after cutting ties with the Catholic Church as part of his bid to divorce Catherine of Aragon, who is buried in Peterborough Cathedral.
The Priory covered a wide area from the modern town centre up to Little London.
Like many religious houses of the time, Spalding had been built using stone quarried in Barnack, near Stamford, and some of these stones can still be found within the town and its buildings today.
Richard believes that some of these stones can be seen in the car park of Chatterton’s Solicitors in Broad Street.
He said: “If you look at the Chatterton’s front garden all of the stones have been worked and it is my belief that they have come from Spalding Priory at some point.
“There was another house which stood next door to it in the car park until the 1960s which I believe had been built using priory stone which had been left here as part of the demolition.
“There was quite a lot of this stone around because the Priory covered such a wide area so it was natural that it would be re-used in other buildings.
“I think there is 90% more of a chance that the stone is from the Priory than any other source around here to get building material like that.”
Nearby, there is a red herring for priory hunters which is not directly connected to the building despite popular belief.
Richard said: “I was always told that the arches in the Broad Street car park had been part of the priory.”
The stones, which make up the series of decorative arches, are worked and the design also incorporates a couple of gullies.
However Richard said: “The arches are not from the priory but the stones might be.
“The stones were incorporated into the wall in the late 1960s when the car park was built.”
Richard believes that the modern day Market Place and Bridge Street would have been part of the priory, which would have stretched back to St Thomas’ Road.
He said: “My original thought was that the precinct of Spalding Priory ended where the shops are now at Bridge Street but my belief now is that the walls came out somewhere in the middle of Market Place.
“They would have covered the entirety of the Priory grounds and that is why there was so much of the material left over.”
Richard said that the monks needed such large walls in order to mark the end of public land and the priory would have been made up of not just buildings but also fields, an orchard and possibly fish ponds.
The remains of people who once lived there have also been found.
Richard said: “Skeletons were found around the dry cleaners and bank area. We believe they were monks and were later reburied.”
One of the most visual remains of the priory can be found within The Hole in the Wall.
A staircase tower that is believed to have been part of the Holy Cross Church once stood in the passageway, and a sliver of stonework is still part of the former Beales building.
This tower had stood within the passage until the 1960s when it was removed as part of the expansion of the Boots store.
An example of a staircase tower can still be seen today in St Mary and St Nicolas Church.
Richard said: “Someone from the government deemed that it was only about 300 years old and had no historical importance.”
A small passageway, which stands between Filius salon and Rumblings in The Crescent, is also another remnant of the priory.
Richard said: “It was part of a procession which went through the Hole in the Wall to the parish church. I don’t think it is a coincidence that it still remains like this.
“It also leads to the heart of priory. The Abbey buildings would have been the monks' dormitories but have been rebuilt and modernised over the years.”
The Prior’s Oven is possibly the most famous building associated with the priory and still stands in the town centre.
Over the years it has been many things from a bakery to a blacksmiths, and is now a popular pub - but it once held a more sinister use.
Richard said: “We also think that the Prior’s Oven was a ‘prison’ for wayward monks. If they got above themselves they were put in restraints and taught how to live piously.
“We think the Priors Oven was once twice the size of it is now. A tower was later added containing a bell which would toll at the time of an execution.”
History of Spalding Priory
For more than 500 years Spalding Priory stood proudly in the centre of the town.
Six Benedictine monks from the powerful Crowland Abbey founded Spalding Priory as an offshoot in 1052.
The abbey was granted the ‘manor of Spalding’ by its benefactor and Sherrif of Lincoln, Thorold of Buckenhale, who was also the brother of Lady Godiva.
However, it became more powerful after the Norman Conquest in 1066 when the town’s overlord Ivo Tailebois replaced the Crowland monks with French ones.
Between four and six monks lived within Spalding Priory between its foundation and 1074, but the fields would have been worked by laybrothers or those employed by the Prior.
Additional buildings such as a cloister, dormitory, infirmary and Prior’s lodging were added by Prior Simon of Hautberg, who ran the priory between 1229 and 1253.
St Mary and St Nicolas Church was founded in 1284 and built at the cost of the priory.
However, the Priory’s power and prestige came to an end in the 1500s when it was dissolved by Henry VIII, who wanted to divorce Catherine of Aragon to marry Anne Boleyn.
Richard Palmer, who was the last person to hold the title of Lord Prior of Spalding, was pensioned off by the king in 1540.
The Priory was then passed onto the king’s close friend Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk.