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For a long time it was believed that St Clere Pomeroy was one of the Abbots of Buckfast Abbey
in the end it came down to punctuation or rather the medieval lack thereof
Parish of Ashburton. Extracts. 15th to 16th C from Church Warden Accounts 1479 – 1580 Published on request- London Yate & Alexander. Chancery Lane 1870. The original written in Latin on parchment. These are Church Warden Accounts where there is mention of St Clere Pomeroy & it has confused genealogists.
Article in question
1499 - 1500 Receipt from a gift of the lord Abbot of Buckfast (N0 Comma) St Clere Pomeroy, Galfrid Harepath, Thomas Wilke,
Thomas Waye, John Waye, Peter Maty, Thomas Geffray...
Illustration by S & M Buck 1734
However serious doubt is thrown on this belief because the list of Abbots at Buckfast does not include St Clere Pomeroy .
St Clere Pomeroy son of Henry died 1471 married Katherine Courtnay before he died at the Battle of Tewkesbury in 1471 so it cannot be him
Sinclere Pomeroy son of Robert Pomeroy of Ingsdon unknown DOB but his parents married in about 1471. He died before his father who died in 1517
Monks did not marry and Abbots certainly did not. They did not have legitimate wives or families, at least not ones they acknowledged publicly.
Sinclere as eldest son & heir had and an entail created for him in 1481 settling Ingsdon on Sinclere & his wife Joanna Younge .This may have been when he was 21 or it may have been on his marriage . We know very little of him or his wife
Sinclair died before his father who died in 1517 .He did marry & his son John died in 1533 around the time of beginning of Henry VIII "Great Matter" which brought changes in the Catholic church in England & the resulted of the Anglo Catholic Church which in a around 1547 began to become the Protestant Church, which allowed priests to marry
His son John inherited Ingsdon Manors from his grandfather Robert in 1517.
Mention of St Clere/ Sinclere as a benefactor in 1499-1500 indicates he was still living at the turn of the 16th century
Abbots of Buckfast Abbey at that time
John Rede (I) mentioned in the Ep. Reg. 1498.
John Bleworthy mentioned in 1505 - Cal. of Early Chancery Proceedings, also in Powderham MSS.
Alfred Gyll mentioned in the Ep. Reg. 1512.
John Rede (II) mentioned in the Ep. Reg. 1525. There is no record of death or resignation from his office.
Gabriel Dunne (or Donne) imposed on the Community in 1535 by Thomas Cromwell. He surrendered the Abbey to the king on 25 February 1539.[8]
More on this Abbot John Rede (called Sir, a customary title for clergy)
John Rede was the last legitimately elected Abbots of Buckfast. He died about 1535, the year of the Visitation ordered by Henry VIII, which resulted in the intrusion of Gabriel Donne into the vacant chair.
Donne surrendered the house to the King in 1538, receiving for himself ample compensation.
Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, Volume 4, 1524-1530. Originally published by Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London, 1875.
Henry VIII, December 1527, 26-31, 01 December 1527-31 December 1527. Cardinal's grace. Endd . R. O. 3733 .
3733. ABBEY OF BUCKFAST.
Complaint of Philip Brayne, of Exeter, to "your mastership" [Cromwell], against Sir John Rede, abbot of Bocffast (Buckfast), Devon, who, when Sir John Cleugger, vicar of Dene, fell ill, and was shriven on Whitsun Eve 1527, sent some of the monks to his house, who bound him to a bier with cords, and carried him to the abbey, where he died in three days. The abbot now withholds the goods of the deceased from Richard Cleugger, his brother and heir, pretending that he holds them by a deed of gift.
Witnesses have been examined in my lord Chancellor's name. Begs [Cromwell] to help his petition in the Star Chamber.
Sir William Corttney (Courtenay) and Sir Thomas Denys, who were commissioned to investigate the matter,....who would do nothing for fear of the Abbot.
Up until the Reformation & the Dissolution of the monasteries by Henry VIII time England was fairly stable.
Timeline for the religious upheaval in England
Dates
1485 Richard III killed at Bosworth and Henry Tudor seized the crown, despite his claim being an illegitimate, female one from a disbarred family, the Beauforts.
1507 His son Henry VIII took the throne.
1534 England split from Rome and Henry VIII declared himself supreme head of the Church in England The English Church was the still Catholic although Henry VIII son Edward VI (1547- 1553 ) was brought up as a Protestant.
1536 the rebellion called the Pilgrimage of Grace.
1539 the Bible was translated into English
1536 and 1541 Dissolution of the monasteries
1547 after Henry VIII death England began to show features of Protestantism (with priests allowed to marry.)
1549 was the Prayerbook Rebellion when the West Country rebelled against the imposition of an English prayerbook in all churches
Buckfast Abbey was one of the wealthiest abbeys in the south-west of England in the 14th century . It owned large numbers of sheep on Dartmoor, seventeen manors in central and south Devon, town houses in Exeter, fisheries on the Dart and the Avon, and a country house for the abbot at Kingsbridge".
By the 16th century, the abbey was in decline. Only 22 new monks were ordained between 1500 and 1539, and at the time of the abbey's dissolution, there were only 10 monks in residence. At which time the last Abbot, Gabriel Donne (d.1558), despite the solemn oaths he had taken, on 25 February 1539 together with nine others of his religious community, surrendered his abbey into the hands of Sir William Petre, as agent for King Henry VIII.
Buckfast Monastery gave up almost 2 tons of gold, gilt & silver of treasure, which was delivered to the Treasury at the Tower of London . The buildings granted, for a fee, to Sir Thomas Denys who stripped out what was left and reduced the building to a stone quarry. .On 26 April 1539 Gabriel Donne the former abbot, was rewarded with a substantial annual pension of £120 which he enjoyed until his death. The other monks, who all co-signed the deed of surrender, also received smaller pensions. At this time the annual income of a husbandmen or small farmer living on a subsistence farm, on rented land, rarely earned more than £20 (typically £10 ) Further up the scale Yeoman or small freehold farmer earned £50-£100 and top 1% ,the land owning Gentry, had annual incomes between £200-£500 )
The only portion of the medieval monastery which survives is former abbot's tower, which dates from 14th or 15th century and is now "much restored".
300 years years later, in 1882 the site was purchased by French Benedictine monks who began to build a new church, the monks doing most of the work themselves.
The abbey church was consecrated on 25 August 1932, but the building was not finished for several years: the last stone was laid in late 1937 and final works completed the following year.
In 1982 and 1994, when the abbey's precinct was rebuilt, the ancient Abbey Tower was incorporated into the abbey's guesthouse. The former well, located in the crypt of the former abbey and which may have dated from Saxon times, was destroyed when the new abbey was built.
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