been fined by the Commissioners for Ecclesiastical Causes for non-appearance to their citation; and that it was in August, 1608, that Clifton arrived at Amsterdam. The date 1607 in Bradford's margin leads us to suppose that he removed from Scrooby with the intention of proceeding to Holland before the close of that year. But while attending to William Brewster we must not forget that the ecclesiastical affairs of Other Nottinghamshire Scrooby were, in his time, under the Brewsters. superintendence of two ministers of his name, who were in succession vicars of Sutton. To these, as probably his near relations, and certainly his near neighbours, we must now attend. In the Bishop's Certificates of persons presented to Benefices within their dioceses, we find this entry in that presented by the Archbishop of York for 1565:"Dominus HENRICUS BREWSTER clericus Henry. admissus fuit ad Vicariam Ecclesiæ Parochialis de Sutton super Londe, decanatus de Newark [Retford], com. Nottingham; per mortem naturalem ultimi incumbentis ejusdem, adtunc vacantem." He held the living till his death in February, 1597-8. He was married, but there is no trace of his having had chil dren. Agnes, his widow, was buried at Sutton, on the 15th of March following. There is nothing from which we can infer concerning him that he had any leaning to the Puritan party in the church, or the contrary. In fact little more is known about him. James. It is different with JAMES BREWSTER, who succeeded Henry Brewster as Vicar of Sutton, and held the living till his death in January, 1613-4. He was buried at Sutton on the 14th of that month. His wife's name was Mary, and she is doubtless the "Mrs. Mary Brewster, widow," who was buried at Sutton, on April 7th, 1637. Their children, as they are to be collected from the Register of Sutton, were, Grace, baptized in 1600; Elizabeth, 1603; Susanna, 1606; Judith, 1609. Grace married William Glaive on October 22d, 1620; Judith, Edward Oldfield on November 5th, 1633. Susanna appears to have died unmarried in December, 1637. As a Mr. Welbeck is said to be father-in-law to James Brewster in Slack's account of the proceedings respecting the Hospital of St. Mary Magdalene at Bawtry, it may be presumed that this Mary was originally Mary Welbeck. The Welbecks came from Suffolk, and were principal people in the parish of Sutton. The heiress married Cordel Savile, a member of the great Yorkshire family of that name. Brewster did a good service to the parish during the period of his incumbency; for he transcribed all the entries which had been made in an older book, of the Baptisms, Marriages, and Burials, from the year 1538, and continued the Register, all in his own hand, which was a very fair one, to near the time of his death. He records this his labour, together with the liberality of the church-wardens in some Sternholdian stanzas, of which a very small specimen will be sufficient, and more than sufficient : "Church-wardens next which did succeed In place and office set, Did recompense the writer's pains In love and kindness great. George Bingley himself for Sutton town, John Redshaw in Lound likewise, In honest sort and guise, As God their hearts inclined With cheerfulness in godly sort," &c. In 1604, he was instituted to the vicarage of Gringley-on-the-Hill, a well-known place on the high road between Bawtry and Gainsborough; but this did not draw him away from Sutton. Whether this person had that deep and earnest sense of religion which is the basis of the Puritan character, may admit of some reasonable doubt: but when we find that he neglected to pay his first-fruits for some years after his institution to one of his livings, and that he was a defaulter in the payment of his quota to the subsidy granted to Queen Elizabeth towards the close of her reign, by the clergy of the Province of York, it would appear that he was not a very nice observer of what was due from him to the church of which he was a minister. Whether he refused the payment contumaciously cannot now be certainly determined: but though cited in his own church to make the payment, which was only six shillings and eightpence, at Tuxford, within forty days, he neglected to do so, and the neglect was returned to the Exchequer, that proceedings might be taken against him.41 41 Copy of the Archbishop's Certificate :-" Jacobus Brewster clericus, vicarius ecclesiæ de Sutton super Lound, monitus fuit apud ecclesiam suam de Sutton predictam tricesimo die Martii ultimo preterito, per Georgium Ormeroid clericum deputatum meum ad solvendum apud Tuxford decimo die Aprilis tunc proximo sequente : But the most remarkable part of the history of James Brewster is his conduct in the affair of the Bawtry Hospital and as these proceedings took place under the immediate inspection of William Brewster, and as a Brewster (probably his near relative) was brought by them into a losing contest with the highest church authority in the diocese, these proceedings seem to be almost a part of the history of William Brewster. Close to the town of Bawtry, but within the bounds of the parish of Harworth, was an Hospital dedicated to Saint Mary Magdalene. The foundation of it was the charitable act of some person in these parts, who lived at a very remote period; but in the year 1390, in the reign of King Richard the Second, it received so large a benefaction from Robert Morton, then the head of that eminent family, that it was considered as founded anew, and the The Bawtry illam partem subsidii per ipsum debitam 26 die Martii ultimi preteriti, pro promotione sua predicta: Sed predictus Jacobus Brewster nec apud Tuxford predicto eodem 10 die Aprilis nec alibi per 40 dies postea summam per ipsum debitam (ut prefertur) solvit vel satisfecit, neque dictam summam de proficuis dictæ promotionis nec de bonis aut catallis dicti Jacobi Brewster ullo modo levare seu recipere potui, 68. 8d." |