Greyfriars, Worcester

Greyfriars, Worcester, was a Franciscan friary and school in Worcester, England. It is a Grade I listed building.^[1]

History

Greyfriars

'The Greyfriars' in Friar Street is the finest half-timbered building in the City. From the 13th century until the Reformation the street was dominated by a Franciscan friary from which Friar Street and Greyfriars both get their names. It was suppressed in 1530s when Henry VIII dissolved the monasteries.

Franciscan friars were sometimes called Grey Friars because of their grey habits. The name of Greyfriars might have come from the house being wrongly associated, from the early twentieth century, with the old Friary, the last building the friars added.

18th-century and 19th-century historians make no reference to No 9 being part of the Old Friary. In 1828 Ambrose Florence merely states ‘... large timber ribbed house adjoins the wall of the new city gaol...’ and in 1882 Littlebury dismisses the building as ‘a quaint old timbered building worth glancing at in passing...’. Official City Guides in the early 20th century also list No 9 under Old Houses, remarking ‘... one of the most interesting is the large structure in Friar Street supposed to have been an ancient hostelry’.

However, The Victoria County History (eds William Page and J. W. Willis-Bund), published in 1924, says ‘... facing Friar Street is a fine two-storied building of timber, having a bold gable at either end and a gateway in the middle, over which is a window of not less than twelve lights. This house may only be the town house of some city merchant, but its position suggests that it belonged to the Grey Friars, and might have been their guest-house”. A further suggestion that No 9 may have been part of the Friary was in 1911 when a local historian, Lewis Shepherd, wrote in the journal of the Associated Archaeological Societies ‘... a considerable portion of the old friary still exists. .. it is of the early Tudor period ...’. Without giving any reasons he implies that No 9 was the guest house of the Friary.

In 1937, an expert on monastic architecture, A.R. Martin, said that Greyfriars was not part of the Friary but a typical medieval merchant’s house. This information was not re-discovered until 1983-85 when a local historian, Pat Hughes, was doing some research into Friar Street and local charities. She identified that rent for No.s 7-9 was paid to the St Thomas Day Charities an ancient ‘bread and coal’ charity with records dating back to the 15th century.

She was able to trace the tenants for No 9 and establish that Greyfriars was built c1480-5, probably by Thomas Grene, an influential citizen and brewer, who was High Bailiff of Worcester on two occasions.

In 1947 Canon Buchanan-Dunlop, another local historian, writing in Worcester Archaeological Transactions, accepted the assumption that No 9 was part of the old friary. This arose from his research which showed that the house, and the old friary site next door, had been owned by the Corporation for at least 350 years.

The external shape of the two gables, with a long pitched roof level between them, is typical of merchant houses of the late 15thC. The remains of the very richly carved barge boards on the gables also suggest a very expensive and high quality building of the early Tudor period, as does the height of the archway which horses and riders would have been able to pass through into the courtyard.

The plot now occupied by 7-9 has always changed hands in its present form. No 7 (now a hairdresser) was built at the end of the 17th century. As the north wall of No. 9 shows considerable weathering, the No. 7 plot may either have been used as a garden or occupied by outbuildings at the beginning of the century

In 1603, the Worcester Corporation granted a lease of the property for 400 years, and for many years it was the home of the Street family, one of which, George Street, a staunch Royalist, was removed from the City Chamber when the Earl of Essex entered Worcester in 1642. In 1643 he died, at the early age of 49, being followed by his widow in 1644. It was stated on their tomb in St. Andrew's Church, that 'she could not bear to be left behind', but as the plague was rampant in Worcester in that year, she probably had little choice. Their son, Sir Thomas Street, was a barrister, and filled many important offices. He was Town Clerk and Recorder of Worcester, and of Droitwich, and M.P for Worcester City in five Parliaments between 1659 and 1681. In 1659 the Puritans tried to turn him out of Parliament, and on the grounds that he had borne arms for the King and that he had used profane language, but the Committee of Privileges had to admit that he had not fought against Parliament, and that he had used no stronger language than, 'by faith and trothe'. Sir Thomas rose to high rank in his profession and became a figure of national importance, when he alone of twelve judges pronounced against the right of James II to grant Dispensation from the Test Act. Street's public career ended with the coming of William III, who would not even grant him an interview.

By 1698, the lease of Greyfriars had been sold to the Maris family, who lived there for over 100 years, and then in 1724, it was let to Daniel George, a baker and maltster, who turned the top of the house, immediately under the rafters, into a tiled withering floor, the tiles being cemented down to the boards. (Withering is part of the process of preparing the barley for malting). It was the George family who divided the Friary into four tenements, and built the row of ten cottages in the garden, eastward to the City Wall; the road through the Friary gateway became known as George's Yard.

About 1870, Henry Schaffer, a German refugee from the 1848 Revolution, further damaged the building by converting the hall into shops despite sharp local criticism, especially from John Noake, the local historian. It was the beginning of the process whereby the Friary became one of the worst of the City's slum properties. The roof was in a terrible state of dilapidation, with rain coming through to the rooms below. Part of the building had become a green grocers, and the back rooms were filled with the vegetable debris of years. Part of the timber framing, that part of the building known as Thompson's Trust, actually fell into the street. It remained in that state until the 1940-50's, when the property was purchased by Mr. W. J. Thompson, and restored by Mr. M. Matley Moore.

Greyfriars School

Previous to Schaffer's ownership, the principal part of the building was occupied by Mr. Christopher Bardin, an old gentlemen of venerable aspect, who conducted a private school at modest fees, in the days when public elementary education was in its infancy. Just as the refectory of the Benedictines became the King's School, so the refectory of the Franciscans became Mr.Bardin's. There he trained more than one generation of small shopkeepers, continuing to keep the school long after it had ceased to keep him. The old gentlemen, in his later years fell on evil days, as was not uncommon with private schoolmasters, but he was a fine gentleman to the last, with his dignified bearing and old world courtesy.

References

1. "Name: THE GREYFRIARS List entry Number: 1389859". Historic England. Retrieved 29 June 2015.

Coordinates: 52°11′26″N 2°13′08″W / 52.190473°N 2.219013°W