REGISTERS OF SOPLEY
97
'Ihe next priests were French refugees. Mr. Argyle's ÂŤ JUT Belli" is difficult to identify. He may possibly be the Abbe Besnee, a Canon of Laon Cathedral, who 'was in Jersey in 1796 (Canon F. X. Plasse, Le Clerge F1'an(:ais Rejugie en Al1gleterre, ii, 437). (( Mr Chantittour" is the Abbe Pierre Chantelou, who was there in 1803. An Abbe Pierre Chantelou had been vicaire at Craon, arrondissement Chateau-Gontier, departement Mayenne. He embarked at Granville 15 September 1792, then aged 29. He is no doubt the Abbe Pierre Chanteloup mentioned by Dr. Oliver (Collections, pp. 185, 262), who became the incumbent of Taunton from 1830 to 1833, leaving the English Mission in the November of 1833. The date of his death has not been ascertained. He was followed by the Abbe Gilles (Aegidius) Viel, vicaire of St. Paterne-du-Buais in the diocese of Avranches, from 1806 to 1807. In 1811 the Abbe Viel built the chapel in Holland Street, Kensington. He died 27 August 1823 (Plasse, Clerge Franr-ais Rejugie en A ngZeterre, II, 285, 286, 292",411). The next priest was the Abbe Alexandre Cochet, of whom Dr. Oliver says (Collections) "an excellent French priest, who did duty for several years at Stapehill before he left for Sopley in 1811. I think he returned to France after the Restoration of the Bourbons." In the Stapehill Register (the transcript of which is given after the Sopley Register) the Abbe Cochet has made the following entry: "Alexander Cochet, Presbyter, successit Rev do Dno Jacobo Porter, Die 22ft Decembris 1801," and he records baptisms therein from 1804 to June 1810. He said Mass on weekdays for the nuns at Stapehill, a Cistercian Father from Lulworth riding over for the Sundays (La Trappe in England, p. 98). He was the first priest at Burton Green. He opened the Sopley Registers, writing in the baptisms performed by his two predecessors, and then entering his own from 1808 to 1816. An appeal by him for funds for a new chapel was inserted in the 1811 Directory: "To all Charitable Christians. The poor Catholics of Sopley, Christchurch and its vicinity from time immemorial, through the generosity of a noble family, had enjoyed the happiness of having in the midst of them a missionary who procured for them the benefit and consolation of our holy religion. But, being deprived of that comfort by the death of the last head of that family and the nearest Mission being situate 10 miles from them, they have with the approbation of their Bishop, the Rt. Rev. Dr. Douglass, opened a subscription to enable them to support a chaplain and to build a Chapel. The subscription having scarcely produced half the funds necessary, they humbly and earnestly solicit the charitable assistance of the nobility, gentry etc. Those who visit the commodious bathing place of Christchurch will reap the advantage of having divine service performed in that neighbourhood . . . . " A second appeal, headed" Burton, New Chapel, near Christchurch, Hants," appeared in the 1814 Directory after the building had been erected. It was stated that" divine service is daily performed" in the new chapel and that a house had been erected "for the residence of their Pastor," but expenses for the purchase of the land, building, and maintenance of the priest exceeded the donations received; hence this second appeal. In 1817 the Rev. Joseph Stapleton was appointed to the Mission
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The Cistercian nuns resided at Burton House, kindly lent to them by Lady Mannock while their ~onvent at Stapehill was being made ready for them, from January to October, 1802, and the Abbe Gilles Viel acted as their chaplain there (La Trappe in England, pp. 91, 96; London, J!)17). G