NO . IX
CATHOLIC REGISTERS OF THE DOMESTIC CHAPEL AT WATERPERRY MANOR HOUSE , OXON, AND ST. CLEMENT'S CHURCH , OXFORD, 1701 ?-1834 CONTRIBUTED BY JOSEPH STANISLAUS HANSOM
THE registers are contained in two books. The first is a common penny paper note-book in a marbled paper cover, ready to fall off from age and use, 6 by 4 inches, the pagination being given below. The entries as far as the year 1756 seem to be made from some previous collection , being in one continuous style of writing (very bad), and is doubtless that of the Rev. Francis Pole, S.J. The subsequententries are continued in the samehand , but shew traces of being inserted at different periods. It is proposed to give a facsimile of a page shewing this. The last entry in the same hand is dated 18 Sept. 1764. The first in another hand is dated 6 Nov. 1765. The second book is of paper 7 by 6g inches, bound in boards, with a leather back. The part printed stops in 1834 ; but in the second book there are other registers down to the end of 1855, which it has been thought unnecessary to print now. Thanks are due to the Revv. Arthur Day and John Edge , S.J. , the late and present rectors of St Aloysius' Church at Oxford , to which the registers belong, for facilities granted , enabling me to make the transcript and collate the proofs with the originals . The Hon . Mrs. Bryan Stapleton, who has made Oxfordshire historya special study, and to whom Catholics are indebted for her interesting and concise History of Post- Reformation Catholic Missions in Oxfordshire, contributes the following historical notes on the chaplaincy and mission. J. S. H. The mission of Oxford , to which these registers belong, embraces six separate and ancient missions or chaplaincies, viz.: Holywell Manor, now part of Oxford ; Sandford on Thames ; Britwell- Prior ; Hazeley Court or Great Hazeley ; Overey, now Dorchester ; and Waterperry . All these were incorporated by Father Richard Blount , S.J. , in 1620 into the Residence of St. Mary's , ' known among themselves as Mrs Oxon. HOLYWELL MANOR The owners, by leasehold from Merton College, were a branch of the Scotch family of Napier who had been settled in Dorsetshire for some years. Theyappear to have held the true Faith early , not upon their arrival in Oxford , as the best-known member of the family, the Ven. George Napier, was born and bred here, and he won his crown of martyrdom at the age of 60 in 1610. After his execution some part of his remains, which had been hung over one of the City gates , were taken and thrown into the river Thames, and floating down opposite Sandford they were taken up and carried to the house of his sister, the wife of Edmund Powell . Tradition says that there they still remain , buried in a barn once the chapel of the Knights of St. John . Holywell continued in Catholic hands until the property was sold in the middle of the eighteenth century by Mr. Neville of Holt, co . Leicester, who had it by marriage with the Napier heiress . It was here that the few hunted Catholics of the day used to assemble for their religious duties whenever a priest came to their help. There is no record of any resident priest here beyond the Ven . George Napier , a son of the house , and later on the Rev. Thomas Kimber, a secular priest , who was son of the resident, being agent to the Nevilles of
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