case study 1 Chapel of the Free School, ,

1617 Private school chapel, no longer in use as a chapel Architect unknown

Historical note

The Free School of Shrewsbury was established in 1552 by a charter granted by Edward VI. The school, called Libera Scola Grammaticalis Regis Edvadri Sexti in the charter, was founded by Adam Jones. However, many impediments, includ- ing epidemic diseases, lack of financial resources, and, last but not least, the en- thronement of the Roman Catholic Queen Mary were obstacles to the school’s taking actual shape. From 1561 onwards Shrewsbury school gained importance under the mastership of the Calvinist Thomas Ashton. Having achieved a repu- tation for excellence under Ashton, in 1571 the school was augmented by Queen .1 New buildings were provided in a long campaign running from the 1590s until the 1630s. The works started with the construction of a library in 1595. In 1617 the library was turned into a chapel and consecrated. Until then, services had been celebrated in a side chapel of St Mary Shrewsbury. In 1630 new buildings in stone were constructed on the site of Castle Gates. The stone buildings, including a new chapel, dormitories, and classrooms were used until the relocation of the school in 1882. The 1617 refurbishment of the school’s library into a chapel necessitated no major architectural interventions. The lower floor of the library was provided with a chancel screen, an altar and a pulpit.2 The chapel no longer exists, but W. Radclyffe gives a description of its interior in his school memorials (1843):

1 Martin E. Speight, “Ashton, Thomas (d. 1578), headmaster,” in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography Online (2004), doi: doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/780. For the history of the school see also: Alfred Rimmer, A History of Shrewsbury School from the Blakeway Mss and Many other Sources (Shrewsbury: Adnitt and Naunton, The Square, 1899). William L. Collins, The Public Schools. Winchester—Westminster—Shrewsbury—Harrow—Rugby. Notes of their History and Traditions (London: Blackwood and sons, 1867). Beryl Copsey, “Read All About It! Grand Opening of Shrewsbury’s free library 100 years ago,” in The Shropshire Magazine, (1985). 2 M. Morrogh, archivist, Shrewsbury School, e-mail: November 17, 2007. A.T. Gaydon, ed., The Victoria County History, A History of Shropshire (London: The University of London Institute of Historical Research, 1973), vol. 2, 154–8.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, 2019 | doi:10.1163/9789004398979_011 268 case study 1

The chapel was begun in 1595. Some years after, it was furnished with the carved pulpit, the Bible desk and the Scholars’ benches, all of the same dark oak. An oak screen divides the building into a chapel and an antechapel. The screen is open at the top, in a series of compartments formed by small Corinthian pillars, from which rise semicircular arches, intersecting one another. In front of the screen, on each side of its door- way, (from which a pair of handsome doors have been removed) are now some plain oak pews for the masters. The two corners between these pews and the entrance of the screen, have seats for two scholars of the week, who used to go from them to the Bible desk, in order to read the first and second lessons. The pews at the other end of the chapel are more recent. And still later, the window at this end has been blanked up, and an Altarpiece erected of wood, painted oak. At the back of the Antechapel is a raised seat, composed of one long bench, with a boldly carved open front of dark oak, probably intended for strangers, many of whom attend- ed here at an earlier period.3

The exterior architecture was part of the bigger school project and was built in the contemporary late sixteenth-century Tudor Gothic with plain classicizing elements.

Sermon

Sermon title: The beauty of holines: or The consecration of a house of prayer, by the example of our Sauiour A sermon preached in the chappell at the free- schoole in Shrewsbury. the 10. day of September, Anno Dom. 1617. At the conse- cration of the chappell, by the Right Reuerend Father in God, the Lord Bishop of Couentrey and . By Sampson Price, Doctor in Diuinity, and chaple- ine in ordinary to his Maiesty.

Imprint: London: Imprinted by Bernard: Alsop: for Richard Meighen, and are to be solde at his shop neere S. Clements Church without Temple-Barre, 1618.

Author: Sampson Price (1585/6–1630)

3 Charles W. Radclyffe, Memorials of Shrewsbury School With Views of Interesting Features of the School as well as Some of the Town and Neighbourhood (Shrewsbury: Sandford and Howell, 1843), unpaginated.