Strongholds of Catholic Recusancy in Oxfordshire

An article written in 2004 for Oxfordshire Family Historian

During the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, those who resolutely refused to attend Anglican church services were known as recusants. Most were Roman Catholics. Despite draconian legislation, Roman Catholicism survived in England because of a deliberate national strategy, formulated near the Oxfordshire/Buckinghamshire border.

In July 1586, a secret conference at Harleyford Manor, a few miles down the Thames from Henley, determined that priests would be based in the homes of the recusant gentry. A network of Catholic missions based in manor houses would keep an ember of the ‘Old Faith’ glowing, in the hope that at some time in the future, the situation might improve.

Harbouring a priest could incur the death penalty and merely being a priest constituted high treason. Nonetheless, the Harleyford strategy worked well in several parts of Oxfordshire. Various factors contributed to this:

1. Recusancy among the gentry was relatively strong, especially in the south Oxfordshire Chilterns, along the Thames between Henley and Oxford, and in parts of north Oxfordshire.
2. Most conforming gentry did not invoke anti-Catholic legislation against their recusant neighbours, who were not only their peers but also often their relatives.
3. Until the reign of Charles I, there was a steady supply of local martyrs to provide spiritual inspiration: Sir Adrian FORTESCUE, Fr Edmund CAMPION, Thomas BELSON, Fr George NAPPER (NAPIER) and many more.
4. The presence of the STONOR family, based at Stonor House near Henley-on-Thames provided a strong focus for respectable recusancy, generally untainted by connections with extremist plots against the Crown. The martyred Sir Adrian FORTESCUE was a kinsman of the STONORS and Fr CAMPION’S secret printing press was at Stonor.

Hence, after two centuries of repression, when Roman Catholicism was at its lowest ebb in England, there were still about 750 RCs known to the authorities in Oxfordshire. The Catholic Relief Act of 1778 put a formal end to the prosecution of priests by informers and allowed RCs legally to purchase and inherit land. Thirteen years later, a second act re-opened the professions to RCs and permitted the legalisation of Catholic chapels.

The government’s 1767 Returns of Papists was a census of Catholics, long before a similar level of detail was sought for the population as a whole. Although the Oxfordshire entries follow the official instruction not to record names, they provide a fascinating snapshot of Catholic demographics. In most cases, the age, sex, rank, occupation and length of residence is given. It is sometimes possible to deduce who certain individuals were, especially if they were gentry.

During the recusancy period, RCs could not officially be buried in Anglican churchyards. In practice, recusant gentry were still interred in family vaults and commemorated by memorials in parish churches. A good example is the Catholic-owned Bardolph aisle in Mapledurham’s parish church. Lesser mortals would be buried in the churchyard at night, usually with a blind eye turned by the authorities. In the absence of civil registration, RCs often had their children baptised by the vicar as well as by the clandestine Catholic priest. Similarly, even when the law did not require an Anglican wedding, RCs might undergo one to provide confirmation of legitimacy.

Occasional conformity to the Church of England was practised by some RCs (particularly the male heads of families) as a means of sheltering themselves and their families from fines, sequestration and worse. The term ‘Church Papist’ was used to describe those who outwardly fully conformed to Anglicanism but who were secretly convinced Roman Catholics.

Let us now look closer at some of old Oxfordshire’s bigger and more enduring recusant enclaves:

SOULDERN & TUSMORE CLUSTER
(DEDDINGTON, SOULDERN, SOMERTON, FRITWELL, TUSMORE, HARDWICK, HETHE, GODINGTON)
These more or less contiguous parishes in the north of the county had, according to the government’s Returns of Papists of 1767, a combined RC population of about 170. The dominant Catholic gentry family here was FERMOR. They had a chapel at Hethe House, Tusmore (1612 to 1828), which was served at least some of the time by Jesuits. The FERMORS had another chapel at Somerton. The DAY family had a chapel at Hardwick Manor Farm from 1768 to 1830. At Souldern House, recusant families included STUTSBURY and WEEDON. The chapel there closed in 1781. At Fritwell the LONGUEVILLE family had a chapel, which closed in 1729.

KIDDINGTON & HEYTHROP CLUSTER
(ENSTONE, HEYTHROP, THE TEWS, CHIPPING NORTON, KIDDINGTON)
This cluster of parishes lies only a few miles west of the Souldern & Tusmore cluster. The BROWNE (later BROWNE-MOSTYN) family had a chapel at Kiddington, served by Jesuits and later Benedictines, from the 17th century until 1825. At Heythrop, from 1717, the dominant RC family was TALBOT (Earls of Shrewsbury). The combined RC population of this cluster in 1767 was 126.

BRIZE NORTON
The GREENWOOD family had a domestic chapel, served by Benedictines, which closed in 1769. Two years earlier, according to government figures, there were 25 RCs in the parish. Via Tadpole Bridge, there was easy communication between the recusants of Brize Norton and those of Buckland in Berkshire, with only one other parish (Bampton) between them.

WATERPERRY
This was the home of the CURSON family, whose domestic chapel was served primarily by Jesuits. There were 32 RCs in the parish in 1767. This mission is the ‘ancestor’ of the present Oxford Oratory Church (St Aloysius) in Woodstock Road.

STONOR CLUSTER
(BRITWELL, GREAT HASELEY, PYRTON, SHIRBURN, WATLINGTON, PISHILL, SWYNCOMBE, ROTHERFIELD PEPPARD)
The STONOR family of Stonor Park dominated this cluster. They were one of the most influential Catholic families in England throughout the recusancy period and thereafter. The chapel at Stonor House is unusual in that it still operates under a pre-Reformation papal licence. Watlington Park, where there was another chapel, was home of the clandestine Bishop STONOR in the 18th century. Another STONOR residence was Blounts Court in Rotherfield Peppard. At Hazeley Court, home of the HUDDLESTON and WOLFE families, there was a chapel, which closed in 1768. An RC branch of the SIMEON family held the manor at Britwell Prior, a detached part of Newington parish, which later passed to the WELD family of Lulworth, Dorset. The SIMEONS had Jesuit chaplains. The 1767 ‘census’ of Catholics shows the baronet, his chaplain and 13 other RCs at Britwell Prior and eight others nearby in Britwell Salome. At Swyncombe lived an RC branch of the FETTIPLACE family until the early 18th century. This cluster of parishes had a Catholic population of nearly 140 in 1767.

THE THAMESIDE STRING
(SHIPLAKE, MAPLEDURHAM, CHECKENDON, DORCHESTER, SANDFORD)
The Thames was the major route between Oxford and London. There was a string of Catholic houses along the Oxfordshire bank, of which those in the above parishes were the most enduring. Shiplake Court was a home of the PLOWDEN family until sold in the aftermath of the ‘Glorious Revolution’. Mapledurham, home of the BLOUNT family, remains a Catholic house to this day. It was served by Jesuits and later by Franciscans and, in 1767, had an RC population of 29. The HILDESLEY family owned a Thameside manor at Littlestoke in Checkendon parish. Whereas most RC enclaves were based in gentry homes, the Catholic survival around Dorchester was primarily due to the loyalty of several local yeoman families. Chief among these was the DAVEY family, who had a chapel at Overy. There were 19 RCs in Dorchester in 1767. The POWELL family lived at Sandford until 1760, by which time the male line had failed.

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The above listing is by no means exhaustive but highlights most of the major RC recusant clusters in Oxfordshire. (For coverage of those parts of the present county that were formerly in Berkshire, see my article at http://www.berksfhs.org.uk/journal/Sep2002/CatholicRecusancyInBerkshire.htm) Although we know most about the gentry families on whom recusancy depended, there is increasing interest in recusants of lower rank whose names are harder to trace. Apart from servants and estate workers, these included the relatively independent self-employed, such as innkeepers, shoemakers, paper makers, wig makers, tailors and blacksmiths. The ‘census’ of 1767 gives an all too rare insight into these people and their families, even if it is left to us to work out what their names were.

© Tony Hadland, 2004 (revised 2022)

Principal Sources
Hadland, T. Thames Valley Papists (revised edition), Mapledurham Trust, 2004.
Gandy, M. Catholic Missions and Registers, Volume 2, Gandy, 1993.
Worrall, E.S. (ed.) Returns of Papists 1767, Volume 2, Catholic Record Society, 1989.