Cardinal Wolsey

Cardinal Wolsey’s Visit to the Manor Lodge.

On November 8th 1530, the great Cardinal Wolsey, having fallen from grace, was being conducted to imprisonment in London. From Pontefract he travelled to Doncaster and the following day arrived in Sheffield, where he spent the next sixteen to eighteen days in an extremely unhappy state. He was met at the Manor Lodge by George, 4th Earl of Shrewsbury with all courteousness, the scene of which is depicted in one of the Cathedral Chapter House windows. We have a detailed report of the visit, written by George Cavendish, Wolsey’s gentleman usher.

‘And the next day we removed and rode to Sheffield Parke; where my lord of Shrewsbury laye within the lodge, the people all the waye still lamentinge him, cryinge as they did before. And when we came into the Parke at Sheffield, nighe to the Lodge, my Lord Shrewsbury and all other gentlemen and servants, strode without the gates to attend my Lord’s cominge to receave him. At whose alightinge the earle received him with much honour and embraced my Lorde sayinge these words ‘ My Lorde, Your grace is most hartelye welcome unto me, and I ame glade to see you here in my poore lodge, where I have long desired to see you, and muche more gladder if you had come after another sort. And here is my wife come to salute you; This done the two lordes went into the lodge arm in arm and so conducted my Lorde to a faire gallery where was in the furthest end thereof a goodly tower with lodgings where my Lorde was lodged.’

Wolsey and the Earl had daily meetings and long discussions, sitting together on a long bench in the great window of the gallery, regarding the Cardinal’s position and in what way Shrewsbury could exert his influence at court to further his cause with the king, Henry VIII. At dinner on the fifteenth evening, however, he was taken very ill with violent pains in the stomach. The apothecary was called and gave some powder which seemed to ease the pain. That night, however, was most uncomfortable for Wolsey and he spent most of it on the toilet. The physician Dr Nicholas, was called from Sheffield and declared that the patient had a matter of only days to live. At the same time Kingston, the Constable of the Tower, arrived to conduct Wolsey to London. The sick man was bundled onto a donkey. By the second night the party had reached Nottingham and the steadily weakening Wolsey, on reaching Leicester Abbey on the third night, all but fell from the donkey, saying to the Abbott ‘ Father Abbott, I am come to rest my bones with you.