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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 September 2015
NOT FAR from Cadiz there is an English property that has remained Catholic for close on five hundred years. Its history goes back to pre-reformation days, indeed to the thirteenth century when the port of Sanlucar de Barrameda was recaptured from the Moors by the Guzman family who later became the Dukes of Medina Sidonia. Strategically Sanlucar was an important port because it was at the mouth of the Guadalquivir and as well as capturing the Seville trade it also commanded the traffic from the Mediterranean to Northern Europe and eventually it was the point of departure for ships leaving for the New World. Among the various nations using the port the English were conspicuous and their merchants were granted various privileges by the Dukes of Medina Sidonia during the fifteenth century. By the early sixteenth century there is evidence of a sizeable colony in the town; in fact the English were the largest single group of foreigners and many English names appear in the baptismal registers as both parents and godparents. At least one of them held high public office in the town. On the accession of Henry VIII to the throne of England, the situation further improved as he abandoned the neutrality of his father and allied himself with Spain against France. So it was that in 1517 a new charter of privileges for the English merchants in Sanlucar was drafted. A grant of land by the river was made so as to provide a chapel and a burial place for Englishmen. The chapel was dedicated to St. George and it was to be looked after by a confraternity. The chaplain was to be appointed by the Bishops of London, Winchester and Exeter, since it was from these dioceses that most of the merchants came. Although there have been rebuildings, this site has remained English ever since.
1 This article is a much expanded account of what is to be found in Williams, M. E., St Albans's College, Valladolid: Four Hundred Years of English Catholic Presence in Spain (1986)Google Scholar Appendix F. Documentation is taken chiefly from the Sanlucar file in the Archives of St. Alban's College. Valladolid. There is eighteenth-century material in the Westminster Archdiocesan Archives (hereafter A.A.W) and nineteenth-century papers are in the Salford Diocesan Archives. Other sources include: C.R.S., 14, pp. 4–6; Owen, Lewis, The Running Register (London, 1626) pp. 69–73;Google Scholar Vaughan, Herbert, Report of the Conditions of the English Catholic Colleges in Italy, Spain and Portugal (Salford, 1876);Google Scholar Kelly, Joseph, ‘San Lucar de Barrameda’, The Albanian, vol. 1 (1912) pp. 43–49,Google Scholar vol. 2 (1912) pp. 47–48; Sir Fisher, Geoffrey, ‘The Brotherhood of St. George at San Lucar de Barrameda’, Atlante, 1 (London, 1953) pp. 31–40;Google Scholar Connell-Smith, G., Forerunners of Drake, (1954);Google Scholar Loomie S. J., A. J., ‘Religion and Elizabethan Commerce in Spain’, Catholic Historical Review. 50 (1964) pp. 27–51;Google Scholar Loomie, ‘Thomas James: the English Consul of Andalusia’, Recusant History, pp. 164–178; Antonia Moreno Ollero Sanldcar de Barrameda a Fines de la Edad Media (Cadiz, 1983).
2 Ollero, pp. 128–130
4 Fisher, p. 35 Fisher, p. 36
5 For Cecil see Anstruther, G., Seminary Priests, 1, pp. 63–68.Google Scholar
6 Loomie, Catholic Historical Review, 50, pp. 41–42. Original documents are in the archives of St. Alban's College, Valladolid, Sanlucar file.
7 Sanlucar file, Valladolid.
8 Henry, Twechbourne S. J. to Thomas, Derbyshire S. J., 2 Feb. 1597 (Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, 1595–7, p. 356)Google Scholar
9 Loomie. Recusant History. 11, pp. 165–178.
10 Thomas, McCoog S. J., ‘The Establishment of the English Province of the Society of Jesus’, Recusant History, 17, pp. 121–139,Google Scholar especially pp. 130–133.
11 English subjects in Cadiz to Cardinal Lante, 9 July 1754 (V.E.C. archives; transcript in Archives of St. Alban's College, Valladolid, Sanlucar file).
12 For Prichard see Anstruther, Seminary Priests, 4, pp. 224–5.
13 C.R.S., 40, pp. 170–1
14 A.A.W., Ep. Var., IX, 62.
15 In a letter to Mayes, the English secular clergy agent in Rome, 4 Nov. 1731, Prichard said he was expressly ordained priest to serve at Sanlucar (A.A.W., IX, 150).
16 A.A.W., XL, 133, 134
17 A.A.W., XXXVIII, 71, 74. For later complaints, in 1735 and 1763, see Williams, op. cit., pp. 55, 57.
18 A.A.W., XL, 135 (13 Oct. 1729)
19 A.A.W., Ep. Var., IX, 139
20 A.A.W., Ep. Var., IX, 62
21 Anstruther, 4, p. 188 for identity of Edward Williams or Matthews.
22 A.A.W., Ep. Var., IX, 139
23 This is despite a letter from them saying his appointment was just and necessary, 8 July 1732; this was forwarded by Prichard to Mayes (A.A.W., XL, 145).
24 A.A.W., XL, 156
25 Birmingham Diocesan Archives, A18 (Prichard to Talbot, 11 Sept. 1744)
26 Anstruther, 4, p. 138–9.
27 Price was appointed by Cardinal Lante 8 Feb. 1747. Letter of 9 July 1754, cited in note 11 above. For Price see Anstruther, 4, pp. 224–5 and 291.
28 A.A.W., XL, 157
29 A.A.W., Ep. Var., IX, 79. A postscript to a letter from Mgr. Ley in Cadiz to Mayes in Rome, 26 May 1739, speaks of Prichard as having an enemy who has harmed him.
30 Letter to Lante (see notes 11 & 27).
31 J. Milner to G. Barnard, President of Lisbon College, 8 April 1763, in Lisbon College Archives, Correspondence (These archives are at Ushaw College, Durham).
32 It would be interesting to discover more about the English and Irish diaspora in Andalusia at this time. There were families like the Dormers who had been in Spain since the late sixteenth century. There were a number of Jacobite sympathisers. Prichard, in one of his absences in Seville, stayed at the house of Lady Carrington, an ardent Jacobite and sister of Lady Nithsdale. Her father was the first Marquis of Powis so perhaps Prichard was following up a Welsh connection. We must remember too that Richard Wall, the former minister of Charles III, retired to Andalusia.
33 Julian Stonor, Stonor (Newport, 1952) pp. 315–7.
34 The period of history that follows is covered mainly by documents at St. Alban's College, Valladolid, the Vaughan Report and documents in the Salford Diocesan Archives. I am grateful to Father David Lannon for drawing my attention to the letters preserved at Salford.
35 Vaughan Report and Kelly in The Albanian.
36 Bishop Griffiths to his Vicar-General, 1 Jan. 1843 (in Bishop Griffiths’ Correspondence, according to a letter from Raymond Stansfield, Westminster Archivist, to Kelly in Valladolid, December 1912)
37 Salford Archives.
38 Mulholland is also referred to in a letter of 4 Feb. 1863 from Mgr. Searle of Westminster with dateline Madrid to Guest, Rector of Valladolid: ‘His Lordship (Bishop Scandella of Gibraltar) thinks Dr. Mulholland's residence is unknown. However I have pretty good authority for believing that he is now in Seville acting as a kind of medical man’.
39 By this time Cuthbert had left Gibraltar and was chaplain to the Convent of Madre De Dios at Jerez.