Chapter Three

THE FIRST YEARS
WITH THE conclusion of all these celebrations the Com-
munity at Belmont was at last enabled to settle down to the
normal routine of monastic life, and thenceforth, as in any
religious house, there was little to attract the attention of the
outside world. In the case of St Michael's, in addition to the
all-important occupation of singing or reciting the Divine
Office in the monastic choir, and of carrying out the other
liturgical functions with exactitude and dignity, there was
also the task of training the young men from the various
monasteries in the principles and practice of the religious
life, and of preparing them for their eventual ordination.
Thus a very great responsibility devolved upon the staff, and
unfortunately that staff was neither numerous, nor, at that
time, particularly well-equipped for the task. It was with
difficulty that even so few had been collected together from
the other houses, for those houses were themselves under-
manned, and moreover it was not only difficult to find a
man who was suitable for such a position, but also to get
him released from his own monastery for the purpose of
helping the new monastery. This, in fact, was to prove a
major difficulty for as long as Belmont remained the Com-
mon House of Studies for the Congregation. Nor was the
problem made easier of solution by the fact that quite a
number of the Congregation were not favourably disposed
towards St Michael's and on principle disliked the whole
idea of having a common noviciate and house of studies.
Right from the start, then, the success of this great and
revolutionary experiment was in jeopardy, and the subject
is one which obviously must be here considered.
In general the problem may be presented as being that

48

THE FIRST YEARS 49
as of the attitude of the other monasteries towards St Michael's,
I and in detail it involves four other matters: the expense of
the establishment, the qualities of the studies there, the
provision of the staff of professors, and the length of time the
Juniors of the various houses were to be allowed to stay there.
On all these matters all the successive Priors of Belmont,
without exception, had constant trouble and difficulty, and
their appeals and complaints to the President never ceased.
It is, however, easy to see the view of both sides in all these
matters, for while the very existence of Belmont and the
welfare of the Congregation itself depended on the readiness
of the other monasteries to respond to the demands of St
Michael's, they, for their part, were themselves short of men
and money, and moreover were not seldom sceptical as to
the benefits accruing to them from the existence of the new
house.

There is no need to stress the subject of expense, for
throughout its history the finances at Belmont were in an
extremely precarious state, the successive Priors had to be
constantly begging, and the other houses became more and
more unwilling to help to shoulder the burden. Bishop
Brown did very much for the house, as has been shown, in its
early days, but after the discontinuance of the episcopal
seminary there in 1874 his interest in the place was naturally
less. Had the other houses been convinced that it was worth
their while to maintain Belmont and to part with really good
professors for its sake, matters would have been different,
but they were very far from being so convinced. In fact the
convictions of many were of an opposite nature. Almost any
year could be picked out to illustrate this financial aspect of
the problem. Thus, for example, in 1871, when the Priorship
of Dom Bede Vaughan was drawing to its close there was the
usual acute financial crisis in the house and the Prior reported
that even the capital had been well-nigh all spent, and he
complained that Downside and Ampleforth were not paying
for their men there. This was a perennial complaint: the
defaulting in the payment of the 'pensions' of Juniors and
Novices, so that there was never enough to enable the monks
to do more than live from hand to mouth. 'Were our butcher

50 THE HISTORY OF BELMONT ABBEY

alone, at this moment', wrote the Prior, 'to send in his bill
and demand payment, we should have to hand over to him
every penny in the house, and every shilling in the bank.' In
the very next year the President himself sent £5 of his own to
help to meet the Belmont expenses, and Prior Vaughan in
thanking him asked very pertinently what 'our two rich
houses are doing' that it should be necessary for the President
to do this. He himself had collected .£'5,000 by begging during
his Priorship.

All this was in itself a serious enough difficulty for the
struggling house, but the position was aggravated by the
difficulty in obtaining satisfactory professors. The other
houses were, perhaps naturally, but yet short-sightedly,
unwilling to send really valuable men to Belmont as they
did not wish to lose their services, and it was only through the
persistent and strenuous efforts of the Prior that such men
were ever sent, and there was very seldom sufficient staff at
St Michael's. Consequently, those holding the various
offices at Belmont being too few, they were invariably over-
worked. On his appointment as Prior in 1862, Dom Bede
Vaughan at once complained of this shortage of officials,
and in 1873 when Prior Raynal was appointed, he, too, at
once made a protest on this point and said it seemed to be
impossible to get the other monasteries to see that they must
make sacrifices of men to act as professors at Belmont since
their own future prosperity depended on it. Of course, from
time to time, there were a few outstanding men on the staff,
and at one stage of his Priorship Fr Bede Vaughan had the
assistance of such men as Frs Gillett, Raynal and Hedley: a
notable trio. Fr Gillett was the soul of loyalty to the Prior
and a steadying influence in the house; while Fr Hedley's
services over a long period of years were invaluable, especially
in the intellectual sphere. He was ever at the disposal of the
Juniors, and was ready for illuminating discussions with
them, took them for long country walks during which he
always managed to impart useful information, and by his
lectures in class greatly stimulated their intellects. As for Fr
Raynal, both as professor and later, for twenty-eight years,
as Prior, Belmont owes an inestimable debt to him.

THE FIRST YEARS 51

Yet there were constant complaints about the low standard
of studies at St Michael's, and this was due not only to the
shortage of professors, but also to the fact that the Juniors
were frequently recalled to their own monasteries much too
soon. In brief they were set to teaching the boys in their own
monasteries when they should have been at their own studies
at Belmont. Here was another perennial problem, and one
that was to afflict Belmont for generations to come. As early
as 1864 it was set out in plain terms by Fr Cockshoot in a
letter to the President:

'Your position is one of the greatest possible difficulty and
delicacy, for the conflicting principles or practice of the New
School and the old one are now in collision in one at least of our
monasteries. The principle of the new school represented at St
Michael's is to give the young men a true view of the religious
and sacerdotal states and to train them individually for their
high vocation. But what is the practice as now described to you
in one at least of our monasteries ? It is to neglect their training
and their studies, and employ them in the school, on the old
principle of "Keep them down and make them teach".
'It is quite evident that the translation of young men from one
house to the other before they are irrevocably bound to their
state is too great a trial, and will prove fatal to some of the most
sincere and earnest of them: and no blame to them. You will
remember that we nearly broke our hearts when some of the
most promising young men who ever offered themselves to the
Congregation were summarily called away by Prior Smith (of
Downside), heedless of the opinions of those who were training
them and who knew them best. You have not been supported by
all the Superiors of the Congregation, who, as is natural, act
according to their own immediate wants rather than for the
welfare of the young men. . . .

'In the year 1846 I wished the General Chapter to prohibit
Priors from employing any young religious in teaching and
studying theology at the same time, but did not succeed. I took the
idea from Ushaw where the principle acted well. Has the time
now come for its introduction amongst us? The effect would be
with us, as at Ushaw and elsewhere, that the masters would be
fewer in number and more efficient, and each religious would
have a course of theology. The same is the practice at Stony-
hurst.'

Five years later Bishop Brown made strong complaints
that the Juniors were not kept at Belmont for three years
after taking simple vows, and Prior Vaughan agreed with
52 THE HISTORY OF BELMONT ABBEY
him, saying that he believed Belmont was a failure as
regards making the Congregation more learned or more
monastic. Schoolboys, he said, cannot be turned into solid
religious men in four years, fit for the mission, and he con-
sidered it disgraceful that whereas the Constitutions order
seven years training they were only getting three. Cardinal
Rinaldini had told him in Rome that the most ignorant
Order and priest in Rome (one who is merely allowed to say
Mass) gets seven years training. But Fr Romuald Woods took
the opposite view, saying that the studies at St Michael's
were far better than those at Ampleforth where he had spent
eighteen years.

It would indeed be surprising if the studies at Belmont
were not of a high standard since the Professors could be
chosen from the whole Congregation and not merely from
one house (which was one of the chief arguments in favour of
having a Common House of Studies), but in practice this
advantage was often discounted by the unwillingness of the
Priors to spare their best men. and by the premature removal
of Juniors. The Priors of the other houses were constantly
crying out for their Juniors to be returned to them as they
were needed in the colleges, and they would not accept the
Belmont Prior's refusal, but appealed frequently to the
President. It was a difficult situation for all. And a further
criticism of the staff at Belmont was that they insisted on too
much manual labour by the novices and juniors. This view
was, for instance, expressed by the influential Fr Allanson,
Provincial of York, who believed that time was thus frittered
away at the expense of the studies.
'Manual labour', he wrote, 'will not improve our young men
and prepare them for the mission. This is not the way to make
Belmont a success. It may be the way to make good illiterate
monks; but we Provincials want more; we want able and learned
ecclesiastics.'
Yet during that same year (1863) Bishop Ullathorne wrote
to the President in quite the opposite sense. He gave great
praise to St Michael's, and said: 'The discipline is as good
as I have seen in any religious house'; and he added that the
manual labour was an element of great importance as

THE FIRST YEARS 53
'developing a sense and habit of the practical'. He cited the
example of the learned Maurists who had two hours of
manual labour every day; and he emphasised the importance
of stability within the monastery, saying that the call to the
Mission is not a necessary result of Profession, nor is even the
Priesthood.
It will be seen, then, that there were many problems, both
practical and theoretical, facing the new community, and
some of them were not solved for very many years to come
if at all. One of them, indeed, and that the most important of
all, has never been entirely resolved: whether the Congrega-
tion should have a common noviciate and/or house of studies
at all, and strong opinions have never ceased to be expressed
both for and against such a plan.1 Many continued to hold
throughout that the whole idea was unwise and undesirable,
and that Belmont in particular was unsatisfactory even if the
principle were sound. Others lament, even at the present
day, the passing of the common noviciate, and still more so
that of the house of studies. Thirty years after the foundation
of the monastery it was denied by some that either the in-
tellectual or the missionary efficiency of those turned out by
it was any better than that of previous generations, and it was
argued that not only had St Michael's ruined the health of
many, but that also it had fostered unrest and disharmony
inside the other monasteries by breaking with old traditions,
and leading the young monks trained there to criticise their
seniors. The best that one well-known monk could suggest in
1889 for its future was that it should 'become a Priory, a
residence for the President General, for the Provincial of the
South Province, for one or more of the Regimen, a house of
retreat, and a Sanatorium for superannuated and invalided
Fathers'! Others on the contrary thought that it promoted
union, by giving all the same training and ideals and
making possible contact between members of different
monasteries. It is this very lack of contact in recent years
that has been lamented by many. But this matter will be
considered further when the changes brought about during

1 See the letter by Bishop Brown (1858) on pp. 36 sqq., supra.

THE HISTORY OF BELMONT ABBEY
the early years of the present century are being considered.1
It need but be added here that many held a much more
favourable view of the results of a Belmont training in those
days, and of its influence on the Congregation. Thus, Abbot
Cummins, who was himself a novice and junior there in the
sixties' of the last century, summed it up in these words:
'Belmont in those years (i.e. under the Priorship of Dom Bede
afforded the nearest approach to University advantages
then possible to English Benedictines, and as a substitute it was
far from inefficient. It gradually raised the genera standard of
study it provided a four years' course undistracted by other
occupations, it brought men into contact with the other Houses
and their traditions, and it laid solid foundations of monastic
observance and interest; in all these and other ways the Reform or Revival then spreading through the Benedictine
world.'
He admits, however, that 'Reform, and some of its manifesta-
tions were not universally acceptable. There was a pouring
of new wine into old bottles that led to some breaking of
glass: with consequent minor injuries!'
Unhappily the conflict of opinion in the Congregation at
large in these very early years as to the value or otherwise of
the new monastery, was reflected by discords within St
Michael's itself, though this was due less to matters of theory
than to incompatabilities of temperament amongst the staff.
And so it is not surprising, especially when we recall also the
extreme austerity of the life at Belmont in those days which
broke down the health of some, that the combined strain,
psychological and physical, before long brought about the
breaking up of the original staff. In fact within three years
all but one had gone. The exception was the Novice Master,
Fr Alphonsus Morrall, but he only lasted a further two years.
One of the first to go was Fr Anselm Gockshoot, the Pro-
curator, who had done such valuable work in supervising
the building of the monastery. But everyone found him
difficult to work with, and he was thought to be slow in
getting the domestic arrangements into working order. He
became chaplain at Bartestree Convent and died there nine
years later. Similarly Fr Lawrence Shepherd became

1 See pp. 113 sq., infra, and pp. 123 sq. See also p. 166.

THE FIRST YEARS 55
chaplain at Stanbrook, where he remained for very many
years and was greatly esteemed by the nuns. The other two,
Frs Benedict Scarisbrick and Benedict Blount left in 1861,
and in the following year the Prior himself gave up the
struggle. He said that he felt that a stronger character was
needed to cope with the internal difficulties. He spent the
rest of his life on the mission at Bath, and eventually became
Abbot ofSt Alban's, dying in 1883.

He was succeeded as Prior of St Michael's and Provost of
the Cathedral Chapter by the young and enthusiastic and
very able Dom Bede Vaughan, who had joined the Belmont
staff in the previous year as Professor of Theology. It is a
striking fact that when appointed Superior he was only
twenty-eight years old, and had been only eight years
professed,2 for he was born at Courtfield in 1834 and was
professed at Downside in 1854. He was, of course, a brother
of the future Cardinal Vaughan, and of Dom Jerome
Vaughan, the founder of Fort Augustus. Fr Bede was to rule
Belmont for eleven years, after which he had a very dis-
tinguished career in Australia, whither he went in 1873 as
Coadjutor to Archbishop Folding, O.S.B., of Sydney. Four
years later he succeeded to the Archbishop as Metropolitan
of Australia, but after only six years in this exalted position
he died very suddenly while on a visit to England in 1883,
and was buried at Belmont, whence his body was translated
to Sydney in 1946.

Prior Vaughan was eager to push ahead the 'monastic
reform' for which Belmont largely stood, and to ensure that
when the young men went back to their own Houses they
carried the new spirit with them,. He was helped in this object
by having the good fortune to be able to recruit two most
valuable new members to his staff; for within a month of the
new Prior's appointment there arrived Dom Wilfrid Raynal,
who was to remain at Belmont for the next thirty-nine years
(most of that time as Superior), and who came to personify
the spirit of Belmont; while two months later came the even
better-known Dom Cuthbert Hedley, the future Bishop of

1 Later Bishop of Port Louis, and eventually titular Archbishop of Cizyca.
' On this account a dispensation had to be procured for him.
56 THE HISTORY OF BELMONT ABBEY

Newport and Menevia. Both these able men were young
when appointed to the teaching staff at St Michaels for
Ravnal was thirty-two, while Hedley was only twenty-five
With the Prior, as already stated, only twenty-eight, youth
wa indeed at the helm of St Michael's in those days The
fact that Wilfrid Raynal was born in Mauritius of French
parents and had had little experience of English ways and
thought, handicapped him all his life, for he never really 
understood the mentality of his young subjects at Belmont
He had also gone straight from the school at Downside into
the cloister, and had been a priest only three years when he
came to Belmont. These facts go far to explain some of his
characteristics, of which more later.
His colleague, Cuthbert Hedley of Ampleforth, was seven
year younger, having been born in 1837. He also had been
I priest only three years on his arrival at Belmont, and
whereas Racial was appointed to teach Scripture and
Canon Law, the younger man was librarian prefect of
studies and professor of philosophy. It was during his years
at Belmont that Fr Hedley wrote the stream of articles for
the Dublin Review (of which he later became editor for
years) which brought him fame as a thinker writer and
Seoloeian. The arrival of these two men greatly raised the
Standard of studies at St Michael's, and the Juniors of those
days were fortunate to have two such teachers Indeed, under
the enlightened and prudent rule of Prior Vaughan, who
knew al so how to delegate authority and never held the reins
too tightly, the Common House of Studies may be said to
have experienced its golden age.
This point, the beginning of the rule of a new Priors a
convenient stage at which to record some of the structural
changes that were introduced in the first few years of the
monastery's existence. At the time of the opening of the house
the refectory was not yet complete. It had in fact  yet no
a floor and it was not until June 26, 1860 that it was
finished and opened for use, and by then it had been
furnished with refectory tables bought at the sale of the
goods of Prior Park College. All the land on which the
Monastery is built had, of course, been thickly wooded, and

THE FIRST YEARS 57
when part of the floor of the refectory was taken up in 1907
during the laying of the hot-water pipes, the old oak stumps
were to be seen still in position. Above the refectory was the
library, but the weight of the books proved too much for the
floor beams, so the library was dispersed into various odd
rooms until 1890, and the noviciate was established in its
place over the refectory from 1870 to 1916. The library was
subsequently housed in the new east wing, which was
intended as its permanent home, but since then it has in
recent years endured several successive transplantings owing
to that wing being taken over by the school, and in the course
of its wanderings shed not a few of its volumes. But to return
to the first years of the house, in 1862 was built the Abbey
Lodge, which was constructed for John Hogan, a young man
who came from Downside with Prior Sweeney to act as
coachman and extern servant. Although he could neither
read nor write, he did most of the business with the trades-
men of Hereford for forty years, and was never known to
forget a message. He was succeeded by his son-in-law James
Lewis, known to generations of monks at Belmont as
'Jim', who worked for the monastery for more than fifty-five
years.1 '

Another addition to the buildings in 1862 was St Bene-
dict's Chapel, which was opened on November 13, the Feast
of All Benedictine Saints. This addition was chiefly due to the
zeal of Dom Alphonsus Morrall who had collected £1,000
for the purpose. The chapel was set apart for the devotions
of the novices, and was so used until 1915, but the altar was
not built until several years after the chapel was opened. In
the following year (1863), as the only road that could be
used by the laity attending the church ran along the front
of the monastery, another road was made around the back,
and therefore the church porch, which then stood where is
now the side-altar in the nave, was moved from the south
side of the church to the north side; and two years later
there was built on the old site of the porch the chapel of St
Anthony of Padua, given by Madame de Paiva in memory
of her husband, and dedicated to the Most Pure Heart of

1 He died on January 8, 1940.

 THE HISTORY OF BELMONT ABBEY
Mary and St Anthony on July 25, 1865, by Bishop Brown.

But the most important structural alteration in the time
of Bede Vaughan's Priorship was the building of the new
Sanctuary. It had long been clear that the makeshift
arrangement in use hitherto could not give adequate space
for the full and dignified ritual of the liturgy, and so in 1865
the east wall was once more taken down and re-erected (for
the fourth time) twenty-five feet further eastward, while at
the same time the side-walls were set back four feet, the
whole roof of the choir was taken off and replaced eight feet
higher, and the dormers were correspondingly raised. this
enabled the architect (Edward Pugin) to place a string
course along the line of the former wall-plate. The two pillars
in the new sanctuary were composed of alternate blocks of
Bath stone and brown marble, but these were all painted a
stone-colour in 1931. The marble altar, to which Mr Wegg-
Prosser added the reredos (representing the angelic choirs
in orchestral worship, as described in Ps. 150), was recon-
secrated in its new site on Christmas Eve, 1865. The total
cost of this reconstruction, which was born entirely by Mr
Wegg-Prosser, was £2,000, while the reredos cost £250. The
formal opening of the new sanctuary was deferred until
September 4, 1866, when Archbishop Manning was present
and preached. The furnishing of the choir and sanctuary
was provided by private subscription, and Bishop Brown
gave £50 for the episcopal throne and canopy which was in
use until the monastery became an Abbey in 1920, when it
was remodelled. In the old choir there had been but one stall
on each side, and as these had now to be removed to the
head of the new choir, friends of the bishop subscribed £100
for the completion of the stalls and the seats in front of them
In front were a number of planks laid on iron tripods which
served (somewhat precariously) to rest the arms of those in
the front seats. .

This new and spacious sanctuary gave occasion to Bishop
Brown to make a special point of the full and exact obser-
 

1 In the summer of 1954 this altar was considerably remodelled by Abbot
Alphege Gleeson and became the Memorial Altar', in memory of those
Old Boys who fell in the war of 1939-1945

THE FIRST YEARS 59
vance of all the liturgical services, so that for many years St
Michael's was an exemplar for the whole country of how the
liturgy should be carried out. Another addition at this time
was the pulpit which greatly improved the appearance of
the church. It was large enough for the Bishop to be able to
preach to his people attended by his ministers.1
In passing it may be noticed that it was at this time that
St Michael's experienced the first of the two earthquakes
that have occurred here during the past hundred years. This
happened on October 6, 1863, in the early hours of the
morning, about 3 a.m., and though by no means so serious
as that of 1896, it was yet described as being 'rather severe ,
and two heavy stone crosses were shaken down from the
gables of the side-chapels of the church. What seems now a
curious side-light on the spirit of those times is the fact that
in this same year the Sisters of Charity at Hereford were
stoned in the streets by Protestants, and that at Belmont it
was found necessary to station a policeman outside the
Priory church during Vespers on Sundays to prevent brawlers
from Hereford from making a disturbance and molesting
those Catholics who attended the church. And in this con-
nection it may be mentioned that Mr Wegg-Prosser, who
took his duties as a magistrate very seriously, always made a
point of not being present at the clothing or profession of
the monks, such superstitious practices being still proscribed
by the law. The non-Catholic attitude has changed since
those days, but whether the modem spirit of indifference is
an improvement on the earlier active hostility is a moot
point.

1 This was removed by Abbot Alphege Gleeson in 1954.