A Topographical Index of Hiding-Places, II

Abstract

Part I of this Index was published in Recusant History fifteen years ago, in October 1982. It was designed to serve two purposes: as an appendix to an earlier series of articles in Recusant History, in which I had discussed about thirty of the most important houses; and as a preliminary list of additions and corrections to Granville Squiers, Secret Hiding-Places (1933), which had been out of print since the publisher’s warehouse was bombed on the night of 29 December 1940. In 1989 my own book, also entitled Secret Hiding-Places, was published by Veritas; but, in order to allow room for necessary architectural and genealogical material, it only deals with about 180 houses, against 360 in Squiers, and of the 180 only 120 are in Squiers. Even after 1989, therefore, there remained about 240 houses where the hides had not been discussed in print since 1933, together with a number of others which had never been collected at all. Part II of the Index now lists another 123 houses (making a total of 300), of which 83 were in Squiers and 40 not. There are also further details on a few houses which were included in Part I, but these retain their original reference nos. (in square brackets) and so do not affect these statistics. Houses which were not in Index I but are in Hodgetts 1989 are not included here unless there is more to report on them, as with nos. 230, 236 and 239.

Mille Maeandris: Nicholas Owen, 1606–2006

“…But it was demolished in 1814 and must be reconstructed from documents. 5 For hides there are, of course, no architects' 'plats' or building accounts; and no hide-builder scratched his name and the date on his handiwork. Moreover, the first writer who even attempted to combine the two sorts of evidence was Granville Squiers in 1933, and by then both had been badly contaminated.…”