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Earlier this year, in the Winter Newsletter, Clarel Hall was
featured with details taken from the
Northern Star or Yorkshire
Magazine. The Friary featured in the same publication,
November 1817 issue. The building's subsidiary name 'Clarel
Monastery' underlines the link between the Clarel family and the
Friary. Nearly 300 years after the Friary was dissolved various
details of the original building were noted in the
Northern Star:
Several parts of this structure still remain, which
are interesting to the antiquary; the present back-kitchen
contains arches, columns, capitals of the refectory; - the
northern porch has over a window in it a shield of arms…The
chapel is now converted into a stable, but its western entrance
is still perfect…
Tom Beastall's book has a history of the Friary on pages 54-9
and 82-3, while the Phototopics section of the Society's website
also has a brief history of the Friary. Additional information
can be found in A history
of the County of York,
Vol. 3 (1974) which is included in the British History Online
website: <http://www.british-history.ac.uk>. For example, when
the friars gave up their land and property on 19 November 1538,
their house contents were sold for £5/1/8. Just under half this
amount was given to the remaining eight friars, about 6/- each.
The friars did not benefit from their land and property holdings
at the time of dissolution which had brought in an annual rent
of £8/6/2 from 57 acres of land in Tickhill, a cottage in
Westgate and 'very considerable property' in Newton on Derwent.
Various families took over ownership of the Friary, one being
the Gladwin family in the 17th Century. George Gladwin of the
Friary married Jane Laughton on 8 April 1684. The following
January, on the same day, the 27th, George's wife, age 21, died
as a result of childbirth, was buried in what was formerly known
as the Laughton Chapel in St Mary's and their daughter, also
called Jane, was baptised. George Gladwin died in 1692 but his
daughter survived to adulthood and married William Backhouse in
1708. In the 18th Century the Hawksworths, yeomen famers,
occupied the Friary, their status recognised as leading citizens
of Tickhill by one of them serving as churchwarden. In 1817 the
Friary was the property of the Revd William Battle who had
married into the Hawksworth family.
Later occupants of the Friary included the Leather family who
had moved to Tickhill in the late 1870s. In the 1881 Census
Frederick and Gertrude Leather are listed with five children,
whose ages ranged from 16 to 1, and had 8 servants. The family
moved away in the 1880s before returning after Frederick's death in 1890.
They took a leading part in local life from 1899 (at the Church
Bazaar in that year, for example), often being mentioned in
Parish Magazines in the Edwardian period. Another family, the
Flathers, bought the Friary in 1949 from Ken Lampson who in turn
had bought the Friary after the War following the building's
occupation by the military. Geoffrey Flather came from a
distinguished family of 'steel men' and served as Master Cutler
during 1951-52, the second member of his family to hold this
post in the 20th Century.
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