College of St Gregory and St Martin at Wye

The College of St Gregory and St Martin at Wye, commonly known as Wye College, was an education and research institution in the village of Wye, Kent. In 1447, Cardinal John Kempe founded his chantry there which also educated local children. , it still includes a rare, complete example of medieval chantry college buildings.

After abolition in 1545, parts of the chantry buildings were variously occupied as mansion, grammar school and charity school, before purchase by Kent and Surrey County Councils to provide technical education. For over a hundred years Wye became that college of London University most concerned with rural subjects, including agricultural sciences; business management; agriculture; horticulture, and agricultural economics.

Chemist and Actonian Prize winner, Louis Wain developed synthetic auxin selective herbicides 2,4-DB, MCPB, Bromoxynil and Ioxynil at Wye in the 1950s alongside his other research into insecticides, plant growth regulators and fungicides. Wain's colleague Gerald Wibberley championed alternative priorities for the college with an early emphasis on land use and the environment.

Successive phases of expansion developed the college's campus along Olantigh Road and accumulated an estate of nearly . However, following a difficult 2000 merger with Imperial College and controversial 2005 attempt to build 4,000 houses on its farmland, Imperial College at Wye closed in 2009.

, a pioneering postgraduate distance learning programme created at Wye College continued within SOAS. Many of the college buildings have been redeveloped, though some are retained for community use or occasional public access.

History

Chantry

Church leaders from the 14th century onwards had become concerned by the influence of John Wyclif and his fellow lollards in the Weald and Romney Marsh area. They felt priests educated in latin and theology, living in the community, would be better able to counter circulation of heretical translations and interpretation. Where these priests' persuasion failed, the alerted church authorities could punish committed lollards, or even have them burnt as at Wye in 1557. The cost of establishing small chantry colleges was relatively modest and many were instituted in part for this purpose.

Accordingly in 1432, John Kempe, then Archbishop of York and a native of adjoining Olantigh, was granted royal licence by King Henry VI to found the College of Saints Gregory and Martin in the parish of Wye. In 1447 after protracted negotiation, he obtained about an acre of land, including dwellings known as Shalewell, Goldsmyth and Shank, from the Abbot and Convent of Battle who owned the Manor of Wye. Kempe constructed the Latin School, and buildings around a cloistered quadrangle for the accommodation of secular priests. There were up to ten priests at any one time in his chantry. Kempe had also rebuilt adjoining Wye Church in 1447 and Archbishop of Canterbury, John Stafford granted its vicarship to the college. The priests acted as a college of canons for the now collegiate church; performed their chantry duties for the Kempes' souls, and included a teacher of grammar (latin). The master had to be a scholar of theology and member of Kempe's alma mater, Merton College.

Kempe's statutes required the college ''to teach all scholars free, both rich and poor'', though as a welcome seasonal exception the schoolmaster could receive small gifts of fowl and pennies on Saint Nicholas Day, ''confuetam galloram & denariorum Sancti Nicholai gratuitam oblationem''.

The dedication to Saint Gregory and Saint Martin mirrors that of Kempe's adjoining church. An earlier, 1290 Wye Church, on the site, had been solely named for Saint Gregory. The further reference, at both the college and church, to Saint Martin may have been to recognise the contribution of Battle Abbey, itself dedicated to him.

By 1450, Wye College had appropriated the pilgrim's church at Boughton Aluph, and acquired land in Canterbury, Wye, Boughton Aluph, Crundale, Godmersham, Bethersden and Postling. King Edward IV granted it the west Kent coast churches of Newington, Brenzett and Broomhill in 1465.

The statutes of Kempe's chantry were not universally upheld. In 1511, Master Goodhewe was
reported to Archbishop Warham for appointing himself, rather than other fellows, to the College's remunerated positions, and taking the entire benefit of its endowment ''to the neglect of divine service and the cure of souls''. He failed to annually proclaim Kempe's statutes and maintained a relationship with a woman, in breach of them. Goodhewe also found time to be Rector of Staplehurst without papal dispensation to hold two incompatible benefices. He was however not removed from office for his misconduct. By 1534 the college had annual gross income of £125 15s 4d, or over £94,000 at 2022 values.

Other partially surviving chantry colleges near Wye include the larger Maidstone, and smaller Cobham Colleges.

Secular use

The college was surrendered in 1545 under the Abolition of Chantries Act of that year, its assets appropriated for the Court of Augmentations. An inventory was valued at £7 1 s 1 d plus a silver salt at £3; silver spoons at 27s 6d, and two old masters at 6s 8d.

Apart from its principal buildings the college owned nearby Perry Court, and Surrenden manors, together with the rectory and advowson of Broomhill on Romney Marsh. It was entitled to annual payments of 33s 4d from Westwell rectory, 10s from Hothfield rectory and 8s from Eastwell rectory. The college owned other land in Wye, Withersdane, Naccolt, Hinxhill, Godmersham, Crundale, Great Chart, Bethersden, Postling, Westbury and Broomhill.

These properties were alienated first to Catherine Parr's Secretary, Walter Buckler for £200, who promptly sold them in 1546 to his brother in law, and property speculator, Maurice Denys. Following Denys' disgrace the college was acquired by William Damsell in 1553, thence passing on death in 1582 to his four daughters.

As the seized properties passed from the Crown, and onwards, they did so subject to conditions, echoing Kempe's statutes, requiring the owners to ''at all times provide and maintain a sufficient Schoolmaster capable of teaching boys and young lads in the art of Grammar, without fee or reward, in this parish''. Those terms were met haphazardly in the coming years. Sometimes the payment was little more than a sinecure, if it was made at all. In 1557, Archdeacon Harpsfield urged William Damsell be reminded of his obligations. Damsell had only been paying £9 of the £17 due each year, even though his former college lands in Wye alone gave him annual rents of £80. Harpsfield's treatment of Damsell was lenient by comparison to the two Protestants he ordered burnt to death at Wye earlier that year.

The college buildings were occupied as a substantial private residence in 1610 for the Twysden family, incorporating the extant fine Jacobean staircase and imposing fireplaces to the Hall and Parlour.

In about 1626, King Charles I granted the forfeit former Wye College rectories of Boughton Aluph, Brenzett and Newington to reward his loyal supporter Robert Maxwell. The proviso was added Maxwell and his successors paid £16 per year, which reinstated the lapsed stipend for a Wye schoolmaster. Years later the sum would be diminished by inflation and several holders of the position faced short tenure and great financial hardship.

With salary back in place, the following year a grammar school for boys opened in part of the college though the southern range continued to be used as a private house in ownership of the Winchilsea Finch family from Eastwell. Restoration poet Ann Finch and her husband Heneage lived quietly at Wye College from 1690 to 1708 to avoid persecution at Court for their Jacobite sympathies. Several of her works refer directly or indirectly to the college and their time there, including reaction to a chimney fire in 1702.

Wye College's grammar school did not achieve the prominence of rival Eton College though its alumni included notables such as Robert Plot, first keeper of Oxford's Ashmolean Museum. In 1762 there were 40 boarders and 100 day pupils but during other periods considerably less, if any at all.

Cardinal Kempe's nephew Thomas Kempe sold Olantigh to Sir Timothy Thornhills in 1607. The 1708 will of Lady Joanna Thornhill, the daughter of Sir Bevil Grenville, second wife of descendent Richard Thornhill, and Woman of the Bedchamber to Queen Catherine of Braganza provided funds to care for and educate the children of Wye. Her trust purchased the college buildings and other property for that purpose. Sir George Wheler, who some sources claim was Lady Joanna Thornhill's nephew, acquired the private mansion linked to his old school in 1713. The transaction left the college part owned by Lady Thornhill's trust, and on Wheler's death in 1724, part by his. A grammar school operated in the Latin School and buildings around the cloister. The grammar school headmaster received free personal accommodation from Wheler's trust and the £16, but had to pay rent to Thornhill's trust for school space. The Thornhill trust operated its own charity schools for boys and girls in the Old Hall and Parlour respectively. Their schoolmaster received £30 per annum salary and the school mistress £20, from rent on property purchased in Wye and on Romney Marsh.

Wheler's will provided an annual £20 exhibition for boys from Wye Grammar School to attend Lincoln College funded by the rent charge on a house in Whitehall which he owned. Unfortunately by 1790, that charge had become impossible to collect. Its absence was still greatly lamented, nearly a century later, both by Wye Grammar School and Lincoln College.

Trustees of Lady Thornhill's charity school, requiring more space for girls to comply with the ''Elementary Education Act 1870'', converted outbuildings at the south east of the grammar school garden, belonging to Sir George Wheler's Trust, for the purpose. The building with its extant exposed crown post roof consequently became known as the college ''Wheelroom''.

Nevertheless, the situation was poor. An inspector passed the facilities "but with the greatest reluctance". He observed the Old Hall used as boys' schoolroom "though a fine old room, is ill-adapted for a school and requires constant repair", and bemoaned that "as long as they are allowed to use this old room, the inhabitants of Wye will not lift a finger towards the
erection of new schools". His conclusion was that Wye "has about the worst schools in the neighbourhood".

In 1878 the Wheler / Thornhill trusts and operation of the grammar and charity school premises they owned were combined, and two years later the girls' Wheelroom was leased to Wye and Brook School Board for use as an infant school.

South Eastern Agricultural College

Duty imposed upon beer and spirits under the ''Local Taxation (Customs and Excise) Act 1890'', commonly known as ''Whiskey Money'', was intended to compensate licencees in the country required to close. It created an income which Sir Arthur Dyke Acland instead proposed to Parliament be earmarked for County Councils to spend on technical instruction. His amendment, it is reported, was adopted by a ''lethargic and half empty house''.

There were many institutions offering short courses in Agriculture but few opportunities for three year degree courses. The Normal School of Science, shortly to merge and form Imperial College, had only graduated seven agricultural students per year between 1878 and 1887. However, nationally £80,000 per year of the ''Whiskey Money'' was to be specifically allocated towards agricultural education.

The newly combined Thornhill Trust owned its school premises; nearby Amage Farm, and agricultural land on Romney Marsh. An 1891 proposal from the Earl of Winchilsea envisaged this should be the basis of an agricultural college for Kent, Surrey and Sussex, funded by ''Whiskey Money''. Sussex County Council dropped out of the scheme, and the farms were not immediately available, but negotiations took place for Kent County Council and Surrey County Council to purchase the school premises and a lease was arranged for Coldharbour Farm from Erle-Drax's Olantigh Estate. Coldharbour was considered difficult, inhospitable, and a suitable challenge for the college to prove its ability to local farmers.

In 1892, Kent and Surrey County Council obtained the old chantry premises for £1,000, the schools moving elsewhere in the village, and in 1894 opened the South Eastern Agricultural College there. They appointed chemist Alfred Daniel Hall as Principal and he opened with thirteen students. It was then ''the first and only college founded and maintained by public money solely for the benefit of agriculture in England''. At the time, it was compared favourably with state funded French Agricultural Institutes; German Research Institutes; Danish Folk Schools, and American Land Grant Colleges. Daniel Hall's student roll grew to 46 in 1900; 71 in 1902, and 124 in 1913.

Between 1892 and 1894, the existing buildings were extensively refurbished at a cost of £18,000; a lecture theatre (Old Lecture Theatre) was abutted to the Parlour repurposed as a library, and biological laboratory (Lecture Room A) constructed north west of the cloister range. Original accomodation to the south of the cloister housed the principal. A chemistry laboratory was arranged in an existing wooden building, and housekeeping wing formed between the cloister range and Wheelroom to service a refectory in the Old Hall. First floor space north of the cloister, and above the new biological laboratory and housekeeping wing, provided 20 student rooms. Others were to be accommodated in village houses.

Entomologist Frederick Theobald joined the opening college as lecturer in agricultural zoology, and later became vice-principal. His work transitioned what had been a matter of simply collecting insects to the study of damage they did to crops and how to mitigate it. He subsequently spent much of his time curating economic zoology and mosquito collections at the British Museum, and ceased lecturing at Wye from 1920 in favour of agricultural extension. Theobald's research on mosquitos and tropical sanitation earned him international recognition including the Order of Osmanieh and Mary Kingsley Medal. Nevertheless, Theobald remained closely involved with the college, living at Wye Court on Olantigh Road until his death in 1930, his coffin carried from there by former colleagues and students to be buried at Wye Church.

Alfred Daniel Hall moved to Rothamsted in 1902 to embark upon his ''marriage of agriculture and science''. At Wye he was replaced as principal by Malcolm Dunstan.

Hall's exodus was joined by his opening botany lecturer and vice-principal John Percival who moved to the University of Reading and become ''founding father of the faculty of agriculture'' there. Seeds Percival took with him became the nucleus of a native european wheat variety collection eventually numbering over 2,500 varieties in the 1930s.

John Russell had joined the college in 1901 and took over some of Hall's chemistry teaching. He began research into soil microbiology determining that oxygen uptake could be used to measure micro-organism activity in a soil sample. However, he too departed in 1907 taking up an invitation to rejoin Hall at Rothamstead. In 1968, Wye College's Russell Laboratories were named for him.

Former World War II RAF Wing Commander Dunstan Skilbeck was appointed Principal at the end of the war. A "forceful character", he remained in post for 23 years modeling Wye on an Oxford college, establishing and reinforcing traditions such as formal dining and the wearing of academic gowns. He took particular interest in establishing organisations such as the college's archeological society and beagle pack.

Skilbeck was joined by Louis Wain, returning to Wye as head of the two person chemistry department. He had previously been a temporary lecturer between 1937 and 1939. Wain went on to be head of Wye's ARC Plant Growth Substances and Systemic Fungicides Unit, and contributed to agricultural chemistry research at the college for fifty years. Whilst at Wye he developed and patented early synthetic auxin selective herbicides 2,4-DB, MCPB, Bromoxynil and Ioxynil.

Wain was widely regarded as "Wye's unofficial chief scientist" and "ambassador" responsible for much of the college's reputation. His work there also created herbicide Mecoprop

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