On this day … 1 December 1860

The Preston Chronicle carried a report of the discovery of the foundations of an old building by a workman working on land next to St Walburge’s Church on the Maudlands. This was the site of the former hospital of St Mary Magdalene, already in ruins at the time of the dissolution of Catholic monasteries and other religious institutions in the early sixteenth century.

Work at the site three weeks earlier had already uncovered more of the foundations and a skeleton. That is the extent of discoveries to date, with history and finds summarised in the Preston Historic Town Survey in 2006 as follows:

‘… little is known about the leper hospital of St Mary Magdalen, founded near the site of the former abbey at Tulketh in the second half of the twelfth century. The rule by which the warden and lepers lived is unknown, and its chapel was served by mostly absentee priests, who had offices elsewhere. Most of its known history relates to appointments to the chaplaincy, but little is known of the development of the buildings.

‘The area of the hospital was preserved in the later name of Maudlands, but the extent of the hospital grounds are unknown, as little remained by the early nineteenth century. Indeed, by the time of the Dissolution, the building was open at both ends and in ruins. Although Whittle [the Preston historian] described it as a splendid gothic magnificence in 1835, this was an undoubted exaggeration, whilst Baines’s description of a small collegiate building with a chapel attached is likely to be more accurate.’

When the Chronicle reported the nineteenth-century finds, it was hopeful of a more extensive excavation, regretting that so little interest had so far been shown in the discoveries and urging swift action since: ‘Should this now be neglected, such an opportunity may not again occur, as the site once occupied by the hospital is destined soon to be covered with other buildings.’

The Chronicle report provides more detail than can be found in later reports:

‘The foundations lately bared are only about a foot or eighteen inches below the surface of the land. They are formed mainly of scantlings of the stone known as the new red sand stone which is found in the bed of our river. A curious question arises, out of what part of the river was the stone taken? Did the old “Stone Delph” at Avenham [just downstream of the Tram Bridge] contribute the material for the hospital as well as for the old Parish Church?

‘The foundations yet bared are only a few yards in length. They are three feet in width and to a portion of the wall there are attached the foundations of a buttress running out three feet six inches in length from the wall, and about two feet six inches wide. Among the foundations are some stones of larger size bearing the marks of the tools with which they have been wrought.

‘There have also been turned up some sculptured stones, that have formed a portion of the upper part of the erection. One of these is a good specimen of Norman architecture with the common dog-tooth or nail-head moulding upon it, and has evidently formed a portion of an arch or a string moulding; two others are parts of mullions, and one is apparently the key stone of an arch. Two or three stones show indications of the interior having been whitewashed and not plastered.

‘In consequence of the breadth of the foundations, an opinion has been expressed that the building was a most extensive one, probably as large as St. Walburge’s church, and that it was most probably the conventual church.

We believe the building has not been the church, as the wall runs north and south, whereas medieval ecclesiastical edifices were usually placed east and west; and, considering that the foundations are very little sunk in the earth and the stones are very small, the probabilities are that the edifice was not a large one. Had it been of great extent some of the foundations would, we think, have been met with either during the excavations for the church, or during the formation of the Lancaster and Preston Railway.’

The land belonging to the hospital became known over time as the Maudlands, a corruption of Magdalen, by which the district is now known.

---

Sources
The Preston Historic Town Survey used to be available on line, sadly no longer:
‘ Previously copies of 33 Historic Town Survey Reports and several Historic Landscape Character Reports were available as PDF downloads from this website, but this is no longer possible. Printed copies of the reports are often available at reference libraries, and copies can be made available on CD (subject to charges for commercial users).’ https://www.lancashire.gov.uk/council/planning/historic-environment-record/
Anyone with a Lancashire County Library card can read the Preston Chronicle and many more papers for free here: https://link.gale.com/apps/BNCN?u=lancs&aty=rpas