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- Item - one challes of silver, a cresmatorye of brass [for holy oil]
- Item - two crosses of brasses, two yeron candelstiks
- Item - one cope of greine sattene, one read saye cope [a kind of serge]
- Item - one vestment of whyt silk with albes
- Item - one vestment of bustian [fustian] with other things apperteninge to yt
- Item - one vestment of greine dornix [coarse
damask] with albe, one old vestment of
tauney saye
- Item -
three alter clothes, two towelles, two
crewettes
- Item -
one fatt for watter, two old codes [pillows],
one old vaill
- Item - one vestment of divers colors, one sirples
- Item - one chyst, two corporaxis
Not only was the Church plundered of most of its valuables but its revenues were confiscated in what must be termed a Tudor experiment in Nationalisation. From now on we find that where the stipend is low, as at Drypool, the parish is held with several others, the services are infrequent and the fabrics are neglected, often because of lay rectors who did not fulfill their obligations.
THE APPEARANCE OF THE CHURCH
Let us try to picture what the church looked like after these changes. The old stone altar has gone, and its place is taken by a table having bulbous legs. This can be carried down into the body of the church on Sacrament Sundays. A pair of candlesticks may have survived and possibly one chalice from the great plunder. There are no altar rails. The screen remained into the eighteenth century, but the Rood with its supporting figures has gone. In its place are the Queen's Arms, newly emblazoned. There are probably few seats in the nave, and there may not be a pulpit, since the church was small.
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Some of the windows may still glow with rich mediaeval glass, witness to the parsimony of the Churchwardens, rather than any reverence for beauty. The walls have lost their pictures beneath a coat of whitewash, with here and there a painted text in black letter. Strange it must have seemed to those who remembered the painted pictures, the figures of the saints and the numerous lights.
TROUBLE WITH THE AUTHORITIES
One of the chief glories of the Elizabethan Church was its emphasis on " sound learning," but at the beginning of the reign, many of the clergy, like their mediaeval predecessors, were ignorant and almost illiterate. Drawn largely from the labouring and artisan classes they were little better than labourers themselves. It was necessary to guard against the spread of sedition, and no-one could preach without a bishop's licence. When there was no sermon, the congregation had to be satisfied with a Homily. Nevertheless quarterly sermons were ordered, and when these were not provided answer had to be made at the Archdeacon's Visitation. This was usually held at some large central church like Holy Trinity, Hull, or St. Mary's, Beverley, whither the incumbent and churchwardens were summoned, the former to submit his letters of ordination, and the latter to answer for the parish and report on the fabric of the church. In 1575, both Sculcoates and Drypool were presented, the former " want their quarter sermons," and the latter" had but two sermons this last yere past."
Twenty years later, the peace of the churchyard was once again disturbed, this time by two term agents, Anne Harrison and Agnes Atkinson, who" scoulded in the churcheyarde to the offence of the congregacion."
AN ELIZABETHAN PARSON
In 1584 George Cockerrill became Curate of Sculcoates. This title must not be taken to have its modern somewhat
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