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 LI E) RARY 
 
 OF THE 
 
 U N I VLRSITY 
 
 Of ILLI NOIS
 
 The Oxford University Commissioners 
 and St Edmund' s Hall. 
 
 ♦►•^» 
 
 A LETTER 
 
 ADDRESSED TO 
 
 The Most Honorable 
 The Marquis of Salisbury, 
 
 K.G., D.C.L., 
 
 Chancellor of the University of Oxford, 
 
 &c., &c., 
 
 And Visitor of the St. Edmunds HalL 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. GEORGE HILL, 
 
 Vicar of St. Winnow, Cornwall. 
 
 TRURO : 
 HEARD & SONS, STEAM PRESS, BOSCAWEN STREET. 
 
 1882.
 
 THE OXFORD UNIVERSITY COMMISSIONERS 
 AND ST. EDMUND'S HALL. 
 
 My Lord Marquis, 
 
 A proposed Statute of the Oxford Commissioners is now 
 lying before the two Houses of Parliament, entitled a " Statute 
 for the partial union of St. Edmund Hall to the Queen's 
 College, Oxford." In behalf of St. Edmund's Hall I would 
 be glad to call wider attention to its provisions before the 
 Statute becomes irremediable. 
 
 For the sake of many who may not be so well acquainted 
 with Oxford as your Lordship, I would state that St. Edmund's 
 Hall is one of the smaller public collegiate institutions of the 
 University, accommodating between 20 and 30 undergraduate 
 members. Although without the wealthy endowments which 
 many larger colleges possess, by which they are able, by 
 scholarships, to attach to themselves the more able of the 
 alumni of the University, St. Edmund's Hall has uniformly 
 pursued an honourable and useful career, successfully main- 
 taining in the University a character for steady work and good 
 discipline. It has never been made a mere " place of refuge," 
 into which might be received men of other colleges who 
 through idleness or other causes have been requested to mi- 
 grate. Historically it bears considerable interest as being one 
 of the earliest of the University institutions. Edmund, after- 
 wards Archbishop of Canterbury, here delivered lectures from 
 1219-1226, attended by a number of very distinguished pupils. 
 The series of the Principals of this Hall, so far as the records 
 have been preserved, extends from the year 1300 to the pre- 
 sent time. They amount in number to sixty-three. 
 
 But now, what does the New Statute of the Oxford Com- 
 missioners propose to do as between St. Edmund's Hall and 
 Queen's College ? It proposes an entire amalgamation of the 
 former with the latter. The general object of the Commis- 
 sioners is supposed to be the utilising of collegiate wealth for
 
 wider university purposes. If some more enlarged funds were 
 attached to the Hall, doubtless much might be done for its 
 fuller growth and development. But then, why, in this case, 
 should any such assistance be bound up with a scheme which, 
 while it is called " a partial union," reduces the Hall to the 
 position of a subordinate, and is in reality such an amalgama- 
 tion as wholly destroys the independence enjoyed by the Hall 
 for 600 years, and its very existence as a distinct public 
 Academical House within the University? The present ex- 
 cellent Principal regards the scheme as '' objectionable." Its 
 menibers are unanimous in deprecating it. The strongest 
 possible feeling prevails among them that the scheme inflicts a 
 serious wrong and injustice. Memorials to that effect, very 
 numerously signed, have already been addressed both to the 
 Principal of the Hall and to your Lordship, as the Chancellor 
 of the University. 
 
 I would endeavour to confirm this estimate of the 
 character of the Commissioners' present scheme by detailing 
 some few of its more important provisions. 
 
 ^ I. — The proposed Statute takes from the Hall the whole 
 of its property and revenue. The site, and the buildings 
 thereon, including chapel, dining hall, library, &c., which are 
 now held by the University in trust for the Hall, are to be 
 vs^holly vested in the College of Queen's in the same manner 
 as the buildings of the said College itself. The small endow- 
 ments of the Hall, including the advowson of the living of 
 Gatcombe, forming part of the stipend of the principalship, 
 all which are in like manner at present held by the University 
 in trust, are to be henceforth held and administered as part of 
 the corporate property of the said College. And all fees and 
 other payment by members of the Hall are to be paid not to 
 the Principal, but to the common funds of the said College. 
 Henceforth the Hall is absolutely and irrecoverably to forfeit 
 all property of her own, and to possess no Trustees to receive 
 for her new benefactions. 
 
 11. — The proposed Statute takes from the Hall, though 
 not in name, yet in authority and influence, as well as in 
 university rank and status, the office of a Principal The Prin- 
 cipal, so called, of the Hall will be no longer one recognised 
 in the University as the head of a distinct and independent 
 
 ^uiuc 
 
 ^
 
 house. He will no longer, as Principal, be eligible for a seat 
 upon the Hebdomadal Council of the University. Within the 
 the Hall his office will be no less degraded. The superintend- 
 ence of its endowments — the election of its exhibitioners — the 
 appointment of his vice-gerent and tutorial staff — the arrange- 
 ments of its tuition — the removal of unworthy members — all 
 these and such like administrative duties must primarily pass 
 out of his hands ; and with these the personal moral influence 
 which would impart its tone to the society and sustain its 
 esprit de corps must in great measure pass away also. Even his 
 time and his tutorial labours he is bound to divide between 
 the undergraduates of St. Edmund's and those of Queen's 
 College. He is in all respects to be the subordinate of the 
 latter society. He would be without that freedom and inde- 
 pendence which even the head of a " private " Hostel would 
 necessarily possess. 
 
 III. — The proposed Statute deprives the Hall of the 
 supervision of the Chancellor of the IJniversity, who, as such, 
 personally or by his commissary, has been from time imme- 
 morial its official " visitor." There is, on the part of the 
 Oxford Commissioners, a peculiar disregard for precedent dis- 
 played in this particular, as the following historical facts may 
 show. Soon after the dissolution of Oseney Abbey the patronage 
 of the principalship of the Hall was, on the application of the 
 then Provost of Queens, granted to that Society by the University 
 in an Act of Convocation, dated 28th January, 1558-59, the par- 
 ticular conditions of such grant being referred to " the House 
 of Congregation." These conditions were accordingly drawn 
 up in tbe year 1559, and among other conditions it was provided 
 that the Chancellor shall retain his original rights and autho- 
 rity as visitor of the Hall. The claims of the University and 
 the independence of the Hall were thus expressly main- 
 tained. Now, however, under the proposed Statute, conditions 
 under which the patronage of the headship was conceded are 
 practically set aside. Queen's College, in exercising that 
 patronage, must henceforth cease to claim it by virtue of any 
 grant from the University. The Commissioners assign it to 
 her, and she would hold it by a new title she did not before 
 possess — by the title of inheritance, conferred and acquired 
 under the new Statute, with but little regard to the rights and 
 interests, whether of the Chancellor and the University or of 
 the Principal and the Hall.
 
 6 
 
 Such is the manner in which the proposed Statute 
 must seriously affect St, Edmund's Hall. It inflicts on it a 
 " suppression " no less completely than the " extinction " pro- 
 posed as regards other Halls inflicts " suppression " on them. It 
 is not to be surprised at that its members, with the full sym- 
 pathy of their Principal, are desirous of expressing their own 
 deep sense of an injustice and wrong. A technical difficulty 
 has prevented them from making an appeal to the Privy 
 Council. The only constitutional course left open to them has 
 been an appeal to the two Houses of Parliament, and by 
 Parliament it must be decided whether it may not be desirable 
 to pray the Queen to withhold her consent to the Statute now 
 proposed. 
 
 It is with this object in view that petitions (of which a 
 copy is subjoined) addressed to the two Houses of Parliament 
 have been signed by upwards of 100 sometime members of St. 
 Edmund's Hall, and that I have the honour to forward to your 
 Lordship the petition addressed to the House of Lords, which 
 you have kindly undertaken to present. It is not the desire of 
 the petitioners to impede the progress of any real improvement 
 of which the said Hall might be capable, or the development 
 of its needed resources. They would gladly look forward to 
 the possibility of such a more complete Constitution as might 
 be secured to her under a Charter of Incorporation. But they 
 feel assured that all such hopes for her future prosperity would 
 be for ever put a stop to if she were now to be deprived of her 
 ancient independence, and the reality of her existence as an 
 academical House. 
 
 I have the honour. 
 
 My Lord Marquis, 
 
 To be your obedient Servant, 
 
 GEORGE HILL, M.A. 
 
 S. Winnow, Lostwithiel, April, 1882.
 
 The following is the form of Petition referred to. 
 
 To the Right Honourable the Lords Spiritual and Temporal of the United 
 Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, in Parliament assembled :— 
 
 or, 
 
 To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain 
 and Ireland, in Parliament assembled :— 
 
 The humble Petition of the undersigned, sometimes Members of St. 
 Edmund's Hall, in the University of Oxford, 
 
 Sheweth,— 
 
 That your Petitioners, as taking an interest in the permanent welfare and 
 independence of the said Hall, regard with much uneasiness the statute 
 proposed by the Oxford University Commissioners, and now lying before your 
 Right Honourable (or Honourable) House, for the "partial union" of St. 
 Edmund's Hall to the Queen's College. 
 
 That they deem it a grievance and to the prejudice of the said Hall that, 
 as now proposed, the office of a distinct Visitor of its own, in the person of 
 the Chancellor of the University of Oxford, should no longer be retained. 
 
 That they deem it a grievance and a wrong that, as now proposed, the 
 Endowments belonging to the said Hall, and the inheritance of all the Build- 
 ings of the said Hall, the repairs and renewal of which have ever been 
 undertaken by its own members, should henceforth not only cease to be held in 
 trust for the said Hall by the University, but should be taken away and 
 conceded to the College of Queens as the absolute property of the said College. 
 
 That they deem it a further grievance that the Principal of the said Hall 
 should, as proposed, cease in future to occupy the position of head of an inde- 
 pendent House within the University, and that the exercise of authority or 
 governance in the said Hall should hereafter be primarily vested in the Provost 
 and Fellows of another College. 
 
 Your Petitioners do therefore pray that the ancient independence of the 
 said ancient Hall may be preserved, and that your Right Honourable (or 
 Honourable) House would be pleased to pray the Qaeen to withhold her consent 
 from the proposed statute of the Oxford Commissioners relating to St. 
 Edmund's Hall. 
 
 And your Petitioners will ever pray. * 
 
 HEARD AND SONS, STEAM PEESS, TRURO.
 
 
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