Blessed Hugh Faringdon (d. 1539), Last Abbot of Reading Abbey
“Not fearing openly to profess that which Henry’s laws made it treason to hold - fidelity to the See of Rome which he declared was but the common faith of those who had the best right to know what was the true teaching of the English Church.”
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Attributed last words of Hugh Faringdon
Possibly originating from Faringdon, Berkshire, hence his name in religion, his
original name was Hugh Cook. He was the abbey’s sub-chamberlain when he was elected Abbot in 1520. Faringdon kept the abbey in good order and encouraged the grammar school attached to the Abbey, attracting better staff and noble pupils. He also fulfilled local government responsibilities including acting as a Justice of the Peace. Despite his resistance to Protestant ideas, signified by his refusal to allow anyone connected to these new ideas
to be attached to the abbey, as a member of the House of Lords he consistently supported the government. He signed petitions to the Pope supporting Henry VIII’s divorce, even offering to search the
abbey’s library to find a stronger case. He frequently entertained Henry at the abbey, and was called by Henry “his own abbot”, being made a Royal Chaplain in 1532. In 1536 he took the oath of Royal Supremacy and also agreed with the dissolution of the lesser monasteries. In 1537 he sang a requiem mass at Jane Seymour’s funeral.
Despite all this royal patronage, the Abbot’s fall in 1539 was rapid, after Faringdon refused to obey hints to dissolve Reading Abbey. In September Faringdon was accused of treason, and taken to the Tower. There were rumours he was connected to the Exeter Conspiracy, but the charges laid against him were of upholding papal supremacy on three separate occasions. Faringdon’s death sentence was passed by Thomas Cromwell, the King’s chief minister, without the proper trial that was his due. He was taken to Reading where, on November 14th, after being dragged round the town, and refusing to recant his loyalty to Rome,
he and two fellow monks, were hung, drawn and quartered in the Forbury before the Abbey Gateway. After his death the Abbey was dissolved, its lands and goods confiscated by the Crown. Beatified in 1895 he gave his name to Blessed Hugh Faringdon Catholic School and is also commemorated in
the Church of the English Martyrs, in Leibenrood Road.
Link to the Dictionary of National Biography (only from a Library terminal).
Hugh Faringdon
See a reconstruction of Hugh Faringdon’s martyrdom from a picture at Reading
Museum.
Find out about the importance of the Abbey to Reading at Reading
Museum's website.
Other External Links to more information:
Entry on Hugh Faringdon in the Catholic Encyclopedia
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