Hartland Abbey

Hartland Abbey is a former abbey and current family home to the Stucley family. It is located in Hartland, Devon. The current owner is Sir Hugh George Copplestone Bampfylde Stucley, 6th Baronet.

Hartland Abbey was built in 1157 and consecrated by Bartholomew Iscanus in 1160 (Bartholomew was appointed Bishop of Exeter the following year). The Botreaux family of Boscastle, Cornwall, were among the most generous donors to the Abbey. (Male heirs were apparently all named William, until the death in 1462 of the last of the line William de Botreaux, 3rd Baron Botreaux.) In 1187 a William de Botreaux gave the advowsons of the churches in his manors of Molland and Knowstone in Devon, and of the church of Forrabury in his Cornish manor of Boscastle, to the Abbey. The grants were confirmed by a charter temp. from King Richard I (1189-1199) and the property was converted into an Augustinian Abbey in 1189.

In 1539 it was the last monastery to be dissolved by Henry VIII. The King gave the building to William Abbot, his Sergeant of the Wine Cellar at Hampton Court.Along with the Priory at Bodmin, which Abbott soon sold to the use of that town. William Abbot converted what had been the Abbot's Lodging into a mansion. In September 1544 the following lands of "Hartland Priory" were granted, with other lands, by Henry VIII to Thomas Godwyne in fee, for a consideration of £1,122 2s 6d: "the messuage, etc., called Abbottes in the parish of Molland alias Batters Moland (i.e. "Molland Bottreaux"), Devon, in tenure of Anthony Deye and a messuage, etc., in Moore alias Moore Town, in Bedyford (i.e. Bideford)parish, Devon, in tenure of Richard Penhorewod" In March 1547 a royal licence was obtained by James Gunter and Henry Wescott, who presumably had been granted them on dissolution, to alienate the "rectory and advowson of the vicarage of Knoweston and Molland, Devon" to Hugh Culme.

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