Wisbech Stirs

The Wisbech Stirs was a divisive quarrel between English Roman Catholic clergy held prisoner in Wisbech Castle in Cambridgeshire, towards the end of the reign of Elizabeth I of England. It set the regular clergy represented by the Society of Jesus, emerging as clerical leaders, who wished for a more ordered communal life in the prison, against some of the secular clergy.

The arguments came to a head in 1594–5, and were then patched up, but distrust continued; the Stirs foreshadowed two generations of conflict, including the Archpriest Controversy, and the troubles over the Old Chapter, which likewise set part of the Catholic secular clergy against some of the Jesuit missioners concerned with England. In fact there was a long period, from 1587 well into the 17th century, when this division among Catholic priests in England was prominent. The idea that there was a continuous strand of anti-Jesuit agitation in these troubles was launched early by Robert Parsons, but is not now accepted in unqualified form.

Wisbech Castle at this point in history was an episcopal palace of the Bishop of Ely. From 1580 it was used to detain Catholic clergy who had been arrested under penal laws, in a policy of internment.

The problems that surfaced at Wisbech went back at least 15 years.Thomas Watson died in 1584, the last bishop of the Catholic hierarchy in England who commanded general allegiance.Thomas Metham had informally acted as Watson's successor at Wisbech; he died in 1592. Cardinal William Allen died in 1594. A group around Charles Paget opposed the appointment of the Jesuit Robert Parsons as his replacement, supporting instead Owen Lewis. Lewis died also in 1594, but Parsons was not made Cardinal, and campaigning involving the English College, Rome included also efforts to lobby the secular priests at Wisbech. Contemporary with the later years of the Stirs were disputes in Flanders that Ludwig Pastor regarded as similar.

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