Reformation

The Reformation enters the novel as both a period of national religious upheaval and a gap in Banfield’s local record. The history of St. Joseph’s Church offers few definite traces of how those changes affected the parish, while Thomas Woolgar’s manuscript supplies a compromised, personal account of later sixteenth-century events. Set beside the present-day crowds gathering around Alice Pagett, that account makes religious authority appear capable of sustaining faith but also of turning fear and accusation into violence.

National change and Banfield’s missing records

Fenn’s research describes the Reformation as a time of change and difficulty for churches throughout England, but he finds no specific account of its effects on St. Joseph’s Church. The parish records begin only in the late sixteenth century, leaving an important stretch of its history undocumented. Fenn notes that some local dignitaries faced serious consequences for refusing to recognize Henry VIII as head of the English Church, while others accepted the change, in part because the dissolution of the monasteries opened church lands to sale and gave the gentry opportunities to acquire them.

The earlier Christian history of Banfield is already presented as a contest over sacred ground. According to Fenn’s account, Sussex had been a stronghold of pagan practice, and the first Christian church in Banfield—presumed to have been St. Joseph’s Church—was built over a place of pagan worship and burial. He also describes resistance to Bishop Wilfred’s conversion efforts and bloodshed during the establishment of Christianity. The novel does not claim that these episodes were part of the Reformation; rather, they establish a longer history in which religious change is entangled with conflict over belief, authority, and place.

Religious factions and local power

Fenn finds no surviving parish record that clarifies how the Reformation played out in Banfield. He suggests that opposing factions may have used the controversy to continue older feuds, but the absence of documents prevents him from substantiating the local history. The gap matters: the novel supplies broad context about changes to the English Church, but does not turn that context into a complete account of the parish’s response.

A separate local episode recalled by Fenn concerns the English Civil War, when the priest at St. Joseph’s Church was a Royalist involved in helping Charles II escape across the Downs to the coast. Cromwell had the priest executed. This later conflict is distinct from the Reformation, but its place in the same sparse church history reinforces the recurring vulnerability of local clergy to shifts in political and religious power.

Thomas Woolgar’s manuscript

The manuscript discovered by Gerry Fenn preserves a first-person account by Thomas Woolgar, a priest writing about events in the sixteenth century. Woolgar describes the religious changes around the reigns of Henry VIII, the young Edward, Mary Tudor, and Elizabeth, and connects those changes to his own fortunes and to the treatment of Einor. His narrative says that Woolgar’s father was a powerful patron of the Church and that the Prioress had reason to be cautious of antagonizing the family. In the account, religious loyalty and family influence shape what people can safely confess and what punishment they can impose.

Woolgar portrays himself as a participant in the events surrounding Einor, not as a detached chronicler. He admits to a sexual relationship with her and to helping conceal the murder of three children. When the Prioress learns of his conduct, he claims that he blamed Einor and described himself as overcome by her influence. He then denounced her as a witch and heretic, invoking the religious climate under Mary Tudor, which he says condemned both witches and dissenters. He recalls burnings in nearby Lewes and reports that the village turned against Einor after he spread the accusations.

The manuscript presents the villagers’ actions as a descent from accusation to mob violence: they seized Einor at the church, sought evidence of witchcraft, and ultimately executed her. Woolgar admits that he helped inflame the crowd and did not stop the abuse. This is his account, not an independently verified parish record. Its religious language casts blame onto Einor and supernatural forces even as his own admissions expose his participation and self-protective distortions. The Reformation-era setting therefore informs the account’s claims about heresy and punishment, but does not make Woolgar’s version an impartial history.

The archive and the novel’s historical frame

After Woolgar’s breakdown, his father arranged for him to serve at a small church on the family estate and removed the church chest from St. Joseph’s Church. Woolgar suspects his father wanted the parish records because they might contain material damaging to the family name. He says those records did not include his confession about Einor, and describes concealing his own manuscript for a future reader. The distinction between the transferred parish archive and Woolgar’s hidden testimony helps explain why Fenn finds so little official documentation while encountering a vivid, deeply interested personal narrative.

The novel sets this buried history against the modern pilgrimage to Banfield. In the present, thousands gather in the field for Alice Pagett, and church leaders struggle with the hopes invested in her alleged miracles. The earlier account offers no simple historical explanation for that gathering, but it gives the place a history of changing religious allegiance, concealed records, and faith entangled with power. The Reformation’s significance lies partly in that contrast: the present congregation is organized around public expectation and ceremony, while Woolgar’s account reveals how religious language could also obscure guilt and license persecution.