St Alban Hall, sometimes known as St Alban's Hall or Stubbins,[2] was one of the medieval halls of the University of Oxford, and one of the longest-surviving. It was established in the 13th century, acquired by neighbouring Merton College in the 16th century but operated separately until the institutions merged in the late 19th century. The site in Merton Street, Oxford, is now occupied by Merton's Edwardian St Alban's Quad.
St Alban Hall took its name from Robert of Saint Alban, a citizen of Oxford, who conveyed the property to the priory of nuns at Littlemore, near Oxford, about the year 1230.[3]
St Alban Hall continued for another three centuries as a separate hall with its own students and principal.[7] It was governed by the university's statutes for Academical Halls, and its principal was chosen by the chancellor of the university.[8]
As later recalled by Dr Henry Robinson, in the mid-1830s there was only one undergraduate, John Robert Tennant,[11] who was known as "the solitary tenant of Alban Hall".[12] There were seven members when Robinson arrived in 1838, rising to twelve by the time he came down. The only tutor was the vice-principal, while the principal, Edward Cardwell, was a university lecturer on divinity. Those aiming for an honours degree took a private tutor, of whom Bob Lowe of Magdalen was the most popular. The Hall then had four servants, a cook, a manciple, a porter, and a boy. Robinson had found St Alban Hall "rather an expensive place, the number being so few, and there was no endowment."[12]
The last principal, William Salter, was appointed in 1861 and resigned in 1882. In 1877 Prime Minister Disraeli appointed commissioners under Lord Selborne and later Mountague Bernard to consider and implement reform of the university and its colleges.[13] The commissioners came to the view that the four remaining medieval halls were not viable and should merge with colleges.[14] In 1881, the commissioners made a University Statute which provided for St Alban Hall to be united with Merton College in the event of Principal Salter's resignation or death.[3] The Hall then had eighteen members in residence, who were admitted to Merton.[7] In 1887, a similar Statute extinguished New Inn Hall and combined it with Balliol College, on the death of Henry Hubert Cornish.[15] In the event, of the halls only St Edmund Hall would avoid merger.[14]
Henry Robinson cast some of the blame for the end of the Hall on Lord Salisbury, the university's chancellor:
"St Alban Hall is destroyed because it has no friends. No one is interested in it except the principal, and he has been pensioned off... I am sure its extinction was not called for, but there was no one to speak up for it. The Chancellor of the University is the Visitor of all the halls, and he holds his place in trust for his successor."[12]
Robinson died a few days after his article was published.[16]
Buildings
St Alban Hall's buildings included a main quadrangle and a smaller court. The Merton Street front of the quad was rebuilt in 1600, funded by Benedict Barnham. The buildings were reconstructed again and a chapel added by John Gibbs from 1863, funded by Principal Salter.[17][18] After 1882 the chapel was no longer needed and was secularized.[19] Between 1904 and 1910 the buildings of the former hall were demolished, apart from part of their front elevation on Merton Street, and the St Alban's Quadrangle of Merton College built on the site.[20]
Edward Smith (1854–1908), clergyman and first class cricketer
Notes
↑ William Upcott, A Bibliographical Account of the Principal Works Relating to English Topography, Vol. 3 (London: Richard and Arthur Taylor, 1818), p. 1108
↑ The Cambridge Review, Vol. 4 (Cambridge: Elijah Johnson, 1882–1883), p. 43
1 2 3 4 "The historical register of the University of Oxford: being a supplement to the Oxford University calendar, with an alphabetical record of University honours and distinctions completed to the end of Trinity term 1888", pp. 214–215
↑ "The historical register of the University of Oxford: being a supplement to the Oxford University calendar, with an alphabetical record of University honours and distinctions completed to the end of Trinity term 1888", p. 213
↑ Oxford Historical Society Publications, Vol. 22 (1892), p. 349
↑ Nikolaus Pevsner and Jennifer Sherwood, The Buildings of England: Oxfordshire (Yale University Press, 1996), p. 164
↑ S. L. Ollard, Fasti Wyndesorienses (Windsor: Dean and Canons of St George's Chapel, 1950
↑ John Ayliffe, The Antient and Present State of the University of Oxford, Volume 1, p. 509
↑ Stuart Handley, "Lamplugh, Thomas (bap. 1615, d. 1691)" in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004) online at doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/15956 (subscription required)
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