Catholic FHS - Catholic Family History Society

Catholic Family History Society

Looking for your Roman Catholic ancestors? The Catholic Family History Society can point you in the right direction. Society members receive Catholic Ancestor, our journal, three times a year containing members' own researches and a wide range of helpful articles. An Annual Day Conference is held in October. Volunteers around the country transcribe early Catholic Registers, and these are offered free to current members when published. They may also be available at your local Record Office or public libraries. Non-members can also purchase these and all past publications.Please use the menu bar at the top of the page to explore this site.

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Saturday 20 November 2021 at 2pm GMT

The story of the Bridgettines of Syon Abbey.

Presented by Carmen Mangion PhD Senior Lecturer in the department of History, Classics and Archaeology at Birkbeck University of London

The great Abbey at Syon was the only Bridgettine house in England. The foundation stone was laid by Henry V in 1415, and in little more than a century of existence it reached a position of unique influence and importance, with especially close links to the Tudor dynasty .

The story of the Bridgettines of Syon Abbey has been remembered as one of triumph over adversity. They were one of two religious orders that were not dispersed after the Reformation, and the only one of the two to have survived thus retaining an unbroken line of succession from the original community founded in south-west London in 1415. After much ‘wanderings’ on the Continent and a short return to England in 1557 during the reign of Mary I, the community settled in Lisbon in 1599. Their permanent return to England in 1861 was celebrated in the Catholic press. This paper is about a lesser-known facet of their
history, and examines Syon’s first return in 1809, when, threatened by the approach of Napoleon’s revolutionary forces, ten members of the Syon community in Lisbon returned to England. The paper begins by outlining the story of the 1809 departure from Lisbon. It then moves to what we know of the events that unfolded in England, identifying the individual Bridgettines, the places they resided, and their benefactors. It examines in depth the individual stories of two sisters who are dispersed, examining the fidelity to their identities as Bridgettines. Then, it considers the memory of the 1809 return interrogating how the history of the first return has been remembered and documented arguing the preoccupations of the twentieth century have shaped how the story of Syon’s first return has been told.

If you would be interested in joining us online for this talk, then please contact us through This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. You will in due course be sent a link for Zoom. If you do not have Zoom it is free and easy to download it to your device. Simply search for Zoom on your search engine and follow the instructions. We hope you will want to join us for what promises to be an enlightening talk.

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