Benjamin Heydon or Haydon (1567–1607) was the Headmaster at Winchester College from 1596 to 1601/1602,The Victoria History of the Counties of England: Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, Volume 2 (Westminster, U.K.: 1903) p. 366 a JP for Somerset,Susan D. Amussen and David E. Underdown, Gender, Culture, and Politics in England, 1560-1640: Turning the World Upside Down, (London, U.K.: 2017) p.114 and Dean of Wells Cathedral from 1602 until his death in 1607.John Le Neve, et al, Fasti Ecclesiae Anglicanae, 1541-1857, 13 volumes (London, U.K.: 1969-2014) 5:6.()
Early life and family
Benjamin Heydon was born in Winchester in the early autumn of 1567 to Edward (d. 1581)Anne Thompson, Parish Clergy Wives in Elizabethan England, (Leiden, the Netherlands: 2019) p. 139. and Edyth Heydon (d. 1583).S. A. Smith and Edward A. Fry, eds. Index of Wills Proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, Volume IV: 1584-1604. (London, U.K.: 1901) p. 202.() He was baptized in St. Swithun-upon-Kingsgate on 23 October 1567.W. P. W. Phillimore and Herbert Chitty, eds. Hampshire Parish Registers: Marriages, etc., Volume 4 (London, U.K.: 1902) p. 86.() Heydon had two older brothers, Francis and Edward, and two sisters, Martha and Mary. Benjamin spent his first ten years in Winchester with his family. When he was eleven, he entered Winchester College in 1578 and studied there until April 1586.T. F. Kirby, Winchester Scholars: A List of the Wardens, Fellow, and Scholars of Saint Mary College of Winchester... (London, U.K.: 1888) p. 148.()
His father, Edward, came to Winchester soon after Elizabeth I took the throne when she granted him a prebendary at Winchester Cathedral.J. H. Collingridge, et al, ed. Calendar of the Patent Rolls, Elizabeth I: 1558-1560 (CPR, 1558-1560), (London, U.K.: 1939) p. 5.() Edward Heydon had a chequered career, and had held multiple offices under Henry VIII, Edward VI, and Mary I of England. After receiving his Bachelor of Canon Law in 1527, he served successively as rector of Ardley, Coln Rogers, Newbury and Coberley, among others.A. B. Emden, A Biographical Register of the University of Oxford, A. D. 1501 to 1540, (Oxford, U.K.: 1974) pp. 286-287. In 1546, Archbishop Cranmer granted Edward a dispensation to hold three concurrent benefices, and Edward was listed as a chaplain to Henry VIII.D. S. Chambers, ed. Faculty Office Registers, 1534-1549 (Oxford, U.K.: 1966) p. 277. After the death of Henry VIII, the church took a series of unconnected disciplinary actions against him for various political mistakes and religious heterodoxy. Princess Elizabeth in 1551 removed Edward from his position in Newbury in favour of her chaplain, Edmund Allen. Earlier in 1550, the parishioners of Newbury complained to their Bishop John Capon that Heydon could not preach according to the Book of Common Prayer (1549), and continued to affirm that the bread of the Eucharist was "Christ's true body."Andrew D. Brown, Popular Piety in Late Medieval England: The Diocese of Salisbury, 1250-1550, (Oxford, U.K.: 1995) pp. 236-237. Historian C. W. Field argues that Elizabeth removed Heydon because he prevented more reformed ministers from preaching in Newbury.C. W. Field, The Province of Canterbury and the Elizabethan Settlement of Religion, (Privately printed: 1973) p. 130; Christina H. Garrett, The Marian Exiles: A Study in the Origins of Elizabethan Puritanism, (New York, NY: 1938) pp. 70-71. Heydon maintained his belief in transubstantiation as late as 1562, when he was summoned before Bishop Richard Cheyney's court for his beliefs.Caroline Litzenberger, The English Reformation and the Laity: Gloucestershire, 1540-1580 (Cambridge, U.K.: 1997) p. 144. Heydon did adopt some new practices raised during the reformation, including clerical marriage. In 1553, Heydon was receiving a pension valued at £3 per year as a former religious who was married.Browne Willis, An History of the Mitred Abbies and Conventual Cathedral Churches, 2 volumes (London, U.K.: 1718-1719) 2:8. After Mary began to reinstate traditional Catholic practices, Heydon was deprived in 1554 from his benefice in St Benet's, Paul's Wharf in London, likely for being married.Susan Brigden, London and the Reformation, (Oxford, U.K.: 1989) p. 570 & n. 66; Barrett L. Beer, "London Parish Clergy and the Protestant Reformation, 1547-1559", Albion, Volume 18, No. 3 (Fall, 1986), pp. 389, 392. In 1563, the churchwardens at Tortworth complained that Heydon failed to properly perform the common prayers required by the laity. Heydon resigned his benefice in Tortworth in 1567 and spent the remainder of his life as prebend of Winchester. He died in 1581. Edyth, mother of Benjamin and wife of Edward, died in late 1583, and the will was proved in 1584. The majority of Edward and Edyth's belongings were divided among their living children, Benjamin, Francis, Edward Jr., Martha, and Mary.
Benjamin’s brother Francis may have followed their father into the priesthood. One Francis Heydon or Heyden received his MA from Corpus Christi College, Oxford in 1575, and then became the rector of Broadwater in Sussex. This Francis may have been Edward's son, as Edward resigned his benefices at Charfield in 1574 and Winnall, Hampshire in 1580 to allow Francis to assume those benefices.Field, Province of Canterbury, p. 130; Collingridge, et al, ed. CPR, 1578-1580, (London, U.K.: 1986) p. 282 () Francis was not able to retain the incumbencies in Winnall and Charfield as he did not have a dispensation to hold multiple benefices; he would instead remain at Broadwater until he died in 1625. The churchwardens' complaints to the bishop indicate that Francis performed his duties lacklusterly until the final few years of his life.R. H. Ernest Hill, ed. Index of Wills Proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury, Volume VI: 1620-1629, (London, U.K.: 1912) p. 135 (); Victoria County History: Sussex, Volume 6, Part 1 (London, U.K.: 1980) p. 78. ()
Benjamin's other elder brother, Edward Heydon Jr., built up his landed wealth from his inheritance from his father and mother. Edward was baptized on 3 February 1566 in the same church as Benjamin: St. Swithun's in Winchester. Edward Sr. and Edyth granted the families' property in Maiden Bradley, Wiltshire to Edward Jr., who had maintained Maiden Bradley as his primary residence while he accumulated more land. He married Dorothea Manning of Kent in the late 1590s. Her family was among the well-to-do in Kent, and had been granted an heraldry by Elizabeth in 1577. ; John B. Threlfall, The Ancestry of Reverend Henry Whitfield (1590-1657)... (Madison, WI: 1989) pp. 43-44. Edward ingratiated himself into the family and served as an executor in her brother, Henry Manning's will, in 1614. By this time, Edward was considered a gentleman, and had added several estates to his name.Threlfall, Ancestry of Reverend Henry Whitfield, pp. 41-42; Henry F. Waters, Genealogical Gleanings in England, 2 volumes (Boston, MA: 1901), 2:1333-1334. () Edward likely died in late 1627, and his will was proved on 22 November 1627.Hill, ed. Index of Wills, 1620-1629, p. 135. Mary Heydon married sometime between 1581 and 1583 to a Mr. Philpott, and Martha’s subsequent fate is unknown.
Education and career
Benjamin's education at Winchester College provided him an academic path to advancement. Edward Sr. lost much of his influence and potential patronage when he was brought before courts for controversial religious opinions, and he surrendered various benefices to Francis before Benjamin finished his education. Winchester College was one of the best grammar schools in England, rivalled only by Eton College. Winchester, from the time of its foundation, was intimately connected to New College, Oxford, and at least seventy of the entrants to New College had to be drawn from Winchester.Joan Simon, Education and Society in Tudor England, (Cambridge, U.K.: 1967) pp. 41-42; Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Online (ODNBO), "William Wykeham (c. 1324-1404)" by Peter Partner. Throughout the sixteenth century, university education became key to advancement in the church. By the end of Elizabeth's reign, a plurality of clergy had obtained some university education, if not full degrees, and Benjamin was eager to take advantage.Rosemary O'Day, Education and Society, 1500-1800: The Social Foundations of Education in Early Modern Britain, (New York, NY: 1982) pp. 134-146; Richard L. Greaves, Society and Religion in Elizabethan England, (Minneapolis, MN: 1981) pp. 77-78. Heydon matriculated to New College in 1586 and received his BA in April 1589, and an MA in January 1593.Foster, Alumni Oxonienses, 2:701. Benjamin remained at New College for the next two years, but was unable to complete his studies for a Doctor of Divinity. Before the 19th century, university fellows studying theology were not allowed to be married. Though no official records of his marriage exist, Heydon appears to have been married sometime around 1595 based on the age of his children later in life.James McConica, ed. The History of the University of Oxford, Volume 3: The Collegiate University, (Oxford, U.K.: 1986), pp. 531-532; T. F. Kirby, Annals of Winchester College, from Its Foundation in the Year 1382 to the Present Time... (London, U.K.: 1892) p. 121. () Heydon would eventually get a degree as Doctor of Divinity in July 1605.
After leaving Oxford in 1596, Heydon returned to Winchester College to take up the position of headmaster.Arthur F. Leach, A History of Winchester College, (London, U.K.: 1899) pp. 320-321. () It was as headmaster of Winchester that he likely first came into contact with William Lord Burghley and Robert Cecil; both father and son had an interest in Winchester College. William Lord Burghley accepted the role of Steward of the college in 1566 and held the post until his death in 1598. The two took also were concerned with the results of the 1596 election of the provost of the college; the same year that Heydon took his office.Kirby, Annals of Winchester College, pp. 283-284; William Acres, ed. The Letters of Lord Burghley, William Cecil, to His Son Sir Robert Cecil, 1593-1598, (Cambridge, U.K.: 2017) p. 43; Calendar of the Manuscripts of the Marquis of Salisbury, 24 volumes (London, U.K.: 1883-1976) 6:159, 165-166, 183-184. Robert Cecil was invaluable to Heydon throughout the remainder of his career, and he likely owed his appointment to the Deanship of Wells to Cecil. Heydon likely had at least one son begin attending Winchester College by the end of his term as headmaster: in 1598 and 1601, Heydon was charged for the cost of the entrance and boarding for at least one unnamed person, which T. F. Kirby argued was Heydon's son.Kirby, Annals of Winchester College, p. 121.