Come join Becki from Ghosts & Giggles, & her team for a night of seeking the ghostly monks of Blackfriars Priory.
Situated in the heart of Gloucester City Centre, this once magnificent priory has many secrets to tell. Founded in 1239 on a site that had once been part of a Norman castle. The Black Friars were of the Dominican order founded in 1217 by St Dominic to fight the twin evils of 'heresy and doubt'.
The friars acted as teachers and evangelists, and they would either travel around the countryside or live together in urban friaries. The monks that lived at Blackfriars had to take on traditional monastic vows of poverty, chastity and obedience; they attended church nine times a day unless excused.
King Henry 3rd then became a major benefactor and patron of the friary and made the decision to grant timber for the roofs from the nearby Forest of Dean and royal forests in Shropshire and Dorset.
The friary continued throughout the next two centuries, the Dominicans acted as confessors to many significant people, they would in turn give generous gifts on the friary in which many of them would be lay to rest.
A cemetery was discovered in 1991 and was found to also have women and children buried there have, indicating that Blackfriars may have been operating as a hospital or hospice for the families of benefactors.
In the early sixteenth century the house was in decline, it had once housed between 30 & 40 friars reduced to a prior & 6 brethren living in poverty at the time of the dissolution. It was later bought by Sir Thomas Bell, who was mayor of Gloucester and also a wealthy Gloucester capper and clothier. He purchased the property for £240 & remodelled the church into a private dwelling house with other buildings being converted into a cloth manufactory providing employment for over 300 townspeople; making him one of the largest employers of the city.
The mysterious “monk’s skull”, found in the nave with a straight line across the forehead. Join us to see the monks who never left, footsteps heard in the night, dark figures seen out of the corner of your eyes, unexplained noises & doors locking on their own.
Tickets £40
8am - 12:30/1am
Wear warm, comfortable clothing and sensible shoes.
English Heritage Archives - North Range Exterior