WILLIAM
630
WILLIAM
Poitiers, and in 1107 he received the Abbey of Celle-
en-Brie from the Bishop of Meaux.
Haub^ad in Gallia chrisl., XIV (Paris, 1856), 313-16; Idem in Nouv. Biog. Gen., s. v.
Michael Ott.
William, Abbot of Saint-B^nigne at Dijon, cele- brated Cluniac reformer, b. on the Island of Giuglio on Lake Orta near Novara in Piedmont in 962; d. at Fecamp, one of his reformed monasteries in Nor- mandy, 1 January, 1031. At the age of seven he was brought as an oblate to the Benedictine monas- tery of Locedia near VerceUi, and went to Cluny in 987. A year later he was sent by Abbot Majolus to reform the priory of Saint-Saturnin near Avignon and, upon his return to Cluny in 990, was appointed Abbot of Saint-Benigne at Dijon. He was ordained priest, 7 June, 990. As Abbot of Saint-B6nigne he inaugurated an extensive reform of the Benedictine monasteries in Normandy, Burgundy, and Lorraine. The Bishop of Langres put him at the head of all the monasteries in his diocese and finally he ruled over more than 40 monasteries and about 1200 monks. In all these monasteries he introduced the severe dis- cipline of Cluny and in many of them estabhshed schools for the monks and monastic candidates as well as for the laity. At Saint-B^nigne he erected (1001-1018) a church in the Romanesque style, then considered the most beautiful in France. WilHam's literary works, consisting of seven sermons, one mystic treatise on St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, vii, 15 sq., eight letters to Pope John XIX, St. Odilo, etc., and his testament, are printed in Chevalier (loc. cit. below, 213-86). Though Wilham has not been formally canonized, he is honoured as a saint in various places. His feast is on 1 January.
Chevauer, Le v(n^rable Guillaume, Abbi de Saint-Btnigne de Dijon, reformateuT de I'ordre benedictin au Xh siecle (Paris and Dijon, 1875); Rinqholz in Sludien u. Miltheilungen aus dem Ben- ediktiner-Orden, III (Wurzburg and Vienna, 1882), 362-83, chiefly a German r^sum^ of the preceding; Sacktjr, Die Cluniacenser, 1 (Halle, 1892^), 257-69, passim. A reliable Life by Raoci, G la- ser, a contemporary and disciple of William, is printed in P. L., CXLII, 697-720, also in Acta SS., I Jan., 57 sq.
MicH.'iEL Ott.
William Carter, Venerable, English martyr, b. in London, 1548; suffered for treason at Tyburn, 11 January, 1584. Son of John Carter, a draper, and Agnes, his wife, he was apprenticed to John Cawood, queen's printer, on Candlemas Day, 1563, for ten years, and afterwards acted as secretary to Nicholas Harpsfield, last Catholic archdeacon of Canterburj', then a prisoner. On the latter's death he married and set up a press on Tower Hill. Among other Catholic books he printed a new edition (1000 copies) of Dr. Gregory Martin's "A Treatise of Schism", in 1580, for which he was at once arrested and imprisoned in the Gatehouse. Before this he had been in the Poul- try Counter from 23 September to 28 October, 1578. He was transferred to the Tower, 1582, and paid for his own diet there down to midsummer, 1583. Hav- ing been tortured on the rack, he was indicted at the Old Bailey, 10 Jan., 1584, for having printed Dr. Mar- tin's book, in which was a paragraph where confidence was ex-pressed that the Catholic Faith would triumph, and pious Judith would slay Holofemes. This was interpreted as an incitement to slay the queen, though it obviously had no such meaning.
GlLLOW. Bibl, Did. Eng. Cath.. s. v. Carter. Williams: Cnlh.
Rer. Soc. PuW. (London, 1905 ), I, 60, 65; II, 228, 229; III,
4, 15; IV, 129, 138; V, 8, 30. 39.
John B. Wainewhight.
William Ezmew, Blessed, Carthusian monk and martyr; suffered at Tyburn, 19 Jvme, 1535. He studied at Christ's College, Cambridge, and became a proficient classical scholar. Entering the London Charterhouse, he was soon raised to the office of vicar (.ub-prior) ; in 1534 he was named procurator. Chauncy says that for virtue and learning his like
could not be found in the English province of the
order. Two days after the Prior of the Charter-
house, Bl. John Houghton, had been put to death
(4 May, 1535), W. Exmew and the vicar, Humphrey
Nliddlemore, were denounced to Thomas CromweU
by Thomas Bedyll, one of the royal commissioners,
a,s being "obstinately determined to suffer all ex-
tremities rather than to alter their opinion" with
regard to the primacy of the pope. Three weeks
later they and another monk of the Charterhouse,
Sebastian Newdigate, were arrested and thrown into
the Marshalsea, where they were made to stand in
chains, bound to posts, and were left in that position
for thirteen days. After that, they were removed to
the Tower. Named in the same indictment as Bl.
John Fisher, they were brought to trial at West-
minster, 11 June following, and pleaded not guilty,
i. e. of high treason, but asserted their staunch ad-
hesion to what the Church taught on the subject of
spiritual supremacy and denied that King Henry
VIII had any right to the title of head of the Church
of England. They were consequently condemned to
death as traitors, and weie hanged, drawn, and
quartered. W. E.xmew is one of the fifty-four
EngUsh martyrs beatified by Leo XIII, 9 December,
1886.
Hendriks, The London Charterhouse (London, 1889); CiLiUKCY, Hist, aliquot Martyrum Anglorum (Montreuil-sur- Mer, 1SS8).
EoMrND GURDON.
William Filby, Blessed, b. in Oxfordshire be- tween 1557 and 1560; suffered at Tyburn, 30 May, 1582. Educated at Lincoln College, Oxford, he was admitted to the seminary at Reims, 12 October, 1579. He was ordained priest at Reims, 25 March, 1581, and shortly after left for the mission. He was arrested in July, committed to the Tower, removed 14 August to the Marshalsea, and thence back to the Tower again. He w.as sentenced 17 November, and from that date till he died was loaded with manacles. He was also deprived of his bedding for two months. With him suffered three other Beali, Thomas Cottam, Luke Kirby, and Laurence Richardson {vere Johnson).
Blessed Luke Kirby was born inthenorthof England about 1549, and is said to have graduated RI.A., probably at Cambridge. Having been reconciled at Louvain, he entered Douai College in 1576, and was ordained priest at Cambrai in September, 1577. He left Reims for England, 3 May, 1578, but returned 15 July and proceeded to Rome, where he took the college oath at the English College, 23 April, 1579. In June, 1580, he was arrested on landing at Dover, and committed to the Gatehouse, Westminster. Trans- ferred to the Tower, 4 December, he was subjected to the "Scavenger's Daughter" formore than an hour, 9 December. He was condemned, 17 November, 1581, and from 2 April till the day of hig death was in irons.
Blessed Laurence Richardson, a son of Richard Johnson, of Great Crosby, Lancashire, was a Fellow of Brasenose College, Oxford, in or before 1569, and supplicated B.A. 25, November, 1572. In 1573 he was at Douai, and on 23 March, 1577, was ordained priest at Cateau-Cambresis. He was sent on the mission 27 July following, and laboured in Lancashire. He was arrested in London on his way to France and imprisoned in Newgate, where he remained until the day of his indictment, 16 November, 1581, when he was committed to the Queen's Bench Prison, and on the day of his condemnation, 17 November, to the Tower, where he had no bedding for two months.
Keoqb and Pollen in Liies of the Eiiglish Martyrs, od. Camm, II (London, 1905), 500-35; .\llen, A Briefe llislorie. cd. Pollen (London. 1908), 67-83; Challoner, Missionary Priests. I, nn. 12, 13, 14; GiLLOW, Bibl. Diet. Eng. Cath.. s. vv.
John B. Wainewright.
William Greenwood, Blessed. See Thomas JonNsoN, Blessed.
