Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 13.djvu/151

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Cromleholme
145
Crommelin

ties used towards them at the end of their revolt. In 1536 Henry VIII imposed all the reformatory measures, that had been passed at Westminster, upon the parliament of Dublin: such as the act of supreme head, the act for first-fruits to go to the crown, the act for suppressing certain monasteries, and others (Irish State Papers, p. 526; Cox, Hibern. Anglicana, p. 248; Dixon, Ch. of Engl. ii. 181). At the same time a number of commissioners appeared, and the English reformation was actively enforced, especially by Browne, the new archbishop of Dublin. Cromer, as primate of Ireland, did what he could to oppose these proceedings. Summoning a meeting of some of his suffragans and clergy, he represented the impiety of acknowledging the king as supreme head of the church; exhorted them to adhere to the apostolic chair; and convinced them that Ireland was the peculiar property of the holy see, from which alone the English kings held their dominion or lordship over it, by the argument that it was anciently called the Holy Island (Leland, ii. 161). Soon afterwards Archbishop Browne informed the powerful minister Cromwell that Cromer was intriguing with the Duke of Norfolk, one of the heads of the old learning in England, to prevent the reformation in Ireland. ‘George, my brother of Armagh, doth underhand occasion quarrels, and is not active to execute his highness's orders in his diocese. The Duke of Norfolk is by Armagh, and the clergy desired to assist them, nor to suffer his highness to alter church rules here in Ireland’ (Cox, p. 257). He also warned him that Cromer had entered into communication with Rome. The latter had indeed despatched emissaries thither, to advertise the pope of the king's recent proceedings; and had received from the holy father a private commission, prohibiting the people from owning the king for supreme head, and pronouncing a curse on those who should not confess to their confessors within forty days that they had done amiss in so doing (Cox, ib., Browne to Crumwel, May 1538). Little came of this, and Cromer seems to have ceased to attract attention. He died in March 1542–3.

[Authorities cited, ad loc.]

R. W. D.

CROMLEHOLME, SAMUEL (1618–1672), head-master of St. Paul's School, born in 1618 in Wiltshire, was the son of the Rev. Richard Cromleholme, who was rector of Quedgeley, Gloucestershire, from July 1624. He was admitted to Corpus Christi College, Oxford, 13 Nov. 1635, at the age of seventeen, and took the degrees of B.A. and M.A. in due course. He became master of the Mercers' Chapel school, London, and in 1647 was appointed sur-master of St. Paul's School, where he found a friend in the Rev. John Langley, the head-master, through whose recommendation he got the mastership of the Dorchester grammar school on 10 Oct. 1651. On 14 Sept. 1657 he succeeded Langley, who on his deathbed had recommended him as head-master of St. Paul's School. Pepys was intimate with him, and held him in honour for his learning, but in one place calls him a ‘conceited pedagogue’ for being ‘so dogmatical in all he does and says.’ He was a good linguist, and hence earned the name of πολύγλωττος. At the burning of the school in the great fire of 1666 he lost a valuable library, the best private collection in London it was reputed, and its loss was thought to have hastened his death, which took place on 21 July 1672. His remains were buried in the Guildhall chapel, and his funeral sermon was preached by Dr. John Wells of St. Botolph's, Aldersgate. His wife, Mary Cromleholme, survived him, but he left no children.

[Gardiner's Admission Registers of St. Paul's School, 1884, p. 49; Knight's Life of Colet, 1823, p. 325; Hutchins's Dorset, 1863, ii. 368; Obituary of Richard Smyth (Camd. Soc.), p. 96; Pepys's Diary, ed. Mynors Bright, 1875, i. 24, 38, 391, ii. 10, 46, 139, 205, iii. 125, iv. 94; Bagford's account of London Libraries in W. J. Thoms's Mem. of W. Oldys, 1862, p. 74; and in Notes and Queries, 1861, 2nd ser. xi. 403; information from Mr. J. W. Bone and others.]

C. W. S.

CROMMELIN, SAMUEL-LOUIS (1652–1727), director of Irish linen enterprise, was born in May 1652 at Armandcourt, near St. Quentin, Picardy, where his ancestry had long been landowners and flax-growers. His father, Louis Crommelin (married in 1648 to Marie Mettayer), was sufficiently wealthy to leave 10,000l. to each of his four sons, Samuel-Louis, Samuel, William, and Alexander. Louis Crommelin, who, on his father's death, appears to have dropped the prefix Samuel, gave employment to many hands in flax-spinning and linen-weaving. The family was protestant, and the revocation of the edict of Nantes in 1685 proved the ruin of their business. Crommelin for some years endeavoured to hold his ground; he had reconciled himself to the Roman catholic church in 1683, but becoming again a protestant, his estates were forfeited to the crown and his buildings wrecked. With his son and two daughters (his wife Anne was dead) he made his way to Amsterdam. Here he became partner in a banking firm, and was joined by his brothers Samuel and William.

Many exiled Huguenot linen-workers had