User:CJMcKenna98/Alfred the great

Death and Burial

Alfred died on 26 October 899 at the age of 50 or 51. How he died is unknown, but he suffered throughout his life with a painful and unpleasant illness. His biographer Asser gave a detailed description of Alfred's symptoms, and this has allowed modern doctors to provide a possible diagnosis. It is thought that he had either Crohn's disease or haemorrhoids. His grandson King Eadred seems to have suffered from a similar illness.

Alfred was temporarily buried at the Old Minster in Winchester with his wife Ealhswith and later, his son Edward the Elder. Before his death he ordered the construction of the New Minster hoping that it would become a mausoleum for him and his family. Four years after his death, the bodies of Alfred and his family were exhumed and moved to their new resting place in the New Minster and remained there for 211 years. When William the Conqueror rose to the English throne after the Norman conquest in 1066, many Anglo-Saxon abbeys were demolished and replaced with Norman cathedrals. One of those unfortunate abbeys was the very New Minster abbey where Alfred was laid to rest. Before demolition, the monks at the New Minster exhumed the bodies of Alfred and his family to safely transfer them to a new location. The New Minster monks moved to Hyde in 1110 a little north of the city, and they transferred to Hyde Abbey along with Alfred's body and those of his wife and children, which were interred before the high altar.

In 1536, many Roman Catholic churches were vandalized by the people of England spurred by disillusionment with the church during the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Once again, Alfred's place of rest was disturbed for the now 3rd time. Hyde Abbey was dissolved in 1538 during the reign of Henry VIII, the church site was demolished and treated like a quarry, as the stones that made up the church were then re-used in local architecture. The stone graves housing Alfred and his family stayed underground, and the land returned to farming. These graves remained intact until 1788 when the site was acquired by the county for the construction of a town jail.

Before construction began, the convicts of this new jail were sent in to prepare the ground, to ready it for building. While digging the foundation trenches, the convicts discovered the coffins of Alfred and his family. The local Catholic priest, Dr. Milner recounts this event:

Thus miscreants couch amidst the ashes of our Alfreds and Edwards; and where once religious silence and contemplation were only interrupted by the bell of regular observance, the chanting of devotion, now alone resound the clank of the captives chains and the oaths of the profligate! In digging for the foundation of that mournful edifice, at almost every stroke of the mattock or spade some ancient sepulchre was violated, the venerable contents of which were treated with marked indignity. On this occasion a great number of stone coffins were dug up, with a variety of other curious articles, such as chalices, patens, rings, buckles, the leather of shoes and boots, velvet and gold lace belonging to chasubles and other vestments; as also the crook, rims, and joints of a beautiful crosier double gilt.

The convicts broke the stone coffins into pieces, the lead, which lined the coffins, was sold for two guineas, and the bones within scattered around the area. After the bones of the great Alfred were scattered by the rude hands of convicts, they were likely covered by a building crafted for their confinement and punishment. Today, the bones of Alfred are still lost, they are assumed to still lay at the site of Hyde Abbey, but they have yet to be discovered.