Thomas Stevens

Who was Thomas Stevens?

Thomas Stevens, Abbot of Netley Abbey and Beaulieu Abbey; was an English renaissance clergyman and Cistercian monk. As abbot of Netley and Beaulieu he had the right to a seat in the House of Lords.

Little is known of Thomas' early life, but at some time in the late fifteenth or early sixteenth century he became a monk at the small and poor Cistercian monastery of Netley Abbey in Hampshire. There he took holy orders and rose through the ranks so that by 1529 he was elected abbot of Netley, succeeding John Corne.