John Ashwell

Who is John Ashwell?

John Ashwell, was the prior of Newnham Abbey, in Bedfordshire.

Ashwell was best known for his opposition to the principles of the Reformation, was a graduate of Cambridge University. In 1504 it is probable that Ashwell, who was then a bachelor of divinity, became rector of Mistley in Essex, and held in subsequent years the benefices of Littlebury and Halstead in the same county. In 1515 we know him to have been appointed chaplain to Lord Abergavenny's troops in France, and six years later a prebendal stall in St. Paul's Cathedral was conferred upon him.

He became prior of Newnham Abbey about 1527. In the same year he addressed a secret letter, written partly in Latin and partly in English, to John Longland, the Bishop of Lincoln, bitterly complaining of the heretical opinions held by George Joye, a bold advocate of Lutheranism, with whom he had lived on terms of great intimacy [see Joye, George]. The epistle unhappily fell into Joye's hands, and the reformer withdrew to Strasburg to escape the effects of the bishop's displeasure.