As the Church of England in Wales is becoming one of the burning political questions of the day, I shall give a sketch of the value and appropriation of the tithe-rent charge of Wales, including the parishes in Monmouth and Salop, which are in Welsh dioceses. The figures are taken from the official Tithe Commutation Return of 1887.

By the operations of the Ecclesiastical Commissioners, when Parliament vested in them the tithe-rent charges of all the archbishops, bishops, chapters, etc., a large quantity of rent-charges was annexed to benefices. The following table indicates the ownerships in 1890:—

It is important to state who were the clerical appropriators, schools, colleges, etc., in receipt of tithes in 1836. As regards the lay impropriators, it would entail enormous work to get their names. The Tithe Commissioners have their names in each apportionment. But in very many cases the property has, since 1836, changed hands, either by sale, wills, etc.

The endowments of the Welsh bishops and Cathedral churches were taken from the parochial tithes. This meant spiritual destitution in such Welsh parishes. The Norman conquerors seized and held the Welsh episcopal and Cathedral endowments; then the bishops and chapters seized the parochial tithes, and at the time of the Reformation, the Crown annexed additional parochial tithes in augmentation of episcopal and capitular incomes. These tithes were not, as in England, monastic, but were actually taken from the parish clergy by virtue of the Crown’s prerogative as head of the Church.

Diocese of Bangor.

Bishop of Bangor had from 16 parishes, £5,560; viz., £3,258 in his own diocese; £2,302 in the diocese of St. Asaph. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners (E. C.), when this property was vested in them, annexed £3,701 to parochial incumbents in the diocese, and retained to £1,859.

Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry held £1,456 10s. from 4 parishes. The E. C. annexed to parishes £863 1s. 9d., and retained to £593 8s. 3d.

Jesus College, Oxford, £1,089 9s. 10d. This college annexed to the two parishes £239 17s. 8d.

The principal of this college £738 10s. from three parishes. He annexed them to the parishes subject to the payment to him of £270 per annum net.

University College, Oxford, has £37, which it still holds.

The Dean and Chapter had no endowments collectively, but separately, thus:—

By an Act of 1 James II. (1685), the Dean and Chapter received the tithes of five parishes in Montgomeryshire for the service and repairs of church. They amount to £1,616, which they still possess.

Diocese of Llandaff.

The Bishop received £1,872 from 11 parishes. The Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol received £430 from two parishes.

The Chapter received £4,487 from 28 parishes. And in addition to this enormous sum, the Chapter’s separate estates amounted to £1,922 from 16 parishes. Here, then, is a total of £6,409 per annum, taken from 44 parishes by the Chapter of Llandaff.

But this is not the end of the depletion of parochial endowments. The Dean and Chapter of Gloucester received £2,618 from 12 parishes; and the Dean and Chapter of Bristol £966 from 5 parishes. Here, then, is a total of £12,297 per annum, taken from 76 parishes in this diocese alone by two bishops and three chapters.

Diocese of St. Asaph.

This was the most lamentable diocese in Wales.

The Bishop received £8,121 per annum from 23 parishes.

Bishop of St. David’s, £800 from one.

The Dean and Chapter received £1,649 from three parishes. By 29 and 30 Charles II., they received £1,370 from 4 parishes for “Domus and Fabric.”

The Chapter’s eight separate estates amounted to £6,084 from 14 parishes, viz., Dean, £1,987; Precentor, £1,585; Chancellor, £868; Treasurer, £350; four Prebendaries, £1,294.

The Dean and Chapter of Oxford, £2,513 from 4 parishes.

The Dean and Chapter of Winchester, £2,205 from two parishes.

The Vicars-Choral received £846 from three parishes.

The total is £23,588 from 54 parishes; add £2,302 received by the Bishop of Bangor from 4 parishes, which has already been stated under “Bangor Diocese,” or £25,890 from 58 parishes in the Diocese of St. Asaph, was received per annum by three bishops and three chapters.

There were 15 sinecure rectories in this diocese in 1836, with incomes amounting in the aggregate to £6,227 commuted value. The rectors of these benefices had no duties whatever to perform. They received handsome incomes and nothing to do for them. Here was the rich harvest for the bishop’s sons and other relatives. The benefices were all in the bishop’s patronage. Bishop Luxmoore, who was bishop of St. Asaph from 1815 to 1830, had an income of £12,000 per annum, and his two sons and two relatives had between them £15,000 a year from the diocese, i.e. £27,000 per annum received by the father, his two sons and two relatives, at a time when the total net receipts by all the working clergy of this diocese amounted to only £18,000 per annum.[289]

Diocese of St. David’s.

Chapter’s separate estates:—

Summary of this Diocese.

It is a very serious matter in reference to the prebendal estates. The Act of 1840 vested all these estates in the Ecclesiastical Commissioners. The prebendaries anticipated what was coming, and therefore granted leases on the lives of mere infants. The result was lamentable to the parishes. No help from the tithe-rent charges could be given them until the leases lapsed. It is now 1891, i.e., fifty-one years after the passing of the Act, and yet sixteen leases of the thirty-seven are still running. And so all the rent-charges of these parishes have for so many years been diverted from these parishes, and so parochial destitution has continued in this diocese. As the leases expire, the Ecclesiastical Commissioners come into possession of the property, and then, but not till then, are steps taken to annex to parishes certain portions of this property. The Ecclesiastical Commissioners have often, in a very kind manner, granted to parishes in England and Wales annuities out of the common Fund, in regard to local claims, in anticipation of the lapse of the leases on tithes, lands, mines and house property.

Tithe-rent Charge now in Possession of the Ecclesiastical Commission in Wales.

The Ecclesiastical Commissioners are in possession (1889) of—

Of the £29,169, I shall give the gross amount of tithe-rent charge in each county, and also the amount still outstanding on beneficial leases.

In this statement we get the actual amount which was outstanding on beneficial leases in 1891, viz., in St. David’s Diocese, £5,191 6s. 8d. on the prebendal tithes only; in St. Asaph’s, £581 6s. 8d.

The annual payments out of the Common Fund in 1889 to the Church in Wales were the following:—

The net annual income derived by the E. C. for 1888 from property in Wales was £28,796. Therefore £38,838 was a free grant out of the Common Fund to the Church in Wales in 1889, and the amount was much larger for 1890.

The value in 1889 of £29,169 commuted tithes in Wales, was £23,014, which was all that the Ecclesiastical Commissioners can be credited with.

By a parliamentary return, issued 30th June, 1890, the E. C. state that in 1885 they had £23,798 of depreciated value of the commuted tithes. The amount in possession of the E. C. varies from year to year on account of (1) depreciation of value; (2) the falling in of beneficial leases, and (3) annexations of all or part of this property to parishes to satisfy local claims when the leases expire.

The total gross revenues from tithes, glebes, Common Fund of E.C., Queen Anne’s Bounty, etc., of bishops, chapters and incumbents, in the four Welsh dioceses were in 1890 £325,226; curates, etc., £55,000 additional. Church population, including children, 350,000. Nonconformist population = 1,400,000.

So, in 1891, the net amount of the £233,727 which goes to the Church is £130,872. This net amount varies annually.

757 incumbents in the twelve Welsh counties and Monmouth receive £186,595 gross tithe-rent charges from these thirteen counties. Average for each, gross £245, and in 1891, net £150. This income is exclusively from tithes.