Note 546 — BOOK V PLAYS AND PLAYWRIGHTS

Lambe notes (iii. 690) in 1636 that on 30 June 1588, ‘the archbishop gave power to Doctor Cosin, Doctor Stallard, Doctor Wood, master Hartwell, master Gravett, master Crowley, master Cotton, and master Hutchinson, or any one of them, to license books to be printed: Or any 2 of those following master Judson, master Trippe, master Cole and master Dickens’. It will be observed that most of the first group of these had already acted as ‘correctors’, together with William Redman and Richard Vaughan, chaplains respectively to Archbishop Grindal and Bishop Aylmer. William Hutchinson and George Dickens were also chaplains to Aylmer. Hutchinson was in the High Commission of 1601. Richard Cosin was Dean of the Arches and a High Commissioner. Abraham Hartwell was secretary and Cole chaplain (Arber, ii. 494) to Archbishop Whitgift. Hutchinson, William Gravett, William Cotton, and George Dickins were or became prebendaries of St. Paul’s. Thomas Stallard was rector of All Hallows’ and St. Mary’s at Hill; Henry Tripp of St. Faith’s and St. Stephen’s, Walbrook. Most of this information is from Hennessy. Crowley was presumably Robert Crowley, vicar of St. Giles, Cripplegate, and himself a stationer, although his activity as a Puritan preacher and pamphleteer makes his appointment an odd one for Whitgift. Moreover, he died on 18 June 1588. There may have been two Robert Crowleys, or the archbishop’s list may have been drawn up earlier than Lambe dates it.