3-021-209 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Leicester: Leicester Abbey, 1868. View of '...the ruins of the once celebrated Abbey on the outskirts of the town, which, though now decayed,...yet appeal with a strange reality to the thoughts of the beholder. The massive walls, pierced here and there with embrasures, or flanked by the fragments of ruined towers...bring vividly back to the mind the days when that vast area was covered with the noblest buildings, and when the mitred Abbot ruled in almost regal state. An old gateway is still shown, through which it is said that Wolsey passed when, "broken with the storms of state, he came to lay his weary bones among them," and craved "a little earth for charity"...The picturesque view, though it is on the Abbey grounds, does not belong to the original structure. It is part of the mansion of the Cavendish family, which was destroyed by the forces of Charles I. after the battle of Naseby; for Leicester witnessed the downfall of Charles, as she had done that of Richard some 200 years before...Though the Abbey has perished - never, in all human probability, to rise again - yet the spirit which reared these noble fabrics in days long gone by has not passed away, as the many beautiful churches for which Leicester is so conspicuous will attest'. From "Illustrated London News", 1868.