Stafford No. 4 / / Stadford / Statford / St. Thomas Priory nr Stafford and Baswich

There are four entries for this Stafford [variant spellings] in the Domesday survey [https://opendomesday.org/place/SJ9223/stafford/] [accessed 16 July 2019] none of which mentions cleric or church in it. The entry for this priory in the Victoria County History (Stafford, vol. 3, 1970] notes: "The priory of St. Thomas the Martyr on the north bank of the Sow two miles east of Stafford was founded about 1174 by Gerard fitz Brian [...] In October 1538 Prior Whytell and five canons surrendered the priory and its possessions to the Crown [...] The present entrance to Priory Farm is almost certainly on the exact site of the medieval entrance to the precinct. [...] The most considerable remains are those of the conventual church and the western and southern ranges of the cloister court. [...] Part of the conventual church is to be seen in a stretch of walling some 39 feet long on the north side of the garden of Priory Farm. The work is without doubt of the earlier 13th century and is part of the north wall of the north transept; two main features of the wall are a respond standing to full height with its original capital and, immediately to the east, a plain aumbry".