Rev. William Gybbe

Other Events and Attributes:

• Occupation: Clyst St George, Devon; Rector

Notes:

Rector of Clyst St. George, buried there 30 May 1571. Monumental tile in the church. Will dated 6 May, proved 8 June 1571 in the Consistory Court of the Bishop of Exeter.

He was instituted to the Rectory of Washford Pyne, 8 miles north of Crediton, 18 October 1537; and to the Rectory of Clyst St. Mary, distant 20 miles from the former via Exeter and Crediton, 7 September 1542 (Bishop Veysey's Register, fo. 108). He resigned Washford on institution to the Rectory of Clyst St. George adjoining Clyst St. Mary, 11 July, 1554 ('Gibbs of Fenton', pp. 57 and n, and 58n). The following account of him in 1561 is in a report on the Clergy of Exeter Diocese made in that year by Bishop Alley to Archbishop Parker of which a MS copy is in Exeter Public Library: 'Clist Sancti Georgii Dominus Willelmus Gybbes, rector, non graduatus, presbyter, non conjugatus nec concubinarius, studiosus, non doctus Latine, residet, non predicat, duo possidet hanc et Clyst Marie dispensatus per statutum ut dicit': and 'Clist Sancti Marie Dominus Willelmus Gybbes, rector, responsus est per eundem ut supra'. Clearly up till 1561 he held both livings (the enquiry may, however, have been made earlier, for a list of rectors of Clyst St. Mary in possession of the rector (1932) states that William G's successor there was John Huntingdon, appointed '1560 before 4 Oct'. No evidence is available from the Exeter Episcopal Registers which are missing from this period. He witnessed and proved the will of Henry Gibbe of Woodbury in 1549. In his own will, 1571, he appointed John, son of George Gybbe of Clyst St. George, his executor and residuary legatee. In 1560, he acted for several Clyst St. George people (see agreement abstracted on pp. 140-1 of 'Gibbs of Fenton') in purchases of property from Lord Wentworth, among them for John Gybbe and for George Gybbe in their purchases respectively of Pytte and Claypitte. That he and his relations at Clyst St. George and Woodbury were related to the Gibbs family of Fenton in Dartington is made practically certain by the fact that the persons concerned in presenting him to the livings of Washford Pyne and Clyst St. Mary were relations of that family: see 'Gibbs of Fenton' pp.57-8.