East Anglia-Our Lady was once

111100 people went to Walsingham in answer Two years ago last Wednesday, May 21, Most honoured there
to an appeal from the Catholic Herald to
pray • there to Our Lady for Peace. War came, but still those prayers rise more insistent than ever. They are not discouraged, those fervent souls who plead in the certainty that their supplications will at last be heard and that Our Lady will restore Peace to her Dowry. One day they will all go again to Walsingham in thanksgiving.
Here is a story of East Anglian Shrines to Our Lady, where people centuries ago prayed with equal fervour for their many needs. They went to Walsingham, and on their way they called at Cambridge, at Thetford, and at other churches and shrines each dedicated to the Mother of God under special invocations.
By a Staff Reporter
WALSINGHAM
pAST ANGLIA, comprising the " counties of Cambridge, Norfolk and Suffolk, is where Catholicism was practically obliterate-d when Protestant doctrines made tremendous inroads in the 16th and 17th centuries. Yet it is where Our Lady was once most honoured, and it is too where her ancient shrines arc springing back to life and popularity.
Walsinghem's lustre has now spread to all corners of the country, and fainter glimmers of reviving past glories can now be seen at Sudbury and Ipswich in Suffolk, at Thetford in Norfolk, and to a certain extent at Cambridge, where the beautiful church enshrines an ancient sacred image of Mary that is becoming increasingly more venerated.
THETFORD
AN article in the May issue of The East Anglian Magazine on devotion to the Blessed Virgin in East Anglia, written by the Rev. II. G. Hughes, quotes John Bramis, a monk of the great Cluniac Priory of St. Mary at Thetford, who writes with reference to the origin of the Thetford Shrine of Our Lady as follows " While the episcopal see (moved to Norwich in the twelfth century) was in the church of St. Mary in the town of Thetford, there was an image of the Blessed Virgin in he saici. church, which was removed to the church of the monks, and placed over the high altar, being the most honourable situation they could assign to it. In process of tbne that ancient Image was taken down and carelessly laid in an obscure part of the church, as if totally forsaken, and in its place was fixed another image of greater elegance and beauty."
There follows an account of apparitions of -Our Lady to a poor man who suffered from an incurable disease, to whom she promised the restoration of his health on condition that he should go to the Prior of the monastery arid tell him to erect a chapel in her honour on the north side of the church.
Thus began the Thetford Shrine, and " many ntiracles of healing were worked through Mary's powerful intercession. Those who at the beginning doubted the truth of the origin of this great shrine ceased doubting when they witnessed happenings so marvellous," concludes Fr. Hughes, who adds: " Pilgrims on their way ro Walsingham called there to venerate Our Lady of Thetford."
When evil times came, the Priory was one of the last to sfall before the greed of henry VIII. Yet in spite of the fame of the Thetford shrine and the haired which it raised in the minds of the reformers. we do not read of the public dishonouring and destruction of the image which had so long been venerated there. This seems strange, and the probable explanation even stranger.
In 1533 Henry, Duke of Richmond and the natural son of Henry VIII by Lady Elizabeth Talbois, a lady-in-waiting to Queen Caiherine of Aragon, married Mary, sister of Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey. Dying three years later, he was buried in a semi-private manner at Thetford Priory. where Surrey erected a tomb over his grave. Within four years the Priory was suppressed, and Surrey moved the lamb to Framlingham in Suffolk, then the seat of the Dukes of Norfolk.
it has been suggested, says Dr. G. W. H. Webb, a former parish priest of Thetford, that Surrey, who was a good Catholic, under the pretext of moving his brother-in-law's body, sfved what he could from the Priory and that the famous statue of Our Lady of Thetford now lies hidden in the grave of the natural son al the despoiler of the monasteries. in Fromlinghans church.
CAMBRIDGE
VENERATION to the Cambridge Shrine
of Our Lady, which, to quote the same magazine, has " grown up without any special urge on the part of the priests," strikes a topical note. As one of the priests of the Church of Our Lade, and the English Martyrs, in which the image is venerated, has informed the writer of the article quoted, " the pre-Reformation statue of Our Lady, occupying a place in honour, is now a great place of pilgrirnege, and numbers of letters are left at the feet of Our Lady asking favours for evacuees, soldiers and others."
An account written by Mgr. Canon My. shall, Cambridge's parish priest, states that the statue is of oak, is of pre-Reformation date, and according to reliable accounts, came from Emmanuel College in Cambridge, being the gift from the College to the late Canon Quinlivan, his predecessor. It is believed that the image belonged to the pre-Reformation Dominicans, on the site of whose Priory Emmanuel College was built, and it was a centre of great devotion at that time.
SUDBURY
FINALLY, the devotion of Our Lady of Sudbury owes its revisal in peso measure to the parish priest, Fr. Moir, which is of slaecial interest in these days by reason of the remarkable recourse being had to OuiLady under this invocation by serving men, many of whom claim as a result the most amazing escapes and favours,
Fr, Moir states that about two thousand petitions have been sent to the shrine since last September alone, together with many !cum expressing gratitude