About 1175, Lambin Frese, one of Canterbury's moneyers, exchanged his workshop near Christ Church Gate for two adjacent buildings 'towards Hottemelne, near the ford'. These dwellings had previously been leased by Christ Church Priory to Godwin Grom and Gerold the Tanner, were thrown together and a new stone house was built there. In c. 1180 most of the moneyers were in trouble with the king over huge loans, and Lambin Frese fled the country and his stone house was taken over by the king and sometime later it was leased to Adam of Charing, he died in c. 1205-7 and Roger the Clerk, son of Lambbin, managed to acquire the site and he sold it to Alexander of Gloucester, who founded the Hospital for Poor Priests in it about 1220.

An enquiry dated 1343 found the hospital buildings to be in a ruinous state and from 1370's onwards rebuilding work took place on a large scale. It is said that in 1373 the Syndic (Master) Thomas Wyke, rebuilt the hospital in stone. The surviving buildings largely date to the 14th century. At the centre is the great hall, with a service wing to the south. At the north end of the hall two doors lead to the undercroft and solar, north-east of this is the chapel. This has a surviving crown-post-roof. This roof is slightly earlier than the other roofs within the complex. Parts of earlier, late 12th and 13th century stone buildings, still survive within and below the 14th century work. The hospital survived the Dissolution and after 1575 a series of complex conversions and different uses were made of the complex's buildings.

Ordnance Survey, 1873, 1st edition map of Canterbury 1873 (Map). SKE30447.

Bennett, P., 1981, The Poor Priest's Hospital 1981 (Article in serial). SKE29841.

Tatton-Brown, T., 1981, 'The Poor Priests Hospital in Canterbury', Collectanea Historica, Essays in Memory of Stuart Rigold (Monograph). SKE30448.

Bennett, P., 1982, The Poor Priest's Hospital 1982 (Article in serial). SKE29840.