A guild dedicated to St. John the Baptist was formed in Dunstable in 1442 by certain burgesses of the town. It maintained a chaplain to celebrate divine service daily in St. Peter’s Church for the good estate of the king and the brethren and for the souls of Thomas Peyvre, Margaret his wife and Mary their daughter. The guild was dissolved in 1547 on the grounds that no poor had been relieved nor grammar school nor preacher maintained, and that John Collop, the incumbent, was “of thage of 1. yeres, but meanly lerned not able to serve a cure.”

A manuscript Register Book of the brethren and sisters of the Fraternity for the years 1506-8 and 1522-41 has apparently been for many years in the library of Sir Thomas Phillipps, from which it has recently been acquired, through the sale of part of this vast collection at Sotheby’s, by Luton Public Museum (Accession no. 191/46).

Of the earlier history of the manuscript nothing has yet been discovered, apart from its entry on the printed page of a bookseller’s catalogue—the bookseller has not been identified but the page appears to be of early nineteenth century date— which has been loosely inserted in the Register.

The manuscript has been removed from an earlier binding and is now rebound between wood boards covered in russia. It contains 83 parchment folios, 15 ½ in. high (392 mm.) and 11 in. (276 mm.) wide, of which f. 2 to f. 26, except for a few blank pages, are entered with the names of the brethren and sisters, the remainder, ruled with red lines in double columns for the lists of names, being blank except for an odd repetitive entry of the name of the president for 1529 on f. 79.

The book falls into two parts; f. 2 to f. 4 contain the lists for the years 1506-8. The first list is headed :

“Thes ben the namis of the brethren and sisters made in the tyme of Master William Grene president of this fraternite of Saint John baptist

Wardeyns of the same fraternite In the yer of owre Lorde god m.10 ccccc.° vi”

written in red followed by the names of 124 brethren and sisters in black, then the heading “Redborne” in red before the names of the last four members.