Another interesting personality gained in a very different manner the
reverence, if not the worship, of the religious devotees of the time.
This was Saint Wulsy, a hermit of repute, who, we are told, lived for
seventy-five years a life of contemplation and seclusion. From
Crowland Abbey, his earlier home, Wulsy was led blindfolded, that he
might not be contaminated by the world, to Evesham, and near the
church he built with his own hands a chapel in honour of Saint Kenelm,
saint and martyr, with a cell adjoining, in which he spent the rest of
his life.

In the reign of Edward the Confessor the church was rebuilt and
greatly enlarged by Abbot Mannie, noted as a skilful craftsman in gold
and silver; but even this must have seemed to the ambitious Norman
insignificant, and unworthy of its high purpose, for very soon after
the Conquest it was pulled down to make way for a much larger and more
dignified building.


THE ABBEY AFTER THE CONQUEST


William the Conqueror did not oust the prudent Abbot whom he found in
office at Evesham. A favourite at the court of Edward the Confessor,
Abbot Agelwy stood high also in Harold's regard, and was not only
unmolested when William took up the reins of power, but was appointed
to other offices of great trust and political importance. On his death
the abbacy was given to a Norman monk, Walter of Cerasia, and in his
time the great church of which some foundations still remain was
begun. The "wily Agelwy" had left "four chests of silver" towards this