This list of subscribers in St Bene’t’s parish to the Spittle House and House of Correction is headed by the most generous resident, Thomas Hobson, who provided £30 as a single payment and promised £20 annually thereafter towards building maintenance. 

The Spittle House, originally founded as the Hospital of St Anthony and St Eloy outside Trumpington Gate, was operating as an almshouse by the seventeenth century. The old House of Correction or Bridewell was on Castle Hill but by the mid 1620s a new one was required. Expanding on this donation, in 1628 Hobson conveyed to the University and city authorities the land on St Andrew’s Street on which was erected a new House of Correction called the Spinning House.

For the methodology employed in presenting records online, see the introduction to this CUDL collection .