Fr Simon Bordley, eighteenth-century recusant priest, schoolmaster and trader in ‘two-legged cattle’

Simon Bordley (1709-1799) was a Catholic priest of humble status in rural Lancashire for much of the eighteenth century. Despite his rural location and apparently humble status, he played an important part in supporting the Catholic seminaries in France and Portugal by supplying them with students, material goods and financial assistance. Bordley left behind him a lively correspondence relating to these activities which provides us with a valuable insight into the world of eighteenth-century priestly training in the English colleges. It also offers a fascinating glimpse into the world of a churchman who laboured with an impressive level of entrepreneurial skill and independence. This article argues that Bordley defies the common image of the seigneurial Catholic curate in service primarily to a family of the landed gentry in the eighteenth century. In doing so he illustrates an example of the type of energetic cleric who provided a crucial lifeline to a church that came to rely less and less on its aristocracy as the century progressed.