About the Order of St Lazarus in Great Britain
Having received a gift of land from the Earl of Arundel at Wymondham, Norfolk, in c1146, the Order became properly established in England somewhere around 1157 after his noble cousin, Roger de Mowbray, had returned from the Second Crusade. Mowbray must have known of the Lazarite hospital of Jerusalem, and with the support of King Henry II he granted a manor and lands to the Order for the foundation of a leper hospital in Leicestershire. The veteran crusader and patron of several monastic orders died in the Holy Land in 1188. The Preceptory he founded near Melton Mowbray became known as Burton Lazars, a name that remains to this day. It prospered and attracted further patrons, including King Edward I, who gave the leper hospital at St Giles', Holborn, to the Order by Letters Patent in 1299 and King Henry VI who granted the estate of Holy Innocents' Hospital, Lincoln, in 1457.
In 1544, the reforms of King Henry VIII which established the Church of England dissolved the religious and military orders and seized their assets, thus effectively abolishing the Order of St Lazarus in England and Wales. In 1960 the Order was reintroduced into England when the 45th Grand Master gave the late Lord Mowbray, Segrave and Stourton, a direct descendant of the crusader Roger de Mowbray, the title of Grand Prior of England and Wales.
The current Grand Priory of Great Britain is led by the Grand Prior H.E. The Baron of Fetternear. It includes adult members from the Roman Catholic, Anglican and Methodist Churches.