The smaller houses identified for suppression were then visited during 1536 by a further set of local

commissions, one for each county, charged with creating an inventory of assets and valuables, and
empowered to obtain prompt co-operation from monastic superiors by the allocation to them of
pensions and cash gratuities. It was envisaged that some houses might offer immediate surrender,
but in practice few did; consequently a two-stage procedure was applied, the commissions reporting
back to Cromwell for a decision as to whether to proceed with dissolution. In a number of instances
these commissioners supported the continuation of a house where they found no serious current
cause for concern; arguments that Cromwell, as vicegerent, appears often to have accepted. Around
80 houses were exempted, mostly offering a substantial fine. Where dissolution was determined on,
a second visit would effect the arrangements for closure of the house, disposal of its assets and
endowments and provisions for the future of the members of the house; otherwise the second visit
would collect the agreed fine. In general, the suppression commissioners were less inclined to report
serious faults in monastic observance within the smaller houses than the visiting commissioners had
been, although this may have been coloured by an awareness that monks and nuns with a bad
reputation would be more difficult to place elsewhere. The 1536 Act established that, whatever the
claims of founders or patrons, the property of the dissolved smaller houses reverted to the Crown;
and Cromwell established a new government agency, the Court of Augmentations, to manage it.
However, although the property rights of lay founders and patrons were legally extinguished, the
incomes of lay holders of monastic offices, pensions and annuities were generally preserved, as
were the rights of tenants of monastic lands. Ordinary monks and nuns were given the choice of
secularisation (with a cash gratuity but no pension), or of transfer to a continuing larger house of the
same order. The majority of those then remaining chose to continue in the religious life; in some
areas, the premises of a suppressed religious house was recycled into a new foundation to
accommodate them, and in general, rehousing those seeking a transfer proved much more difficult
and time-consuming than appears to have been anticipated. Two houses, Norton Priory in Cheshire
and Hexham Abbey in Northumberland, attempted to resist the commissioners by force, actions
which Henry interpreted as treason, resulting in his writing personally to demand the summary brutal
punishment of those responsible. The prior and canons of Norton were imprisoned for several
months, and were fortunate to escape with their lives; the canons of Hexham, who made the further
mistake of becoming involved in the Pilgrimage of Grace, were executed.