Freemasonry in England – 1567 to 1813, by Leon Hyneman (1806 -1880) published in 1877, 192 pages.

I acquired a copy of this book as the Grand Secretary of the newly formed (2005) Grand Lodge of all England told me that it explained what happened with the York Grand Lodge in 1717. It would also help to understand why he formed the new version. Well, I can truly say that this is a fascinating book written by a rather eccentric (as far as I can tell) character, although he was, apparently, a well known and respected Masonic writer and historian in America.

This is one of several books that proves conspiracy theory was alive and well even within Masonic circles over 100 years ago. Delving into this book was like discovering my own “Rosetta Stone” as it has finally answered a puzzle that has eluded me for over ten years, that being “why do some American Masons think that the “Antients” Grand Lodge had something to do with the fabled Grand Lodge of All England at York”.

Not to put too fine a point on it but despite all the documentation to the contrary this guy didn’t believe that there was ever an Antient Grand Lodge formed in London by Irish Masons after the London Masons swapped the signs about. He believed (well at least wrote) that it was actually formed by Masons who held warrants from the Grand Lodge of All England at York! Apparently these “York” Masons at first supported the rebellious London Masons but then decided they could not go against the “Mother” Grand Lodge in York and so left the new Grand Lodge and set up their own body. Despite the fact that they called themselves a Grand Lodge he maintains that it wasn’t and was a grouping of “Ancient York Masons”. In fact he proves this by consistently adding York to the phrase Antient Masons and claiming that the first Antients’ Grand Secretary was in fact the Grand Secretary of the York Grand Lodge and that his famous “Ahimon Rezon” was in fact the York Constitutions..

He contends that his theory is partly proven by the fact that the Premier Grand Lodge never mentions the existence of a Grand Lodge at York in the minutes of its Quarterly Communications, This, he claims, shows that the London Grand Lodge didn’t dare to mention it for fear of its censure (It seemed to be lost on him that the fact that it wasn’t mentioned could be because it didn’t actually exist, hey ho.). Of course he never reproduces any minutes of the York Grand Lodge that mention the London Grand Lodge so I don’t really understand his point. In fact no one has been able to produce anything from the York Grand Lodge that pre-dates its actual formation in 1725 but that’s another story.

Unfortunately, the rest of his evidence consists of branding well-known 18^th Century Masons (Anderson, Desaguliers etc) liars and cheats and quoting verbatim from Grand Lodge transactions but interpreting them in a really strange and convoluted ways to mean other things. Another favourite tool is to nitpick the words written by long-dead men (who cannot answer him) more than a Century before he himself writes. Oh did I mention that he supplies no real evidence but suggests that the reader might like to purchase his 2 volume work entitled the “Masonic Library” in order to see some evidence of his claims.

However, despite all of the above this is a useful book as he reproduces extracts from early Grand Lodge of London Quarterly Communications and there are some fascinating snippets about some of what was going on in London Freemasonry during the 1700s.

Overall Rating 5/10.

Contains interesting historical information, hidden amongst the illogical diatribe against the original Grand Lodge of London and Westminster. A hard but worthwhile read for such a small book.