Lydgate had a consuming passion for literature, and it was probably that he might indulge this taste more fully that in 1 434 he retired from the priorate of Hatfield Broadoak (or Hatfield Regis), to which he had been appointed in June 1423.
Hatfield obtained from it a gas of composition B3H3.
He constructed "Morton's Dyke" across the fens from Wisbech to Peterborough, repaired the episcopal palace at Hatfield and the school of canon law and St Mary's Church at Oxford.
The name of the town is Great Berkhampstead (or Berkhamsted), in distinction from Little Berkhampstead near Hatfield in this county.
Dr Creighton had access to the manuscript returns of burials and christenings for five years from 1578 to 1582 preserved in the library at Hatfield House.