Eadwine, the last Saxon Abbot, died in 1071, and was buried in the cloisters; he lay near to the very centre of all the life in the monastery which had so developed under his wise rule. Here in the cloisters the monks walked and talked, studied and transcribed; here the novices and the boy scholars sought their recreation; here was the great refectory, and close by the infirmary and St. Catherine's Chapel; overhead was the long bare dormitory. Surely it was fitting that the Abbots of Westminster should be laid in the cloisters, and so they continued to be till the year 1222. You will find the names of many of them recut on the stone benches in the south cloister, if you look for them, only unfortunately this was very carelessly done, and in many cases the names are put over the wrong graves. It seems, too, that Eadwine's body was moved from the south cloister and laid in the passage leading to the Chapter-House, close to the faithful Hugolin, who was the Chamberlain and close friend of the Confessor.
William appointed in Eadwine's place Geoffrey, a Norman, but so evil were his ways that at the end of four years, "having been first admonished by the king and Archbishop Lanfranc, but not amending upon the admonition," he was deprived and sent back to Normandy in disgrace, where he died. He was followed by Vitelus, Abbot of Bernay, held by William to be wise and a man of business, as indeed it was necessary the ruler of a large monastery should be, and among other things "being a stirring man, he let the monk Sulcardus, the best pen they had belonging to the Abbey, draw up the history of the place to give it a figure in the world."
During the rule of Geoffrey, the Lady Eadgytha, widow of Harold, died at Winchester, and was buried with great honour in the tomb of her husband, a tomb which each year became more and more of a holy place to the people of England. Under the hard rule of William, who, in the words of that honest chronicler Master Richard Wuce, "was eke so stark a man and wroth that no man durst do anything against his will, beyond all metes stark to those who withstood his will," the hearts of the people turned to that tomb of an English king, as the source from which they might hope for deliverance, as the spot of comfort from whence came signs from heaven that the saintly king still watched over his sorely tried people.