and a boy. Robinson had found St Alban Hall "rather an expensive place, the number being so few, and there was no endowment." The last principal, William Salter, was appointed in 1861 and resigned in 1882. In 1877 Prime Minister Disraeli appointed commissioners under Lord Selborne and later Mountague Bernard to consider and implement reform of the university and its colleges. The commissioners came to the view that the four remaining medieval halls were not viable and should merge with colleges. In 1881, the commissioners made a University Statute which provided for St Alban Hall to be united with Merton College in the event of Principal Salter's resignation or death. The Hall then had eighteen members in residence, who were admitted to Merton. In 1887, a similar Statute extinguished New Inn Hall and combined it with Balliol College, on the death of Henry Hubert Cornish. In the event, of the halls only St Edmund Hall would avoid merger. Henry Robinson cast some of the blame for the end of the Hall on Lord Salisbury, the university's chancellor: Robinson died a few days after his article was published. Buildings St Alban Hall's buildings included a main quadrangle and a smaller court. The Merton Street front of the quad was rebuilt in 1600, funded by Benedict Barnham. The buildings were reconstructed again and a chapel added by John Gibbs from 1863, funded by Principal Salter. After 1882 the chapel was no longer needed and was secularized. Between 1904 and 1910 the buildings of the former hall were demolished, apart from part of their front elevation on Merton Street, and the St Alban's Quadrangle of Merton College built on the site. Principals A list of the principals of St Alban Hall. 1437: Roger Martin 1439: Robert Ashe 1444: John Gygur 1450: William Shyrefe 1452: William Romsey 1468–1477: Thomas Danett 1477: Richard FitzJames, later Bishop of London Thomas Lynley Robert Gosbourne Ralph Hamsterley 1501: Hugh Saunders, alias Shakspeere 1503: John Forster 1507: John Beverstone 1507: William Bysse 1509: Richard Walker 1510: John Pokyswell 1514: John Hoper Simon Balle 1527: Walter Buckler 1530: Robert Tailer 1532: William Pedyll 1535: Robert Huyck 1536: Richard Smyth, also first Regius Professor of Divinity at Oxford 1539: Humphrey Burneford 1543: John Estwyck 1547: William Marshall 1567: Arthur Atye Richard Radclyffe 1599: Robert Masters 1603: Henry Masters 1614: Anthony Morgan 1621: Richard Parker 1624: Edward Chaloner 1625–1661: Richard Zouch 1641: