close to London Bridge where the remnant shell of his palace is Winchester Palace. It formed one of the largest and richest sees. During the Middle Ages, the rump diocese left of all areas appertaining to Hampshire and Surrey before those counties shrank was one of the wealthiest English sees, owning for instance the rectories (the feudal landlord's interest in farms, fisheries, mills and great or small tithes) of many churches in its former, greater area and even in Norman France. Its bishops included a number of politically prominent Englishmen, notably the 9th century Saint Swithun and medieval magnates including William of Wykeham and Henry of Blois. In the 1530s the diocese faced low compensation for the confiscation of its accumulated wealth and monastic feudal dues and lands in the Dissolution of the Monasteries such as, principally, the pensioning of abbots and friars and in some cases granting of the rectories to the incumbent priests. Later the diocese found it difficult to prevent unlawful, nefarious subletting of some of its buildings, for morally dubious purposes such as connected with the numerous British Empire wharves involved in the slave trade often due to the distance, physically and legally from the perpetrators in ownership/operating structure of diocesan clergy and administrators as chief landlords. In the early 19th century office holders lobbied hard with other bishops to bring to an end the trade in the House of Lords, through its missionaries, and in the messages preached across the diocese itself. The Report of the Commissioners appointed by his Majesty to inquire into the Ecclesiastical Revenues of England and Wales (1835) found the Winchester see was the third wealthiest in England, after Canterbury and London, with an annual net income of £11,151. By the 19th century much of the non-church buildings estate of the church had been lost, some statutorily such as by the Tithe Acts procedures but much willingly sold for urban church building. Many schools built by the diocese transferred to state hands in the process of secularisation and National school charitable movement as it evolved under Disraeli. Many schools were co-founded by the diocese in the 20th century and various remain supported by the diocese. Channel Islands component The Channel Islands were transferred from the Diocese of Coutances in Normandy, France, in 1500 by papal bull. The transfer was later confirmed by a letter from Elizabeth I and an order in