According to the account of the local antiquary John Lucas, Aylmer came from Hertfordshire and was seduced by 'some popish emissaries' at Oxford and went to Douai. There he joined the Franciscans, and took the name of Augustine. The reference in Chester records to his having been promoted priest by [Jacques-] Theodore, Comte de Bryas, Archbishop of Cambrai, puts his ordination between 1675 and late 1694. In 1695, he was appointed to preach and hear confessions at Doaui, and he became Professor of Divinity and guardian of the Convent of the English Franciscans. On 18 Dec. 1709 he presided over Richard Colleridge's divinity thesis.
He converted back to the Church of England, and delivered his sermon of recantation at Oxford before the Bishop, William Talbot, and city council on 20 Sept. 1713 (it was published in Oxford, 1713, and Dublin, 1714, as 'A Recantation Sermon against the Errors of Popery'). Talbot was also Dean of Worcester, and it was Worcester Dean and Chapter who presented him to Warton.
According to the antiquary John Lucas,who knew him and wrote a history of Warton parish, 'Having formerly studied physic as well as divinity he was very serviceable to the bodies as well as to the souls of his parishioners'.
In 1716, when queries over estates applied to 'superstitious uses';, Aylmer declared his ignorance of any such 'upon the word of a Christian, gentleman and priest'; who had 'given more than ordinary proof of [his] sincere zeal for the Protestant Religion'.
He d. 24 Oct. 1733.
VCH, Lancs., 8.159n. (also the source of all quotations); J. Kirk, Biographies of English Catholics in the Eighteenth Century (1909), p. 9; T.D. Whitaker, History of Richmondshire, 2 vols. (1823), 2.295; J. Lucas, History of Warton Parish, ed.J. Rawlindon Ford & J.a. Fuller Maitland (Kendal, 1931),15-6.
None of the records here record either university or degree, but in a memorandum of 1715, Lucas notes Aylmer as MA (The Memoranda Book of John Lucas, 1712-1750, ed. J. Oates, Thoresby Society Publications. 2nd series, vol 16 (2006), p. 45.
Gastrell in notes recording his response to enquiries made in 1722 recorded him as 'D.D. Oxon', The Cumbria Parishes, 1714-1725', ed. L.A.S. Butler, Cumb. & Westmor. Ant. & Arch. Soc., Rec. Ser., vol. 12 (1998). But Aylmer does not appear in Foster's Alumni Oxonienses either as undergraduate or DD. However, Aylmer himself noted in the parish register, 'Wilhelmus Aylmer in Ecclesia Romana olim S.T.P. inductus fuit in Vicariam de Warton Die 20mo. Mensis Maii 1714', J. Lucas, History of Warton Parish,15. The Doctorate is presumably from Douai.
| Year | Type | Name as Recorded | Location | Office/Status | Full Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| --- | Ordi(ordination) | Aylmer, Gulielmus | / | priest | View |
| --- | Appt(Collation) | Aylmer, William | Warton / | King's Preacher | View |
| 1714 | Appt(Institution) | Aylmer, Gulielmus | Warton / | Vicar | View |
| 1714 | Appt(Institution) | Ailmer, Willhelmus | Warton / | Vicar | View |
| 1716 | Libc | Aylmer, Gulielmus | Warton / | Vicar | View |
| 1725 | Libc | Aylmer, Gulielmus | Warton / | Vicar | View |
| 1730 | Appt(Collation) | Aylmer, Gulielmus | County of Lancashire / | King's Preacher | View |
| 1733 | Vac(Death) | Aylmer, William | County of Lancashire / | King's Preacher | View |
| 1733 | Libc | Aylmer, William | Warton / | Vicar | View |
| 1734 | Vac(Death) | Ailmer, William | Warton / | Vicar | View |