Did Henry VIII physically destroy the abbey's or are they in ruins due to neglect?

[Springtime_for_Spacers]

@Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party

Yes, this is what happened to Bolton Abbey in Yorkshire.

I was thinking of Rievaulx.

[UDS]

@APB

Wolsey only ever leased the manor of Hampton from the Knights Hospitaller, so it was only that lease that he transferred to Henry. However, in 1531 Henry was able to acquire the manor outright by agreeing a swap with the Knights Hospitaller by which they got the lands of Stansgate Priority, which had been suppressed not as part of the Dissolution of the Monasteries (which had not yet begun) but to endow Wolsey’s Cardinal College (i.e. Christ Church) in Oxford.

IIRC, legally the priory couldn’t give or sell the Hampton estate to Wolsey outright; they had no power of sale over land which had been endowed upon them for charitable/religious purposes. And in fact Wolsey didn’t ask for an outright transfer; he wanted what was, in effect, a guaranteed perpetual tenancy. And I think he did get something of the kind, or at least some guarantee of a long tenancy, because he spent a large fortune on building the palace, and he would hardly have done that unless he was prettys secure in the possession of the estate.

Henry did get an outright transfer of the land, as you point out. I think the legal uncertainties were resolved by the practical consideration that the transferee was the crown. No court was going to rule against Henry if his ownership of the estate were challenged.