Walter Besant - Medieval London (Vol. 1&2)

Respect for the law, after a long period of lawlessness, was the lesson which the nation had to learn. In London it was sternly taught the citizens by the King’s Custos, Sir Ralph Sandwich. And first by the example of the foreign merchants: for finding them justly charged with short measure and false weight, he imprisoned them all in the Tower, and fined them a thousand pounds. This punishment struck a salutary terror into the heart of many an honest trader: quart pots, for instance, were everywhere restored to their original dimensions by the removal of the pitch which had raised up the bottom. Another useful lesson was given when a rescue was attempted. The Sheriff was haling a criminal to prison when three misguided citizens assaulted him and forcibly released the man. They were promptly arrested, tried, and sentenced to have their right hands struck off. It is a punishment which one would not willingly see revived; at the same time, it may be acknowledged that the spectacle of these unhappy stumps must have reminded the citizens every day of the respect due to a magistrate. It was an object lesson which continued till the death of the last survivor of the three. And another lesson was taught them when some of the principal citizens broke open the Tun prison and set the prisoners free. They were themselves imprisoned and the City was fined 20,000 marks.

In the year 1295 there happened a thing happily most unusual in the annals of the country—the deliberate venal treachery of a knight esteemed honourable and loyal as he was already proved to be courageous. There is an account of the case in Holinshed; Stow and others briefly notice it; the fullest account, however, is that of Bartholomew Cotton, quoted in the Appendix to the Chronicles of Old London (FitzThedmar):—

“In the same year (A.D. 1295) a certain knight, Thomas Turbevile by name, who had been taken by the French at the siege of Rheims, and detained in prison by the said King of France, came over to England with traitorous designs, and said that he had escaped from prison of the said King of France: whereupon, he was kindly received by our Lord the King of England, and much honoured. But after he had remained some little time in the Court of our Lord the King of England aforesaid, he attempted to send a certain letter to the King of France: whereupon, his messenger carried the same to our Lord the King of England and gave him a full and open account of the treachery of his employer. The traitor, suspecting this, took to flight, but was taken shortly after. The tenor of his treasonable letter was as follows:—

The whole of the letter need not be quoted here. It proved the treason of the man up to the hilt.

“‘And know that the King is sending into Gascoigne twenty ships laden with wheat and oats, and with other provisions and a large amount of money: and Sir Edmund the King’s brother will go thither, and the Earle of Nichole, Sir Hugh le Despenser, the Earl of Warwyk, and many other good folks: and this you may tell to the high Lord. And know that we think we have enough to do against those of Scotland! and if those of Scotland rise against the King of England, the Welsh will rise also. And this I have well contrived, and Morgan has covenanted with me to that effect. Wherefore I counsel you forthwith to send great persons into Scotland: for if you can enter therein, you will have gained it for ever.’”

The said Thomas was seized on the Saturday next before the Feast of Saint Michael, and taken to the Tower of London: and on the Saturday next after the Feast of Saint Faith (October 6) he had his trial, and departed in manner underwritten:—He came from the Tower, mounted on a poor hack, in a coat of ray, and shod with white shoes, his head being covered with a hood, and his feet tied beneath the horse’s belly, and his hands tied before him: and around him were riding six torturers attired in the form of the devil, one of whom held his rein, and the hangman his halter, for the horse which bore him had them both upon it: and in such a manner was he led from the Tower through London to Westminster, and was condemned on the dais in the Great Hall there: and Sir Roger Brabazun pronounced judgment on him, that he should be drawn and hanged, and that he should hang so long as anything should be left whole of him: and he was drawn on a fresh ox-hide from Westminster to the Conduit of London, and then back to the gallows: and there is he hung by a chain of iron, and will hang so long as anything of him may remain.

In the year 1290 Edward lost his Queen, Eleanor of Castile, and to show his grief for her death he erected crosses of a beautiful design at all the stopping-places of the funeral procession on its way from Nottingham to London. It may be remembered that one of the suggested derivations of Charing Cross is “Chère reine,” in allusion to the cross there. The present cross in the station courtyard is on the model of the ancient one, though not exactly like it.

In the same year those remaining of the Jews were banished, their lands and houses were seized; though they were suffered to carry with them their portable property. The hardships endured by these unfortunate people are spoken of elsewhere (see p. 9). The following simple story of brutal murder is related by Holinshed (vol. ii.):—

“A sort of the richest of them, being shipped with their treasure in a mightie tall ship which they had hired, when the same was under saile, and got downe the Thames towards the mouth of the river beyond Quinborowe, the maister mariner bethought him of a wile, and caused his men to cast anchor, and so rode at the same, till the ship by ebbing of the stream remained on the drie sands. The maister herewith entised the Jewes to walke out with him on land for recreation. And at length, when he understood the tide to be coming in, he got him backe to the ship, whither he was drawne up by a cord. The Jewes made not so much hast as he did, bicause they were not aware of the danger. But when they perceived how the matter stood, they cried to him for helpe; howbeit he told them, that they ought to crie rather unto Moses, by whose conduct their fathers had passed through the Red Sea, and therefore, if they would call to him for helpe, he was able inough to helpe them out of those raging floods, which now came in upon them; they cried indeed, but no succour appeared, and so they were swallowed up in the water. The maister returned with the ship, and told the King how he had used the matter, and had both thanks and reward, as some have written. But other affirme (and more trulie as should seem) that diverse of those mariners, which dealt so wickedlie against the Jewes, were hanged for their wicked practise, and so received a just reward of their fraudulent and mischeevous dealing.”

In the end the banishment of the Jews brought no alleviation to those who wanted to borrow money. The Lombards and the Caursini proved as flinty-hearted in the matter of interest as any Jew had been.

Edward granted but one Charter to the City. This was in 1298, when the Mayor was restored to the City. It is simply a Charter of Confirmation. The citizens are to have all their old liberties together with the right of electing their Mayor and Sheriffs. The election of Henry Waleys as the first of the new series showed that the preponderance of power was still with the aristocratic class. Edward’s financial embarrassments and his wars belong to the history of the country. As regards the City, Edward borrowed money of the Italian Companies (see p. 212); he created knights by the hundred; he searched the monasteries and churches for treasure; he seized the lay fees of the clergy; he got £2000 out of the City in recognition of his knighting the Mayor; and he persuaded, or ordered, the Londoners to furnish him with three ships, forty men mounted and equipped, and fifty arbalisters for the defence of the southern coast.