London and the Kingdom Volume I Part 6

In later years, however, upon an enquiry being held by the Justiciars of the Iter (a 14 Edward II, A.D. 1321), the claimant was obliged to acknowledge that he had disposed of Baynard's Castle in the time of Edward I, but had especially reserved to himself all rights attaching to the castle and barony, although he very considerately declared his willingness to forego the right and t.i.tle enjoyed by his ancestor of drowning traitors at Wood Wharf.(186)

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But it was in time of war that Fitz-Walter achieved for himself the greatest power and dignity. It then became the duty of the castellain to proceed to the great gate of St. Paul's attended by nineteen other knights, mounted and caparisoned, and having his banner, emblazoned with his arms, displayed before him. Immediately upon his arrival, the mayor, aldermen, and sheriffs, who awaited him, issued solemnly forth from the church, all arrayed in arms, the mayor bearing in his hand the city banner, the ground of which was bright vermilion or gules, with a figure of St. Paul, in gold, thereon, the head, feet, and hands of the saint being silver or argent, and in his right hand a sword.(187) The castellain, advancing to meet the mayor, informed him that he had come to do the service which the city had a right to demand at his hands, and thereupon the mayor placed the city's banner in his hands, and then, attending him back to the gate, presented him with a charger of the value of 20, its saddle emblazoned with the arms of Fitz-Walter, and its housing of cendal or silk, similarly enriched.

A sum of 20 was at the same time handed to Fitz-Walter's chamberlain to defray the day's expenses. Having mounted his charger, he bids the Mayor to choose a Marshal of the host of the City of London; and this being done, the communal or "mote-bell" is set ringing, and the whole party proceed to the Priory of Holy Trinity at Aldgate. There they dismount, and entering the Priory, concert measures together for the defence of the city. There is one other point worthy of remark, touching the office of chief banneret, and that is that on the occasion of any siege undertaken by the London forces, the castellain was to receive as his fee the n.i.g.g.ardly sum of one hundred s.h.i.+llings for his trouble, and no more.

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It is not improbable that Fitz-Walter's election as leader of the remonstrant barons was in some measure due to his official position in the city. It is also probable, as Mr. Riley has pointed out, that the unopposed admission of the barons into the city, on the 24th May, 1215, may have been facilitated by Fitz-Walter's connexion, as castellain, with the Priory of Holy Trinity, situate in the vicinity.

But there were other reasons for selecting Fitz-Walter as their leader at this juncture. If the story be true, Fitz-Walter had good reason to be bitterly hostile to King John, for having caused his fair daughter Maude or Matilda to be poisoned, after having unsuccessfully made an attempt upon her chast.i.ty.(188) This is not the only crime of the kind laid to the charge of this monarch,(189) and there appears to be too much reason for believing most of the charges against him to be true. It is certain that Fitz-Walter was one of the first to entertain designs against John, and that he and Eustace de Vesci, on whose family the king is said to have put a similar affront, were forced to escape to France. The story how Fitz-Walter attracted John's notice by his prowess at a tournament in which he was engaged on the side of the French, and was restored to the King's favour and his own estates, is familiar to all.

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After a feeble attempt to capture Northampton, the barons, with Fitz-Walter at their head, accepted an invitation from the citizens of London to enter the city. They made their entry through Aldgate.(190)

The concession which John had recently made to the citizens, viz.:-the right of annually electing their own mayor(191)-had failed to secure their allegiance. The city became thenceforth the headquarters of the barons,(192) and the adhesion of the Londoners was followed by so great a defection from the King's party (including among others that of Henry de Cornhill), that he was left without any power of resistance.(193)

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The citizens met their reward for fidelity to the barons when John was brought to bay at Runnymede. In drafting the articles of the Great Charter the barons, mindful of their trusty allies, made provision for the preservation of the city's liberties, and the names of Fitz-Walter and of the mayor of the city appear among those who were specially appointed to see that the terms of the charter were strictly carried out.(194)

By way of further security for the fulfilment of the articles of the charter the barons demanded and obtained the custody of the City of London, including the Tower, and they reserved to themselves the right of making war upon the king if he failed to keep his word. For a year or more the barons remained in the city, having entered into a mutual compact with the inhabitants to make no terms with the king without the consent of both parties.(195)

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The right of resistance thus established was soon to be carried into execution. Before the year was out, John had broken faith, and was besieging Rochester with the aid of mercenaries. An attempt to raise the siege failed, owing to the timidity (not to say cowardice) of Fitz-Walter, who, like the rest of the barons, was inclined to be indolent so soon as the struggle with the king was thought to have ended.(196)

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The Pope supported his va.s.sal king. For a second time during John's reign London was placed under an interdict. The first occasion was in 1208, when the whole of England was put under an interdict, and for six years the nation was deprived of all religious rites saving the sacraments of baptism and extreme unction.(197) It was then the object of Innocent to stir up resistance against John by inflicting sufferings on the people, now his purpose was to punish the people for having risen against John.

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The barons saw no other course open to them but to invite Louis the Dauphin to come and undertake the government of the kingdom in the place of John. On the 21st May, 1216, Louis landed at Sandwich and came to London, where he was welcomed by the barons. Both barons and citizens paid him homage, whilst he, on his part, swore to restore to them their rights, to maintain such laws of the realm as were good, and to abolish those (if any) that were bad.(198) Suspicion, however, had been aroused against Louis by the confession of a French n.o.bleman who had come over in his train, and who had solemnly declared on his deathbed that his master had sworn when once on the throne of England to banish all John's enemies.(199) Just when matters seemed to be approaching a crisis and the barons were wavering in their allegiance, John died (19th October, 1216).

CHAPTER IV.

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Although London remained faithful to Louis after John's death, the barons began to desert him, one by one (_quasi stillatim_),(200) and to transfer their allegiance to John's eldest son, a boy of nine years of age, who had been crowned at Gloucester soon after his father's death, the disturbed state of the country not allowing of his coming to London for the ceremony.(201)

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After his defeat at Lincoln (20th May, 1217), by William the Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, one of Henry's guardians, Louis beat a hasty retreat to London and wrote to his father, the French king, to send him military a.s.sistance, for without it he could neither fight nor get out of the country.

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Among the prisoners taken at Lincoln were Robert Fitz-Walter, and a neighbour of his in the ward of Castle Baynard, Richard de Muntfichet, who, like Fitz-Walter, had also suffered banishment in 1213. The tower or castle of Muntfichet lay a little to the west of Baynard's Castle, and was made over in 1276 by Gregory de Rokesle, the mayor, and citizens of London to the Archbishop of Canterbury, for the purpose of erecting a new house for the Dominican or Black Friars, in place of their old house in Holborn.(202) We hear little of Fitz-Walter after this, beyond the facts that he soon afterwards obtained his freedom, that he went on a crusade, and continued a loyal subject to Henry until his death in 1235. He is said to have been in the habit of wearing a precious stone suspended from his neck by way of a charm, which at his last moments he asked his wife to remove in order that he might die the easier.(203)

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A French fleet which had been despatched in answer to Louis was defeated off Dover by Hubert de Burgh, who had gallantly held that town for John, and continued to hold it now for Henry. London itself was invested by the Marshal, and threatened with starvation; but before matters came to extremes, Louis intimated his willingness to come to terms.(204)

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A meeting was held on the 11th of September (some say at Kingston,(205) others at Staines(206)), and a peace concluded.(207) Louis swore fealty to the Pope and the Roman Church, for which he was absolved from the ban of excommunication that had been pa.s.sed on him, and surrendered all the castles and towns he had taken during the war. He, further, promised to use his influence to obtain the restoration to England of the possessions that had been lost beyond the sea.

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Henry, on his part, swore to preserve to the barons and the rest of the kingdom, all those liberties which they had succeeded in obtaining from John. Everything being thus amicably settled, Louis went to London, and, after borrowing a large sum of money from his former trusty supporters, betook himself back to his native country.(208) The general pardon which was granted by the young king extended to the Londoners, who became reconciled and received back their lands,(209) but did not extend to the clergy, who were left to the tender mercy of the papal legate.

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For some years to come there remained a party in the city who cherished the memory of Louis, and the cry of "Mountjoy!" the war-cry of the French king-was sufficient to cause a riot as late as 1222, when Constantine Fitz-Athulf or Olaf, an ex-sheriff of London, raised the cry at a tournament, in order to test the feeling of the populace towards Louis.

Any serious results that might have arisen were promptly prevented by Hubert de Burgh, the justiciar, who very quickly sought out the ringleader, and incontinently caused him and two of his followers to be hanged at the Elms in Smithfield. Whilst the halter was round his neck, Fitz-Athulf offered 15,000 marks of silver for his life. The offer was declined. He was not to be allowed another chance of stirring up sedition in the city.(210)

A more circ.u.mstantial account of this event is given us by another chronicler,(211) who relates that the wrestling match which took place on the festival of Saint James (25th July),-the same as that mentioned by Matthew Paris-was held at Queen Matilda's hospital in the suburbs,(212) and was a match between the citizens of London and those outside; that victory declared itself in favour of the Londoners, and that their opponents, and among them the steward of the Abbot of Westminster, thereupon left in high dudgeon. With thoughts of revenge in their hearts, the latter caused invitations to be issued for another match to be held at Westminster, on the following feast of Saint Peter ad Vincula (1st August).

It was at this second and later match that the trouble began. The steward was not content with collecting the most powerful athletes he could find, but caused them to seize weapons and to attack the defenceless citizens who had come to take part in the games. The Londoners hurried home, bleeding with wounds, and immediately took counsel as to what was best to be done. Serlo, the mercer, who had held the office of mayor of the city for the past five years, and was of a peaceable disposition, suggested referring the matter to the abbot; and it was then that Constantine, who had a large following, advocated an attack upon the houses of the abbot and of his steward. No sooner said than done, and many houses had already suffered before the justiciar appeared upon the scene with a large force.

As to the seizure of Constantine and his subsequent execution, the chroniclers agree.

Constantine's fellow citizens were very indignant at the indecent haste with which the justiciar had caused his execution to be carried out, and did not fail to bring the matter up in judgment against him, when, some ten years later, Hubert de Burgh himself fell into disgrace.(213) The result was, that the justiciar took refuge in the Priory of Merton. When the citizens received the king's orders to follow him there, and to take him dead or alive, they obeyed with unconcealed joy. They allowed little time to elapse, but set out at once, 20,000 strong, ready to tear him limb from limb; but luckily they were stopped in time by another message from the king, and Hubert obtained a respite.(214)

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At the time of Constantine's execution, there was real danger to be antic.i.p.ated from raising the cry in favour of any foreigner. The land was already swarming with foreigners, and in that very year (viz. 1222), the archbishop had been under the necessity of summoning a council of bishops and n.o.bles to be held in London, owing to dissensions that had arisen between the Earl of Chester, William of Salisbury, the king's uncle, and Hubert de Burgh, and to a rumour that had got abroad, that foreigners were inciting the Earl of Chester to raise an insurrection.(215)

A few years later, the country was over-run by a brood of Italian usurers who battened on the inhabitants, reducing many to beggary. When attempts were made to rid the city of these pests, they sheltered themselves under the protection of the Pope.(216)

Throughout the reign of Henry III, there was one continuous struggle against foreign dominion, either secular or ecclesiastical. In this struggle, none took a more active part than the citizens of London, and "when [in 1247], the n.o.bles, clergy, and people of England put forth their famous letter denouncing the wrongs which England suffered at the hands of the Roman bishop, it was with the seal of the city of London, as the centre of national life that the national protest was made."(217)

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Side by side with this struggle another was being carried on, a struggle for the liberty of the subject against the tyranny and rapacity of the king. More especially was this the case with the city. Henry was for ever invading the rights and liberties of the citizens. Thus in 1239, he insisted upon their admitting to the shrievalty one who had already been dismissed from that office for irregular conduct, and because they refused to forego their chartered right of election and to appoint the king's nominee, the city was deprived of a mayor for three months and more.(218)

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The subst.i.tution of a _custos_ or warden appointed by the king for a mayor elected by the citizens, and of bailiffs for sheriffs,-a procedure known as "taking the city into the king's hands,"-was frequently resorted to both by Henry and his successors, and notably by Edward I, in whose reign the city was deprived of its mayor, and remained under government of a _custos_ for thirteen consecutive years (1285-1298).(219)