On Lord Mayor's day (29 Oct.) 1720, an incident occurred worthy of a passing notice. From particulars laid before the Court of Aldermen (10 Jan., 1721) by a committee appointed to investigate the matter,[47] it appears that when the members of the Court of Aldermen were riding in their coaches towards the Three Cranes on the banks of the river, thence to attend the new lord mayor (Sir John Fryer) in his barge to Westminster, a certain ensign in the Second Regiment of the Guards--Thomas Hockenhull or Hocknell by name--who was in charge of a detachment of soldiers on their way to the Tower, thought fit to break through the aldermen's procession, and to bring Sir John Ward's coach to a sudden standstill, his horses being struck over the head by the soldiers' muskets. The affront was too serious to be passed over, and Sir John reported the matter to Secretary Craggs, who forwarded the alderman's letter to the Secretary at War, and at the same time expressed regret that such an incident should have happened.[48] Later on the officer himself appeared before the Court of Aldermen bearing a letter from Sir George Treby to Alderman Ward to the effect that the officer had already received a reprimand, and would (he hoped) make a suitable apology. A written apology was read to the Court of Aldermen in which Hockenhull pleaded ignorance as to whose coach it was that had been stopped, and endeavoured to throw the blame on two of his soldiers, who he declared to be "a little in liquor." The officer being called in offered to make submission and to beg pardon, but the Court was not in the humour to accept his apology, and so the matter rested until the following January (1721), when upon Sir George Treby's intercession and Hockenhull's submission the Court agreed to pass the matter over. The Secretary at War was at the same time desired "that for the future the route for the Guards marching to and from the Tower may be as usual through Watling Street, and not through the high streets of this city." [Sidenote: The South Sea Company, 1711-1720.]