Mediæval London, Volume 2: EcclesiasticalBesant, Walter
History
Mediæval London, Volume 2: Ecclesiastical
Besant, Walter
London (England) -- History -- To 1500; London (England) -- Social life and customs -- To 1500
Suspicions were aroused about the time of the birth of Owen, which
took place apparently before it was expected, and without all the
precautions necessary, in the King’s House at Westminster. The infant
was taken as soon as born to the monastery of St. Peter’s secretly. It
is not likely that the Abbot received the child without full knowledge
of his parents. He did take the child, however; and here little Owen
remained, growing up in a monastery, and taking vows in due time. Here
he lived and here he died, a Benedictine of Westminster.
It would seem as if Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, heard some whisper
or rumour concerning this birth, or was told something about the
true nature of the Queen’s illness, for he issued a very singular
proclamation, warning the world, generally, against marrying
Queen-dowagers, as if these ladies grew on every hedge. When, however,
a year or so afterwards, the fourth child, Margaret, was born, Humphrey
learned the whole truth: the degradation, as he thought it, of the
Queen, who had stooped to such an alliance with a man of humble
rank, and the audacity of the Welshman. He took steps promptly. He
sent Katherine with some of her ladies to Bermondsey Abbey, there
to remain in honourable confinement: he arrested Owen Tudor, also a
priest—probably the priest who had performed the marriage—and his
servant, and sent all three to Newgate.
All three succeeded in breaking prison and escaping. At this point
the story gets mixed. The King himself, we are told, then a lad of
fifteen, sent to Owen commanding his attendance before the Council.
Why did they not arrest him again? Owen, however, refused to trust
himself to the Council—was not Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, one of
them? He asked for a safe-conduct. They promised him one by a verbal
message. Where was he, then, that all these messages should be sent
backwards and forwards? I think he must have been in Sanctuary. He
refused a verbal message, and demanded a written safe-conduct. This
was granted him, and he returned to London. But he mistrusted even the
written promise; he would not face the Council; he took refuge in the
Sanctuary of Westminster, where they were afraid to seize him. And here
for a while he remained. It is said that they tried to draw him out by
sending old friends, who invited him to the taverns outside the Abbey
Precinct. But Owen would not be so drawn. He knew that Duke Humphrey
would make an end of him if he could. He therefore remained where he
was. I think that he must have had some secret understanding with the
King; for one day, learning that Henry himself was with the Council, he
suddenly presented himself and pleaded his own cause. The mild young
King, tender on account of his mother, would not allow the case to be
pursued, but bade him go free.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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