Elizabeth I, Queen of England, 1533-1603; Great Britain -- History -- Elizabeth, 1558-1603
Queen Mary was very much alarmed. She had no armed force in readiness to
encounter this danger. She sent messengers across the Thames and down
the river to meet Wyatt, who was advancing at the head of four thousand
men, to ask what it was that he demanded. He replied that the queen must
be delivered up as his prisoner, and also the Tower of London be
surrendered to him. This showed that his plan was to depose the queen.
Mary rejected these proposals at once, and, having no forces to meet
this new enemy, she had to retreat from Westminster into the city of
London, and here she took refuge in the city hall, called the Guildhall,
and put herself under the protection of the city authorities. Some of
her friends urged her to take shelter in the Tower; but she had more
confidence, she said, in the faithfulness and loyalty of her subjects
than in castle walls.
Wyatt continued to advance. He was still upon the south side of the
river. There was but one bridge across the Thames, at London, in those
days, though there are half a dozen now, and this one was so strongly
barricaded and guarded that Wyatt did not dare to attempt to cross it.
He went up the river, therefore, to cross at a higher point; and this
circuit, and several accidental circumstances which occurred, detained
him so long that a considerable force had been got together to receive
him when he was ready to enter the city. He pushed boldly on into the
narrow streets, which received him like a trap or a snare. The city
troops hemmed up his way after he had entered. They barricaded the
streets, they shut the gates, and armed men poured in to take possession
of all the avenues. Wyatt depended upon finding the people of London on
his side. They turned, instead, against him. All hope of success in his
enterprise, and all possibility of escape from his own awful danger,
disappeared together. A herald came from the queen's officer calling
upon him to surrender himself quietly, and save the effusion of blood.
He surrendered in an agony of terror and despair.
The Duke of Suffolk learned these facts in another county, where he was
endeavoring to raise a force to aid Wyatt. He immediately fled, and hid
himself in the house of one of his domestics. He was betrayed, however,
seized, and sent to the Tower. Many other prominent actors in the
insurrection were arrested, and the others fled in all directions,
wherever they could find concealment or safety.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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