Thither on the day appointed the gentry of the island, with the yeomen
and country people, wended their way. The Bailiffs of Newport, Newtown,
Yarmouth, and Brading, accompanied by the richer of the burgesses of
those boroughs, attended. There were the bailiffs and stewards of the
various estates held by the ecclesiastical bodies of Winchester College,
Whorwell Monastery, Christchurch Priory, and Ashey; while the Abbot of
Quarr, the Prior of Carisbrooke, representing the Carthusian monastery
of Shene, and the Bailiff of Appuldurcombe, for the nunnery of St Clare,
without Aldgate, were also present. There came, besides, the reeves of
the manors belonging to the imprisoned Earl of Warwick, from Brixton and
Swainston. There were representatives of all the island families: Sir
Nicholas Wadham, Sir John Oglander, Sir William Lisle of Wootton, Master
Meaux, recovered from his rough handling of five months before, a
Bowerman from Brooke, Trenchards from Watchingwell and Shalfleet, a
Dineley from Woolverton, a Cheke from Mattistone, the Bowermans of
Austerborne or Osborn, John Racket of Knighton, and his relative by
marriage, Leigh of Woolverton in Bembridge, a Hawles of the ancient
family of De Aula from Stenbury Manor. There were Urrys, Keyneys, De
Heynos, Bruyns, with many others too numerous to mention, and a crowd of
the lesser yeomen and common people. When all were assembled, the
Captain of the Wight, in full armour, but with bare head, mounted on his
splendid charger, and surrounded by his seneschals, esquires, and pages,
addressed the crowd.
In a stirring speech he explained the situation. He told how many evils
the French had inflicted upon their forefathers. How in Edward the
First’s reign they had threatened the island, but were daunted by the
stout preparations of the ancestors of many there present. How again in
Edward the Third’s time they harassed the island by their evil
depredations, until under the brave Sir Theobald Russel of Yaverland,
who gave his life for his people, they were driven out with loss and
shame. How again in Richard the Second’s reign the whole island was
overrun, and cruel damage inflicted, when all their towns were in
flames, and no place safe but the Castle of Carisbrooke. But here again
the ancient valour of their race broke out, and under the stout Sir Hugh
Tyrrel, "that right hardy knight," they chased the false Frenchmen to
their ships, slaying them by scores, "insomuch that from that day
Deadman’s Lane went by no other name, and Neddie’s Hill is still there
to show the burial place of the marauders." Again how valorously they
drove off Waleran de St Pol, that "noble knight of haut lineage," and
frightened away the caitiffs again a few years after; while in Henry the
Fifth’s time they slew many who were running away to their ships.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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