Sir John of Shoreditch was a doctor of laws, advocate and knight, a man of great eminence in his profession. This may be inferred from the fact that, in 1343, he was sent, with others, as envoy to the Pope to complain of papal exactions. In the year 1345, writes the chronicler, on the tenth of the month of July, Sir John, of the king’s council, was secretly suffocated by four of his servants at a certain house of his near Ware. These four servants, suspected and apprehended, confessed their crime, and on the eighteenth day of the same month, being the Sunday before the festival of St. Margaret, they were in London drawn, hanged, and beheaded, and their heads were set up on Newgate, on poles.[131] The punishment thus inflicted was the penalty of petty treason, of which they were guilty in killing their master. Tyburn is not mentioned as the place of execution. =1347.= The Scotch king, David II., the earl of Fife, and the earl of Menteith were captured. Fife and Menteith were sent to London and tried. From Calais Edward III. sent the judgment to be pronounced on these two “traitors and tyrants.” In accordance with the sentence, Menteith was drawn, hanged, disembowelled. His head was set on London Bridge, and the quarters sent to various parts of England. The sentence was not carried out against Fife, as being allied to the king in blood.[132] This is the sentence as given by Rymer:— Si est agarde q’ils soient Ajuggez Traitres, &, come Traitres & Tirantz atteintz, Traynez, Penduz, Decolez, & lour Corps Quartirez, & lour Chiefs mys sur le Pount de Loundres, & les Quarters mys a les Quatre Principals Villes du North (c’est assaver) a Everwyk, Noef Chastel sur Tyne, Kardoil, and Berewyk, de les y pendre haut par Cheines, en ensample & terrour des Traitres & Tirantz celles Parties. Tyburn is not mentioned. =1377.= Sir John Menstreworth, accused of embezzling from the king large sums allotted to him for the pay of soldiers, fled to France. About this time (April), writes the chronicler, was captured Sir John Menstreworth, a traitorous knight, who had fled to Pamplona, a city of Navarre. Brought to London, he was first drawn, then hanged: finally his body was divided into four quarters, which were sent to four principal cities of England; and his head was fixed on London Bridge, where it remained for a long time.[133] =1386.= And that yere the goode man at the sygne at the Cocke in Chepe, at the Lyttyll Condyte, was mortheryd in hys bedde be nyght, and therefore hys wyffe was brente, and iiij of hys men were hangyd at Tyborne.[134] The Grey Friars Chronicle says that three servants were drawn and hanged. This is the record of a terrible judicial error. The Chronicles tell the story, some under the year 1386, some under 1391. We may suppose that the dates are those respectively of the commission of the crime and the discovery of the real criminal. Stow thus tells the whole story in his “Summary,” ed. 1598:—