man this Gilbert Germyn was. The convulsions and changes in religion
that had succeeded each other in waves since the year 1531 had
unsettled men’s minds; with the exception of fanatics on one side or
the other--the staunch adherents to the Papacy, and the thorough-going
Puritans--dead apathy had settled down on the majority with regard
to religion: they knew not what to believe and how worship was to
be conducted, and they did not much care. Having been taught to
abhor the distinctive errors of the Church of Rome, they had not
been instructed in the distinctive errors of the Church of England
that they were required to embrace. The clergy to fill the vacant
benefices were ignorant and brutish. They had no religious convictions
and no culture. So long as they had pliant consciences, Elizabeth
was content. In many dioceses in England, a third of the parishes
were left without a pastor, resident or non-resident. In 1561 there
were in the Archdeaconry of Norfolk a hundred and eighty parishes,
in the Archdeaconry of Suffolk a hundred and thirty parishes in this
condition. Cobblers and tailors occupied the pulpits, where there were
no incumbents. “The Bishops,” said Cecil, “had no credit either for
learning, good living or hospitality. The Bishops ... were generally
covetous, and were rather despised than reverenced or beloved.” The
Archbishop of York was convicted of adultery with the wife of an
innkeeper at Doncaster. Other prelates bestowed ordination “on men of
lewd life and corrupt behaviour.” And a good many of them sold the
livings in their gift to the highest bidder.
Gilbert Germyn was the son of an apothecary in Exeter. At the time,
Bridestowe cum Sourton, one of the best livings in the gift of the
Bishop, was held by Chancellor Marston. The apothecary, it is stated,
bribed the Chancellor to resign, with a present of £100, and then
negotiated with the Bishop--at what price is not known--to present his
son to the united benefices.
When so many livings were without incumbents, all sorts of
unscrupulous men, of a low class, rushed into Orders, without
university education, indeed without any education at all, so as to
secure a living in which they could draw the tithe and farm the glebe,
without a thought as to their religious responsibilities.
Such a man Gilbert Germyn seems to have been. In 1582 articles of
misdemeanours were drawn up against him by Henry Bidlake and some of
the parishioners, but as far as can be learnt without effect. The
Bishop had presented him, for reasons best known to himself, and was
indisposed to take cognizance of his conduct.
It is worth while looking at some of the charges brought against a man
whom the Bishop, John Woolton, delighted to honour.
He was complained of for his grasping character. Although the glebe
comprised a manor of eight or nine tenements, yet he did not rest till
he got into his own hands “by dyvers meannes three of the best and most
fruitfull tenements in the two parishes.”
That, in addition to being rector of Bridestowe and Sourton, he was
vicar of another parish in Cornwall.
That he was litigious, citing his tenants and the tithe payers even for
a halfpenny.
That he refused at Easter to give the Holy Communion to a bedridden
woman, eighty years old, named Jane Adams, till she paid him a penny
for his trouble.
“He is a great skold and faller owte with his neybors, for lyght
occasyons, as with Mr. William Wrays, and other the best of the
parishes; and stycketh not to saye yn the churche Thou lyest; and to
skold yn the Churchyerde.
“For his pryde, Skoldyng, Avarice and Crueltye his manner is hated
and abhorred of all the 2 parishes, and so driveth them awaye from the
Church.
“He marryed hys wyffe, a notorryowse lyght woman, and of lyke parents
descended being notoryusly suspectyd with the sayd German of [causing]
her first husband’s death; after whose deathe one Edmonds, her servant
claymed her in promise, to be his wyffe, and that openly, and yn the
presence of dyvers requyred the Parson German to procleme the bannes
bytwene them. But German refused to doo yt but presently shyfted
secretly to marry her hymself, having a lycence, and yn a marryng
before sun rysyng so dyd, having a lyttle before cyted the said Edmonds
to ... prove his contract with her, came too late, and thuse were
they marryed withowt clearyng of the woman, to the offence of both
parishioners and others, knowyng before her lyght behavyor.”
It seems that this widow whom Germyn married had some money. Her former
husband had left a will making several bequests, but Parson Germyn
having got the money of the deceased into his hands refused to pay the
bequests, as also the debts of the man and of his widow, now his wife;
also refused to pay annuitants.
It was further complained that Mrs. Germyn baked bread and sold it in
the rectory.
It may be worthy of remark that there is no trace in the Episcopal
Registers of Mr. Germyn having obtained a licence to marry this widow.
It was probably a bit of bluff on his part to say that he had one. Who
performed the ceremony we are not told. Unfortunately the Bridestowe
registers do not go back sufficiently far to help us.
From 1582 to 1613 we hear no more of Parson Germyn. At this latter date
fresh complaints were made against him. Another bishop now occupied
the see, William Cotton, a man of some character and worth, and not
one interested in protecting the disreputable priest.
It was now charged against Mr. Germyn that “he preached that John
Baptist and Mary Magdalen wear married in a citie called Cana in
Galilee,” also that “the said Parson readeth the usuall divine prayers
soe fast that few can understand what he sayeth or the clarke can spare
to answere him accordinge to what is sett fourth in the booke of Common
prayer,” also that “he setteth out the Church yard for 8 shillings
and sixpence, and suffereth the horses and sheepe to use the Church
porche as a common folde, the smell being verie loathesome to the
Parishioners.”
Then came in an accusation of Peter Ebsworthy, “for usurpinge of place
in the Churche, being a man of no discent, or parentage, and claiminge
a Seate unfittinge for a man of his ranke or position.”
This was not a reasonable charge. The Ebsworthys, it is true, in
1620 could prove only three descents, but one had married an heiress
of Shilston, another an heiress of Durant, and they were allied by
marriage with the Calmadys, the Harrises, and the Ingletts. The
Ebsworthys, of Ebsworthy, had probably lived on their paternal acres as
long as had the Bidlakes, of Bidlake, but as yet they had laid no claim
to bear coat-armour. The Bidlakes bore two white doves, but naturalists
say that doves and pigeons are the most quarrelsome of birds.
The spiteful remark about Peter Ebsworthy being of no descent and
parentage was intended to wound the feelings of the rector, who had
married one of his daughters to Peter Ebsworthy. The ancients said that
doves were without gall.
“Next for his wief abusing of my wief in goinge to the Communion, by
blowes and afterwards with disgracefull words.” Also, “Paule Ebsworthy
for layinge of violent handes upon my wief in the Church yard: and his
wiefs scouldinge, Katheren Ebsworthy using these wordes before the
Parson unto her sister, Peter’s wief, that her sister might be ashamed
to suffer such to goe before her as my wief was.”
It seems that Agnes Bidlake, the wife of William, sought assistance
of her uncle, Sir Edward Giles, to bring these complaints before the
Bishop. He replied to this by writing to William Bidlake:--
“I would intreat you and my niece your wife at the time of hearinge of
these differences before his Lordshipp to be very temperate in your
utterances. You know it is an old sayinge, A good matter may be marred
in the handlinge; and I know if passion doe not overcome you all, it
will be to my Lord’s good likeinge.”
Mr. Bidlake went up about the matter and interviewed the Bishop, who
agreed to hear the case at Okehampton on the following Thursday.
The Bishop wrote to Parson Germyn: “Being credibly informed that Mr.
Bidlake and his wief were latlie by your sonne Peter Ebsworthy and his
wief verie disgracefully wronged at a Communion ... as alsoe for your
scandalous and indiscreete doctrine which you usually teach I may not
att any hande suffer,” he summoned him to appear before him at his
approaching visitation at Okehampton.
On 13 May, 1613, the Bishop of Exeter summoned plaintiffs and
defendants and witnesses before him for the following Friday at
Okehampton.
The Rev. Gilbert Germyn indignantly denied that he had ever preached
scandalous and indiscreet doctrine; but what was the result of the suit
before the Bishop does not transpire.
Old John Bidlake, the father of William, mightily disapproved of this
contention. He wrote to his son: “Commend me heartily to your wief whom
I pray God to give patience and charitie unto in all these troubles,
and that yourselfe forgett not that which I said I lately dreamed of 2
snakes whereof the one seemed to me to ate up the other before me. And
that which I formerly dreamed of the Man that firstlie riding from me
said, Commend me to my friends that are like to be lost if they repent
not er time be past. Good sonne, seeke peace and ensue it in what you
may, for to live peaceably with all men maketh a man and woman long
to seme younge. And if you knewe the hindrances and losses besides
heartburnings, weariness of bodye and unquietness innumerable that
suits of Lawe doe bring, as well as I, you would rather goe with your
wief even unto all such as have donne you offence and openly imbrace
them as brethren and sisters and fully forgive them and desier them to
accept of your lives ever hereafter; as honest quyet neighbours should
doe, rather than vex your neighbours by suits of laws therein, whereof
are as variable as the turnings of a weathercock.”
This was dated 10 April, 1613.
William died before his father.
Old John was a fine and loyal man; the date of his death is not known.
The estates devolved on Henry Bidlake, the son of William, born in 1606
or 1607.
After Henry Bidlake came of age, he married Philippa, daughter of
William Kelly, of Kelly; whereupon his mother, the quarrelsome Agnes,
retired to the south of Devon, there indulged in some costly lawsuits,
and died in 1651.
Henry, while yet young, joined the army of King Charles, and in 1643
was made a captain of horse under Colonel Sir Thomas Hele, Baronet.
In 1645 he was one of the defenders of Pendennis Castle; a copy of
the articles for its surrender is preserved among the Bidlake Papers.
These articles were signed on 18 August, and the besieged went forth.
From that time misfortune after misfortune befell Henry Bidlake. On 18
January, 1646, the Standing Committee of Devon “ordered upon Perusall
of the inventory of the goods of Mr. Henry Bidlake amounting to Thirtie
pounds that upon payment of fower and Twentie pounds unto the Treasurer
or his Deputie by Mr. William Kelley, the sequestration of the said
goods shall be removed and taken off, and the other six pounds is to be
allowed to Mrs. Bidlake for her sixth part.”
Several stories are told of Henry hiding from Cromwell’s soldiers,
who were sent to surround Bidlake in order to take him prisoner.
He was warned, and dressed himself in rags in order to pass them.
Some soldiers met him and asked him if he had seen Squire Bidlake.
“Aye, sure,” he replied, “her was a-standin’ on ’is awn doorstep a
foo minutes agoo.” So they went on to search Bidlake House while he
escaped to the house of a tenant of his named Veale in Burleigh Wood.
The troopers went there also, and Mrs. Veale made him slip into the
clock-case; they hunted high and low, but could not find him. One of
the soldiers looking up at the dial and seeing the hand at the hour
said, “What, doant he strike?” “Aye, aye, mister,” replied Mrs. Veale,
“there be a hand here as can strike, I tell ’ee.”
Mr. Bidlake suffered from a chronic cough, and just at that moment it
began, but he had the art to dip his head, let the weight down behind
his back, and the clock struck the hour and drowned the cough in the
case.
According to another version of the story, his cough was heard, the
clock-case was opened, and he taken. But I doubt this. An old man,
William Pengelly, who had been with my grandfather, and father, and
myself, told me that Henry Bidlake was concealed by the Veales in
Burleigh Wood--that is, the wood over the promontory where are the
camps--and they supplied him with blankets and food for some weeks till
it was safe for him to reappear. Their farm is now completely ruined,
but I can recall when it was occupied. According to Pengelly’s story,
later on, Henry Bidlake granted that farm to the Veale family to be
held in perpetuity on a tenure of half a crown per annum, so long as
there remained a male Veale in the family. Pengelly informed me that
the last Veale had died when the Rev. John Stafford Wollocombe held the
estate, 1829-66, and that the tenure had remained the same till then.
The Rev. J. H. Bidlake Wollocombe, present owner of the Bidlake estate,
tells me that he can find no evidence of the grant to the Veales among
the deeds, and that he never heard of the story save from me.
If Henry Bidlake had been secured on this occasion, it would certainly
have been recorded. We have a narrative of the visit of a troop of
horse sent to Bridestowe by the Earl of Stamford in 1647. In the
_Mercurius Rusticus_ of that year is an account of this expedition,
but not a word about the capture of Henry Bidlake. There is, however,
one of a barbarous act committed in the cottage of a husbandman in
Bridestowe, whose name, however, is not given, but possibly enough
it may have been Veale. This man having openly adhered to the King’s
party, the Earl of Stamford sent a troop of horse to apprehend him in
his cottage or farm. “When they came thither, they found not the good
man at home, but a sonne of his, about ten or twelve years old, they
ask him where his Father was, the childe replyed that he was not at
home, they threaten him, and use all arts to make him discover where
his Father had hid himselfe, the childe being ignorant where his father
was, still persisted in the same answer, that he knew not where he was;
hereupon they threaten to hang him, neither doth that prevail; at last
they take the poore innocent childe and hang him up, either because he
would not betray his Father, had he been able to satisfie their doubt,
or for not having the spirit of Prophecy, not being able to reveale
what by an ordinary way of knowledge he did not know; having let him
hang a while, they cut him downe, not intending to hang him unto death,
but being cut downe they could perceive nothing discovering life in
him, hereupon in a barbarous way of experiment, they pricke him with
their swords in the back and thighs, using the means leading to death
to find out life; at last after some long stay, some small symptoms of
life did appear; yet so weake, that they left him nearer the confines
of death than life; and whether the child did ever recover, is more
than my informer can assure me.”
In 1651 a fine of £300 was put upon Henry Bidlake, and his estates
were sequestrated to the Commonwealth until it should be paid. He had
to borrow money from his friends in order to pay his fine. Money was
lent him by Nicholas Rowe, of Lamerton, by Daniel Hawkins, of Sydenham,
by David Hore, of Coryton, by Prudence Lile, of Lifton, by Richard
Edgecombe, of Milton Abbot, by John Baron, of Lawhitton, and by John
Cloberry, of Bradstone. His mother-in-law, Philippa Kelly, of Kelly,
seems to have repaid these friends, or paid the interest due to them.
As security, Henry Bidlake alienated and sold to her his goods and
chattels, only reserving his wearing apparel. He got back his property
in 1654, but his account with the Parliament seems never to have been
settled, and he was liable to repeated vexations. As late as December,
1658, he received a summons along with his wife, from Richard, Lord
Protector, to appear before the Chancery Court at Exeter. But next year
he died, too early to see--what would have gladdened his heart--the
Restoration, and to have learned by painful experience the ready
forgetfulness by kings of services rendered in the past.
Bidlake House is a very interesting example of a simple mansion such
as suited the small squires of Devon in the seventeenth century. It
is Elizabethan, and has a quaint old garden at the back. Like so many
old houses, the aspect was not considered, and the sun pours into the
kitchen, but hardly a gleam can reach the hall and parlour.
But our ancestors had their reasons for burying their mansions at the
foot of hills, and turning their backs against the sun. The great enemy
was the south-west wind which they could not exclude. It drove through
the walls. Therefore by preference they planted their houses under the
lee of a bank of hill that intervened between them and the south, and
turned their backs like horses against the driving rain.
THE PIRATES OF LUNDY
“In the Bristol Channel,” says Mr. Chanter, “twenty miles from
Barnstaple Bar, and nearly equidistant from the two headlands of the
bay, lies the island of Lundy, sometimes invisible from the shore,
but generally looming dim and mysterious and more or less shrouded
in mists, or capped with cloud-reefs; occasionally standing out
lofty, clear, and distinct, bright with varied hues of rock, fern,
and heather, its granite cliffs glittering as they reflect the rays
of the morning sun, and the graceful lighthouse tower and buildings
plainly defined; or at night traceable by its strange intermittent
light--either suddenly shining out as a star and as suddenly vanishing,
or gradually rising and fading according to the atmospheric conditions;
but in all its aspects, varying much from day to day. And to those who
know how to read them aright, the changing aspects of Lundy are the
surest indications of approaching changes of weather--of winds, storms,
or settled sunshine.
“As seen nearer the island shows itself a lofty table-headed granite
rock, rising to the height of 500 feet, surrounded by steep and
occasionally perpendicular cliffs, storm-beaten, riven, and scarred
over with grisly seams and clefts, and hollowed out here and there
along the shore into fantastic coves and grottoes, with huge piles
of granite thrown in wild disorder. The cliffs and adjacent sea are
alive with sea-birds, every ledge and jutting rock being dotted with
them, or they are whirling round in clouds, filling the air with their
discordant screams.
“This island, so little known, so little visited, so wild and
mysterious in aspect, possesses an interest in its remote history,
its antiquities, its physical features and peculiarities, and in its
natural history, almost unrivalled.”[7]
Lundy is an outcrop of the granite that heaved up Exmoor on its back,
but there never broke through. Here the superincumbent carboniferous
rocks have been cleared away by the action of the sea, and Lundy stands
forth a naked shaft of granite. It possesses but a single harbour, at
the southern extremity of the island.
Lundy takes its name from the puffins, in Scandinavian _Lund_, that at
all times frequented it; but it had an earlier Celtic name, Caer Sidi,
and is spoken of as a mysterious abode in the Welsh _Mabinogion_.
From an early period, its peculiar position, commanding the entrance to
the Bristol Channel, its inaccessibility, its remoteness, rendered it
a resort of pirates. Thomas Wyke, Canon of Oseney, in 1238, speaks of
it as the haunt of a notable pirate, William de Marisco. This William
had a son Jordan, who held the island in defiance of the King, and
descended from it to make raids on the adjoining coasts. The island had
been granted by Henry II to the Templars, but they had been unable to
dislodge the De Mariscoes and obtain possession of it. A special tax
was levied on the counties of Devon and Cornwall for the siege of Lundy
and the defence of their maritime ports, but it does not seem that
Sir William was ever dispossessed. Marisco was one of the prisoners
captured from the French in a sea fight in 1217, and was afterwards
reinstated in his island, along with his wife and children, who had
also been taken. In 1222 he removed to Lundy some guns he had taken
from his lordship of Camley in Somerset, and, turbulent to the end, he
was, in 1233, amerced in a fine of 300 marks to the King for his ransom.
His younger son, Sir William, was outlawed in 1235 for slaying in
London an Irish messenger. His elder brother Jordan, or Geoffrey, had
made a descent on Ireland and was killed at Kilkenny in 1234.
Sir William got into further trouble on an accusation of an attempt to
assassinate Henry III, and this led to the breaking up of the robbers’
nest, and its being wrested from the Marisco family for many years.
But before telling the story, it will be well to say a few words about
the castle erected by this turbulent family, of which some remains may
still be seen. It was probably originally erected by the first Sir
Jordan, in the reign of Henry II.
The keep is all that now remains, and it is turned into cottages. The
basement wall is nine feet thick, and the lines of bastion and fosse
may still be traced. Two engravings and a plan of the castle, as it was
in 1775, appear in Grose’s _Antiquities_. He thus describes it:--
“The castle stood on two acres of ground, and was surrounded by a stone
wall, with a ditch, except towards the sea, where the rock is almost
perpendicular. The ditch is very visible, and part of the wall. The
walls of the citadel (i.e. keep) are very perfect, of a square form.
It is converted into cottages, the turrets, of which there are four,
one at each angle, serving as chimneys. The S. W. wall is 51 feet,
the N. W. wall 38 feet, in length. In front of the house five guns
were placed. The garrison was supplied with water from a spring, which
rises above the (mansion) house. It was conveyed from thence by earthen
pipes. At the extremity of the rock, within the fortification, is a
cave, supposed to be cut out of the rock for a store-room, or magazine,
for the garrison.”
We come now to the attempted assassination. Matthew Paris tells the
story under the date 1238, in the reign of Henry III.
“On the day after the Nativity of St. Mary, a certain learned esquire
came to the King’s Court at Woodstock pretending that he was insane,
and said to the King, ‘Resign thy kingdom to me’; he also added, that
he bore the sign of royalty on his shoulder. The King’s attendants
wanted to beat him, and drive him away from the royal presence, but
the King interfered, saying, ‘Let the madman rave--such people’s words
have not the force of truth.’ In the middle of the night, however, the
same man entered the King’s bedchamber window, carrying an open knife,
and approached the King’s couch, but was confused at not finding him
there. The King was, by God’s providence, then sleeping with the Queen.
But one of the queen’s maids, Margaret Bisett, was by chance awake,
and was singing psalms by the light of a candle (for she was a holy
maid and one devoted to God), and when she saw this madman searching
all the private places to kill the King, she was greatly alarmed, and
began to utter repeated cries. At her cry the King’s attendants awoke,
and leaped from their beds with all speed, and running to the spot,
broke open the door, which this robber had firmly secured with a bolt,
and seized him, and notwithstanding his resistance, bound him fast.
He, after a while, confessed that he had been sent to kill the King
by William de Marisco, son of Geoffrey (or Jordan) de Marisco, and he
stated that others had conspired to commit the same crime. On learning
this, the King ordered him to be torn limb from limb by horses, at
Coventry.”
The evidence incriminating William de Marisco was clearly worthless. If
the would-be assassin had not been insane he would not have asserted
a claim to the crown and drawn attention to himself before making the
murderous attempt. De Marisco had nothing to gain by the King’s death,
and he may certainly be acquitted of participation.
William fled to Lundy, “impregnable from the nature of the place, and
having attached to himself many outlaws and malefactors, subsisted
by piracies, taking more especially wine and provisions, and making
frequent sudden descents on the adjacent lands, spoiling and injuring
the realm by land and by sea, and native as well as foreign merchants.
Many English nobles, having learnt how that the said William and his
followers could not be surprised save by stratagem, apprised the King
that the securing of this malefactor must be effected not by violence,
but by craft. The King therefore ordered his faithful subjects to
exert themselves strenuously in order to capture him and relieve their
country.”