POLITICAL HISTORY 



entrusted to William Mareschal and John FitzOsbert, the then sheriffs. 

 They were soon replaced by Hubert de Burgh,' the great justiciary, who now 

 appears for the first time in local history. 



During the fight which took place after the signing of Magna Carta, 

 John suffered a severe blow through the loss by drowning near Yarmouth of 

 an expedition commanded by Hugh de Boves, to whom he had promised 

 Norfolk and Suffolk. It is stated that 40,000 lives were lost on this occa- 

 sion, a number certainly greatly exaggerated, though the expedition included 

 many women and children, it being intended apparently to make a regular 

 settlement on the east coast.^ Though the rest of the history of this reign 

 and the next is a continuous tale of fighting and civil war, very little of it 

 took place in Norfolk. In 1216 John marched from Lincolnshire southward 

 to Lynn,^ where he was gladly received and stayed two days ; it was on his 

 retreat from this port that he lost his baggage in the Wash, fell ill and died 

 on 19 October, i 2 1 6, at Newark. 



The next reign was one of continuous trouble in England generally, but 

 we hear of no fighting or events of importance in Norfolk until 1266. In 

 this year an attack was made upon Norwich by a force belonging to the 

 barons' party which was lying in the Isle of Ely.* This band came across 

 under the leadership of Sir John de Evile and attacked the city. They 

 stayed there a day and a night and plundered the place, carrying away many 

 of the citizens to ransom. Nothing is said about their getting into the 

 castle, so it probably withstood them. A curious sidelight is thrown on this 

 attack by a local record, from which it appears that Thomas de Carlton, the 

 high constable, was afterwards tried for the murder of Walter de Starston, 

 one of the city sergeants. He was eventually acquitted, it being shown that 

 when he requested the sergeant to call the citizens to join in defending the city, 

 the sergeant refused and used base language to him ; the constable thereupon 

 killed him by a stroke from a sword under his breast. 



The citizens of Lynn, underestimating the strength of this baronial 

 force and anxious to recover the royal favour, came to the king, offered to 

 capture the rebels and deliver them to him alive or dead, if he would restore 

 the forfeited liberties of their town ; this he agreed to do. Thereupon the 

 men of Lynn set out in warlike array in their ships, but the rebels carefully 

 chose their ground, set up flags, so that their assailants might have no diffi- 

 culty in finding them, and, when the bold townsmen arrived, fled from them 

 in apparent terror — only to turn on their disorderly and unwary foes and to 

 cut them up, so that but few returned to Lynn, non sine derisionibus} 



In the last year of Henry's reign, 12^2, took place the great riot 

 of the monks and citizens. The king came to Norwich after the Parliament 

 at Bury St. Edmunds, and his intervention in this affair is said to have 

 indirectly shortened his life.' 



' Pat. 17 John, m. 22. He was born at Burgh St. Margaret's in Flegg, and married first the daughter of 

 Sir Robert Arsic, a well-known Norfolk baron, and afterwards the daughter of Wm. de Warenne, who was the 

 widow of Dodo Bardolf. " Matt. Paris, Chron. Maj. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 622, 623. 



' Ibid, ii, 664. * Earth, de Cotton, Hist. Arigl. (Rolls Scr.), 141, 142. 



' Will. Rishanger, Chron. et Annales (Rolls Ser.), 44, 45. 



^ Sec, for a fuller treatment of this riot, Rye, 'Norf. Antiq. Miscellany, ii, 17. There was a similar riot at 

 Colchester only five days later, on St. John the Baptist's day (Harrod, Colchester Records, 33). It is noticeable 

 that after this happened the bailiffs of Colchester were ordered (Harrod, op cit, 25) to stop and detain the 

 person and goods of any Norwich citizen, which looks as though some sought a friendly refuge there. 



2 473 60 



