By the Rev. J. E. Jackson. 



257 



(No. 9.) At Grenewiche the i day of March An 0 1556-7. (Council Book p. 516.) 



A Letter to the Lord Lievetenaunt of the Towere to delivere the bodies of the 

 Lord Sturtone's fower servantes remaininge in his custody to S r Hugh Paulet, 

 to be by him convayed downe unto the countye of Wilts to receive there their 

 furder tryall for murderinge of the Hartgilles, accordinge to the order of the 

 lawes. 



On the 2nd March Lord Stourton with his four servants, in 

 charge of Sir Robert Oxenbridge and certain guards, rode from 

 the Tower towards Salisbury. His arms were pinioned and his 

 legs fastened under the horse. The first night they rested at 

 Hounslow : the next da}' they came to Staines : thence to Basing- 

 stoke and so to Salisbury. Execution was done upon him on the 

 6th March in the Market-place and he made great lamentation at 

 his death for his wilful and impious deeds, says the historian 

 Strype. 



Bishop Burnet seems to be the authority for the story that he 

 was hanged in a silken cord : and an old MS. in the writer's 

 possession (being a kind of Tourist's Notes, without name or date) 

 mentions that there was an " old silken string" hanging over his 

 tomb. It adds, " This must needs have been a mighty comfort to 

 him. It is not unlike a passage that is in the Roman History 

 about Galba ; who being petitioned by a condemned Knight that 

 he might not suffer like a common malefactor, the emperor com- 

 manded the gallows to be finely painted and coloured that it 

 might be answerable to his quality." Dodsworth says that a 

 twisted wire, with a noose emblematic of a halter, remained till 

 about the year 1775. Lord Stourton's monument in Salisbury 

 Cathedral formerly stood at the East end of the church, but was 

 removed and is now on the South side of the nave. It is a plain 

 tomb with three apertures on each side intended, as Dodsworth 

 explains them, to represent the six wells or fountains in the 

 armorial shield of the Stourton family, but the resemblance is not 

 very striking. There is no inscription. 



The four servants sent down to Salisbury for further trial, (two 

 of whom would certainly be William Earre and Henry Symes, 

 who knocked the Hartgills down) were executed according to the 

 following Order, (Council Book, p. 532.) 



AA 2 



