FRENCH PROTESTANT EXILES.
BOOK FIRST.
Chapter I.
REFUGEES OF EARLIER DATE THAN THE ST. BARTHOLOMEW MASSACRE.
As far as England is concerned, the years 1567 and 1568, and the persecutions in the Netherlands renewed and intensified by Duke Alva, are the usual framework for pictures of the flight and arrival of Protestant refugees. We picture a crowd of Walloons whom a poet has described as
Calvin’s sons from Artois' fruitful fields,
and a re-inforcement of Huguenots who joined them in their journeys through the northern provinces of France. A history tracing this exodus hither and thither might be compiled; but materials for refugee biography at the earlier date are non-existent, at least when the theme is limited to persons whose destination was England. We cannot single out any remarkable sufferers and pourtray their sufferings in their native Flanders, and then proceed to exhibit them in England as refugees and citizens of an adopted country, whose lives have survived in the memories of their new fellow-countrymen. The registers of their churches for the earliest dates have not survived, excepting Southampton, where the refugees obtained from Edward VI., and afterwards from Elizabeth, a chapel (originally dedicated to St. Julian) known as “Domus Dei,” Maisondieu, or “God’s House.” The surviving register of this church begins with the month of December 1567, but the earliest names are of no celebrity. The dates at which the other principal registers begin are — Canterbury, July 1581; Norwich, June 1595; London (Threadneedle Street), January 1600.
If we go back a few years, perhaps to 1560, we get a glimpse of a refugee who ultimately settled in England, but who, in the first place, fled to Frankfort. Old papers in the possession of the Earl of Radnor[1] introduce us to the Chateau des Bouveries, near Lille, where, at or about the date indicated, the Sieur Des Bouveries was austerely attached to the Romish communion. His younger son, Laurent, had imbibed Protestant doctrine. I now quote the substance of the old narrative:— “Having frequently absented himself from mass, he was told by his father that he suspected he had conversed too much with his heretic tenants, and that if he did not appear at mass on the next Sunday, he would have him examined by the Inquisition. Laurent, thoroughly terrified by the intimation of such a procedure, fled immediately to Frankfort-on-the-Main. Seating himself at the gate of a person who kept a considerable silk manufactory, he was asked by him what occasion brought him thither. Having explained, he was told by the old man that he himself had been driven to Frankfort by persecution, and was therefore inclined to be his friend. I see, by the zuhitcness of your hands (said he), that you have not been used to hard work; but if you will stay with me you will have only to keep my accounts and supervise my workmen. In that station Laurent gave entire satisfaction — married his patron’s niece — and at the old man’s death became his heir. Ultimately he was one of the many foreign Protestants who accepted Queen Elizabeth’s invitation to England.”
The visitation or invasion of Duke Alva began at Brussels, 28th August 1567,
- ↑ Quoted in “Collins’ Peerage” (Brydges’ edition), vol. v. p. 29. The Radnor Papers mention a German martyr named De Fournestraux, who was burnt at the stake, being drawn to the place of execution by his own coach-hordes.
