A HISTORY OF NORFOLK Geoffrey or John le Litester, the nominal head of the rebelHon, till he is killed at North Walsham), the insurgents met on Mousehold Heath, near Norwich. They are then said to have sent a peremptory message to Sir Robert Salle, the temporary keeper of Norwich, to come out and confer with them, threatening to force the city if he did not. He is said to have ridden out alone and, having scornfully refused the suggestion to turn traitor and join the rebels, to have been killed near Magdalen Chapel on the verge of the heath, while fighting on foot, after having slain twelve of his opponents — all of which is told graphically by Froissart.^ The rebels then entered and plundered the city, but only one man seems to have been murdered, viz. Reginald de Eccles,' a justice of the peace, who was in the abbot of Hulme's house at Heigham. They appear to have seized four knights, de Scales, William de Morley, John de Brewes, and Stephen Hales, who are said to have been forced by Lister to serve him on bended knee.* On the 1 8th they compelled the prioress of Carrow to give up certain deeds and court rolls, which they burned, and on the same day proceeded to Yarmouth and made the burgesses surrender their charter of liberties, which they destroyed.* While there they murdered three Flemings, plundered Fastolfs house at Caistor, burnt the court rolls of St. Benet's Abbey, which were apparently given up without resistance. The Bromholm rolls were also burned. By this time Spenser, the fighting bishop of Norwich, had returned to his diocese, and was probably at St. Benet's Abbey, then a fortified place. The rebels attacked it by night, but were beaten off, this being their first check. ^ A ' Wat Tyler ' now appeared, this name being probably assumed to encourage the rebels, and tried unsuccessfully to capture John Holkam, 'Justice of our Lord and King' at Thursford. Gurney, the steward of the duke of Lancaster, also escaped, though his house was plundered. On the 21st the rolls of Binham Abbey were burnt.* At Lynn the rebels murdered Flemings, while round about Felbrigg, in the duke of Lancaster's country, they burnt the court rolls and plundered property. The first success of the rebels had been largely due to the indecision of the lay officers of the county. The bishop of Norwich, however, Henry Le Spenser, gathered his retainers at Burley Manor in Rutland and hurried south. Detached parties of the rioters were dispersed and the prisoners hanged. By the time he reached Norwich the local gentry had recovered from the first surprise, and rallied to the episcopal standard. The commons retired to North Walsham,^ and there threw up hasty intrenchments and a barricade of windows, shutters, and doors, while their transport was laagered in the rear. The bishop determined to attack at once, ordered the trumpets to sound the charge, and lance in rest led his horsemen across the ' Chronicles (ed. Lyons), ii, cap. 77, 1859. He was a well-known fighting man of the period, of the Sir John Hawkwood type ; of great strength and size, not a gentleman born, and had been knighted for valour and made M.P. for the county, 1378. In the account given of his death by Thomas of Walsingham {Hist. Angl. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 5) he is said to have been one of the knights who were captured by the insurgents ; this would absolve him of the imprudence generally ascribed to him of riding out alone from the city entrusted to him. See article by G. R. Howlett in Korf. Antiq. Misc. (2nd ser.), vol. i. ' Rising in East Anglia, 30. ' T. Walsingham, Hist. Angl. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 5, 6.
- Rising in East Anglia, 32. ' Ibid. 34 Anct. Indict. No. 128 Norf. TunsteJ.
- Ibid. 35. ' Thomas Walsingham, Hist. Angl. (Rolls Ser.), ii, 7.
484
