The Secret Diary of Eleanor Cobham (22 page)

He called to God for forgiveness as the thick noose of rope was pulled over his head.
Martha
had also known him as a good man, who always treated her more as a lady than a maidservant. She sobbed as she recalled how he had not been calling for his own salvation but for the souls of those who had judged him, for the men who now had the task of ending his life. With his last strength, he cried out for the Lord to show mercy. He called on God to forgive them.

Martha
was reluctant to tell me more. I told her I must be told the truth of what happened that fateful day at Tyburn. For whatever reason, Sir John Holland had not been able to keep his promise to me. Roger Bolingbroke had been cut down from the gibbet while he still lived. A bucket of water was thrown into his face to revive him, then he was stripped and held down on a wooden table. They cut him open, removed his bowels and burned them on a brazier while he was made to watch.

This poor man, who would have dearly wished to be laid to rest in his peaceful Oxford churchyard, suffered the worst abuse. His still beating heart was cut out and thrown on the flames, to a cheer from the crowd. His head was severed, carried off to be placed on a spike on London Bridge, where black crows would peck out his eyes. His poor body was butchered into quarters, sent to be displayed on ropes at the gates of Oxford, Cambridge, York and Hereford, as grisly, maggot-riddled warnings to heretics and Lollards.

Munus regis

No word had been said by any of the bishops about where I was to be imprisoned, although I had begun to be convinced it would be in the dark dungeons of the Tower of London. Instead I found myself returned to my rooms at Leeds Castle, a place I thought I may never see again. I wondered if this was where I was destined to end my days, in honourable confinement like that accorded to the Dowager Queen Joanna. I even began to hope that, like her, I would one day be released.

I had forgotten my imprisonment was a way to keep my husband out of power. The cardinal must have worried that even Leeds Castle would not hold me, as I was put into the
custody of Sir Thomas Stanley, Controller of the Royal Household. Sir Thomas had been chosen to be responsible for me because he was also the Constable of Chester Castle, so it was no surprise that it was there he decided I should be held.

I said my farewell to Sir John Steward and gave him my gold ring with a large, valuable diamond to thank him for making my time at Leeds Castle as comfortable as he could. A good man, he had always been most charming to me. As I was about to leave he kissed my hand, then beckoned one of his servants. Sir John presented me with the beautiful lute, saying he had witnessed how my playing had improved and wished me well for the future.

He told me I was to make the long journey from Kent to Cheshire escorted by a dozen of the king’s soldiers. Arrangements had been made for the sheriffs of each county to be held personally accountable for me. They were under orders from the Chancellor, John Stafford, Bishop of Bath and Wells, that my journey was not to be delayed for any reason, particularly by feigned illness. My last memory of Sir John Steward is when I looked back and saw him watching my entourage leave. He raised a hand and I did the same in return, certain I would never see him or Leeds Castle again.

My first escort was John Warner, a talkative and wealthy landowner and Sheriff of Kent. Accompanied by my servants, including my loyal maidservant
Martha
, and the young maid Mary, I carried with me only the few possessions I had taken when I sought sanctuary and the lute, a present I was most grateful for. A horse-drawn bier had been provided for our long journey and we had not travelled far when snowflakes began drifting from the sky. It was late January, in the middle of what was to prove one of the worst winters for several years.

The road ahead was soon obscured with the falling snow, which made the going dangerous and difficult for our horses. The sheriff was leading our small procession when he gave a shout as his horse strayed from the track we were following and fell into a roadside drainage ditch. He was determined to rescue his favourite horse, a fine grey mare, and soon all the soldiers were trying to pull the poor creature. It was no good. The ditch was deep and full of icy water and the horse’s struggling made it sink deeper into the slippery mud. The men tried lashing together reins and bridles and almost succeeded, yet despite their best efforts we could see the horse was stuck fast. There was no hope.

We watched as the sheriff took a knife from his belt. I could hardly bear to look as he leaned over his horse and affectionately patted it on the head one last time. Then he sawed through the thick leather straps and salvaged his valuable saddle from the horse’s back. I can still picture the forlorn look in that horse’s eye when we were forced to abandon it to take its chances. It reminded me how I had also been abandoned to my fate by my husband.

The loss of his horse put the sheriff in a sombre mood as we made our cautious progress to London. He told me his orders were not to delay our arrival in London for any reason, yet we had lost a lot of time. The winter sun set early and it was dark by the time we reached Westminster, sodden through from the melted snow. John Warner looked greatly relieved as he formally handed me over to the Sheriff of London.

My latest custodian was an arrogant young merchant with the memorable name of Richard Ryche, new in his post and clearly unused to being in command of so many soldiers. We were exhausted from the cold and had to rest for the night, so the sheriff decided to house us at the Abbot of Westminster's manor house at Neyat, within sight of Westminster Abbey. The manor was old and poorly maintained, with moss-covered shingles sliding from the roof and unglazed windows. The poorly fitting shutters did little to keep out the cold, but I was allowed to have my servants light a fire in the hearth.

As we huddled for warmth by the fire, with only a bowl of oat potage and a crust of rye for sustenance,
Martha
reminded me of the lavish Christmas banquets we would have at Bella Court, with a roasted boar’s head carried round the tables by carol singers and minstrels. I recalled the menus for our grand New Year’s Day celebrations. I
missed the hot mulled wine and longed to taste again the sweet gingerbread, full of rare and precious spices few of our guests could afford, cinnamon and cloves, brought by merchants from the mysterious east.

Most of all, I deeply missed seeing my family. I missed my husband, who would always be a little drunk on fine brandy by the end of New Year’s Day. I missed my beautiful daughter Antigone, with my grandchildren, all growing up so fast, and of course I greatly missed my son Arthur, the image of his father. I lived in hope of word that they were safe and well and would one day be able to visit me, wherever I was to spend the rest of my days.

The weather had not improved by the morning, with another fall of snow turning the roads to slippery slush. We had some two hundred miles still to travel before we would reach Chester, so the young sheriff decided we must wait until the weather was good enough to continue. There was nothing to do to pass the time, other than cook and eat, and try to have some sleep. It was little wonder that my thoughts would turn to escape.

Once inside the castle at Chester there would be a slim chance of evading my ever-present guards, yet in the abbot’s manor there was only one man posted outside our door through the night. I examined the shuttered windows of my room. One was more than wide enough for me to climb through. Unfortunately my room was on the first floor, so the drop to the snowy courtyard below would be too much for me. Looking out into the darkness I saw it was a moonless night, with no sign of my guards in the courtyard outside. This could be my only chance of escape.

Gathering some of my possessions together into a bundle I tried to plan what I would do and where I could go once I was free. I was not sure exactly where I was although I knew Westminster well and would soon recognise familiar streets and buildings. A greater problem was to decide where I should be going, Sadly there was no point in trying to reach Bella Court, so I resolved to find London Bridge, cross the River Thames and hurry as far from London as I could.

There would be few people around at such a late hour and I pulled a shawl around my face to keep warm and reduce the chance of being recognised. I opened the old shutters wide and was about to climb through the window when I realised the drop was greater than I had thought. I could break a leg or at the least twist my ankle in the fall to the hard cobbles below. I would need a different plan.

If I was going to escape, I would somehow have to distract the guard at the door. For a moment I considered trying to bribe him with some of my jewellery or the money I still carried in my purse. There was no sound from outside my door, so I cautiously opened it a crack and saw the hallway and stairs were in darkness. My guards had become complacent and did not expect me to attempt an escape.

Taking my bundle, I crept out into the hall, stopping as one of the floorboards creaked under my foot, to listen for the guards. Feeling for each step in the dark, I made my way down the stairs to the floor below. I guessed the front door would be locked and barred, so headed through to find a way out through the back. A glimmer of light came from the kitchen hearth, left burning through the night, and I could see an old door. I had come too far to turn back now and tried the handle. It opened and I slipped through into the cold darkness outside.

I almost tripped over the man guarding the back door. He shouted in surprise at seeing me and I was soon surrounded by soldiers. Sheriff Richard Ryche was angry at having been called from his bed. He reminded me I was the guest and responsibility of
the Abbot of Westminster and
asked if I had given any thought to the consequences for him if I had succeeded in my plan. I could see from the look on his face that, in truth, the young and ambitious sheriff feared the consequences for himself. He was right, though. I had not spared a moment’s thought for the men who were guarding me that night or how harshly they would have been punished. I promised I would not try to escape again.

The weather improved a little in the morning and we continued on our way north-west to the old Roman town of Chester. Even though the snow had cleared from the roads, the slush turned them to slippery mud and we made slow progress, being forced to stop often. I was handed from one sheriff to the next and stayed in a succession of inns and manor houses as we made our way through each county, taking nearly a week to complete the journey.

Sir Thomas Stanley greeted our party as we arrived at his castle. A gruff, portly man with an abrupt manner, Sir Thomas was in a surly mood and made no secret of the fact he was aggrieved to have me in his charge. He complained he had only been granted a hundred marks a year for his duty, one tenth of what he had been expecting, so I was not to expect the same comfort and privileges as the Dowager Queen Joanna.

Chester Castle stands on a low hill within a bend of the River Dee, a stones-throw from the border with Wales and within sight of the prosperous old walled city. At first I had high hopes, as we crossed a drawbridge over a deep moat through an impressive gatehouse and across an outer bailey. The castle, with walls of reddish-pink sandstone, looked well maintained and I thought my rooms would compare favourably with Leeds Castle. I could not have been more wrong. They thought there was a risk of my attempting to escape, and Sir Thomas Stanley was not a man to take risks.

The ancient stone gateway to the inner bailey of Chester castle is called the Agricola Tower, after the general who led the Roman conquest. Underneath this high, square building was a vaulted-ceilinged crypt, where I learned Humphrey’s father had imprisoned King Richard II, his first cousin, when he first took the throne of England. With his cruel sense of irony, Sir Thomas decided there could be no more fitting place for him to keep me safe.

Damp and miserable, the old crypt had bare stone walls and nothing but dirty rushes on the floors. The rooms were small and dark, with only the most basic furniture and a hall which was cold and drafty, despite the fire we lit in the hearth. I did my best with my servants to clean and tidy my new home and hoped it was only temporary, while proper arrangements were made to find somewhere more suitable for my imprisonment.

Unlike Leeds Castle, I was not permitted by Sir Thomas to explore the grounds, other than to occasionally have some fresh air within the small inner bailey and visit the high ceilinged chapel of St Mary de Castro, on the first floor of the Agricola Tower. The walls of the chapel were decorated with colourful images of saints, painted in red and blue, with gold-leaf ornament. Although by this time I had lost my faith, I would spend as much time as I could in the chapel, watched over by these long-dead saints, where it was at least clean and dry, if not particularly warm in winter.

If I had known I was to be held there for nearly two long years, I think I would have gone half mad with boredom, as there was nothing to do apart from survive from one day to the next as best I could. The distance from London meant there was almost no news. Even when I sent Martha out into the provincial city of Chester with some of the coins from my purse to learn what she could, it seemed I had been forgotten by the world.

One morning Martha came to tell me that the young maidservant Mary had returned to London, as her father was ill. I was surprised Mary had left without saying goodbye, as she had been in my service since I was first at Leeds Castle in Kent. I had never trusted her though and always wondered if she had been placed in my service to spy on me.

Something nagged at the back of my mind about Mary’s sudden departure and I pressed Martha to tell me the truth. She reluctantly confessed that it had been Mary who raised the alarm when I escaped from the abbot’s manor
house at Neyat. Later when I was tidying my room I found my priceless New Year’s gift from the king was gone.