IV. IN THE MIDDLE AGES.
Dover, in the Middle Ages was a thriving town and port, having the sea passage to France, protected by Royal decrees and many other privileges. The whole of the Burgesses, as members of the Corporation, had the right to speak and vote in Common Assemblies ; and, according to their several trades and callings, were formed into guilds to protect and promote their special interests. The Town Guilds in Dover, of which the oldest and most important was the Fellowship of the Passage, reached their zenith during the short reign of Henry V. and the long minority of Henry VI., when " Good Duke Humphrey," as the then Regent was called, was Constable of the Castle and Warden of the Cinque Ports.
That period, in Dover, was one of peace and pros perity. The townspeople seemed to have been a happy family ; their Burgesses of Parliament, their Mayors and Jurats were from time to time elected unanimously. Those trusted men Walter Stratton, John Garton. Thomas Arnold, John Braban, Thomas Crouchc. and William Brewys all took their turns in the Mayoralty, in the Cinque Ports Brotherhood and hi Parliament; but at the end of the Minority of Henry VI. there came a blighting change, when the young King and Queen, influ enced by foreign advisers originated a policy which disturbed the harmony of Dover and a few years later involved the country in that civil war called the Wars of the Roses. Duke Humphrey, the Lord Warden, in 1435, unfortunately became the next in succession to the Crown, and the Queen, jealous of his popularity, alleged that he was plotting against the King's life. Persecution against the Lord Warden and his wife Eleanor (one of the Cobhams of Kent) became so bitter, that not only were they involved, but the Mayor and Jurats of Dover, some of whom were Castle Officials, were suspected of being the Duke's partisans. This strife lasted ten years, from 1436 to 1446- The Duchess Eleanor Cobham was charged with practising witch craft against the Kings life, was sentenced to a shameful penance and imprisoned for life in Peel Castle. Duke Humphrey, thus severed from his wife was charged with High Treason, and before he could be brought to trial was poisoned in prison.
In the midst of this crisis, when the imprisonment of Eleanor Cobham and the persecution of the good Duke Humphrey had aroused hostility to the King and Queen, amongst the men of Kent it was thought desirable by the King's party to conciliate the men of Dover. The plan adopted was to threaten them with all kinds of pains and penalties for what they were alleged to have done and then to win their alliegence by a general pardon. The pardon was issued in November 1446 when the impeachment of the Duke was pending and the Duchess was in prison. The pardon was specially addressed to the Corporation of Dover. Opening with the usual formal greeting, it proceeded: — " Know ye that of our special grace, etc, we have par doned, remitted and released to Ralph Toke, Mayor of the town of Dover, and Walter Nysham, Bailiff, and the commonalty of the said town all manner of trespasses, offences, etc, committed by the said Mayor, Bailiff, and Commonalty, before the 9th of April last past," etc. The document continues to recite, in an enormous num!)er of words, eleven different classes of offences accumulated up to various dates. The full meaning of the legal jargon and the significance of the special dates mentioned would require an intimate knowledge of the day l)y day proceedings in Dover during the previous ten years. Seeing that the Mayor, Bailiff, and the whole Commonalty of Dover were fully and freely forgiven, the details were of no consequence except the outstanding fact that for the Duchess Eleanor there was no ])ar(lon, the prison in the Isle uf Man, where she then lay being destined to retain her till death came to her release. The celebrated Dover pardon was no doubt intended to cover up an ugly past, but the reckoning had to be settled a few years later in a different way, when Jack Cade's Rebellion brought matters to an i.ssue by a fearful sacrifice of life, including the beheading of the Lord Warden, who succeeded Duke Humphrey, in London and the Duke of Suffolk, the Queen's favourite, was executed at sea, and his head was cast on the shore at Dover.
The Wars of the Roses following quickly on the dramatic climax 6i the Cade Rebellion was a cause of great anxiety to the Dover Corporation; and the trouble was far from being over when Edward of York ascended the throne in the room of the unfortunate Henry VI. who had vainly tried to clean the slate by the Dover Pardon. The final crisis came after Edward IV. had reigned ten years, when Earl Warwick, the Lord Warden, went over to the Lancas trian side, and, for a brief period, — from the 9th October, 1470, until the 14th of April, 147 1 — kept Henry VL on the throne. In the performance of that surprising .feat "Warwick, the King Maker" was supported by the Cinque Ports. If Warwick had not been slain in the final battle of Barnet, the Lancastrians, after all their reverses, might have prevailed, and English history might have been written in a different way. The impartial historian is bound to record that Dover and the Cinque Ports generally, were more moved by a great leader than by a just cause. They sided with Earl Warwick as a Yorkish leader, and with equal enthusiasm they fought with him when he turned Lancastrian ; with the result that two months after the final defeat of the Lancastrians and the death of the Earl of Warwick, Edward IV. su.spended the chartered rights of Dover. The document by which the suspension was effected, dated 9th July, 1471, was as follows: —
" Edward, by the grace of God, King of England, etc., to all to whom these present letters shall come, — Greeting. Know that, as the Liberties and Franchises of our town of Dover and its Limbs stand seized in our hands for reasonable and legitimate causes ; we, therefore, wishing so far as pertains to us to properly provide for the sound and suitable government and the happy ruling of our Town and Limbs aforesaid, and of our people there, and for the safety of others daily going to the same, and also for notable causes especially moving us and our Council, with the assent and advice of our said Council, we have constituted our beloved and faithful Thomas Hexstall, in whose discretion and fidelity we repose full confidence, as Warden of our Town and Limbs aforesaid, during our pleasure, giving and granting to him, by the tenor of these presents, full and suflBcient authority and power for ruling and governing the said Town and Limbs, and our people of the same, and others going to them, and for doing, exercising and executing all other and singular things which pertain to the good ruling and sound government of the said Town and Limbs, according to the laws and customs hitherto justly and reasonably used in the said Town and Limbs, also for having the keys and officers, as the Mayors of the Town aforesaid, by virtue of certain Liberties conceded by us and our progenitors on 'that behalf, hitherto had, until we otherwise order for the governance of the said Town and Limbs : We give it also firmly in command to the officers of the Town and I^imbs aforesaid, and also to all and singular our Lieges and subjects of the said Town and Limbs, by the tenor of these presents that they be aiding, consultant and obedient in all things, as is seemly, to the said Thomas, as Warden of the said Town and Limbs, in all things which pertain to the rule and governance aforesaid.
" Witness myself at Westminster on the Ninth day of July, in the eleventh year of our reign." [By the King himself, and on the date aforesaid, by the authority of Parliament.]
The Parliament in which the above decree was made was hastily summoned in July, 147 1, immediately after Edward IV. had finally overcome the rebellion. In that stage of the Wars of the Roses, the Cinque Ports men having been against the King, it was thought necessary to take immediate steps to place Dover, which was then in reality the Gate of the Kingdom, in reUable hands; and it was also resolved to send out a Commission of Judges to try and, if necessary, punish those who had been responsible for using the Cinque Ports forces against the holder of the Crown, as it was one of the most ancient and cherished franchises of Dover that its Freemen should not be tried except by a Cinque Ports tribunal, the King deemed it necessary to suspend the ancient liberties so that his Judges might come down to the Ports and 'ry the rebels. What happened in the other Cinque Ports tovns forms no part of this narrative, but at Dover the proceedings of the Royal Commission were little more than a formality. Although the Mayoralty was suspended, Thomas Hexstall, who hati been Mayor up to the time of the Commission, was retained in ofHcc as the King's Warden, with exactly the same power and authority that Mayors had always h.'^<l. In the calendar of persons to be trieil, Thomas Hexstall, Receiver of the Lord Warden, was one, yet, six months before the Com mission sat at Dover, Thomas Hexstall was described, in the King's own words, as " our beloved and faithful Thomas Hexstall, in whose fidelity and discretion we repose full confidence." Whatever he had done was partloned. The Commission which sat in the Cinque Ports consisted of the following Judges : — Nicholas Statham, Baron of the Exchequer, Thomas Bourchier, Knight. T. Dynham, John Fogge, Thomas Echyngham, Knight, and William Notting ham. There are various entries about thi'; date in the White Book of the Cinque Ports, which indicates that the trials by the Royal Commission extended to all the Cinque Ports, but at Dover no one seems to have been " one penny the worse," for Thomas Hexstall, in the course of 147 1-2, was again holding the office of Mayor in the ordinary way.