The Strange Death of Edmund Godfrey

by Alan Marshall

  Upon his arrival in Westminster, therefore, Shaftesbury soon made up for lost time. Already there were many disaffected former courtiers such as George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham, seeking to exploit the crisis now brewing in the nation. And as the plot began to suck in both great and small, it was to be used to gain many a courtier some advantage at the court of Charles II. While Shaftesbury may personally have doubted Oates’s claims, the informer and his brethren, who were soon to come forward, could be encouraged to target their accusations against those in the government who mattered most in Shaftesbury’s mind: Danby, the Duke of York and even the king himself if necessary. Danby he wanted removed and as for the Duke of York, as a Catholic he was to be subject to a policy of limiting his powers as a future monarch, or even exclusion from the succession should that policy fail. In the great political contest that was to follow the death of Edmund Godfrey, the victim himself became merely a pawn to be moved across the board, as both Shaftesbury and the king sought to resolve the crisis of the succession.9

  At the opening of parliament in October, Charles II had only briefly mentioned the plot, much to everyone’s frustration. This was partly deliberate. Behind the scenes his first minister, Danby, and his brother, the Duke of York, were engaged in continual squabbles over what to do about the affair. Danby still hoped to exploit it for his own purposes, while Charles appears to have hoped that the whole affair, which he regarded as a pack of lies in any case, would soon blow over. This, however, only gave the initiative to the opposition: for if the king and his government were unwilling and unable to exploit the plot, then the opposition was. Dominated by men such as Shaftesbury, the Commons and Lords now began rather aimlessly to interrogate everyone in sight, to nobody’s particular satisfaction. In the meanwhile, Titus Oates was brought before the Commons and for three days running he kept the shocked Members of Parliament enthralled with his tales of the devilish designs of the Catholics against the Protestant nation.10 With his credit rising once more, mainly due to Edward Coleman’s papers and Godfrey’s death, Titus was now in his element. Well paid, well fed and in his own apartments at Whitehall, he made frequent forays as ‘saviour of the nation’ to visit the House of Commons and reveal yet more longforgotten details of the plot, or to try to discredit many an old enemy among the Catholic community.

  As a result, the arrests of various prominent, and not so prominent, Roman Catholics continued. On 24 October warrants were issued for the arrest of five Roman Catholic peers, Lords Arundel, Bellasis, Petre, Powis and Stafford, all of whom had been accused by Oates of possessing commissions from the Pope. As yet Oates had refrained from any accusations that would bring him closer to the king, but York and Danby were becoming all too obvious targets and his backers were not about to let them off the hook on which all now found themselves. Indeed, under Shaftesbury’s patronage, the hunt for papists and closet plotters began to widen. Shaftesbury’s aim in this affair appears to have been to keep the agitation over the plot simmering as a useful political tool, but he was also concerned, as every ‘true’ Englishman was, with a defence of parliament and English liberties against Stuart schemes of popery and arbitrary government. With this in mind a series of attacks on Danby and the Duke of York began to form, but Shaftesbury also had time to inquire into the death of Edmund Godfrey.

  Within parliament the opportunity was taken to form a committee on 23 October in order to investigate the Popish Plot.11 By 28 October the House of Lords had also suggested that a subcommittee on Godfrey’s murder should be created. It was soon packed with ‘opposition’ or opportunistic peers: George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham was the first to be appointed to the committee, alongside the Marquis of Winchester, Viscount Halifax, the Earl of Essex and, bringing up the rear, Danby’s own man, the Bishop of London.12 Initially their task was to secure witnesses as well as to gather and examine evidence; however, Shaftesbury, who soon joined the committee, governed its actions. The committee’s methods left much to be desired. Indeed, far from conducting a sober dissection of the Godfrey case, it was politically biased from the very beginning. The committee members had little time for those with tales of Edmund Godfrey that did not fit into its already preconceived notions that the papists had murdered him.13 That plain fact was what they intended to prove to themselves if to no one else. So witnesses were treated to a mixture of threat and financial inducement in a series of robust interrogations. For example, both of the men who had discovered the body, William Bromwell and John Waters, were thrown into prison for their pains as their stories did not match, while John Rawson, the landlord of the White House, was forced to admit that a Catholic club often met on his premises. Francis Corrall, a hackney coachman, was hauled before the committee for foolishly claiming while in his cups that four men had forced him to convey Godfrey’s body in his coach.14 He was treated with bluff threats and thrown into Newgate prison to rot for his intemperance. Little else emerged from the hearings and interrogations, and given this fact, the gift of Godfrey’s funeral, soon to take place in the streets of the city, was not to be lightly passed up.

  A state funeral for Godfrey was naturally out of the question. Despite Burnet’s claim that he had persuaded the king otherwise, Charles II and the Duke of York, according to the French ambassador at least, still believed Godfrey had been a troublesome ‘fanatique’ who had committed suicide.15 Both men were also well aware that the magistrate’s death could be used to stir up even more political agitation against the government, given that the regime was generally seen by the public as reluctant to investigate the plot at all. Undaunted by this royal obstacle the ‘opposition’ were willing to give their martyr, as they now saw him, a suitable farewell by organising a hero’s funeral themselves.16

  For some time the body had been lying in-state at Bridewell. On 31 October 1678 Godfrey’s coffin, draped in a black cloth with armorial bearings and carried by six men, left Bridewell and proceeded in a massive funeral procession along Fleet Street and the Strand to Godfrey’s old church of St Martin’s-in-the-Fields. Seventytwo divines and over 1,000 mourners of ‘quality’ attended the cortège, and considerable numbers of citizens from London also joined the procession. This prodigious crowd packed the church to hear a bombastic pulpit performance by Dr William Lloyd. As if to emphasise the danger to the entire congregation, and to give an added frisson to the occasion, Lloyd was also protected by two burly clergymen deliberately chosen for their size. As they squeezed into the pulpit with him, in case the papists, ever more daring it seemed, should make an attempt upon the life of the pastor, the congregation settled down to hear a vivid explanation of the troubled times in which they all lived.17

  Lloyd’s sermon, which was to run to several editions when printed, was upon the text ‘Died Abner as a fool dieth’. In a number of ways, or so Lloyd thought, the comparison with the biblical Abner was appropriate. Abner had also ‘spent [his] life serving [his King, doing] justice and shew[ing] mercy’, only to be murdered for his pains. Abner was an eminent and dignified man, useful among his people ‘and not forgetful of the church’, and therefore to Lloyd the biblical figure was Edmund Godfrey written into scripture. So to contemporaries even the Bible itself had foretold the terrible events of Godfrey’s sad demise in 1678. Unfortunately, Lloyd’s parallels between the two men soon began to be somewhat laboured, so he returned to the subject at hand, which was Godfrey the man. Edmund was, claimed Lloyd, a ‘Just and Charitable man, a Devout, a zealous and contentious Christian’. Lloyd’s personal recollections of Godfrey’s character were in fact to set the pattern for the magistrate’s future iconography. The official image of Godfrey was to emphasise the magistrate’s kindness among the dissenters and recusants, as well as his fitness for office through his ‘Nature and education . . . study and practice’.18 To Lloyd, Godfrey was a man who had given his life for his country; his parish and its affairs were his wife and children. The image, in short, was of a devoted, caring individual who had put aside worldly pleasures in favo
ur of duty. Godfrey’s dubious business dealings, his complex politics and odd behaviour were firmly suppressed. However, in dealing with the current rumours of depression and suicide, Lloyd proved remarkably circumspect. He dismissed the rumours as either a ploy of Godfrey’s killers, a slander on the family, or, more dubiously, something that proceeded from Godfrey’s own ‘thoughtfulness’. Even so, Lloyd openly admitted that he had not at first entirely dismissed the possibility of suicide, ‘till I saw the contrary with my eyes’ on viewing the body.19 Having dealt kindly with Godfrey’s memory, Lloyd then moved on to the reason for his death. Here, he firmly laid the crime at the door of the Jesuits as part of a wider popish plot. In his sermon Lloyd was able to lay the foundations for the recreation of the confused and troubled Edmund Godfrey as a Protestant martyr.20

  WILLIAM BEDLOE, MILES PRANCE AND THE SOMERSET HOUSE TALE

  Titus Oates was naturally of little help in finding the murderers of the dead magistrate. He now proclaimed himself an intimate friend of the safely dead Godfrey, to whose demise, as even he himself admitted, he owed much of his success. But Oates had been under guard in Whitehall Palace at the time of the death and in any case he had bigger fish to fry. What were needed, therefore, were other witnesses to come forward who could throw some light upon the mystery. As an inducement, a proclamation offering a reward of £500 was issued in the hope that someone would turn up with some information.21

  As it happened, the first of the informers to crawl out into the light and claim knowledge of the strange death of Edmund Godfrey was none other than Oates’s old Spanish acquaintance William Bedloe.22 On 2 November 1678, the Secretary of State, Henry Coventry, received an intriguing letter from William Bedloe who was in Bristol. In this letter Bedloe claimed that not only did he know something of the murder of the magistrate, but he was now prepared to make revelations about the affair. The small-time thief had in fact only just been released from gaol, where, ironically, he had been supported by some Jesuits and as far as we know he had never even met Godfrey. Not that this mattered to William Bedloe, of course, for if he could fool many in Europe with his frauds, why not seize this opportunity at home when it presented itself? Bedloe, like Oates before him, sensed that his hour had come. He was swiftly brought up to London and on 7 November he was taken before the Privy Council. There he was to prove to be a rather more cautious witness than Oates, but only after he had gradually dropped his improbable stories of vast hordes of men disguised as pilgrims waiting to cross over from France.23

  Bedloe’s story was that he had been four years among the Jesuits, and he had also been in Spain and other parts of the Continent acting as a messenger for them. The most important new evidence that he presented was that he knew the papists had murdered Godfrey, because he himself had been asked to help shift the body from Somerset House, the residence of the queen, by the killers. Sometime in October 1678, he said, two Jesuits of his acquaintance by the names of Le Fèvre (or Phaire) and Walsh, who were attached to the queen’s entourage in Somerset House, had met him and sought to secure his help in a deed of great note. Le Fèvre, a mysterious Englishman who passed himself off as a Frenchman, had promised William a sum of money if he would join their design. A great obstacle to their business, Le Fèvre claimed, had to be dispatched. Although Bedloe was intrigued by the affair, his associates were unwilling at first to say who was to be murdered. Bedloe, reluctantly, refused to participate and he did not attend a second pre-arranged meeting. He then claimed to have met Le Fèvre once again, this time by accident in Fleet Street on 13 October. The latter had rebuked him for his lack of courage, but despite this he was still willing to offer Bedloe a second chance. A further meeting between the two was arranged at Somerset House the next day. Here, in the middle of a courtyard after dark Bedloe was told that the business had already been done and he could now see the body. Bedloe was taken to a small room and there was shown the dead body of the murdered Godfrey. Also at this meeting, it later transpired, were Walsh, a person who attended the queen’s chapel, and Samuel Atkins, a clerk to Samuel Pepys. As the body clearly could not remain there, Bedloe had promised to return to assist the gang to remove it elsewhere. Once more he had thought better of it and did not turn up the next evening.

  Walking in Lincoln’s Inn Fields the next day, he had again chanced upon Le Fèvre and yet again the patient Romanist had rebuked Bedloe about his lack of zeal. Nevertheless, Le Fèvre had then rather absurdly proceeded to tell Bedloe the circumstances of the murder. He, Walsh and one of Lord Bellasis’s gentlemen had succeeded in luring Godfrey into Somerset House at about five o’clock on the Saturday afternoon on the pretence of making further disclosures about the plot. Once there, the magistrate had been forced into a small room in the palace and a pistol had been placed at his head. The plotters had then demanded the return of the depositions sworn by Oates. Godfrey refused and so they stifled him between two pillows and, sensing he was still alive, had finished him off by strangling him. On the Monday night, having first shown the body to the unreliable Bedloe, they carried Godfrey in a chair and then a coach into the fields near Primrose Hill and there placed his body in a ditch with the magistrate’s own sword run clean through him, so as to make it appear that he had killed himself. On learning of all this, Bedloe had fled London on 23 October and then returned to Bristol.

  Bedloe also took the opportunity to relate an edited version of his origins and European activities to the Privy Council. He had been born in Chepstow, he said, and bred a Protestant. He had also briefly served in the Prince of Orange’s army, but had been seduced by the religious houses on the Continent.24

  What is one to make of Bedloe’s tale? It was, given his previous history, deliberately vague, for as yet he had not been coached by anyone in any other version. However, we may note some details from it for now and pass on. It seems to have been Bedloe, or his sponsors, who first established Somerset House as the scene of the crime. The murderers had also been given a purpose in killing Godfrey: they wanted to prevent some secret he held from going any further. Additionally, the killers had been a mixed bunch of Catholic priests and laymen. Godfrey had been stifled, strangled and then run through with his own sword to make it appear that he had committed suicide. Conversely, Bedloe’s timing for those events was very dubious and difficult to reconcile with the discovery of the body on the Thursday.

  The next day, a rather more confident William Bedloe went before parliament and there he began to describe a more elaborate story to his new audience. Indeed, so confident in his tale did Bedloe now appear that the king was certain someone had further instructed him overnight. Nevertheless, William’s rise was now rapid, in spite of the fact that when faced with the unfortunate and innocent young Samuel Atkins, who had recently been accused of being a conspirator to murder, he had not been able to recognise him.

  Samuel Atkins was a servant of the former diarist and civil servant Samuel Pepys, who was himself a client of the Duke of York. The arrival before the Lords Committee of one Captain Charles Atkins (no relation of Samuel’s), who claimed knowledge of the murder, had led to Samuel Atkins’s arrest. It was hoped that the young man would soon collapse under pressure from the committee, inform upon his master and thus become the key witness for the opposition in the murder of Edmund Godfrey. Unfortunately, Samuel proved a stubborn suspect and moreover he had a reliable alibi in that he had actually been lying dead drunk on board a ship at the time Godfrey was supposed to have been murdered. Bedloe was pushed forward to confirm Atkins’s presence at the scene of the crime. The plot to frame Samuel Atkins fell through but despite this, William Bedloe became, alongside a rather jealous Titus Oates, the darling of the nation. Further revelations flowed from his mouth and pen as he grew ever more confident in his accusations. Now he revealed that he had also been an agent of the Jesuits on other business and was well aware of their dealings. As the poor unfortunates whom he had caused to be arrested began to have their time in court, Bedloe also joined Oates as a witnes
s for the prosecution. Although he was to perform poorly in court, of far more importance was the fact that Bedloe, after some prompting, had now managed to implicate Miles Prance, a Roman Catholic silversmith, in the strange death of Edmund Godfrey.25

  Miles Prance was born in Eastwood in the parish of Marsh in the Isle of Ely.26 His father was Simon Prance, a gentleman of some note in the parish and in the Cambridge area until his Royalist sympathies caused him to lose both his estate and his liberty. Thereafter Simon Prance spent some time in prison, where he converted to Roman Catholicism and became something of a zealot in its cause. He even had his children educated as Roman Catholics. Indeed, it was said that two of his sons became secular priests in France and the Indies, and two of his daughters became nuns, one in Lisbon and the other in Rouen, Normandy. Miles was sent into an apprenticeship as a gold- or silversmith. He became quite accomplished in his profession and his Catholic contacts enabled him to have ‘a beneficial employment among men of the Roman profession . . . in regards of the many . . . trinkets of silver-work, which are used by the professors of that out-side religion’.27 Prance, based in St Giles-in-the-Fields, also took work in the household of Queen Catherine at Somerset House in the Strand and became a familiar figure there, although he later lost his employment. At the time of the plot’s discovery, Prance was living with his wife on Princes Street in Covent Garden, alongside a number of fellow Catholics. He had also joined the club that regularly met at the White House tavern and he drank at the Plough Inn, another regular haunt of the Catholic community. Up until that point there appears to have been little sinister in Prance’s life and nothing much to mark him out from any number of other Catholics who lived and worked in London.