by Nina Mason
When the crowd quieted, Robert returned his attention to the scaffold, where the doomed duke was preparing to address his audience. “I shall say little,” he began. “I come here, not to speak, but to die—as a Protestant of the Church of England.”
One of the Anglican bishops interrupted him. “Unless you acknowledge your resistance to be sinful, sir, you are no member of the Church of England.”
Ignoring him, the duke went on to pay tribute to his mistress, Henrietta, Baroness Wentworth. “She is a young lady of virtue and honor and I love her to the last, and cannot die without giving utterance to my feelings.”
The bishops again took exception, begging him not to commit such blasphemies at such a time.
The crowd cried, “Let him speak! Let him speak!”
The bishops continued urging Monmouth to repent, but their admonitions were in vain. Then, they reminded the doomed duke of the ruin he had leveled upon his brave and loving followers, of the blood which had been shed, and of the souls his sinful actions had sent unprepared to the Great Accounting.
At length, Monmouth yielded with a quiet, “I do own that I am sorry it ever happened.”
The bishops then prayed long and fervently with the condemned man, who joined in their supplications until they invoked a blessing on his uncle.
“Sir,” said one of the bishops in response to Monmouth’s prolonged silence, “will you not pray for the king with us?”
The duke paused for some time and appeared to struggle within himself before he said, almost too softly to be heard, “Amen.”
Having pressed Monmouth this far, the bishops endeavored to press him even further by requesting he say a few words on the duty of obedience to the government.
“I will make no speeches,” said the duke. “Only ten words, my lords.” Turning away, Monmouth called his servant and put into the man’s hand a toothpick case, the last token of his ill-starred affair with Baroness Wentworth.
“Give it,” he said, “to that person.”
Maggie elbowed Robert in the ribs to gain his attention. “What person does he mean?”
“His mistress, I can only presume.”
They stopped talking when Monmouth addressed his executioner, who stood by with axe at the ready. “Here,” said the duke, handing Mr. Ketch several guineas. “Do not serve me as you did my Lord Russell. I have heard that you struck him three or four times. If you strike me twice, I cannot promise not to stir.”
Monmouth then undressed to his shirtsleeves, felt the edge of the axe with his thumb and, after expressing concerns about its dullness, laid his head on the block.
All the while, the bishops cried, “May God accept your repentance! May God accept your imperfect repentance!”
The crowd held its breath as Mr. Ketch raised his axe. The first blow inflicted only a slight wound. The duke raised his head, as promised, and regarded the headsman reproachfully.
His head returned to the block. Down came the blade again, but still the neck remained unsevered.
Robert grimaced in revulsion, pitying poor Monmouth with all of his being. No man, however severe his crimes, should be subjected to such tortures.
The stroke was repeated again and again and still the duke continued to wriggle upon the block. So gruesome was the display that many spectators fainted. Others roared in outrage and horror.
Maggie, paling, turned away from the scene. “Upon my soul, this barbarity is not to be borne!”
Robert pulled her against him just as Ketch flung down the axe with a curse. “I cannot do it. My heart fails me.”
“Take up the axe, man,” the sheriff demanded.
The mob, growing more and more distressed, cried, “Fling him over the rails! Fling him over the rails!”
At length, Mr. Ketch lifted the axe once more and delivered two more blows, which succeeded in putting the poor duke out of his misery, yet failed to sever his head from his shoulders. Setting the axe aside, Ketch produced a knife, which he used to cut the remaining bone and muscle.
Robert shot a glance at the king, curious to see his reaction to the carnage. James watched unflinchingly, seemingly unaffected by the butchery. His unruffled demeanor brought to Robert’s mind a story from His Majesty’s days in the navy. After a fellow officer took a cannonball to the head, splattering his brains all over his commander, the then-Duke of York pulled out his handkerchief, wiped the gore from his face, and coolly said, “Too bad. He was a good man.”
When Robert first heard the story, he was impressed by the duke’s ability to remain so composed under fire. Now, he wondered if his father-in-law’s unflappability demonstrated his cold-heartedness more than his courage.
Robert turned back to the main event when Ketch held up the duke’s head by its hair. By then, however, the onlookers were in no mood to cheer the display. They wanted Ketch’s head, not Monmouth’s. To prevent the angry mob from tearing the executioner to pieces, he was escorted from the scaffold under heavy guard.
When they were gone, the crowd began to intone en masse: “Monmouth is a martyr. Monmouth is a martyr. Monmouth is a martyr.”
Robert blanched at the sound. He and others had warned the king not to make of his nephew a sacrificial lamb, but James would not listen. Now, he would have to face the consequences of his obstinacy.
* * * *
A few weeks later, the assizes began. All who survived Sedgemoor were rounded up and charged with treason, a capital offense. In the eyes of the law, those who committed the crime and those who aided the wrongdoers were no different, and the king was determined that all who took part in “the Pitchfork Rebellion,” as the overthrow attempt came to be known, would pay dearly for their disloyalty.
No betrayal was too small to be overlooked. Even the young maidens who had greeted the Duke of Monmouth with flowers as he rode into Taunton were called to stand trial. The only way to escape the hangman’s noose was to purchase an acquittal for a steep sum.
Lord Grey did—for a hefty £40,000. The maidens of Taunton, too, were ransomed, via the pooled funds of the ladies-in-waiting of the royal court. The poor and those against whom the king bore a grudge were not as lucky.
The judge who presided over these trials was a man named George Jeffreys. The Lord Chancellor, his reputation for vindictiveness, harsh sentencing, and judicial rule-bending had earned him the nicknames “Bloody Jeffreys” and “the hanging judge.” Jeffreys also was reputed to be so deeply in the king’s pocket he could scarcely see daylight.
The first trial was held on 27 August, 1685 in the Great Hall of Winchester Castle. The accused was Dame Alice Lisle, a highborn lady who’d been charged with harboring two men who’d fought for Monmouth at Sedgemoor.
From his arse-numbing seat upon one of many church pews brought in to form the spectator’s gallery, Robert looked around him at the medieval Great Hall’s stone pillars, stained-glass windows, pebbled sandstone walls, and beamed ceilings. On the rear wall, behind the Lord Chancellor’s white-wigged head, hung a replica of King Arthur’s round table, looking rather like a very large archery target.
If looks were arrows, Robert would have emptied his quiver.
He was furious with the king for pursuing the charges against Lady Lisle, a 70-year-old widow with failing hearing. In his opinion, the whole proceeding was a travesty of justice trumped up by the king not to punish the lady’s alleged misdeeds, but to avenge her late husband’s crimes against the crown.
Alice Lisle was the second wife of Sir John Lisle, a lawyer and politician who had a hand in the execution of King Charles I. After the Restoration, Sir John fled to Switzerland, where he was later assassinated.
Sir John’s wife and seven children remained behind in England. When his estates were confiscated, his widow returned to her family home, Moyles Court in Ringwood, an old market town in the parish of Hampshire.
A fortnight after the Battle of Sedgemoor, Lady Lisle had permitted two fugitive rebels (John Hickes and Richard Nelthorpe), at the request
of one James Dunne, to spend the night at Moyles Court. In the morning, all three men were arrested for treason, along with their hostess.
Judge Jeffreys, a sour-faced man with a nose like a saber, conducted the trial from behind his tall bench in his typical bullying fashion, putting the fear of God into the only witness for the defense (Mr. Dunne) with threats of eternal damnation if he should stray in the slightest from the truth. At one point, he called Mr. Dunne “a strange, prevaricating, shuffling, sniveling lying rascal.” At other moments, he used language unfit for a cock fight.
Where Lady Lisle was concerned, the judge did everything in his power to prejudice the jury, including repeating a hearsay report that she “rejoiced at the death of King Charles I.” To preserve the appearance of propriety, he quickly added that any report of that nature ought not to “influence the court of jury against her,” but the bell, as it was said, could not be unrung.
Lady Lisle insisted she was innocent, claiming she had no knowledge of the men’s support of Monmouth and no sympathies whatsoever for the rebellion.
The judge’s closing remarks to the jury, while not explicit, clearly conveyed his desire for a guilty verdict. After retiring for deliberation, the jurors returned to tell the Lord Chancellor they had “some doubt” as to Lady Lisle’s guilt.
After a brief exchange, the jury retired once more and, a quarter of an hour later, returned a verdict of guilty, whereupon the Lord Chancellor, now at liberty to speak more freely, remarked, “If I had been among you, and she had been my own mother, I should have found her guilty.”
Jeffreys then passed sentence: As the law made no distinction between traitors and their accessories, Lady Lisle was to be burnt alive that very afternoon.
Robert was so outraged, he could barely keep his composure. It was obvious the king wanted a guilty verdict in the case and that Jeffreys had aspired to please him. It was equally apparent that Lady Lisle had been treated unjustly.
The Lord Chancellor gave the poor woman two hours to find support for a deferment, which she did forthwith, from among the shocked clergy of Winchester Cathedral. After they interceded on her behalf, the judge gave her a six-day respite.
Now, only one thing could save her from the pyre: a royal pardon. Would James exercise his prerogative of mercy? Robert doubted it very much, given his bewigged henchman’s conduct throughout the trial. At the same time, Robert could not believe anyone with half a heart could put an elderly gentlewoman to death on such flimsy evidence of guilt.
The question was: Did King James have even that much heart in his breast?
From all he’d seen so far, Robert greatly suspected pleading with the king would be so much wasted breath. Even so, he was determined to do all he could to right the gross miscarriage of justice he’d just witnessed.
Seething with fury, he hurried out of the castle and into his waiting carriage. Upon his arrival at Whitehall Palace, he marched straight to the king’s bedchamber, and bribed the page to arrange an audience with His Majesty at the earliest possible moment. An hour later, he was face to face with King James, ready to do battle (and hoping not to fall upon his own sword).
“Your Majesty,” he began, “I implore you to have mercy upon Lady Lisle. She is an old woman and a widow who was only doing what she saw as her Christian duty.”
James arched an eyebrow. “You attended the trial?”
“I did, sire, and have only just now returned.”
“I presume from your entreaty that a guilty verdict was returned.
Was it possible the king had not yet been informed of the trial’s outcome? Or did he know before the trial began what the result would be?
“’Twas, Your Majesty,” Robert confirmed. “But only because Lord Jeffreys pressured the jury into doing so after unjustly aiding the prosecution throughout.”
“You disapprove of the Lord Chancellor’s conduct?”
“I do, sire. He behaved like a foul-mouthed bully throughout the proceedings.”
“He did no more than was asked of him.”
This confirmed his suspicions that Jeffreys was only dancing on the king’s puppet strings.
“But, sire…”
“I mean to make an example of her and will not be dissuaded.”
“Even if she is innocent?”
“If she was without guilt, as you say, the jury would have decided in her favor.”
“They were coerced, as I said.”
“By Lord Jeffries?”
“Aye, Your Majesty.”
“And what would you have me do? Show weakness by overturning the jury’s verdict?”
“I would have you show mercy, sire.”
The king heaved an exasperated sigh. “Very well. She is to burn, is she not?”
“She is, sire.”
“Then, I shall grant her the mercy you request, but only by reducing her sentence to beheading, which is her right as a person of noble birth. That is, however, the extent of the clemency I intend to grant the lady. She betrayed her king, whom our Lord has crowned, and must be made to pay the price for her crimes.”
There was an icy edge in his tone that Robert found more frightening than the heat of his anger. “But, Your Majesty…”
The king’s deep blue eyes hardened into flint. “I will hear no more arguments on the matter. My mind is made up. If you are wise, therefore, you will take your leave and try my patience no more or I might be tempted to burn the Old Bat just to spite you.”
Chapter Thirteen
Over the next two years, King James grew steadily more devout and dictatorial.
He filled the palace with an army of priests and the army with a plethora of Catholic officers.
He ordered everyone at court to attend mass at least once a week.
He fired several of his protestant ministers and ordered his remaining advisers to either convert or step down. The vacancies were filled with dull-witted, self-serving yes-men of the Romish faith.
He dismissed the antagonistic Parliament and never called the legislature again.
He sacked every judge who tried to limit his power and replaced them with toadies who would support his unconstitutional policies.
Once His Majesty had the backing of the courts, he took the bit between his teeth and charged ahead, blind to the steep cliff he was racing toward at breakneck speed.
Watching all of this with growing alarm, Robert was sure his father-in-law was slowly going mad. Only power mad, perhaps, but still dangerously out of touch with reality. Fearing for the reign’s longevity and his family’s safety, he sought the king’s permission to return to Dunwoody. His request was denied with no more explanation than “I need you here.”
In October of 1687, the royal court returned to Whitehall Palace. Soon thereafter, it began to be whispered that the queen was pregnant. While the prospect of an heir brought new hope to Catholics at home and abroad, it was the worst possible news for the Protestants. One papist king they could endure, but a whole dynasty of Romish monarchs was beyond what could be borne.
Within a month of the report becoming generally known, Robert began to hear whispers that the queen’s pregnancy was only a ruse. By March, all who believed the rumors were laughed at.
The king’s other daughters also believed the queen’s gravidity was part of a papist plot to steal the throne from Princess Mary and her husband, with whom she’d agreed to share her reign. In a letter Lady Fitzhardinge had delivered, Anne wrote to her sister: “I cannot help thinking that the ‘grosseness’ of Mansel’s wife is rather suspicious. It is true that she is very big, but she looks better than she has ever done, which is not usual in the case of women as far gone as she pretends to be, as they generally look very ill. Besides this, it is very strange that the baths, which, according to the opinion of the most celebrated doctors, should have done her a great deal of harm, have had such a good effect, and so promptly, that she became ‘grosse’ from the first moment that Mansel and she met after her return from Bath. The certit
ude she has that it will be a son, and the principles of her religion being such that nothing will stop her, however impious may be the means of which she makes use, provided they advance its interests, causes one to think that some trickery is intended. I do all I can to discover what is being done, and if I discover anything, I will not fail to let you know. This much, you may count upon for a surety: I shall be present to witness the alleged birth with my own two eyes!”
Anne’s dislike for the queen (“Mansel’s wife” in her letters, for unknown reasons) was no secret at court, but to suspect Mary Beatrice of faking her “grosseness”—the French word for being with child—seemed like hatred carried to extremes.
Robert and Maggie, of course, knew the truth of the queen’s condition. She was indeed pregnant, a miracle the Catholics at court attributed to two causes: The first was the king giving up his Protestant mistress, Catherine Sedley. The second was the royal couple’s pilgrimage the previous year to the Well of St. Winefride in Wales, where they had prayed to be blessed with an heir at long last.
According to legend, the spring, which had miraculous healing powers, had arisen spontaneously from the spot where St. Winefride’s head hit the ground after she was decapitated by a would-be rapist. She was later raised from the dead by her uncle, St. Beuno, a seventh-century Welsh abbot and confessor.
To Robert’s dread, Queen Mary was not the only member of the royal family presently warming the nest. Maggie, too, was in the family way, and just as sure as her stepmother the babe in her womb was a boy. Robert could only pray his wife was wrong about the child’s sex.
Please, Heavenly Father, let us have a daughter this time. Let the queen have a boy and my wife have a girl—a sweet, golden-haired lass I can spoil like a princess and not be asked to give up for your purposes.