In mid-July 1533, Cologne merchant and gunpowder-maker John Wolfe and his wife Alice Wolfe led a group of co-conspirators in the heinous murder of two Italian merchants on a boat in the Thames. The home base for their elaborate plot was the sanctuary precinct at Westminster: John Wolfe was registered there as a debtor andContinue reading “Murder on the Thames: John and Alice Wolfe”
Tag Archives: Execution by hanging
Cheshire feuds
Cheshire was a hotbed of violent gentry rivalries. The violence wasn’t confined to Cheshire itself: in 1539, two killings occurred in the shadow of St Paul’s Cathedral in London. The first: on 10 February 1539, a coroner’s inquest was held over the body of gentleman Richard Cholmeley of Cheshire, who lay “feloniously murdered” near StContinue reading “Cheshire feuds”
Rubbing Cromwell the wrong way
This sanctuary seeker seems to have been another felon who rubbed Cromwell the wrong way, and was not fortunate enough to successfully use Westminster’s asylum to gain time to organize a pardon. In February 1539 a London yeoman named George Brewce was tried for burglary in Colchester. He claimed benefit of clergy in an attemptContinue reading “Rubbing Cromwell the wrong way”
Sanctuary Seekers in England, 1394-1557 