Passage to Pontefract

by Jean Plaidy

  It was fascinating to listen to him and that which many had accepted before as God’s will, they now questioned.

  It was not long before John Ball was noticed, as anyone preaching such a doctrine must be. Moreover whenever he preached, people flocked to hear him. It was disconcerting. More than that. It was dangerous.

  On Sundays he would wait until the people came out from Mass and then start preaching in the market square. He had a magnetic quality and many found it impossible to pass on. Moreover his words were so arresting. They had certainly never heard the like before.

  One day he was at his usual place and was soon addressing the crowd.

  ‘My good friends,’ he cried. ‘Things cannot go well in England or ever will until everything shall be in common, when there shall be neither villein nor lord, and all distinctions levelled, when the lords shall be no more masters than ourselves. How ill they have used us! And for what reason do they keep us in bondage? Are we not all descended from the same parents, Adam and Eve, and what reasons can they give, why they should be more masters than ourselves – except perhaps in making us labour for them to spend. They are clothed in velvets and rich stuffs, ornamented with ermine and other furs, while we are forced to wear poor cloth. They have wines, spices and fine bread while we have only rye and the refuse of the straw; and if we drink it must be water. They have handsome seats and manors when we must brave the wind and rain in the field. And, my friends, it is from our labour that they have the wherewithal to support this pomp. What else should you lack when you lack masters? You should not lack for fields you have tilled nor houses you have built, nor cloth you have woven. Why should one man mow the earth for another?’

  If John Ball was aware of strangers in the crowd who listened he gave no sign. He did not care who heard him. What he said was truth.

  He would go on saying it because he believed it. No matter what befell him, he would go on telling the truth, before the King, before the Pope, before God.

  But this could no longer be called the ranting of a mad priest. It was the rumblings of revolt.

  John Ball was becoming a menace to security.

  It wasn’t long before he received a command to appear before the Archbishop of Canterbury.

  Simon of Sudbury – so called because he had been born in the town of that name in Suffolk – had become Archbishop of Canterbury some four years previously. He was a staunch adherent of John of Gaunt and there could not have been a man less like the priest, John Ball. Simon was not one to allow himself to become involved in doctrines; he had been originally disturbed by the rise of John Wycliffe but preferred to forget about him particularly as John of Gaunt was inclined to favour the preacher. But Courtenay, the Bishop of London, was of a very different mettle. There was a man who was going to stand by what he believed in even if he lost his post in so doing.

  Simon of Sudbury could well be without these uncomfortable men and such a one was John Ball.

  The man stood before him and had the temerity to repeat what he had been saying in market squares. The Archbishop could sense the fiery fanaticism of the man and knew at once that he was dangerous. Such as John Ball should not be allowed to roam the countryside inciting people to revolution.

  The Archbishop realised that it was no use admonishing him. He had already been in trouble before. People had been forbidden to attend his meetings – but that had not stopped them. He had been excommunicated, but no one – least of all John Ball – had cared very much about that.

  There was only one thing to do with such a man and that was put him away where he could not preach, so the Archbishop sentenced him to a term in Maidstone prison.

  Let him stay there where he could do no harm. The people would soon forget him and his dangerous doctrines.

  But people did not forget John Ball. His words were remembered. When men laboured in the fields for a pittance, when they wondered where their next meal was coming from and the children were hungry, they remembered John Ball. Why should it be? they asked. They watched the rich ride by on their fine horses with their fine clothes and their attendants. Why? asked the people. How did it happen? Hadn’t they all begun with Adam and Eve? Who was then the gentleman?

  Resentment grew when the collectors came round for the tax. Collecting had come to be a somewhat dangerous occupation and only those would enter into it who were promised big rewards.

  There was one baker of Fobbing in Essex – a man of great strength who refused to pay the tax and who so terrified the collector that he did not insist.

  This baker was talked of throughout Essex and the people of Fobbing made a hero of their baker and would have followed him if he would have led them. But the baker of Fobbing had no desire but to carry on baking his bread and this he did; but he had given them an indication that resistance was not impossible.

  One May day the collector called at the house of a tyler in the town of Dartford and demanded payment of the tax.

  The man of the house, Walter, was close by at his work tyling a house, and two women, his wife and daughter, were alone.

  The collector demanded the tax not only of the mother but of the girl, at which the woman said: ‘My daughter is not yet fifteen years of age and therefore pays no tax.’

  ‘What?’ said the collector casting a lascivious eye on the girl. ‘That one not fifteen!’

  He approached the girl and took her chin in his hand. He forced her to look at him. She was trembling with fear. Her mother looked on with horror, for she had heard tales of how these collectors could behave and that there was no redress against them because they were working for the government and it was not easy to get men to take on the disagreeable task of collecting.

  ‘Not fifteen! Why, she’s a fine big girl. I can see that. Not fifteen. Come.’ He had pulled at her gown, tearing at it so that the top part of her body was exposed.

  The girl screamed. Her mother ran out of the house calling for help.

  The collector laughed and seized the girl.

  Within a few moments the girl’s father was in the doorway. In his hand he carried the lathing hammer with which he had been working.

  ‘Take your hands off my girl, you devil,’ he cried.

  The collector turned on him. He carried a knife, for collectors came well armed.

  ‘How dare you touch my daughter,’ went on the tyler.

  ‘She’s a ripe wench,’ said the collector licking his lips. ‘Leave us, Tyler. We’ll be pleasant together and who knows I might not demand the tax off her.’

  The tyler’s answer was to raise his hammer and bring it down on the collector’s head. In a few seconds the collector was lying on the floor, blood spurting from his body.

  ‘He’s dead,’ said the girl and threw herself sobbing into her mother’s arms.

  The sound of the affray had spread throughout the neighbourhood and people were coming to see what had happened.

  The tyler knelt beside the collector. He could see that his daughter had spoken the truth.

  The man was dead.

  ‘What’ll you do?’ they asked. ‘You know what this means.’

  ‘You must get away,’ said his wife. ‘Wat, they’ll be after you. They’ll refuse to believe what sort of man he was. You’ll be in the wrong, they’ll say. Oh, Wat, you must go away.’

  Walter looked blankly ahead of him. ‘What shall I do?’ he said. ‘Shall I run? Leave my wife, leave my family … run for the rest of my life.’

  ‘You did right, Wat,’ said the one man. ‘I’d have done the same.’

  ‘And I. And I.’

  ‘A curse on the tax. A curse on the collectors. What’s it for, eh?’

  ‘To buy jewels for the rich.’

  ‘Why should they have what we work for? Why, why, why …? Didn’t we all come from Adam and Eve?’

  ‘They’ll never give us what we should have,’ said Walter. ‘I reckon the only way we’d get it is to take it.’

  ‘Let’s take it. Let’s march. Let’s marc
h on London.’

  Something had happened to Walter the Tyler. He had been a peaceful citizen until now. But he had killed a man for attempting to deflower his daughter and he felt no remorse. He felt only anger.

  He had heard John Ball when the priest had come this way and he had agreed with what the man had said but he had never believed the words of a priest could change anything.

  But why should the world go on in one way just because it had for so many years? There was much in what John Ball had said. And no one ever got anything they didn’t fight for.

  Here he was at a turning-point in his life – forced to it by a tax collector.

  He had killed a man and he would be discovered. Death awaited him – horrible death. But the people were watching him eagerly. They were looking to him. They were asking him to lead them.

  More and more were gathering round.

  Walter heard himself addressing them.

  ‘Why should we go on as we have been? Why shouldn’t we change things? The time has come. We’ll march …’

  He heard a cry go up. ‘We’ll march. Come on. All you people come. Fall in. Wat the Tyler is going to lead us to London.’

  A fever of excitement possessed the little town of Dartford. Within a few hours after the death of the tax collector they were gathered together and ready to march. There were hundreds of them. They had snatched up anything that could be used as weapons. True these were of the most primitive kind – mostly the tools of their trades such as flails, bill hooks and plough handles. There were a few pikes. But what they lacked in weapons they made up for in the fire of their determination.

  This was going to be the end of slavery. No longer would they allow the government to send its servants to their towns to take their money and dishonour their women.

  News spread to the surrounding villages and from all directions men were coming in to join what they called Wat Tyler’s army.

  Wat had discovered in himself the gifts of leadership, which had been awakened by the sight of his daughter in the hands of the collector. He had a certain gift for oratory and the fact that this ragged army looked to him as their leader was a great inspiration.

  He addressed the crowd and he was amazed at the silence as soon as he began to speak, and the manner in which they attended to his words was gratifying.

  ‘My friends,’ he cried, ‘we are going to right our wrongs. We shall not cease until we have done so. But let us not forget the man who has shown us the way to go. We have all heard his words. He has brought home to us the injustice of our lot. He has shown us that we have as much right to the good things as our masters have. I mean John Ball.’

  ‘John Ball be a prisoner of the Archbishop, Wat,’ called a man. ‘He be in the Maidstone prison.’

  ‘I know it,’ answered Wat. ‘So our first task is to free him.’

  ‘To Maidstone,’ cried the crowd. ‘Free John Ball!’

  So the march to Maidstone began. It was a distance of some twenty miles and as they passed through the villages people ran out to see them.

  Marching to free John Ball. Marching to London to get their rights. It was a goodly cause and there was scarcely a man who did not want to be part of it. By the time they reached Maidstone their numbers had doubled. They were an army.

  They stormed into the town of Maidstone, shouting, ‘To the Jail. To the Jail. Free John Ball.’

  The guards were startled to see this wild army descending upon them. ‘Open the gates,’ they shouted. The startled guards looked on in amazement, and did not move.

  ‘No matter,’ cried Wat. ‘We’ll soon break in.’

  There were so many of them and they were men of muscle; their lives had been spent in hard physical labour. It was not long before the gates gave way and they were storming into the prison.

  ‘John Ball,’ they chanted. ‘Where are you, John Ball? We have come to free you, John Ball.’

  The terrified guards were ready to help them. They were men with a grievance too. And there was John Ball standing before them, his joy apparent on his face.

  ‘At last, at last!’ he cried. ‘The day of atonement has come.’

  He must hear what had happened. They told him how they had started out from Dartford under Wat the Tyler’s leadership, and had gathered men on the way.

  ‘We can gather men from all over England,’ said John Ball. ‘Wat, you are a fine man. You killed the tax collector and it was a righteous killing. God is with you. He has chosen you to lead these men. But it is not enough, Wat. We need more. We will arouse the whole country. There is not a villein in this land who will not join with us when he knows we are on the march.’

  ‘How …?’ began Wat.

  But John Ball silenced him. ‘We will send messengers all over the country as far north as Durham … out to Essex and Suffolk, to Somerset and York. They will ride with all speed. A clarion call shall go through England. John Ball hath rung the bell.’

  There had been trouble in Essex following the affair of the Fobbing baker. In that village and a few others those who refused to pay the tax had been taken to court. A priest calling himself Jack Straw had arisen to lead the people. He marched into the court and the result was that fighting broke out. The officials were no match for the mob and the court was broken up and Jack Straw’s men marched through the town with the heads of officials dripping blood from the pikes on which they had been stuck.

  Now the men of Essex were marching to join the men of Kent. The revolt was no longer a local matter.

  The first objective was Canterbury where they might come face to face with Archbishop Simon of Sudbury, he who had sent John Ball to prison and would have let him stay there for the rest of his life if his friends had not come to rescue him.

  News reached the Mayor of Canterbury that John Ball with Wat Tyler and their army of desperate peasants were marching on the town, their object being to storm the Cathedral and bring the Archbishop to justice.

  The Mayor was in a panic. He was aware of what had happened in Fobbing and he was thankful that the Archbishop had gone to London. That was a mercy. He determined to do all he could to save his town.

  The marchers came steadily along the Pilgrims Way and they gave a shout of triumph when they saw the grey walls of the city.

  ‘We shall have to storm our way in,’ said Wat; but this proved not to be the case.

  The Mayor was waiting at the gates to welcome them, to tell them that he had every sympathy with their cause, and that he had food for them for he felt sure that was their most urgent need.

  ‘Our most urgent need is to come face to face with the Archbishop,’ replied John Ball.

  ‘My friend, he is not in Canterbury. He left some weeks ago for London.’

  There were cries of disappointment. But they were not taking the Mayor’s word for it.

  They partook of the food which was offered; then they searched the Cathedral and the Archbishop’s palace. It was true. Their bird had flown.

  ‘We’ll find him yet,’ declared Wat. ‘And when we’ve rested a night it’ll be to London.’

  Joan, the Queen Mother, had been on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St Thomas at Canterbury and was staying at a manor house near Rochester on her way back to Westminster when she heard of the peasants’ rising.

  She had been very uneasy lately. The King was growing up but was still very young – not yet fourteen; and she was constantly anxious about him. Each day she more deeply regretted the death of the Black Prince and often thought how much easier life would have been had he lived. She who had been so frivolous in her youth had grown very serious. She tried to guide her son. The uncles were there in the background of course. She looked more to John of Gaunt than the others; but John was so unpopular with the people and there were such evil rumours about him that she felt she must be wary. He was at this time in Scotland – for the Scots could always be relied upon to be troublesome at the most inconvenient times; Edmund was in Portugal and Thomas in the Marcher country – a
ll on missions which she guessed would prove to be fruitless.

  She had undertaken this pilgrimage to ask for St Thomas’s help; and now hearing these rumours of the peasants’ activities she told her attendants that they must lose no time in getting back to London.

  Travel for Joan had become something of a trial, for she had grown very fat over the last few years and riding a horse was irksome. For this reason she had had a vehicle built for herself. It was a most unusual contraption and when it passed along the roads people ran out of their houses to see it. The Queen Mother was one of the most popular members of the royal family, particularly in Kent, where she was still known as the Fair Maid of Kent, and she was the mother of the young King who, although he was not quite so rapturously received as he had been on the day he was crowned and had so appealingly lost his slipper, was still loved for his youth and beauty. Joan had never been afraid to mingle with the people and her ready smiles had kept her popularity.

  Now the sight of this carriage which looked like a wagon of red and gold covered in a white hood with a curtain over it to hide the occupant from view, brought out the crowds to give a smile and a cheer for the Fair Maid, even if in truth she scarcely deserved the name, though in spite of her obesity the remains of her remarkable beauty were still apparent. Moreover although the people loathed John of Gaunt, and had little love for the other sons of the King, they had idealised the Black Prince and retained a certain affection for Joan.

  Joan set out from Rochester instructing her servants that they must make every effort to reach London as soon as was possible. She sat in her carriage and made no complaint as they rattled along the roads even though the speed did not add to the comfort of travelling thus.

  Then suddenly as they rattled along the carriage gave a sudden jolt and they were stationary.

  ‘What can this be?’ asked Joan anxiously.

  One of her women who had been travelling with her inside the carriage lifted the curtain and looked out.