Now! Then! 2024! - Yorkshire On This Day

Excerpt

Shrove Tuesday being one of great liberty for boys and apprentices to play and throw at cocks, some of them playing near a house in the minster yard, disturbed the company in it. The master comes out, strikes one of the boys, and knocks down another. They, getting some of their companions together, throw stones at the man, and accidentally break the window of a Popish chapel that was in his house. He being a Roman Catholic makes his religion the cause of the quarrel, sends to the lieutenant-colonel for two files of musketeers, who presently sends them, being of his own persuasion, and very ready to espouse the dispute upon that foot. At the coming of the soldiers the boys disperse, some of them are taken, and some citizens – being by as spectators but not concerned in the matter – to the number of 15. The soldiers carry them to the main-guard [castle], tie them neck and heels, and make them ride the wooden horse [a torture device], not carrying them at all to the Lord Mayor [Thomas Mosley, apothecary], which ought to have been done, being citizens, to be punished according to law. And an ensign, one Oard, struck a citizen in the presence of my Lord Mayor.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.

Abbreviations:

• ER: East Riding
• GM: Greater Manchester
• NR: North Riding
• NY: North Yorkshire
• SY: South Yorkshire
• WR: West Riding
• WY: West Yorkshire

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Original

March 1. I had notice by the Deputy-Recorder of York by an express that the lieutenant-colonel commanding in my absence had dealt very severely and illegally with the citizens, and that the occasion of it was a little tumult raised on Shrove Tuesday in this manner. That day being one of great liberty for boys and apprentices to play and throw at cocks, some of them playing near a house in the Minster Yard, disturbed the company in it. The master comes out, strikes one of the boys, and knocks down another. They, getting some of their companions together, throw stones at the man, and accidentally break the window of a popish chapel that was in his house. He being a Roman Catholic makes his religion the cause of the quarrel, sends to the lieutenant-colonel for two files of musketeers, who presently sends them, being of his own persuasion, and very ready to espouse the dispute upon that foot. At the coming of the soldiers the boys disperse, some of them are taken, and some citizens – being by as spectators but not concerned in the matter – to the number of fifteen. The soldiers carry them to the mainguard, tie them neck and heels and make them ride the wooden horse, not carrying them at all to the Lord Mayor [Thomas Mosley, apothecary] (which ought to have been done, being citizens) to be punished according to law. And an ensign, one Oard, struck a citizen in the presence of my Lord Mayor. The lieutenant-colonel’s account was little different as to the fact, but altered as to the occasion, for he said that some priests had informed him the night before that they heard the rabble intended to pull down that house and the chapel, which made him act more severely; but I truly believe the uproar was merely accidental. I gave the King a particular account of the thing as it appeared most likely from the recorder. The lieutenant-colonel gave another himself, but at at the same time I excused the soldiers in this, that if they did transgress something in the method of punishing, the citizens deserved it a little for their former offences in this kind; for they rose in the same place and on the same day in my Lord Frescheville’s time, and had near killed Doctor Lake (since Bishop of Peterborough [actually of Sodor and Man, Bristol and Chichester]) because he checked them for making a noise in the time of Divine service, and they endeavoured to pull down his house that stood in the Minster Yard. Another time they fell upon my company there at the funeral of my Lady Strafford, as I have before taken notice in the proper place.

458 words.

Tags

Tags are assigned inclusively on the basis of an entry’s original text and any comment. You may find this confusing if you only read an entry excerpt.

• Apprenticeship (3) ·
• Blood sport (5) ·
• Carnival (3) ·
• Catholic Church (57) ·
• Cock throwing (1) ·
• James II (20) ·
• John Lake (bishop) (1) ·
• Reresby, John (1634-89) (23), Thrybergh-born, politician and diarist, governor of York 1682-88, 2nd baronet ·
• Shrovetide (1) ·
• Stanley, Henrietta Mary (-1685) (2), Countess of Strafford through her marriage to William Wentworth ·
• Torture (1) ·
• Wooden horse (device) (1) ·
• 📌York Castle (36) ·
• 📌York Minster (27) ·
• 📌York (164) ·

All tags.

Similar

• 13 January 1686: A mob plunders the funeral of the Countess of Strafford at York Minster
• 17 October 1688: York on the eve of the Glorious Revolution: “an archbishopric without a bishop, a city without a lord mayor, a garrison without a soldier”
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