Page:American Historical Review vol. 6.djvu/677

The Risings in the English Monastic Towns 667 or guardians of the peace, in the county of Berks, and these meas- ures proved efficacious in subduing the revolt.' The next Sunday Abbot John de Canynge returned to his mon- astery with a bodyguard of gentlemen and archers. Many of the chief rioters fled from the town, others concealed themselves from justice; several of the latter were captured, however, and confined in Wallingford Castle. Later on they were tried before the royal justices and twelve of them were hanged. An even larger number would have suffered capital punishment had it not been for the mediation of the abbot, who interceded successfully on behalf of sixty of the culprits." The losses which the abbey had sustained were very large, being estimated at over ten thousand pounds. So heavily crippled, indeed, was the great monastic corporation that in January 1328 the King, at the abbot's request, appointed two cus- todians to guard its revenues and interests.^ Certain of the stolen valuables, along with deeds and charters were recovered by the ab- bot, but much of irreparable value was completely lost. The processes and commissions in connection with the troubles at Abingdon in 1327 are very numerous. They extend into the year 1330 and include indictments against the men of Oxford as well as those of Abingdon. Large numbers of the former were successively apprehended and tried, with the result that in many cases they were hanged for the part they had taken. Hundreds of offenders were condemned to death, fine, or imprisonment during the three years that followed the rising, and in the case of some of the chief offenders the proceedings dragged on several years longer on account of sentences of outlawry." The townsmen had to sur- render their charter of liberties and privileges, extorted from the prior and monks, and go back to their former state of dependence on the abbot and convent, and also make good the losses sustained by the abbey. To this end they were prosecuted by Abbot Robert de Garford, who succeeded John de Canynge in December, 1328, and was a man of much sterner temper and disposition, and of greater decision and force than his predecessor had been.*' This ' For these writs see ; Cal. Pat. Rolls, 1327-1330, p. 125 ; Cal. Close Rolls, 1327- 1330, pp. 201, 203. 2Brit. Mus. MS. 28666, p. 160 ; Placita Coram Rege, I Edw. III., Hilary temi, roll 271, m. Iviii. (Record Office). ' Cal. Pat. Rolls, 1327-1330, p. 202 ; there is also a curious petition of the abbot and convent to the king, asking for the patronage of a church on account of their losses, in Ancient Petitions (Record Office), file 30, No. 1467. < Dugdale, Moitasticon, I. 509; Cal. Pat. Rolls, 1 327-1330, gives abstracts of these commissions. Ca'. Pat. Rolls, 1327-1330, pp. 458, 475. ^Brit. Mus. MS. 28666, pp. 163 and 164.