1. Crucifixion and Conversion: King Henry III and the Jews in 1255: Part 2

In the second part of this Fine of the Month, David Carpenter demonstrates how tightly woven into the national political scene, and into Henry’s religious consciousness, the events at Lincoln in 1255 were. Several entries in the Fine Rolls point to Henry’s concern for Jewish converts to Christianity, some of known were from Lincoln, and he examines how his treatment of converts and his religious world view feed into the atrocious fate meted out to some of their former brethren.

⁋1Having handed their custody over to his brother earlier in the year, Henry, by the time of the Lincoln affair, no longer had a direct financial interest in protecting the Jews, and thus was all the freer to be guided by purely religious motives. As we have seen, he believed that his rule should exalt the catholic faith, so much so that in his speech to the sheriffs assembled at the Exchequer in 1250, he ordered them to take action against anyone ‘blaspheming the name of Jesus Christ’. 1 He was bound to take very seriously the appalling affront to the faith alleged at Lincoln, quite apart from the infanticide involved, however much he might have doubts about what had actually happened. There was, however, another reason why his mind was very much focused on the Jews, for 1255, the year he intervened at Lincoln, was also the year when his efforts to care for Jews who had converted to Christianity reached a climax. The evidence for this lies in some extraordinary material on the fine rolls, and while this has long been known to historians, it has never before been linked to the other events of the year.

⁋2The motives and methods of the campaign to convert Jews to Christianity in thirteenth-century England have been brilliantly exposed by Robert Stacey. 2 It was a movement in which Henry III himself was very much involved. Several conversi were baptised in his presence and took the names of leading courtiers, for example John Mansel, John de Plessis and the king’s confessor, the friar, John of Darlington. 3 Another conversus, who went on to an important career in the king’s service, was personally converted by Henry himself and given his name, Henry of Winchester. 4 The king was very concerned to provide material support for those who had converted and to that end, as early as 1232, he had founded the Domus Conversorum, the House for Converted Jews, in what was to become Chancery Lane. (The old Public Record Office building, now the Library of King’s College, is, of course, built on the site and one fragment of the thirteenth-century chapel still survives.)

⁋3The success of conversion, however, outran the capacity of the Domus, which seems to have been about 80 souls, 5 and so Henry got into the habit of parking individual conversi on religious houses throughout the country, asking them to provide either daily food and drink or a daily money pension. When, however, Henry got back from Gascony at the end of 1254, he found these arrangements in chaos. That he moved at once to restore them shows their importance in his mind. Thus on 20 January 1255, in a standard letter designed to be sent to many houses, he explained that as a result of the war in Gascony and other arduous affairs touching his state and that of his queen, he had been unable to make proper provision as yet ‘for the state of the conversi’. He therefore asked each house to provide a conversus with victuals and other necessaries for two years, although if he (or she) was not content with this daily dole, then the house could chose to give a pension of one and half pence a day instead. 6 All told around 160 conversi were listed in the roll as being equipped with this or some equivalent letter, some (around twenty-five) going back to houses where they had already been established, the rest setting out apparently for entirely new homes, the total number of houses involved being around 140. 7 The majority of the bearers were single men and women but there were also some family groups, husbands and wives, and mothers and daughters. Over 70 of the 160 converts were women. What is striking in our context is the number of converts from Lincoln: one man, Roger, and no less than five women: Alice, Matilda, Susanna the widow of John (presumably also a convert), and Mary with her daughter. How lucky they were to escape what was to come.

⁋4Henry, in his letter, had been careful to imply that this was a temporary arrangement until, he made proper provision. His wording shows he was making a request, not issuing an order, but he made it very clear that he expected his prayers to be heard, in which case the houses would benefit from his reciprocal grace and favour. There were to be no excuses making it necessary for him to solicit again. In the most cases, this did the trick, but some thirty conversi, with whatever excuses, were turned away, including Roger of Lincoln from Louth Park and Mary of Lincoln and her daughter from Kirkstead. The rejects were sent back (this time apparently successfully) with further standard form letters (the first was issued on 6 February), in which the king expressed his anger and astonishment, but gave the houses a second chance to prove their devotion, adding that he hoped the present delay would be wholly expiated by their subsequent actions, which would then deserve thanks and fitting reward. The letter also contained a reproach so rueful and inconsequential that one feels it must have come direct from the king himself, indicating how much he had the matter at heart, and also how plaintive and unimpressive he could sometimes be. For, Henry said,

⁋5‘we presume without doubt from this [refusal] that if we were absent in parts across the sea, these same prayers would have little or no effect with you, especially since you have refused to admit them when we are present’. 8

⁋6Henry had, of course, just returned from overseas, and hence presumably this line of thought, but it was hardly relevant now or exactly commanding to reflect on how much worse the response would be if he were to go abroad again, something anyway he had no plans to do.

⁋7The first of the letters for the rejected converts was issued, as we have said, on 6 February, and others followed as more met with refusal. The whole issue of the Jews was thus very much in Henry’s mind, and helps to explain the determination with which he investigated the Lincoln affair. That does not mean he had yet decided that the Jews were guilty. Indeed, when he stopped briefly at York on his way south, he may well have heard some sceptical words on that both from Richard of Cornwall and a Lincoln Jew, for it was there that Hagin of Lincoln, Richard’s ‘attorney’, informed the king, on Richard’s behalf, about the poverty of Aaron of York and sought a consequent concession. 9 It would be strange if Hagin was not also questioned about events in Lincoln. 10 When, however, Henry eventually arrived in the city on 3 October, he was, we may be sure, hit with a great wave of emotion and certainty over what had happened. The atmosphere must have been electric. Doubtless, the mother Beatrice flung herself once more at Henry’s feet; the blind woman proclaimed her miraculous recovery of sight; and the dean and chapter showed off the place of honour in the cathedral where they had laid to rest the boy who was already becoming ‘Little Saint Hugh’. There was also one other extraordinary twist, at least if the ballad can be believed. Just what advice Henry’s converts would have given him about the allegations we do not know. Would those from Lincoln have said they knew nothing of such terrible rituals? Perhaps they did. And yet, according to the ballad, it was actually a convert, after finding the body, who helped reveal that it had been crucified. Because of the dirt which covered the corpse, this was not initially clear, and it was the convert who stood forth and advised that it be washed, and then

⁋8‘Je crei ben que ert trové Comment l’enfant pené’. 11

⁋9Did the convert, then, also come before the king, explain his role in the affair, and assure him, with all his inside knowledge, that yes the Jews did indeed commit such crimes. Given Henry’s respect for such men and concern for their welfare, this was evidence which would be very hard to resist, whatever his earlier hesitations. And there was one other crucial factor. Because of the necessity of getting to Westminster by 13 October, Henry was in a hurry. Leaving the queen behind (Eleanor was ill), 12 he had come down from Wark making little more than overnight stops on the way, and after arriving in Lincoln on 3 October, he was off again on the sixth. 13 He could give just three days. In the city, Henry was surrounded by emotion and needed a quick result, just the kind of situation which has led to miscarriages of justice in murder trials through the ages. The first step was to arrest all the male Jews, or those who could be caught, and then came the examination. 14 Here there was a man, thanks to his combination of learning and local knowledge, supremely fitted for the task, namely, as Langmuir showed, the king’s steward John of Lexington. 15 John had accompanied the king from the north and had indeed been pretty constantly at court since the spring. 16 He was a literate knight, a ‘miles litteratus’, learned in both canon and Roman law, and also, as steward of the king’s household, one of the judges of the court coram rege. He also came from a very distinguished family whose ancestral home at Laxton was only fifteen miles from Lincoln. 17 One brother, Robert, had been a senior royal judge, another, Stephen, as we have seen, was abbot of Clairvaux, while a third, Henry, was at this very time bishop of Lincoln. In addition, three of John’s nephews were canons of the cathedral, and thus quite possibly participants in the procession which had born Hugh’s body to its resting place. 18

⁋10What arguments and insinuations John brought to bear to extract Copin’s confession we do not know, but doubtless the key factor, mentioned by both Matthew Paris and the Burton annalist, was the promise of his life. Langmuir thought it quite possible that John did not believe the confession and was simply seizing the chance to add a new saint to his brother’s cathedral. 19 Yet one wonders about this because John and his brother had actually good reasons for playing down the whole affair. Lincoln already had a recent saint in Hugh of Avalon, who had died in 1200, and was now, as we have seen, well on its way to another with Grosseteste. Both these were former bishops of the diocese whose sanctification boosted episcopal authority, which was hardly the case with Little Saint Hugh. 20 There was also the danger that, lying there beside him, Hugh would overshadow Grosseteste and thus obstruct his path to official canonisation. The dean and canons of Lincoln, often in conflict with their bishop, might perhaps have looked at things differently, but, in this case, the dean, Richard of Gravesend, had been a Grosseteste protégé and was soon to follow Henry of Lexington as bishop. John himself, if he inspired Henry’s letter to the Cistercians on 4 August, believed as strongly as his master in the need to ‘exalt the Catholic faith’. Faced with the evidence of the body and the miracles, and enveloped by the tide of emotion which was sweeping through the city, he might well believe that a gross assault had been made on the faith at Lincoln. What is certain is that John, as Matthew Paris put it even before the Lincoln affair, was ‘a man of great authority and knowledge’. Any confession he obtained was bound to carry belief. 21

⁋11According to the Burton annals, Copin’s testimony was written down and read out before the king. 22 According to the ballad, more dramatic, but not necessarily less believable, the Jews, were brought bound into the king’s presence, and there Copin recited his confession which was then put in writing. 23 After that, Henry’s reaction seems rather an anti-climax:

⁋12‘Pur la pité Jhésu Christ Mult meafist que l’occist ’. 24

⁋13Matthew Paris, however, again perfectly believable, now has the king making another decisive intervention, because he overruled John’s promise of mercy and determined that Copin should die. Indeed, as a ‘a blasphemer and murderer he deserved to die many times over’. 25 For one with, as we have seen, a horror of blasphemy and an urgent concern to promote the Christian faith, this verdict was understandable. So Copin suffered his excruciating fate, his body, or what was left of it, ending (another local detail provided by the ballad) on Lincoln’s gallow’s hill at Canwick. 26 As for the rest of the accused, they seem to have been offered a trial by an all Christian jury, something eighteen of them refused to accept, demanding a mixture of Jews as well. 27 What was to be done, however, could be left to the future. Leaving the Jews imprisoned in Lincoln castle, Henry was off: 6 October, Sempringham; 7th, Stamford; 8th, Peterborough; 9th, Huntingdon; 10th, Royston; 11th, Hertford; and thus at Westminster in time for the feast of the Confessor’s translation on 13 October.

⁋14The rest of the tragic story is quickly told. In October, the constable of Lincoln castle was ordered to despatch all the Jews ‘taken for the child lately crucified’ to the king at Westminster, from where they were sent to the Tower. 28 Next month (on 22 November), with Hugh’s mother actively prosecuting her suit, all ninety-two were brought back to Westminster. The eighteen Jews who, at Lincoln, had not wished to place themselves on a jury of Christians without Jews were immediately drawn through London and hanged on a specially constructed gallows, their refusal being presumably taken as a confession of guilt. The remaining seventy-four Jews were returned to the Tower. 29

⁋15There were now some signs of relaxation. According to the Burton annalist, the Dominican friars intervened strenuously for the Jews, Paris ascribing the same role to the Franciscans. Both chroniclers reported the story that they were motivated by money, although Paris, in some troubled reflections, acknowledged that their motives might have been pious. 30 In December, one of the Jews in the Tower, after intercession by a Castilian envoy in England, was released and restored to his property: John of Lexington’s inquiry, it was said, had shown he was only accused of ex post facto consent to the crime; he had put himself on a jury before the king’s justices at Westminster; and the boy’s mother had acknowledged he was not guilty. Then in January 1256, another Jew was pardoned, this time at the instance of John of Darlington. Since the Jew in question is described as ‘John the convert’, it would seem likely that he had been converted by Darlington and taken his name. 31

⁋16There were still, however, legal proceedings for in the same month, January 1256, a jury of twenty-four knights living close to Lincoln, and twenty-four burgesses from the city, was summoned to Westminster to certify the justices ‘concerning the death of Hugh son of Beatrice, whom the Jews crucified and handed to death, as it is said’, the Jews in the Tower having agreed to stand by their verdict. 32 The ‘as it is said’ sticks out here and it is a great pity that no record survives of the resulting proceedings, if there were any. Both Paris and the Burton annalist say the Jews were convicted, but this would make the subsequent events almost inconceivable, for there were no more executions. Instead, in May 1256, the remaining Jews were released after the intervention of the earl of Cornwall, something even he could hardly have achieved had they been convicted. 33 Interestingly, the chronicle of Paris’s fellow St. Albans monk, John of Wallingford, also ascribes the release to Henry of Bath, the senior judge of the court coram rege, which could point in the direction of an acquittal or at least a failure to convict. 34 Richard himself had clearly a financial motive in protecting the Jews (as both Paris and the Burton annalist pointed out) but probably had never believed in the accusations in the first place. 35

⁋17The eventual release of the Jews, formally acquitted or not, shows that relations between Christians and Jews were not fixedly prejudiced. Indeed, reading between the lines of the Lincoln affair, the same point appears. Little Hugh was said to be playing with Jewish boys. According to the ballad, his body was actually disposed of by a former nurse of one of the Jews who passed for a Christian. 36 When the Jews were arrested, their women and children were left untouched ‘out of pity’. 37 The same close relations between Jews and Christians, as Robert Stacey has shown, also stand out in the tale of the ritual crucifixion of Adam of Bristol, which was probably written soon after the Lincoln affair. 38 If Henry III himself gave official sanction to the crucifixion myth, he did so only in extraordinary circumstances which did away with what may earlier have been a more measured approach to the affair. Given his interest in the Jews, he would probably have gone to Lincoln in 1255, even if it had meant a journey to and from the south, rather than merely looking in on his way home from Wark. But if Henry had enjoyed more time, if he had not been under such pressure ‘to get a result’, then the affair might well have taken a less atrocious path.

⁋18One sequel. 39 In November 1256, a year after the execution of its Jews, the dean and canons of Lincoln sought permission to lengthen their church to the east. 40 This was the beginning of the angel choir of the cathedral. Truly, in Lincoln, the barbarity and beauty of this age lived together. Perhaps indeed they were connected, for was it with help from offerings at the shrine of Little Saint Hugh than the canons hoped to construct their wonderful new building?

Footnotes

1.
M.T. Clanchy, ‘Did Henry III have a policy?’, History 53 (1968), pp. 215–16. Back to context...
2.
R.C. Stacey, ‘The conversion of the Jews to Christianity in thirteenth-century England’, Speculum 67 (1992), pp. 263–83. Stacey has also shown how the king’s taxation between 1240 and 1260 undermined the finances of the Jews, thus reducing their value to the crown and preparing the way for the expulsion: R.C. Stacey, ‘1240–1260: a watershed in Anglo-Jewish relations?’, Historical Research lxi (1988), pp. 135–50. For Henry’s legislation on the Jews in 1253, see H.G. Richardson, The English Jewry under the Angevin Kings (London, 1960), pp. 191–93 and P. Brand, ‘Jews and the law in England, 1275–90’, English Historical Review cxv (2000), pp. 1138–58, at p. 1142 notes 1 and 3 and pp. 1143–44. Back to context...
3.
Stacey, ‘The conversion of the Jews’, pp. 267, 269. Converts called John Mansel, John de Plessis and John of Darlington all appear in the fine roll material mentioned below. Back to context...
4.
Stacey, ‘The conversion of the Jews’, pp. 276–77; Brand, ‘Jews and the law’, pp. 1149–53. Back to context...
5.
Stacey, ‘The conversion of the Jews’, p. 267 and note 22. Back to context...
6.
CFR 1254–55, no. 53 Back to context...
7.
There are five overlapping lists of the beneficiaries: CFR 1254–55, nos. 54, 124, 125 (those sent back to their previous homes), 203 and 981. The most recent analysis of them is to be found in Joan Greatrex’s, ‘Monastic charity for Jewish converts: the requisition of corrodies by Henry III’ in Christianity and Judaism, ed. D. Wood (Ecclesiastical History Society, Oxford, 1992), pp. 133–43. See also Stacey, ‘The conversion of the Jews’, p. 269. I have attempted some analysis of the lists myself which explains any differences with Greatrex’s findings. Back to context...
8.
CFR 1254–55, no. 123. The Latin is ‘presumentes ex hoc indubitanter quod si absentes essemus in partibus transmarinis, eedem preces parum vel nullum penes vos optinerent effectum maxime cum in presentia nostra illas admittere recusaveritis’. The ‘presumentes ex hoc’ has been written over the deleted word ‘sperantes’. I would like to thank Lesley Boatwright for help with the translation of this passage. Back to context...
9.
Close Rolls 1254–56, p. 140. Back to context...
10.
Hagin, however, acquired possessions of some of the executed Jews: Calendar of Charter Rolls 1226–57, p. 460; Hill, Medieval Lincoln, pp. 227–28. Back to context...
11.
HL, pp. 50–51, stanzas 64–66. Back to context...
12.
Foedera, I, i, p. 328 (CPR 1247–58, p. 425; Calendar of Liberate Rolls 1251–60, p. 240; Close Rolls 1254–56, p. 142..Queen Margaret was allowed to stay with her mother until she recovered and set off for the south. Back to context...
13.
He had time, however, according to Matthew Paris, to lay violent hands, as a forced loan, on money deposited for safe keeping in Durham cathedral: CM, v, pp. 507–08. But see CPR 1247–58 p. 423 and Calendar of Liberate Rolls 1251–60, p. 261 which suggest a different interpretation. Back to context...
14.
AM, i, pp. 344–45. The ballad seems to put the arrest on the day before the king’s arrival: HL, pp. 51–52, stanzas 72–75. Back to context...
15.
Langmuir, pp. 474–77. Back to context...
16.
This is shown by his witnessing of royal charters: The Royal Charter Witness Lists of Henry III, ed. M. Morris, 2 vols. (Lists and Index Society, 291–92, 2001), ii, pp. 96–99. Matthew Paris’s major mistake was to think John examined Copin before the king’s arrival which plainly he did not: CM, v, p. 518. Back to context...
17.
For Laxton, John and his family, see Crook, ‘Dynastic conflict in thirteenth-century Laxton’, pp.194–98. Back to context...
18.
Langmuir, p. 472. The evidence for these canonries is slightly later than 1255, however. Back to context...
19.
Langmuir, pp. 477, 481. Langmuir, however, adds that John must have wanted to believe the fantasy. He also notes that he had provided Matthew Paris with information about a miracle: CM, v, pp. 383–84. Back to context...
20.
The potential conflict between cults like that of William of Norwich and Little Saint Hugh emerged at the workshop referred to in note 1 of Part 1. Back to context...
21.
CM, v, p. 384. Back to context...
22.
AM, i, p. 345. Back to context...
23.
HL, pp. 52–54. Back to context...
24.
HL, p. 53, stanza 87: ‘By the pitie of Jhesus Christ, I trowe, Much ill did the infant’s murder do.’ Back to context...
25.
CM, v, p. 518. The quotation is Paris’s comment not Henry’s direct speech. Back to context...
26.
HL, p. 54. Back to context...
27.
Cronica Maiorum et Vicecomitum Londoniarum, ed. T. Stapleton (Camden society, 1840), p. 23. Back to context...
28.
Close Rolls 1254–56, p. 145. Back to context...
29.
Cronica Maiorum, p. 23; CM, v, p. 519. It is noticeable that Paris is now better informed than the Burton annalist who places the executions after Christmas: AM, i, p. 346. Back to context...
30.
AM, i, pp. 346–48; CM, v, p. 546. Back to context...
31.
Foedera, I, i, p. 335 (CPR 1247–58, pp. 453, 457. See Stacey, ‘The conversion of the Jews’, p. 272. The reference in December to John of Lexington’s inquiry is the last mention of him in the affair. The last royal charter he attests is one at Lincoln on 4 October (The Royal Charter Witness Lists of Henry III, ii, p. 98), a point I owe to David Crook. He was dead by early 1257. Back to context...
32.
Royal and other Historical Letters of the Reign of Henry III, ed. W.W. Shirley, 2 vols. (Rolls series, 1862, 1866), ii, p. 110. Back to context...
33.
AM, i, p. 348; CM, v, pp. 546, 552. Back to context...
34.
R. Vaughan, ‘The chronicle of John of Wallingford’, English Historical Review lxxiii (1958), p. 74. Some doubt seems later to be expressed even in respect of those executed for the crime, for example Close Rolls 1256–59, pp. 236–37. Back to context...
35.
Richard, however, did profit from the possessions of the executed Jews: Close Rolls 1254–56, pp. 241, 285. Back to context...
36.
For Christian wet-nurses working for Jews, see Brand, ‘Jews and the law’, p. 1145 note 2 and H. Mayer, ‘Female moneylending and wet-nursing in Jewish-Christian relations in thirteenth-century England’ (unpublished University of Cambridge doctoral thesis, 2009), especially chapter 7. Back to context...
37.
HL, p. 48, stanzas 44, 47; p. 52, stanza 74; p. 53, stanza 85. Back to context...
38.
Stacey, ‘”Adam of Bristol”’, pp. 11–12. Back to context...
39.
The following link was made by Paul Binski at the workshop mentioned in note 1, part 1. See also D.A. Carpenter, ‘King Henry III and the chapter house of Westminster Abbey’, p. 33 of a volume about the chapter house of the abbey, edited by Richard Mortimer and to be published by the Society of Antiquaries in May 2010. Back to context...
40.
CPR 1247–58, p. 506. Back to context...