ST JOHN’S GATE.
A short distance from the very heart of London, stands—for it has not yet been swept away by the builder’s hand—one of the finest remaining relics of the ancient city. It is a heavy fortified gate, built of large blocks of freestone, and flanked by bastions. It has a fine groined Norman arch; and though it is now old and decayed, it is still strong, and shows us what its strength and stability have been in days gone by. It was built by, and belonged to, at one time, that famous order of chivalry, ‘The Knights Hospitallers,’ or ‘Knights of St John of Jerusalem,’ the great rivals of the Templars, and who did such good service in the Holy Land in the time of the crusades; and when Palestine was hopelessly lost, kept up their incessant war against the Infidel in Rhodes, and when driven from that island by the Turks—in Malta.
This order had at one time many religious houses scattered over Europe; and their London priory, that of St John of Clerkenwell, has quite a history of its own to tell. It was founded in the year 1100 by a devout baron named Jordan Briset, this being the time that the first crusade, led by Godfrey of Bouillon, was going on. For a considerable time after this, we know little of the priory, save that the knights were growing in riches and arrogance, and thus were making themselves obnoxious to the people, although some of the old chroniclers tell us that ‘they tended the sick and the needy.’ In fact, they got to be so disliked by the common people, that in the riots which took place in the reign of Richard II.—in which Wat Tyler, Jack Straw, and John Ball took so prominent a part, the last-named being a clergyman, who, in his harangues to the multitude, took for his text the rhyme,
When Adam delved and Eve span,
Who was then a gentleman?
and made the people think that all the property of the rich was really theirs—the rebels made the Priory of St John a special mark of their fury, and after destroying houses and much property belonging to the knights, they attacked the place itself and burnt it to the ground; and capturing the prior soon after, they executed him upon the spot.
For many years after, the knights were engaged in building a new priory; but the work went slowly on, owing to the troubled state of the order at what was then their great stronghold, Rhodes, and the large numbers of men and sums of money required there to assist in keeping back the conquering Turks, who were fighting with great zeal under the victorious Sultan Solyman. Gradually, a fine church, whose bell is related to have had an exceedingly fine tone, was added to the priory; and soon after the church was finished, Thomas Dockwra, who was then prior, built the gate; this being in or about the year 1504, in the latter part of the reign of Henry VII., the first of the famous dynasty of Tudor sovereigns.
About the year 1540, Henry VIII. suppressed all the larger monasteries and private religious houses in England, and the venerable priory fell with the others. This was a severe blow to the prosperity of the order, and is said to have broken the heart of the valiant old L’isle Adam, the grandmaster, who held Rhodes till he could hold it no longer, and then, obtaining honourable terms from the Sultan Solyman, removed to the island of Malta, where the knights continued to be a powerful enemy to the Turks until 1798, when, ‘through the treachery of the Maltese, and the cowardice of D’Hompesch the grandmaster, the island was surrendered to the French;’ and soon after this, most of the property still belonging to the order in many parts of Europe was confiscated by the various governments. Since then, the order, which had been gradually degenerating, has not had any political importance.
The priory, however, was not destroyed, like most of its kindred buildings, at the Reformation, for even the bluff, matter-of-fact King Henry had some respect for the venerable old building; and so, instead of destroying it, we are told that he used it for a military storehouse. In Edward VI.’s reign, however, a more ruthless and sweeping hand came to deal with it. The proud and ambitious Seymour, Duke of Somerset, at that time Lord Protector, had no kindly feeling for such places; and the church and all the rest of the priory, with the exception of the gate, were blown up with gunpowder. The large blocks of stone were used to build Somerset’s palace in the Strand in 1549. It remained till the year 1776, when it gave place to the present one, a building erected after the Palladian style, from the designs of Sir William Chambers.
We hear nothing more of the gate till the reign of James I., when that monarch bestowed the building on Sir Roger Wilbraham, who lived there for many years. Long after this, Cave the printer rented the old gate for a small sum, and here was first printed and published the Gentleman’s Magazine. This was one of the first places to which Dr Johnson, then poor, and almost unknown, came, when he settled in the great city. Here he made his first literary efforts by helping Cave in his publication. Here also Garrick the actor first played, some of Cave’s interested workmen taking the other parts of the pieces.
The old gate is now turned into a tavern, called Old Jerusalem Tavern, and inside may still be seen some interesting relics of the former days of the gate, when it was the chief entrance to the priory of one of the most powerful religious bodies in Europe. Who can look upon such a relic without being reminded of the great spirit of chivalry, that strange compound of barbarity and courtesy; of the crusades, and the great changes which have taken place since the time of the prosperous days of the old priory? and we cannot but feel thankful that we live in a happier, less troubled, and more enlightened age; and as we gaze upon the grim old gate, think of the words of Shakspeare: ‘To what base uses may we return.’