ST. SEPULCHRE’S BELL.
For the Table Book.
On the right-hand side of the altar of St. Sepulchre’s church is a board, with a list of charitable donations and gifts, containing the following item:—
| £. | s. | d. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1605. | Mr. Robert Dowe gavefor ringing the greatestbell in this church on theday the condemned prisonersare executed, andfor other services, forever, concerning suchcondemned prisoners, forwhich services the sextonis paid £1. 6s. 8d. | 50 | 0 | 0 |
Looking over an old volume of the Newgate Calendar, I found some elucidation of this inscription. In a narrative of the case of Stephen Gardner, (who was executed at Tyburn, February 3, 1724,) it is related that a person said to Gardner, when he was set at liberty on a former occasion, “Beware how you come here again, or the bellman will certainly say his verses over you.” On this saying there is the following remark:—
“It has been a very ancient practice, on the night preceding the execution of condemned criminals, for the bellman of the parish of St. Sepulchre, to go under Newgate, and, ringing his bell, to repeat the following verses, as a piece of friendly advice to the unhappy wretches under sentence of death:—
All you that in the condemn’d hold do lie,
Prepare you, for to-morrow you shall die;
Watch all, and pray, the hour is drawing near,
That you before the Almighty must appear:
Examine well yourselves, in time repent,
That you may not to eternal flames be sent.
And when St. Sepulchre’s bell to-morrow tolls,
The Lord above have mercy on your souls!
Past twelve o’clock!”
In the following extract from Stowe’s London,[44] it will be shown that the above verses ought to be repeated by a clergyman, instead of a bellman:—
“Robert Doue, citizen and merchant taylor, of London, gave to the parish church of St. Sepulchres, the somme of £50. That after the several sessions of London, when the prisoners remain in the gaole, as condemned men to death, expecting execution on the morrow following: the clarke (that is the parson) of the church shoold come in the night time, and likewise early in the morning, to the window of the prison where they lye, and there ringing certain toles with a hand-bell appointed for the purpose, he doth afterwards (in most Christian manner) put them in mind of their present condition, and ensuing execution, desiring them to be prepared therefore as they ought to be. When they are in the cart, and brought before the wall of the church, there he standeth ready with the same bell, and, after certain toles, rehearseth an appointed praier, desiring all the people there present to pray for them. The beadle also of Merchant Taylors’ Hall hath an honest stipend allowed to see that this is duely done.”
Probably the discontinuance of this practice commenced when malefactors were first executed at Newgate, in lieu of Tyburn. The donation most certainly refers to the verses. What the “other services” are which the donor intended to be done, and for which the sexton is paid £1. 6s. 8d., and which are to be “for ever,” I do not know, but I presume those services (or some other) are now continued, as the board which contains the donation seems to me to have been newly painted.
Edwin S——.
Carthusian-street, Jan. 1827.
[44] Page 25 of the quarto edition, 1618.