It happened that Stephen had shut up a number of the Empress Matilda's partisans and their families when he besieged the town of Lincoln; among these was the Earl of Gloucester's youngest daughter, who had recently married her cousin, the Earl of Chester. So determined were the father and husband to liberate her, that, with all their followers, they swam across the river Trent, behind which Stephen and his army thought themselves safely encamped, and fiercely attacked him in their dripping garments.
Stephen fought desperately, until he was left almost alone on the field, when a stout knight seized him and led him captive before the Empress Matilda, who ordered him into close confinement in Bristol Castle.
Then the Empress Matilda made her public entry into the city of Winchester, where she was received in state by Stephen's brother, the bishop of that place, who excommunicated all those who adhered to the imprisoned king, and promised absolution to all those who joined the cause of the empress.
At this melancholy juncture Queen Matilda returned from France. She at once made a personal appeal to the citizens of London, with whom she had always been popular, and so readily did they listen to her complaint that they demanded the liberation of the king. But her brother-in-law, Henry de Blois, the Bishop of Winchester, paid no attention to the demand; he even refused to have Queen Matilda's address to the Synod in behalf of her husband read aloud, and boldly declared the Empress Matilda sovereign of England.
[Original]
Then Queen Matilda made a pathetic appeal to this haughty, arrogant woman in behalf of Stephen, who remained, heavily ironed, in prison. She assured the empress that the loss of power was of little moment; all she asked was that her husband might be set at liberty. She even proposed that if her life were spared, and her son were permitted to enjoy the Earldom of Boulogne, she would enter a convent, her husband a monastery, and promised that both would forever forego all claim to the crown of England.