A History of Epidemics in Britain, Volume 1 (of 2) / From A.D. 664 to the Extinction of Plague

by Charles Creighton

“The note of John Hooker alias Vowell;” and the text of the note is as follows[794] (III. pp. 1547-8):—“At the assizes kept at the citie of Excester, the fourteenth daie of March, in the eight and twentieth yeare of hir majesties reigne, before Sir Edmund Anderson, Knight, lord chief justice of the common pleas, and sargeant Floredaie, one of the barons of the excheker, justices of the assises in the Countie of Devon and Exon, there happened a verie sudden and a strange sickenesse, first amongst the prisoners of the Gaole and Castell of Exon, and then dispersed (upon their triall) amongst sundrie other persons; which was not much unlike to the sickenesse that of late yeares happened at an assise holden at Oxford, before Sir Robert Bell, Knight, lord chiefe baron of the excheker, and justice then of that assise....

The origin and cause thereof diverse men are of diverse judgment. Some did impute it, and were of the mind that it proceeded from the contagion of the gaole, which by reason of the close aire and filthie stinke, the prisoners newlie come out of a fresh aire into the same are in short time for the most part infected therewith; and this is commonlie called the gaole sickenesse, and manie die thereof. Some did impute it to certain Portingals, then prisoners in the said gaole. For not long before, one Barnard Drake, esquire (afterwards dubbed Knight) had beene at the seas, and meeting with certeine Portingals, come from New-found-land and laden with fish, he tooke them as a good prize, and brought them into Dartmouth haven in England, and from thense they were sent, being in number about eight and thirtie persons, unto the gaole of the castell of Exon, and there were cast into the deepe pit and stinking dungeon[795].

These men had beene before a long time at the seas, and had no change of apparell, nor laine in bed, and now lieing upon the ground without succor or reliefe, were soone infected; and all for the most part were sicke, and some of them died, and some one of them was distracted; and this sickenesse verie soone after dispersed itselfe among all the residue of the prisoners in the gaole; of which disease manie of them died, but all brought into great extremities and were hardly escaped. These men, when they were to be brought before the foresaid justices for their triall, manie of them were so weak and sicke that they were not able to goe nor stand; but were caried from the gaole to the place of judgement, some upon handbarrowes, and some betweene men leading them, and so brought to the place of justice.

The sight of these men’s miserable and pitifull cases, being thought (and more like) to be hunger-starved than with sickenesse diseased, moved manie a man’s heart to behold and look upon them; but none pitied them more than the lords justices themselves, and especially the lord chief justice himselfe; who upon this occasion tooke a better order for keeping all prisoners thenseforth in the gaole, and for the more often trials; which was now appointed to be quarterlie kept at every quarter sessions and not to be posted anie more over, as in times past, untill the assises.

These prisoners thus brought from out of the gaole to the judgment place, after that they had been staied, and paused awhile in the open aire, and somewhat refreshed therewith, they were brought into the house, in the one end of the hall near to the judges seat, and which is the ordinarie and accountable place where they do stand to their triales and arraignments. And howsoever the matter fell out, and by what occasion it happened, an infection followed upon manie and a great number of such as were there in the court, and especially upon such as were nearest to them were soonest infected. And albeit the infection was not then perceived, because every man departed, (as he thought), in as good health as he came thither; yet the same by little and little so crept into such as upon whom the infection was seizoned, that after a few daies, and at their home coming to their owne houses, they felt the violence of this pestilent sicknesse; wherein more died, that were infected, than escaped. And besides the prisoners, manie there were of good account, and of all other degrees, which died thereof; as by name sargeant Floredaie who then was the judge of those trials upon the prisoners, Sir John Chichester, Sir Arthur Basset, Sir Barnard Drake, Knight[796]; Thomas Carew of Haccombe, Robert Carie of Clovelleigh, John Fortescue of Wood, John Waldron of Bradfeeld and Thomas Risdone, esquires and justices of the peace.

... Of the plebeian and common people died verie manie, and especiallie constables, reeves, and tithing men, and such as were jurors, and namelie one jurie of twelve, of which there died eleven.

This sicknesse was dispersed throughout all the whole shire, and at the writing hereof in the time of October, 1586, it is not altogether extinguished. It resteth for the most part about fourteene daies and upwards by a secret infection, before it breake out into his force and violence.”

Here we have the same incubation-period as in the Oxford fever, about fourteen days. But in the Exeter case, we have it clearly stated that an infection arose in the prison from the poor Portuguese sailors or fishermen who had been thrown into “deep pit and stinking dungeon” after their capture on the high seas by Sir Bernard Drake, that the infection attacked the other prisoners, that many of the prisoners died and all were brought to extremities, and that those who stood their trial were then in a most feeble state, although they seemed to the pitying spectators to be more starved than diseased.

So far as concerned the infection in the Assize Court, among the lawyers, county gentry, and officials, jurors and others, it was of the same tragic kind as at Oxford in 1577 and at Cambridge in 1522, and, as we shall see, on several occasions in the eighteenth century. But the Exeter case has some features special to itself. Within the gaol were both English felons and thirty-eight Portugals, who had become subject to capture on their way home from the banks of Newfoundland with boatloads of stock-fish, and to treatment as felons, because Spain and England were at war. Within the gaol there seems to have been also a gradation of misery, a deep pit and stinking dungeon, “in the lowest deep a lower deep,” to which were consigned the men of foreign breed, the Portugals. It was among them that deaths first occurred, in what special form we know not. From them an infection is clearly stated by Hoker to have spread through the gaol at large, and to have made many of the prisoners so weak that they had to be carried into court. This is quite unlike what we read of in the Cambridge and Oxford cases, in neither of which was illness noted in the prisoners or asserted of them, although at Oxford two or three had died in chains a few days before. In the Exeter case there were three circles of the damned instead of two only: nay there were four. Farthest in were the Portugals, next to them were the native English felons, then came those present on business or pleasure at the Assizes, and lastly there were the country people all over Devonshire for many months after. We must take all those peculiarities of the Exeter gaol-fever together, and explain them one by another. It was a somewhat elaborated poison. It had passed from the foreign prisoners to the English, and in the transmission had, as it were, consolidated its power; hence, when the prisoners did give it to those who breathed their atmosphere in court, the infection did not limit itself to them, as it certainly did at Oxford and, so far as anything is said, at Cambridge also, and as it usually does in typhus-fever; but it became a volatile poison, it developed wings and acquired staying power, so that its effects were felt over the county of Devon for at least six months longer.