The Hansa Towns

by Helen Zimmern

The exact means employed to break Wullenweber's strong spirit during the first months of his imprisonment are not known. There is no doubt, however, that he was subjected to torture, and that upon the rack he was made to acquiesce in statements, many of them quite false, and others distorted to serve the purpose of his tormentors. Among the so-called confessions were said to be an admission of his Anabaptist leanings, an intimation that he had proposed to murder and kill as many nobles as possible, that he had abstracted for his own private ends public and church property, and other statements, so manifestly out of keeping with his previously known character and general bearing, that it is amazing to think how his contemporaries, even those most opposed to him, could for a moment have given them credit.

Hero though Wullenweber was in the moral sense he was no hero at bearing physical pain, and, indeed, the two qualities by no means go together, nor does nervous shrinking from pain necessarily imply moral weakness. The contrary is often the case. The man of finely strung nerves, to whom bodily pain is on this account less supportable than to his more coarse-grained brother, is, for that very reason, capable of a refinement of sentiment and action equally unknown to the other. The beef-built man is apt to be beef-witted.

It is quite certain that all the admissions undoubtedly made by Wullenweber were wrung from him under excruciating tortures. Indeed, in the hour of his death, and in two letters to his brother Joachim, he affirmed that "the jailer of Bremen, together with his mortal enemies, had forced him into the admission of political and moral sins." He says he was racked again and again, and on one occasion had to swear that he would not answer in any other sense than that demanded of him. If he failed in obedience to this command he should be torn to little pieces on the wheel, but, so God help him, he knew nothing whatever of Anabaptists or these other charges. He implores his brother to make known all this to his friends at Lübeck, and to beg that some honourable men would search his account books, and see whether it be true that he had abstracted State moneys. The brother himself might come and hang him higher than any thief yet hung, if he could prove that he, Jürgen, had stolen anything from the Lübeckers. Finally, he warns the zealous Lutherans that the purpose of all that he had to suffer, all that was now being done, was to restore the old state of things, and that he feared that his foes would effect this in Lübeck of all other places.

Meantime, King Henry of England repeatedly demanded of the Archbishop of Bremen that his "beloved and trusty servant, Jürgen Wullenweber," should be treated with more clemency. Receiving no reply from the archbishop, the king turned to the city of Hamburg for aid to release the imprisoned burgomaster. He said he had need of his "innocent servant" for most important purposes, and pointed out that it was for the weal, not only of his own kingdom, but also, and even more, for that of the German nation, that Jürgen should be freed. Baffled on all sides, the king demanded at last, that at least the reasons for this confinement should be made publicly known.

These reasons could not be given, based as they were on motives of the lowest kind, that would not bear the light of day and of judicial investigation. The inquiries, however, caused the archbishop and his wire-pullers at Lübeck to think it well to remove Wullenweber from his prison at Rothenburg to some other more distant place. In consequence, he was passed on in the spring of 1536 to the custody of the archbishop's brother, Duke Henry of Brunswick, a bigoted Catholic and zealous persecutor of heretics. He confined Wullenweber in his castle of Steinbrück, a strong fortress situated between the towns of Brunswick and Hildesheim. The dark dungeon with its walls ten feet in thickness, with its small door but a foot and a half in breadth, are shown to this day. Quite recently this inscription has been put up inside it—"Here Jürgen Wullenweber lay and suffered. 1536-1537."

Yes, suffered indeed. For a year and a half this unfortunate man suffered mental and physical tortures in this hole. On one occasion he was racked in the presence of Nicholas Brömse and other burghers from Lübeck, and in order that he might recant nothing he had previously been made to say, he was racked twice before this public torture came about, and threatened with instant death did his answers vary. The duke was present on all occasions, it being a special pleasure to him to witness the sufferings of heretics. At the end, when the questions and replies were read aloud in the presence of the Lübeckers and the lacerated man, the duke turned on him harshly, asking, "Jürgen what do you say to all this?" "I have said, yes," replied the broken man, in low tones.

A letter written to his brother a few days after this event is heart-rending in its accents of despair and sorrow that he had been made to incriminate others by enforced false testimony. He begs his brother to do his best to make this good; he says he knows that he himself will lose his life, though he had two kings of England to friend, but he wished to save those who had stood by him and aided him. Brömse and the others who persecute him, know well that all the accusations are false, but it suits their purpose to put them forward. "Vouchsafe me credit; if I am a thief, may you yourself help me on to the gallows; if I am a traitor, on to the wheel; if I am an Anabaptist, into the fire."

Thus Wullenweber's confinement dragged on, and public sympathy for his fate increased. Seeing this, his persecutors thought it desirable to make an end. They announced that "the honest country" should judge Wullenweber. They carried out this proposal in the most despicable and treacherous manner. On a Monday morning September 24, 1537, a large gathering of peasants was assembled in an open space in the neighbourhood of Wolfenbüttel. From their midst were chosen twelve farmers who had not the smallest knowledge of State affairs, and barely comprehended the question at stake against the accused. Then the charges made against Wullenweber and to which he had acquiesced under torture were read before them. Called upon to reply, Wullenweber boldly, in a speech of great dignity, denied the charges, and declared himself willing to die to prove his innocence. That he should die was unanimously resolved; indeed, the verdict was a foregone conclusion. As they were unable to resolve upon the method it was voted that the hangman should decide on Wullenweber's punishment. Master Hans, called on by the judge, said that he "deemed it right and fitting that Wullenweber should be led forth and quartered and his body be torn on four wheels, and that he should be judged thus between heaven and earth, that he might act in this wise no more, and that others should remember how he had been dealt by."

But even after this Wullenweber's enemies were not appeased. They read out three more articles of accusation against him, articles which the advocate said he could not hear because of the noise made by the crowd. Jürgen replied. It was true he had confessed this while in prison, but under great pain, and in order to save his body and soul. But in order that his soul might not lie before the stern judgment seat of God, he herewith exculpated those whom he had inculpated while in prison, and begged his gracious lord (Duke Henry was close by) not to stain his hands with innocent blood and to bring therewith his (Wullenweber's) soul to lasting damnation. He then requested, as a last favour, to be permitted to speak a word or two with the emissaries from Lübeck. Most unwillingly the two men came into the presence of their late chief. "Jürgen, what do you want?" said one of them, in harsh tones that roused all the pent-up ire of Wullenweber's soul. In presence of the miserable instruments of his oppressors he broke, for the first time, his silence of two years' standing.

"This," he said in loud, clear tones: "this is what you have striven after so long, even four years ago when you wanted to surprise and carry me off by night in my house, which God Almighty did not permit. Now after all you have succeeded, that I admit before God. But I also tell you before the whole world, that the last articles are false, and that what I said in prison, I said under torture and to save my life."