Their Indictments are probably still to be found at York Castle. And it is a great desideratum that the old York Castle Indictments should be catalogued, and a catalogue published. I believe such never has been done.
Since August, 1900, York Castle has been used as a Military Prison. All the old Indictments that are in existence, whether at York, Worcester, or other Assize towns, would be of interest and value re the Gunpowder Plot if the affair is to be thoroughly bottomed.
The York Quarter Sessions’ Indictments appear to be irretrievably lost, which is a great pity, as many of those of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries must have referred to Popish recusants, and those of the seventeenth century probably to Puritan sectaries, and, later, to Quakers as well — the latter being punished under the Popish Acts of Supremacy and Allegiance. Indeed, the barrister, William Prynne (seventeenth century), a Calvinistic English Presbyterian, wrote a book to prove that Quakerism was only a sort of indirect and derivative Popery. The learned gentleman entitled his work: “The Quakers unmasked and clearly detected to be but the spawn of Romish Frogs, Jesuites, and Franciscan Fryers.” Now, Prynne was not far wrong either, the erudite historical philosopher knows very well, who has studied the genesis of the remarkable system developed by Fox, Barclay, and Penn.
Was there a Grimston near Mount St. John, Feliskirk, near Thirsk? Or was it Grimston Garth, Holderness? or was it North Grimston, between Malton and Driffield, that Thomas Grimstone came from; or Grimston, three miles east of York?
Since writing the preceding note I have come to the conclusion that the Grimston was, most likely, the Grimstone some twelve miles from Mount St. John, in the Parish of Gilling East, near Hovingham and Ampleforth, in the Vale of Mowbray, and near Gilling Castle, once the seat of the Catholic branch of the Fairfaxes, now the seat of George Wilson, Esquire, J.P. This Grimstone would be a spot very suitable for harbouring Campion after he had been at Babthorpe, near Selby; Thixendale, near Leavening, east of Malton; and Fryton, west of Malton, near Hovingham.
(How wonderful to think that the probabilities are in favour of the supposal that these tranquil, sequestered nooks, each with its own fair summer beauty, once rang with the golden eloquence of Edmund Campion, “one of the diamonds of England,” in the days of Shakespeare.)
Guy Fawkes was also connected with another Roman Catholic martyr, “the Venerable” William Knight, yeoman, of South Duffield, Hemingbrough, Selby, East Yorkshire, who suffered death at the York Tyburn in 1596, for “explaining to a man the Catholic faith.” — See Challoner and Foster’s “Pedigrees of Yorkshire Families” (“Fawkes, of Farnley”).
[A] The Constables, of Everingham, are one of those old English Roman Catholic families who so appealed to the historic imagination and so touched the historic sympathies of the first Earl of Beaconsfield. The present Lord Lieutenant of the East Riding of Yorkshire, Lord Herries, is the owner of this grand old home of the Constables, one of whom was executed for his share in the first Pilgrimage of Grace under Robert Aske, of Aughton on the Derwent, in the time of Henry VIII. (1536). The pilgrims captured York, Pontefract, and Hull, and laid siege to Skipton Castle. Aske was hanged as a traitor from one of the towers of York, either Clifford’s Tower or possibly the tower of All Saints’ Church, The Pavement, York. After the movement had been quelled, Henry VIII. came with dread majesty to York and established the Council of the North. Lady Lumley, the wife of Sir John Lumley, of Lumley Castle, was burned alive at Smithfield. — See Burke’s “Tudor Portraits.”
[34] — Father Morris, S.J., in “The Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers” (York volume), says that Father Tesimond was a Yorkshireman; though in
Foley’s “Records,” in one place, he is said to have been born in Northumberland, perhaps a translation of the Latin “Northumbria,” intended to represent the name “Yorkshire.” There were, at least, three families of Tesimond in York in the reign of Elizabeth, namely, Robert Tesimond, a butcher, of Christ’s Parish; Anthony Tesimond, a cordyner; and William Tesimond, a saddler, both of St. Michael-le-Belfrey’s Parish. I incline to think that Father Oswald Tesimond was the son of William Tesimond, who lived in the Parish of St. Michael-le-Belfrey, York. Oswald Tesimond was born in 1563; but as the Register books of St. Michael’s Church, unfortunately, begin in 1565, two years afterwards, there are no means of verifying my supposal. William Tesimond was, for a great part of his life, a rigid Catholic, suffering imprisonment for his faith, although eventually he appears to have yielded. Margaret Tesimond, the wife of William Tesimond, also bore a more than lip testimony to the ancient religion by suffering imprisonment for it. Whether William Tesimond died “reconciled” or not, I cannot say. Perhaps further researches will clear the matter up as to this and the exact parentage of Father Tesimond. In the very learned and deeply lamented Dr. James Raine’s admirable book on the City of York (Longmans, 1893), on p. 110, is the following: — “Whilst the Earl of Northumberland’s head was lying in the Tolbooth on Ouse Bridge, William Tessimond cut off some hair from the beard. He wrapped it in paper, and wrote on the outside, ‘This the heire of the good Erle of Northumberland, Lord Perecy.’ For this he got into great trouble.” This must have been about the 22nd August, 1572, as Thomas Percy Earl of Northumberland was beheaded on that day, at three o’clock in the afternoon, in The Pavement, York, for his share in the Rising of the North. The Church Register of St. Margaret’s Church, Walmgate, York, contains an entry of the death of the Earl of Northumberland. The Percy family had property in Walmgate at that time. The Earl is now “the Blessed Thomas Percy,” one of “the York martyrs.” The Lady Mary Percy, of Ghent, a well-known Benedictine Abbess, was his daughter. She would be probably named after her aunt Mary, the wife of Francis Slingsby, of Scriven Hall, near Scotton. There is a fine monument in the Parish Church of Knaresbrough to the memory of Francis Slingsby and Mary Percy, his wife. The Slingsbies were Roman Catholics till many years after the reign of Elizabeth; in fact, Sir Henry Slingsby, who was beheaded during the Commonwealth, was himself a Roman Catholic.