[160] Deposition of White, coroner of Westminster. Brief Hist. iii. 224.
[161] Quoted from the printed copy published by Janeway in 1682. Brief Hist. iii. 232.
[162] “The jury’s reasons for the verdict they gave.” Brief Hist. iii. chap. xii.
[163] Evidence of Collins, Mason, and Radcliffe. Brief Hist. iii. 252, 300. Some not very good evidence was collected several years afterwards as to Godfrey’s movements later in the day. It cannot be considered trustworthy. 8 State Trials 1387, 1392, 1393. Brief Hist. iii. 174, 175.
[164] The coroner’s evidence before the Lords’ committee; “There was nothing in the field on Tuesday.” House of Lords MSS. 47. Evidence of Mrs. Blith and her man at the inquest. Brief Hist. iii. 244.
[165] Deposition of Robert Forset. 8 State Trials 1394, 1395.
[166] Sir George Sitwell says: “The bruises or discolourations upon his chest might well have been produced by those who knelt upon it in stripping off the clothes” (First Whig 41). Bruises however cannot be made to appear upon a corpse beyond the time of three and a half hours after death (Professor H. A. Husband in the Student’s Handbook of Forensic Medicine), nor is there any evidence that the body was so treated. Marks which look like bruises may be caused after death by the process of hypostasis or suggillation, the gravitation of the blood to the lowest point in the dead body. But if the marks on Godfrey’s body had been thus caused, the face and neck would have shown pronounced signs of discolouration, since the head was lower than any other point in the body. It had moreover been in that position for at most only twenty-four hours, so that the blood would not have gravitated to the chest immediately after death at all.
[167] L’Estrange afterwards persuaded the surgeon Lazinby to say that the mark was caused by the pressure of the collar. Brief Hist. iii. 259. But his evidence in court was, on the contrary, that it was caused “by the strangling with a cord or cloth.” 8 State Trials 1384.
[168] The evidence as to the exact condition of the neck, varies slightly, but the doctors, and indeed all who saw the body, were agreed that it was broken.
[169] Evidence of the surgeons Cambridge and Skillard at the trial of Green, Berry, and Hill. 7 State Trials 185, 186. Evidence of the coroner before the Lords’ committee. House of Lords MSS. 46. Evidence of Hobbs and Lazinby, surgeons, and the two Chaces, apothecaries, at the trial of Thompson, Pain, and Farwell. 8 State Trials 1381–1384.