The crowds of children gathered more and more over France and Stephen designated Vendôme as the central place in which to assemble and to get ready to depart for Palestine. This was a good selection as it was an important place and with roads coming into it from all directions. The bands of children came into Vendôme in great numbers, one chronicler stating that there were fifteen thousand children under twelve years of age from Paris alone, and although in all probabilities this is an overestimation, yet it shows there was a vast assembly of children, so much so that Vendôme could not contain them and they had to encamp outside its walls, each band to itself so that those from the same city or community were together. The children were from all parts of France, varying in language and dress, but not in zeal. Whether they all wore a uniform is not known, but they did put on the Cross of the Crusaders, made of red woolen cloth and sewed on the right shoulder of the coat by some one of the leaders, and of which emblem the children were all very proud. Finally all the bands had gathered and Stephen was ready to make the start for the sea, which was to open and let them march through to the Holy Land. The number assembled at Vendôme was about thirty thousand.
The message of the pilgrim delivered to Stephen must have come the last of April or the first of May, 1212, as it occurred shortly after Stephen had observed in the city of Chârtres the procession to commemorate the sufferings of those who had died in defense of the Holy Land and which was held on St. Mark's day, April 25th. He went to St. Deny's in the month of May and to Vendôme, perhaps, the last of May or the first of June and the start for the sea was made the last of July or the first of August, all of the same year.
And now all was ready for the departure from Vendôme. Their leader Stephen had become so great that there was provided for him a carriage, decorated with flags and tapestries of brilliant colors, and over him was a canopy of rich draperies as a protection from the heat of the sun. About his carriage was a band of youths of noble blood, on horseback, and equipped as knights, acting as his body guard. Good-byes were said and the procession, singing their songs, with flags and oriflammes, started. At the beginning of the journey Stephen was given great honor and gladly obeyed, they even vied with one another in showing him adulations and tried to secure a piece from his clothing or from the trimmings of the carriage or from the trappings of the horses which was kept as a relic and used as a charm. But as days went on and hardships and sufferings came upon them and their journey lengthened out, they became little more than a straggling crowd without order or discipline, and then Stephen's authority was no longer regarded by them. Their journey was to Blois, where they crossed the Loire, and then to Lyons, where the Rhone was crossed, and thence to Marseilles. As they were asked on the way where they were going they all answered: "To Jerusalem." This was an unusually hot summer and the children suffered greatly from heat and thirst and many of them from hunger, although the people along the way sympathized with the movement and aided them. At last they came to Marseilles. They asked for shelter in the city for the night only, as on the morrow God was to open the sea for them and they would proceed on their way to the Holy Land.
The city granted their request and the children entered the gates and went into the city, singing their songs as they marched through the streets. They passed the night and in the morning they went to the sea to go on with their journey. The sea did not open that day nor the next day nor on any day. This discouraged them and many gave up, but others remained, hoping for a way to Palestine. And a way did come, for two merchants of Marseilles, Hugo Ferreus and William Porcus, so their Latin names read, offered "for the cause of God, and without price," to provide ships for their transport. Preparations then were made, and seven ships furnished and it is estimated that about five thousand children went on board these ships to proceed on their way to Palestine. Nothing further was heard of these children who sailed from Marseilles on that August day in 1212, till in 1230, eighteen years afterward, when a priest came to Europe from Palestine and told that he was among those who were on the vessels with the children. He stated that two of the ships were wrecked off the coast of the island of San Pietro and all on board perished. The other five ships were taken to Bujeiah and Alexandria and the children were sold to the Saracens. Upon learning of this, Pope Gregory IX. had a church built on the island where the wreck occurred and had the remains of the children interred in it and named it the Ecclesia Novorum Innocentium—The Church of the New Innocents.
The story of Stephen at St. Denys was not only carried all over France, but likewise to the neighboring countries, spreading to the Rhine provinces in Germany. It reached a village near Cologne where lived a boy who was about the same age as Stephen and by the name of Nicholas. Like Stephen he, too, was a shepherd boy, and he had heard the stories about the Crusades. When he learned about Stephen there arose a desire to do as he, and aided by his father, some say induced by him, he took upon himself the preaching of a children's crusade for Germany. He, too, had been called to the work, as he stated while with his flocks he saw a blazing cross in the sky and there came to him a voice that told him the cross was to lead him to victory in his undertaking to recover the Holy Land. Like Stephen, too, Nicholas went to a great religious center, the city of Cologne, as at this time this city was a great center for pilgrimages, as in its cathedral rested the bones of the "Three Kings of the East" who came "with a great multitude of camels to worshippe Christ, then a little childe of thirteen dayes olde," so the old legend ran.
Nicholas related his story and preached his crusade before the cathedral to the pilgrims who came to view the relics. These pilgrims carried the story of Nicholas back to their homes and there soon came a number of children to him at Cologne. He also sent out assistants to preach the crusade in different parts of the land. The excitement became even greater than in France for bands of children came into Cologne in even greater numbers than to St. Denys. This was a more mixed crowd than that of Stephen, as there were more girls and more adults and especially more lewd women, so many of these latter that the chroniclers referred to them often and attributed to them the greater part of the evils that came upon the multitude. These crusaders had a uniform, which consisted of a long gray coat, with a cross sewed upon the breast, and they wore broad brimmed hats and carried a palmer's staff. In about a month the host had gathered and was ready to start for the sea, which was to let them pass through to the Holy Land, as with the army of Stephen. But there arose a division and only a part started under the leadership of Nicholas.
Those who remained with Nicholas left Cologne for Genoa in June or July, 1212. The number that started was said to have been twenty thousand, the majority being boys under twelve years of age. Nicholas took his place at the head and at a signal the start was made, with banners flying and the singing of hymns. But this was not true of all the parents and friends, for many of them were in great distress over the leaving of their children, and they followed for some distance pleading for them to give up and return to their homes. One of the songs of this band comes down to us. Gray[219] states that an account of the discovery of this hymn may be found in a magazine, the Evangelical Christendom for May, 1850, and that Hecker asserts it was used by the children. It was in German, coming from Westphalia, and had been used before by Crusaders on their journey to Palestine. The English translation is as follows:
"Fairest Lord Jesus,
Ruler of all nature,
Thou of Mary and of God the Son!