The last Chevauchée took place in Guernsey on the 31st of May, 1837, but the description of the procession we have given refers to the one in 1825, and is taken from Jacob’s Annals, and the Chronique des Isles, by Syvret.
The oldest known Act of the Court of St. Michael is the following, dated the 14th of October, 1204:—
“Les Chefs Plaids Capitaux de la Saint Michel tenus à Sainte Anne en la Paroisse du Sarazin,[33] par Nicolle de Beauvoir Bailly, à ce présens Jean Le Feyvre, Jean Philippes, Martin de Garris, Jean Maingy, Jean Le Gros, Jemmes le Marchand, Pierre de la Lande, Robert de la Salle, Colin Henry, Jurez de la Cour de nostre Souverain Seigneur le Roy d’Angleterre en l’Isle de Guernereye. Le quatorzième jour du moys d’Octobre, l’an MCCIV. Sur la Remonstrance qui nous a esté faicte de la part des Frères Jean Agenor, Prieur, en la Paroisse de l’Archange de Saint Michel du Valle et ses aliez Pierre de Beauvoir, Pierre Martin, Jean Effart, Jean Jehan, Pierre Nicolle, Pierre du Prey, Jean Agenor, Michel le Pelley, Jean Cappelle et autres Marchands et Manans, tant en la Paroisse du Valle que de Saint Sampson, qu’ils éstoyent grandement empeschez et endomagez concernant le desbordement de la mer, laquelle auroit coupé le Douvre et passage commode entre les dittes Paroisses, entendu qu’il estoit impossible non seulement de faire Procession, mais aussi d’aller traficquer les uns avec les autres aux Landes du Sarazin, s’il ne nous pleust leur permettre et accorder de faire maintenir un certain Pont passant du Valle à Saint Sampson, estant propre et passable de toutes Marées, de Charues, et Charettes, de pied et de Cheval, et à qui il appartiendra de la maintenir en temps advenir. Parquoy ne voulant refuser la Raisonnable remonstrance des avants dits, et pour le bien public, nous leur avons appointé Veue sur les Limites les plus célèbres des dittes Paroisses, dans le jour Saint Barthelemi prochain, et advertiront le commun de s’y trouver, pour ouir ce que par nous sera ordonné touchant la ditte edification.”
Another copy, which differs from the preceding in the names of the Jurats, finishes by these words, “donné par copie des roles, signé par Colin de la Lande, clerq.” According to this copy the names of the Jurats are “Jean Le Gros, James Le Marchant, Pierre de la Lande, Robert de la Salle, Colin Henry, Raoul Emery, Gaultier Blondel, Guillet Le Febvre.” It is noticeable that the first four names of the copy first cited are not among these, and that the last three on this list are not in the Act which we have transcribed.[34] At the end of the second copy we find the following notice: “N.B.—Mr. Thomas Le Maître, Prevost de St. Sauveur à Jersey en a l’original.”
Originally the vavassors[35] of the Court of St. Michael were twelve in number, similar to the Jurats of the Royal Court, but if you ask why the number for the last two hundred years has been reduced to eleven, the answer is—“that the devil carried away Vivien.” All that is known about Jean Vivien is that he was a vavassor of this Court, and that, in a fit of despair, he drowned himself, early in the seventeenth century. Up to about the middle of the present century three letters “I. V. V.” cut by himself on the broken fragment of rock from which he leapt into the gulf, still existed at the end of a footpath, not far from the “Fosse au Courlis”—Curlew’s ditch or grave—a spot haunted by witches.
Since then no Christian has dared to replace the suicide Jean Vivien, and, when making the calculation of the symbolic vavassorial stones, his pebble is always omitted. There are but eleven instead of twelve.
[27] “There were two Nigels (Neel or Niel), Viscounts of Cotentin, and proprietors of St. Sauveur le Vicomte. I have reference to those two charters, the perusal of which exalts conjectures into genuine facts. It is highly gratifying to possess, at last, extracts from the authentic charters of Robert I. and William II. granted to St. Michel and St. Martin of Tours.”—Extract from MS. letter from George Métivier to Sir Edgar MacCulloch, Nov. 1846.
[28] According to Mr. Métivier Guernsey was called “Holy Island” in the days of a learned Greek called “Sylla,” the friend of Plutarch’s grandfather, and he says that it was the custom for persons to go from the “ogygian” (Gallic or Breton) Islands, to Delos every century, which means every thirty years. The voyagers also visited the temple of Dodona; and on their return from Delos “the sacred navigators were conducted by the winds to the Isle of Saturn or Sacred Island (Guernsey), which was peopled entirely by themselves and their predecessors; for although they were by their laws permitted to return after having served Saturn thirty years, which was the century of the Druids, yet they frequently preferred remaining in the tranquil retirement of this island to returning to their birth-places.” Demetrius, also, says: “Among the islands which lie adjacent to Britain, some are desert, known by the name of the Isles of Heroes.… I embarked in the suite of the Emperor, who was about to visit the nearest of them. We found thereon but few inhabitants, and these were accounted sacred and inviolable.” Mr. Métivier goes on to say later “Onomacritus, an author who flourished five hundred years B.C., in one of his poems speaks of a vessel that conveyed the ashes of the dead between England and Spain, and a celebrated Greek author of undoubted veracity, Procopius, who wrote about 547 A.D., states that the “Breton fishermen of an island subject to the French, were exempt from all tribute, because they conveyed the dead into a neighbouring island.” The Breton French fishermen came from Jersey, “La Porte Sainte,” and terminated their funeral voyage at Guernsey, “l’Ile Bienheureuse.” The ashes of the dead were deposited in our croutes and sacred enclosures, within the tombs composed of five horizontal stones, which number indicated the resting places of knightly heroes, or noble Gauls.”—Métivier in the Monthly Selection, 1825, pp. 327 and 452.
[29] Editor’s Note.—M. de Gerville denies the truth of this tradition. See Documents Inédits du Moyen Age, relatifs aux Iles du Cotentin, p. 16.