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However, probably much more terrifying for the populace as a whole was the plague, known to have taken around 20,000 lives in just one visitation, in this case that of 1499. Such traumatic events must have destabilised society and helped create the conditions which kept a constant flow of wretches, many of so humble a status that their names were never recorded, ‘going west’ to receive the hangman’s attentions at Tyburn.
    In 1485 Henry Tudor had established his dynasty when he became King Henry VII after defeating Richard III at the battle of Bosworth. However, he soon found his claim to the throne threatened by a number of pretenders. One such was Perkin Warbeck. He adopted the identity of Richard of York, the younger of the two ‘Princes in the Tower’, and rested the strength of his claim on his assertion that he had been allowed to escape when his brother was murdered. The story gained enough plausibility for his claim to be accepted by Charles VIII of France and Margaret of Burgundy, who ack-nowledged him as her nephew. The rebellion in Cornwall mentioned below, gave Warbeck great hope and he travelled to Bodmin where he declared himself King Richard IV. But his career in this character was short-lived and although he attracted some support, he was captured. At first his life was spared but when he attempted to escape, he was sent to the Tower and on 23 November 1499 he was drawn on a hurdle to Tyburn and hanged.
    In 1497 Henry VII, regarded by many at the time and since as a usurper, faced the most challenging rebellion of his reign. The news that taxes would have to be raised in order to finance a military invasion of Scotland was met with widespread outrage. Nowhere was this more so than in Cornwall where an army of 15,000 rebels was assembled which then proceeded to march on London. A pitched battle was fought on Blackheath in June 1497 at which more than a thousand Cornishmen died and the rebellion was effectively suppressed. The leaders, Lord Audley, Thomas Flamank, a lawyer and Michael Joseph, a blacksmith, were captured and tried and found guilty of treason. Audley was executed at the Tower but Flamank and Joseph, being of lower social status, hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn. All three enjoyed a certain social equality later on however, when their heads were set upon poles on London Bridge. Joseph is said to have declared on his way to Tyburn, that he should ‘have a name perpetual and a fame permanent and immortal’ (Marks 1908: 123).

THREE
Tyburn in Tudor Times: Victims of Religious Persecution and Others
    T he Tyburn gallows received many victims during the sixteenth century, a very large number of them falling foul of the religious turmoil of the period. Henry VIII’s break with the Roman Catholic Church in the 1530s and the Act of Supremacy declaring him the head of the English Church began a process of religious change that was to lead over the next six decades to the execution of large numbers of Catholics and Protestants for their beliefs and practices. Following the Act of Supremacy, a Treason Act was passed in February 1535 which bound all ecclesiastical and lay officials to renounce papal law and uphold the supremacy of the King.
    Soon after the passage of this Act, three Carthusian monks, Robert Lawrence, Augustus Webster and John Houghton were executed at Tyburn. Their ordeal was described by another Carthusian monk, Maurice Chauncy. He said that they were roughly fastened on a hurdle and then dragged by horses all the way to Tyburn over roads that were rough and hard in places and wet and muddy in others. When they arrived at the gallows, where a large and expectant crowd had gathered, the executioner bent his knee before the condemned men and craved their forgiveness. The monks then ascended the ladder but were asked if they would submit to the King’s command in order to obtain a pardon. They refused. The first to be executed was Houghton. When the rope was cut, his body fell to