A HISTORY OF SUSSEX towards Henry, for whom a contempt was felt which was probably well voiced by John and William Merfeld of Brightling, who ' in the open market the Sonday in the feste of Seynt Anne the xxviii yer of our saide sovereyn lorde falsly seide that the kynge was a naterell foole and wolde ofte tymes holde a staff in his handes with a bird on the ende playing therewith as a Foole.' ^ This enmity was clearly shown by the action of William Hovell of Sutton, gentleman, Richard Seynt of Pulborough, clerk, and a number of others who assembled at Chichester and issued proclamations summoning all the county on pain of death to join them in deposing the King and his lords/ The further aim of communism was also prominent. Thus John Clipsham, carpenter, and about a hundred others met in the woods near Hastings and elected captains and masters to depose the King, ' proposing as Lollards and heretics to hold all things in common ' ; and similar instances occurred at Horsham, Eastbourne and many other places. The election of ' captains ' was a noticeable feature of the rising ; Cade himself was ' the captain of Kent,' and one John Cotyng, yeoman, ' calling himself captain of Burwash,' headed an attempt to break up the abbot's fair at Robertsbridge. The sheriffs tourn at Battle and the leet court at Sedlescombe were also broken up, and some of the gentry were attacked, one of the household of John Oxenbridge being killed. Sir John Pelham's chaplain being assaulted and laid up for six weeks, and William Frenyngham's house at Waldron being plundered of precious stones and other goods and himself held to ransom.^ A large contingent from Sussex evidently joined Cade's Kentish followers in their successful march on London, for after the rebels had been expelled from the city over four hundred Sussex men are named in the pardons issued on 7 July. That the rebels were no disorganized rabble is evident from these names, which include the Abbot of Battle and Prior of Lewes, with all their monks and servants, twenty-three gentlemen, of whom the most considerable were Bartholomew Bolney of West Firle, Colbrond of Wartling, Lunsford of Battle, Parker and Rakeley of Willingdon, Selwyn of Selmeston and Wolf of Ashington, the bailiffs and burgesses of Lewes, Seaford and Pevensey, the constables and inhabitants of eighteen hundreds and all the men of eight parishes.* On the receipt of this general pardon Cade's followers broke up and returned to their homes, leaving him with only a handful of the more desperate at Rochester, whence he fled on 1 1 July, and being pursued by Alexander Iden, sheriff of Kent, was overtaken and slain in a garden at Heathfield. An attempt appears to have been made to revive the insurrection in Sussex by one Thomas Skynner, but no details of this second rising are preserved.^ For some little time there is little to record; in 1455 a commission, including the Earl of Arundel, Lord Delaware and Sir Richard Fenys, ' Anct. Indictments, 122. 2 Ibid. ' Ibid.
- Suss. Arch. Coll. xviii. ^ The Antiquarian Magazine, iii. 168,
