Early Criminal Trials. the highest ecclesiastics of the time. (2 State Trials, 785.) Now came the break between Overbury and his friend. When Rochester informed Overbury of his intention of marrying Lady Frances, Overbury opposed it with great warmth. He warned his friend against formally allying himself with a woman of abandoned character, and used every in fluence to avert what he very properly char acterized as a useless entanglement. This opposition stirred Lady Frances' passionate nature to its depths, and she seems to have resolved to be revenged on Overbury, even before consummating the desired marriage. Rochester evidently desired to save his late friend from the lady's wrath as much as possible, and endeavored to persuade him to undertake a foreign mission. But Overbury, in spite of the frowns of the court circle, would not go. Lady Frances' taunts at last drove Rochester to consent to con sign the culprit to the Tower as a temporary expedient. There is no proof that Rochester was cognizant of Lady Frances' subsequent operations against Overbury; she seems to have persuaded him that with Overbury in the Tower they would effectively stop his mouth, and incidentally they could oversee his correspondence. But my lady's fury knew no such bounds. Nothing but Overbury's life would satisfy her. She first suggested assassination to Sir David Wood; but. although offered a tempting reward, Sir David could not see his way clear to under take the risk unless she would secure a pardon in advance through Rochester. Ob viously such a course was not available. She then started upon another course. Through the influence of her unscrupulous great uncle, the Earl of Northampton, she secured the dismissal of Sir William Waad, the lieutenant of the Tower. Sir William, it seems, had an unconscionably high reputa tion for integrity. A more pliable officer. Sir Gervase Helwys, was promptly put in the place. Another of Lady Frances' crea tures, Weston by name, was appointed goaler
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and put in immediate charge over the prisoner. Other agents of the infuriated lady were a Mrs. Turner, an abandoned character, and James Franklin, an apothe cary. Weston, the goaler, had instructions to mix with the prisoner's food the poison ous contents of certain phials with which he was supplied. Lady Frances herself pro vided the confectionery for Overbury's table, which Helwys was suggestively instructed to allow none but the prisoner to taste. According to the confession subsequently made by Franklin, the apothecary, white arsenic was the poison chiefly employed, although aqua fortis, mercury, powder of diamonds, ¡apis costitus, great spiders and cantharides" were at various times mixed with Overbury's food. Overbury was in poor health at the time of his imprisonment and had no suspicion that foul play was the cause of his failing health. Although he was not allowed to see anyone, he was permitted to write, and his letters, which have been preserved, are filled with pathetic de scriptions of his physical tortures and with appeals for release. After' three months of this inhuman torture his condition became critical, and with a view to finishing him he was removed to a damp and unwholesome cell. So cleverly had the plot been carried on that two of the most eminent physicians of the day, who had been allowed to ex amine him, were deceived. For some reason Sir Gervase Helwys now summoned a new medical attendant, one Lobel, who diagnosed Overbury's ailment as consumption. Lady Frances, meanwhile, had become impatient with slow and cautious methods and em ployed a man in Lobel's pay to end the matter at once. Thereupon the latter administered a clyster of corrosive sublimate, from the effects of which Overbury died on the following day, after three months and a half imprisonment. On the same day. September 14, 1613, he was buried within the Tower. Meanwhile, having obtained her divorce,
