Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 16.djvu/108

 small post of under-sheriff would prove useful in this connection, and the fact that both Dudley and Empson resided in St. Swithin's Lane confirms Dudley's alleged association with the city.

The official position of Dudley and Empson is difficult to define: they probably acted as a sub-committee of the privy council. Polydore Vergil calls them ‘fiscales judices,’ but they certainly were not judges of the exchequer nor of any other recognised court. Bacon asserts that they habitually indicted guiltless persons of crimes, and, when true bills were found, extorted great fines and ransoms as a condition of staying further proceedings. They are said to have occasionally summoned persons to their private houses and exacted fines without any pretence of legal procedure. Pardons for outlawry were invariably purchased from them, and juries were terrorised into paying fines when giving verdicts for defendants in crown prosecutions. These are the chief charges brought against them by contemporary historians. Bacon credits Dudley with much plausible eloquence.

In 1504 Dudley was chosen speaker in the House of Commons, and in the same year was released by a royal writ from the necessity of becoming a serjeant-at-law. In the parliament over which Dudley presided many small but useful reforms were made in legal procedure. In 1506 Dudley became steward of the rape of Hastings, Sussex. Grafton states that in the last year of Henry VII's reign Dudley and Empson were nominated, under some new patent, special commissioners for enforcing the penal laws. Whether this be so or no, their unpopularity greatly increased towards the end of the reign. On 21 April 1509 their master, Henry VII, died. Sir Robert Cotton (Discourse of Foreign War) quotes a book of receipts and payments kept between Henry VII and Dudley, whence it appears that the king amassed about four and a half million pounds in coin and bullion while Dudley directed his finances. The revenue Dudley secured by the sale of offices and extra-legal compositions was estimated at 120,000l. a year.

Henry VIII had no sooner ascended the throne than he yielded to the outcry against Dudley and Empson and committed both to the Tower. The recognisances which had been entered into with them were cancelled on the ground that they had been ‘made without any cause reasonable or lawful’ by ‘ certain of the learned council of our late father, contrary to law, reason, and good conscience.’ On 16 July 1509 Dudley was arraigned before a special commission on a charge of constructive treason. The indictment made no mention of his financial exactions, but stated that while in the preceding March Henry VII lay sick Dudley summoned his friends to attend him under arms in London in the event of the king's death. This very natural precaution, taken by a man who was loathed by the baronial leaders and their numerous retainers, and was in danger of losing his powerful protector, was construed into a plan for attempting the new king's life. Conviction followed. Empson was sent to Northampton to be tried separately on a like charge in October. In the parliament which met 21 Jan. 1509–10 both were attainted. Henry VIII deferred giving orders for their execution, but popular feeling was not satisfied. Dudley made an abortive attempt to escape from the Tower with the aid of his brother Peter, his kinsman, James Beaumont, and others. On 18 Aug. 1510 both he and Empson were beheaded on Tower Hill. Dudley was buried in the church of Blackfriars the same night. With a view to obtaining the king's pardon Dudley employed himself while in the Tower in writing a long political treatise entitled ‘The Tree of Commonwealth,’ an argument in favour of absolute monarchy. This work never reached the hands of Henry VIII. Stow gave a copy to Dudley's grandson, Ambrose Dudley [q. v.], earl of Warwick, after whose death it came into the possession of Sir Simonds D'Ewes. Several copies are now known; one is in the Chetham Library, Manchester, another in the British Museum (Harleian MS. 2204), and a third belongs to Lord Calthorpe (Hist. MSS. Comm. 2nd Rep. 40). It was privately printed at Manchester for the first time in 1859 by the brotherhood of the Rosy Cross. A copy of Dudley's will, dated on the day of his death, is extant in the Record Office. He left his great landed estates in Sussex, Dorsetshire, and Lincolnshire to his wife with remainder to his children. His brother Peter is mentioned, and the son Jerome was placed under four guardians, Bishop FitzJames, Dean Colet, Sir Andrews Windsor, and Dr. Yonge, till he reached the age of twenty-two. Certain lands were to be applied to the maintenance of poor scholars at Oxford. Dudley also expresses a wish to be buried in Westminster Abbey.

By his first wife Dudley had a daughter Elizabeth, married to William, sixth lord Stourton. By his second wife he had three sons: John [q. v.], afterwards duke of Northumberland, Andrew, and Jerome. was appointed admiral of the northern seas 27 Feb. 1546–7. He was knighted by Somerset 18 Sept. 1547, when ordered to occupy Broughty Craig at the mouth of the river Tay together with Lord