Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 51.djvu/301

 levellers in the spring of 1655 (, vi. 694, 829). In February 1655 Cromwell's officers in the west of England were in hot pursuit of Sexby, but he succeeded in escaping to Flanders (ib. iii. 162, 165, 195). At Antwerp he made the acquaintance of Colonel Robert Phelips (son of Sir [q. v.]) and other royalists, to whom he described Cromwell as a false, perjured rogue, and affirmed that, if proper security for popular liberties were given, he would be content to see Charles II restored (Nicholas Papers, i. 299, 340, 347).

Sexby also sought an interview with Count Fuensaldanha, the governor of the Spanish Netherlands, to whom he revealed all he knew of Cromwell's foreign plans and of the expedition to the West Indies, and from whom he asked a supply of money and the assistance of some of the Irish troops in the Spanish service in order to raise an insurrection in England. Fuensaldanha sent Sexby to Spain that his proposals might be considered by the Spanish council (June 1655), and he returned again about December with supplies of money and conditional promises of support (Clarendon State Papers, iii. 271). Father [q. v.], who acted as interpreter in Sexby's dealings with Fuensaldanha, communicated his proposals to Charles II, urging the king to come to an agreement with Spain, and to utilise Sexby and his party (ib. iii. 281). In December 1656 Sexby presented a paper of proposals to Don John of Austria, offering to raise a civil war in England, and requesting a thousand Irish foot and four hundred horses (for which he undertook to provide troopers). The royalists were to assist, but he stipulated ‘that no mention be made of the king before such time Cromwell be destroyed, and till then the royalists that shall take arms shall speak of nothing but the liberty of the country, according to the declaration whereof I have spoken with the King of England's ministers’ (ib. iii. 315).

The Protector's government through its agents abroad was kept well informed of Sexby's negotiations with Spain, and a number of his intercepted letters, written under the assumed names of ‘Brookes’ and ‘Hungerford,’ were in its hands (, State Papers, v. 37, 349, vi. 1, 33, 182). In Cromwell's speech at the opening of his second parliament (17 Sept. 1656), he informed them of Sexby's plot, terming him ‘a wretched creature, an apostate from religion and all honesty’ (, Cromwell's Speech, p. 5). The assassination of Cromwell was an essential preliminary to the success of the rising. Sexby sent over ‘strange engines’ for the purpose, but his agents missed their opportunities, and in January 1657 an attempt to fire Whitehall led to the arrest of their leader, [q. v.] (Cromwelliana, p. 160; Clarendon State Papers, iii. 325, 327). Still confident, Sexby devised new plots. ‘Be not discouraged,’ he wrote to Father Talbot, ‘for so long as Sexby lives there is no danger but Cromwell shall have his hands full, and I hope his heart ere long, for I have more irons in the fire for Cromwell than one. … Either I or Cromwell must perish’ (ib. iii. 331, 335, 339). Under the name of William Allen he drew up an apology for tyrannicide, entitled ‘Killing no Murder,’ which he ironically dedicated to Cromwell himself, printed in Holland, and sent over to England about May 1657 (ib. iii. 343;, vi. 311). In June he followed his pamphlet to England, to concert measures for carrying out its principles, and on 24 July, just as he was embarking for Flanders again, he was arrested ‘in a mean habit disguised as a countryman’ (Cromwelliana, p. 168; Clarendon State Papers, iii. 357, 362). He died in the Tower on 13 Jan. 1658, ‘having been a while distracted in his mind and long sick’ (Cromwelliana, p. 169).

‘Killing no Murder’ was answered by Michael Hawke of the Inner Temple in ‘Killing is Murder and no Murder,’ 1657, 4to. Sexby's authorship of the former is proved by internal evidence, and by his own confession made in the Tower (, vi. 560). Captain [q. v.], who was intimate with Sexby, and may perhaps have given him some assistance in writing it, was, after the Restoration, reputed its author (, Athenæ, iv. 624). It is reprinted in the ‘Harleian Miscellany,’ ed. Park, iv. 289, and by Professor Henry Morley in his ‘Famous Pamphlets.’

[Authorities given in the article.]  SEXRED or SEXRÆD (d. 626), king of the East-Saxons, was the son of (d 616?) [q. v.] the first Christian king of the East-Saxons. He refused to accept Christianity, and when he succeeded his father in 616, reigning conjointly with his two brothers, Sæward and another, said on no good authority to have been named Sigebert (, ap. Decem SS. col. 743), openly practised paganism and gave permission to his subjects to worship their idols. When he and his brothers saw (d. 624) [q. v.], bishop of London, giving the eucharist to the people in church, they said to him, so it was commonly believed in Bede's time, ‘Why do you not offer us the white bread