Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 57.djvu/8

 commending a list of candidates for the town council, and, what is yet more strange, these candidates (including a doctor and two ministers) adopted this address as their own. In August 1837 his father, who had at last learnt what had become of him, petitioned the home secretary (Lord John Russell) for his release, backed by a letter from his former employer, Edward Turner (a partner in the firm of Lubbock & Co.), M.P. for Truro. A free pardon was granted in October, with an order that he should be delivered to his father. Unfortunately he was handed over to one of his former supporters, George Francis of Fairbrook, near Canterbury, who shared his religious delusions, and is believed to have lent him large sums of money. The circumstances of his release subsequently gave rise to a debate in parliament. For some three months he lived with Francis, and then moved to a neighbouring farmhouse on the high road between Canterbury and Faversham. Here he began to preach communistic doctrines, and to assert for the first time that he was the Messiah. He showed the stigmata on his hands and feet, and professed to work miracles. Disciples gathered round him to the number of more than a hundred. He armed them with cudgels and led them about the country side, mounted on a white horse, with a flag bearing the emblem of a lion.

No breach of the peace, however, occurred until a warrant was issued against him on the charge of enticing away the labourers of a farmer. When constables came to serve the warrant, Tom shot one of the party and cruelly mangled the dying man. This was in the early morning of 31 May 1838. That afternoon two companies of the 45th regiment were marched out from Canterbury to arrest him. They found him, with his followers, lurking in Blean Wood, near Hern Hill. He rushed forward with a pistol and shot an officer, Lieutenant Henry Boswell Bennett. Immediately afterwards Bennett received a fatal wound from another hand. The soldiers were ordered to return the fire and charge with the bayonet. The affair was quickly over. Tom, with eight of the rioters, was killed on the spot, and of seven who were wounded three died a few days after. Of those taken three were subsequently sentenced to transportation and six to a year's hard labour; not one was hanged. Tom was buried in the churchyard of Hern Hill with maimed rites, and his grave was guarded that his followers might not assert he had risen on the third day. The spot where he fell is marked on the ordnance map as ‘Mad Tom's Corner,’ and a gate close by is still called Courtenay's Gate. Tom was a tall man, of fine presence, with a full beard, and is said to have borne a striking resemblance to the traditional representations of Christ. A portrait of him, painted in watercolours by H. Hitchcock, a Canterbury artist, shows him in eastern dress and scimitar, looking something like Henry VIII. His earlier imposture forms the subject of a ballad entitled ‘The Knight of Malta’ in Harrison Ainsworth's ‘Rookwood.’

[Contemporary newspapers, particularly the Times and the Lion, ut supra; Essay on the Character of Sir W. Courtenay, Canterbury, 1838; Life and Adventures of Sir W. Courtenay, by Canterburiensis, with portrait and illustrations, containing much material supplied by Tom himself, Canterbury, 1838; History of the Canterbury Riots, by the Rev. J. F. Thorpe, 1888; ‘A Canterbury Tale of Fifty Years Ago,’ reprinted from the Canterbury Press, containing narratives by survivors of the tragedy (1888); Boase and Courtney's Bibl. Cornub. i. 724–7; personal inquiries.]

 TOMBES, JOHN (1603?–1676), baptist divine, was born of humble parentage at Bewdley, Worcestershire, in 1602 or 1603. He matriculated from Magdalen Hall, Oxford, on 23 Jan. 1617–18, aged 15. His tutor was William Pemble [q. v.] Among his college friends was John Geree [q. v.] He graduated B.A. on 12 June 1621. After Pemble's death he succeeded him in 1623 as catechism lecturer. His reputation as a tutor was considerable; among his pupils was John Wilkins [q. v.] He graduated M.A. on 16 April 1624, took orders, and quickly came into note as a preacher. From about 1624 to 1630 he was one of the lecturers of St. Martin Carfax. As early as 1627 he began to have doubts on the subject of infant baptism. Leaving the university in 1630, he was for a short time preacher at Worcester, but in November was instituted vicar of Leominster, Herefordshire, where his preaching was exceedingly popular, and won the admiration of so high an Anglican as John Scudamore, first viscount Scudamore [q. v.], who augmented the small income of his living. In June 1631 he commenced B.D. He left Leominster in 1643 (after February), having been appointed by Nathaniel Fiennes [q. v.] to supersede George Williamson as vicar of All Saints, Bristol. On the surrender of Bristol to the royalists (26 July), he removed to London (22 Sept.), where he became rector of St. Gabriel, Fenchurch, vacant by the sequestration of Ralph Cook, B.D. In church government his views were presbyterian.