Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 59.djvu/288

 vision, soon procured the dismissal of Walworth and his colleague from their position of confidence, although no complaint was made against them for any breach of trust (, London and the Kingdom, i. 214–215). The city was now divided into two parties—one headed by Walworth and John de Northampton [q. v.], which strongly supported the Duke of Lancaster; the other with Philipot and Brembre at its head, which as strongly opposed him. On 2 March 1380 Walworth is once more associated with Philipot as a city representative on a commission to inquire into the financial state of the realm (ib. p. 459).

In 1380 it was proposed to build two towers, one on either side of the Thames, from which an iron chain was to extend across the river for the protection of shipping. The warlike John Philipot undertook the erection of one tower at his own cost, and Walworth and three other aldermen were appointed a committee to receive and expend a tax of sixpence in the pound on city rentals for the erection of the other tower (City Records, Letter-book H, f. 125).

Walworth was mayor again in 1380–1. The invasion of the city by the Kentish peasantry found in him a mayor both able and determined to act with vigour. On 13 June 1381 Walter or Wat Tyler [q. v.], with his followers, after having burnt the stews in Southwark at the foot of London Bridge, were checked in their attempt to cross the bridge by Walworth, who fortified the place, caused the bridge to be drawn up, ‘and fastened a great chaine of yron acrosse, to restrain their entry’ (, History of the Tower Bridge, p. 110). The Kentish men were, however, reinforced by the commons of Surrey, and the citizens, fearing their threats to fire the bridge, granted them admission. A contemporary account, with graphic details, is given in the ‘City Records’ of Walworth's meeting with Wat Tyler in the presence of the king at Smithfield (‘City Records,’ Letter-book H, fol. 133, printed in Memorials, pp. 449–451). Walworth ‘most manfully, by himself, rushed upon the captain of the said multitude, Walter Tylere by name, and as he was altercating with the king and the nobles, first wounded him in the neck with his sword, and then hurled him from his horse mortally pierced in the breast.’ Walworth made good his retreat from the fury of Tyler's followers, who were demanding his head of the king, and raised a strong force of citizens for the king's protection. On his return to Smithfield with the citizen body-guard, the king ‘with his own hands decorated with the order of knighthood the said mayor,’ Brembre, Philipot, and others, and further rewarded Walworth with the grant of 100l. a year. A picturesque account of this ceremony is given by Stow.

The Fishmongers' Company possess a dagger which is traditionally supposed to be the weapon with which Walworth killed the rebel leader; and a statue of Walworth, carved in wood by E. Pierce, is at the head of the great staircase in their hall. Beneath the statue is a quatrain of very poor rhyme which asserts that Richard gave the dagger as an addition to the city arms to commemorate Walworth's valiant service. The same erroneous statement was engraved on Walworth's monument in St. Michael's, Crooked Lane, which was restored by the Fishmongers' Company after its defacement in the reign of Edward VI. From these two sources probably arose the widely spread belief that Walworth's dagger was added to the city arms. The charge in question is not a dagger but the sword of St. Paul which existed as part of the city arms in 1380, and probably long before (, Survey of London, 1603, pp. 222–3;, Chronicles of London Bridge, pp. 174 et seq.).

At the close of this eventful day (15 June) Walworth and six other citizens were constituted a commission of oyer and terminer to take measures to quell the peasants' revolt (Cal. Patent Rolls, Rich. II, 1381–5, p. 23), and on 8 March 1382 he was nominated on the larger commission to restore the peace in the county of Kent (ib. p. 139).

A few years before his death Walworth greatly enlarged by the addition of a new choir, transepts, and a south aisle or chapel, the church of St. Michael, Crooked Lane, which had been rebuilt by Lovekyn. He also obtained from the king on 10 March 1380 a license to found a college of ‘one master and nine priests,’ to pray for the good estate of the king, and of the founder and his wife while living, and of their souls when dead. The license, printed at length by Herbert (History of St. Michael, Crooked Lane, pp. 126–30), authorised him to unite the revenues of four ancient chantries for the support of the chaplains, with an augmentation from his own estate of 20l. 13s. 4d. a year; he also gave for a dwelling-house his own newly built house next the church. In 1383 he was elected with Philipot and two others to represent the city in parliament (, History of London, ii. 343).

Walworth died in 1385, and was buried at St. Michael's in his newly built north chapel