Page:Notes and Queries - Series 11 - Volume 9.djvu/286

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [iis.ix. APRIL n,i9u.

rabble. In fact, the Prior of Lewes and monks of his convent, and all its servitors, are named as abettors ; and the inhabitants of whole parishes, and even hundreds, are also so classed.

" With regard to the capture of Cade when he escaped from London, a price being set upon his head, he retired to the woody fastnesses of his native county, not to Hothfield in Kent, as asserted by some chroniclers ; and it was at Heathfield in Sussex that he met with his fatal wound, Alexander Iden being one of his pursuers. Cade Street was the scene of his capture, and the exact spot is still pointed out. It was a little garden adjacent to the farmhouse, once the inn called ' The Cat.' Jack is said to have taken things coolly so says a long-established tradition when Iden with his men tracked him out, and the Sheriff struck him down with a well-aimed arrow from his long bow. He did not die out of hand, but survived a brief space, though not long enough to be conveyed alive to London.

" On the side of the public road opposite the garden where he was taken stands a handsome monumental stone, erected by the well-known Mr. Francis Newbery, the philanthropic druggist of St. Paul's Churchyard, then owner of Heath- field Park, which has the following inscription :

" Near this spot was slain the notorious Rebel Jack Cade

By Alexander Iden, Sheriff of Kent, A.D. 1150.

His* body was carried to London, and his head

fixed on London Bridge.

This is the success of all rebels,

And this fortune chanceth ever to traitors.

(Hall's Chronicle.)"

Notwithstanding the above facts, the writer in 1897 received a statement from the then owner of Heathfield that the scene of Jack Cade's capture was quite uncertain (referring to Heathfield), which shows, however clear a matter may be, it is very hard to accomplish its acceptance when it refutes accounts already long-accepted, even though these have been shown to be untrue.

W. L. KING.

Paddock Wood, Kent.

BIRMINGHAM STATUES AND

MEMORIALS. (See ante, pp. 202, 243.)

ATTWOOD'S statue, by John Thomas, is in Stephenson Place, New Street ; it cost about 900Z., and was presented to the town by Mr. Alderman Hodgson on behalf of the subscribers on 6 June, 1859 (the twenty- seventh anniversary of the giving of the Royal Assent to the Bill), in the presence of Sir John Ratcliff, the Mayor, and George Edmonds, a veteran stalwart of the agita- tion, both of whom made speeches suitable to the occasion, after which many concerned in the ceremony " partook of an elegant luncheon at the Queen's Hotel." This

large, somewhat uncouth effigy of " sledge- hammer Attwood .... at best but a Brum- magem barbarian," as Thackeray the cynic dubbed the people's champion, has the w^aistcoat buttoned on a principle the reverse of that usually in vogue.

The Quaker philanthropist Joseph Sturge (1793-1859) is kept in memory by a statue by John Thomas at the Five Ways, Edg- baston, flanked by large female figures of " Peace " and " Charity " in Portland stone at a slightly lower level. Unveiled on 4 June, 1862, by Mr. W. Middlemore, in the presence of John Bright, W. Scholefield, M.P., and 12,000 people, it is Birmingham's one suburban street statue. More than thirty years ago the left arm broke away from the body, but was replaced. Sturge is promi- nently shown as a delegate to the Anti- Slavery Convention of June, 1840, in the large picture by B. R. Haydon, now hanging in the Great Hall of the Law Courts at Temple Bar. An uncompromising " Friend," he instigated in 1829 an abortive attempt to frustrate the success of the Birmingham Musical Festival, on the ground that its methods involved action " inconsistent with and opposed to the spirit of Christianity." As a candidate for Parliament he was defeated at Nottingham in 1842 by John Walter of The Times, and by Richard Spooner at Birmingham in 1844, on a va- cancy occurring in the representation of the borough, but was later on influential in forwarding the candidature of John Bright for a Birmingham seat. The occasion of his sudden death " by lone Edgbaston's side," when on the point of attending a "Peace Society" meeting as its President, drew forth a noble poem from the American poet John Greenleaf Whittier.

On the grand staircase of the Council House are statues of Albert the Prince Consort (robed), by John Foley, R.A. (1867), and of Queen Victoria (as at about the period of her marriage), by Thomas Woolner, R.A. (1884). That of the Prince stood at first in the old Art Gallery in Rat- cuff Place, and then in the News Room of the Central Library, where it was slightly damaged by the disastrous conflagration of 11 Jan., 1879. Thence it was subsequently removed to the vestibule of the Council House (together with models of statues of Goldsmith and Burke, also damaged in the fire), until elevated to its present position. The Prince laid the foundation-stone of the Birmingham and Midland Institute on 22 Nov., 1855, and accompanied Her