Westminster Abbey Refectory Raid: A Confession, A Cup, A Key, A King

Summary: A London Sheriff and seven Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid justices never prioritized righting the Westminster Abbey Refectory raid.

London Sheriff Hugh Pourte, who was also a stock-fishmonger, had Richard Puddlicott, 1303 Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid and 1302 Abbey refectory raid prime suspect stay in Pourte's house in St. Magnus parish, an area populated by fishmongers and stock-fishmongers; London Bridge (black inserted arrow) and London's Fishmongers' Hall (inserted green arrow) and St. Magnus the Martyr Church, namesake of St. Magnus parish (inserted red arrow); Southwark's St. Mary's Overie (Southwark Cathedral)(inserted blue arrow); detail of Panorama of London, Westminster and Southwark in 1543 by Flemish topographical artist Anton von den Wyngaerde (ca. 1512/1525-May 7, 1571): Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

Confessions, indictments, inventories and orders about the Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid acknowledged three incidents that arose from the antecedent Westminster Abbey Refectory raid even though they apparently never accomplished its recovery.

The first event, a bungled cup December 1302, became the second-last of the three to be brought up before the king's appointed justices July 6, 1303. The second incident concerned the Westminster Abbey Refectory door key among John de Lenton's possessions upon his arrest as a Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid suspect. The third occurrence dealt with Westminster Abbey Refectory raid descriptions in Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid suspect Richard de Puddlicott's confession sometime around Dec. 3, 1304.

Three events June 25, 1303, September 1305 and Feb. 10, 1307, never entered into commissions, confessions or indictments and ensured Westminster Abbey Refectory silver's eternal exile.

Thames River boatmen furnished Suffolk jurors for Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid indictments July 6, 1303, with three facts about Westminster Abbey Refectory raid filched silver.

Boatmen gave the name Geoffrey Atte Stigle for a Thames River fisherman whose net gathered "a precious cup" among the catch just before Dec. 25, 1302. Stigle had not known "that it was a crime," "that it was a felony," that he handed Westminster Abbey Refectory raid stolen silver to area silversmiths. The interaction never implicated Stigle even though a Westminster Abbey Refectory raid key initiated John de Lenton's arrest June 16-23, 1303, and hanging March 5, 1304.

Lenton likely joined four unknowns hanged with Fleet Prison Keeper and Westminster Palace deputy Keeper William Palmer March 5, 1304, at Smithfield, near St. Bartholomew's Priory.

Lenton, acquaintance of Benedictine community sub-prior Alexander de Pershore (died 1311?) and Westminster landowner just west of the Abbey at Long Ditch, likely kept the key.

Oxfordshire merchant Puddlicott listed himself as solely liable for staging the Westminster Abbey Refectory raid and the Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid and selling the loot. And yet contemporary records mentioned that Lenton "ge une clef fust trovee en Le cofre mesme celi Johan accordant a mesme le clef du avandit freytour." The Norman French noted, "a key was found in the Coffee of the same John [de Lenton] which matched the very key to the above-mentioned refectory."

The Westminster Abbey Refectory raid occurred in a Benedictine community building even though the Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid occurred in the Chapter House's royal-operated Crypt.

London Sheriff Hugh Pourte placed Puddlicott under arrest June 18-19, 1303, pulled him out of sanctuary June 25, 1303, and put him in the Tower Prison.

Contemporary records quantified Puddlicott's on-hand, on-site, unsold royal plunder at £2,200 even though they never queued up his Westminster Abbey Refectory raid booty in Pourte's custody. Pourte retired after his 1302-1303 sheriffship with the Westminster Abbey Refectory raid plunder, recovered while Puddlicott remained in his custody June 18/19-24/25, 1303, in his residence. King Edward I's (June 17, 1239-July 9, 1307) order Feb. 10, 1307, stated that Pourte should return "all the cups which were lately stolen" by Puddlicott.

Paul Doherty, in The Great Crown Jewels Robbery of 1303 for Carroll & Graf Publishers Sept. 26, 2005, thinks that Pourte never turned in Puddlicott's plunder.

Oxfordshire merchant Richard Puddlicott claimed sole responsibility in his December 1303 confession for the 1303 Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid and its antecedent, a raid of the Abbey's refectory in 1302; drawing and engraving of refectory, with "the wall & arcade c. 1066 -- the windows c. 1380," by English architectural engraver and draughtsman John Henry LeKeux (March 23, 1812-Feb. 4, 1896) in G.G. Scott's Gleanings From Westminster Abbey (1861), page 199 (Plate XXX): Public Domain via Internet Archive

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

London Sheriff Hugh Pourte, who was also a stock-fishmonger, had Richard Puddlicott, 1303 Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid and 1302 Abbey refectory raid prime suspect stay in Pourte's house in St. Magnus parish, an area populated by fishmongers and stock-fishmongers; London Bridge (black inserted arrow) and London's Fishmongers' Hall (inserted green arrow) and St. Magnus the Martyr Church, namesake of St. Magnus parish (inserted red arrow); Southwark's St. Mary's Overie (Southwark Cathedral)(inserted blue arrow); detail of Panorama of London, Westminster and Southwark in 1543 by Flemish topographical artist Anton von den Wyngaerde (ca. 1512/1525-May 7, 1571): Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Maps_Of_Old_London_Wyngaerde_Part_2.jpg

Oxfordshire merchant Richard Puddlicott claimed sole responsibility in his December 1303 confession for the 1303 Westminster Abbey Royal Treasury raid and its antecedent, a raid of the Abbey's refectory in 1302; drawing and engraving of refectory, with "the wall & arcade c. 1066 -- the windows c. 1380," by English architectural engraver and draughtsman John Henry LeKeux (March 23, 1812-Feb. 4, 1896) in G.G. Scott's Gleanings From Westminster Abbey (1861), page 199 (plate XXX): Public Domain via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/stream/gleaningsfromwes00scot_0#page/n280/mode/1up

For further information:

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