Nicholas Brembre - Trial and Execution

Trial and Execution

He was therefore among the five councillors charged with treason by the Lords Appellant on 14 November 1387, and, on the citizens refusing to rise for him, fled, but was captured (in Wales, says Jean Froissart) and imprisoned at Gloucester, until on 28 January 1388 he was moved to the Tower. The Merciless Parliament met on 3 February, and the five councillors were formally impeached by Gloucester and the Lords Appellant. Brembre, who was styled "faulx Chivaler de Londres," and who was hated by York and Gloucester, was specially charged with taking twenty-two prisoners out of Newgate and beheading them without trial at the "Foul Oke" in Kent. On 17 February he was brought from the Tower to Westminster before Parliament and put on trial. He pleaded "guilty of nothing" to all charges and claimed trial by battle as a knight, but it was refused. When the king supported him, 305 people in Parliament threw down their gauntlets opposing the king. He was sentenced on the 20th and was ordered to be taken back to the Tower, whence the marshal should "lui treyner parmye la dite cite de Loundres, et avant tan q'as ditz Fourches, et illeõqs lui pendre par le cool" The hanging was carried into effect, though he had "many intercessors" among the citizens but was reversed by Richard in his last struggle, 25 March 1399. John Stow in his annals incorrectly wrote that he was beheaded ("with the same axe he had prepared for other"). He was buried in the choir of the Christ Church Greyfriars