5
Pilgrimages were incessant in the fourteenth century. They were undertaken as penance for sins committed, as thanks for good fortune or recovery from illness, or simply as an expression of devotion or a desire to travel. There were an almost infinite number of small shrines that enjoyed only a local reputation, as well as numerous venues that were celebrated throughout the realm. The latter included the shrines of Confessor Cuthbert at Durham and King Edward the Confessor at Westminster, the holy thorn tree at Glastonbury, and the tomb of the decapitated rebel against Edward II, Thomas of Lancaster, at Pontefract. But none could bear comparison with those of St. Thomas Becket at Canterbury and Our Lady of Walsingham in Norfolk, both of which attracted hundreds of thousands of pilgrims each year. Walsingham, the most revered Marian shrine in England, housed a miraculous bejeweled statue of the Virgin in a chapel that was reputedly modeled on the Holy House of Nazareth. The cult of Walsingham, which may have been founded by a local nobleman who visited the Holy Land in the twelfth century, flourished in the later Middle Ages on the strength of many royal visits and numerous stories of the powers of the shrine and Mary’s milk to cure the sick, reward piety, convert the wicked, and work many other wonders. Pilgrims avidly collected souvenirs from the shrines they visited, many of which were cheap and shoddily made. In 1348-1349, despite the perceived risks of contagion, terror of the pestilence led soaring numbers to go on pilgrimages in search of the expiation of sins and protection from death and disease which saints and shrines might afford.
Although there are problems in charting the spread of the pestilence and uncovering the epidemiology behind it, the disease generally moved faster along the major routes of trade and communications, where it was carried by large numbers of people and possibly by the goods they transported. By spring and early summer 1348, the pestilence was not only raging throughout the Mediterranean but moving steadily northward through Italy and Spain. It struck Florence, Bologna, Pistoia, Perugia, and Padua in March and April, and had reached Siena, Ancona, and Naples by May, when Perpignan, Barcelona, and Valencia had also been infected. After the initial eruption in and around Marseilles and Avignon, however, progress in France was patchy. By the end of April the plague had arrived in Lyons, some two hundred kilometers up the heavily trafficked Rhone valley from Avignon, but it then began to slow down, and progress westward overland was sluggish. Transmission by sea was of great importance, and it was by this means that the plague arrived in Bordeaux and the coastal towns of Normandy, just across the Channel from England. The date the pestilence broke out in Bordeaux is disputed, but on September 2 Edward III’s daughter, Princess Joan, followed the fate of many in her entourage when she died there on her way to marry Prince Pedro of Castille. Mortality did not begin to rise in Bruges until July 1349 and the disease did not spread northward to the Low Countries, Germany, and Scandinavia until long after it had landed in southern England.
In the weeks that followed his visit to Bury abbey, Master John took care to reveal to no one the depths of his despondency about the inevitability of God’s terrible scourge striking England and Walsham. Enough alarm, he believed, was already being sown in the hearts of his flock by lurid stories of the devastation wrought in neighboring lands, and the waves of dire prophecies that repeatedly washed through the parish. Yet he had to confide some of his private terror to his assistant clergy in order to spur them to ever greater efforts to purge the sins of their flock, for he was true to his resolve to spare no effort in ministering to his flock. In pulpit, confession, and conversation, John tirelessly encouraged his parishioners with the certainty of the blessings of repentance and, somewhat less frequently, he warned them of the dire consequences of remaining obdurate in the face of divine punishment.
News had always spread rapidly through the towns and villages of England, even when there was little to report. The desire to learn and the desire to tell were almost universal, and so it was no surprise in this time of mounting dread that almost every visitor to Walsham brought new details of the horrific pestilence, whether true or false, plausible or implausible. When the folk of Walsham traveled to nearby villages and towns, and especially when they ventured farther afield to fairs and markets, they returned with their fevered imaginations recharged by sensational accounts of terrifying carnage. Thus it was only a short time after Master John had returned tight-lipped from the abbey of Bury that surprisingly full and accurate accounts of much of what he had learned there began circulating in the village. Many details of the reports the young clerk had given to the brethren of the ravages of the pestilence in Avignon had been leaked, not just by monastery servants but by a number of garrulous monks. And it was not long before this relatively untainted testimony was embroidered and extended by constant and careless repetition.
In spring and early summer, as the pestilence continued to spread northward from the Mediterranean ports of France, tales of the desolation of foreign lands and cities that had recently come third and fourth hand to the village were now being supplemented by eyewitness reports, or at least by reports delivered by those who swore they had spoken to eyewitnesses of dreadful events. Testimonies emanating from merchants and sailors in Ipswich, London, and Lynn began to find their way by the mouths of carters and carriers, peddlers, travelers, and traders into the cities, towns, markets, fairs, and villages of Suffolk and neighboring counties. The sheer numbers of sources that fed these stories, the increasing familiarity of names of the places where the plague was now said to be wreaking its havoc, and the credentials of the people who were said to have experienced it firsthand combined to sow anguish in the phlegmatic and religious hysteria in the fervently pious. There was relatively little protest when it was decided to stop holding wrestling matches in the churchyard of St. Mary’s because they might be an affront to God.
Mindful of the advancing plague, the pious and the petrified feverishly sought the protection bestowed by the worship of saints and relics. As acts of piety deserving of divine mercy, numerous little pilgrimages were organized, such as walking a few miles to the west to pray at the shrine of St. Edmund in the great abbey at Bury or considerably farther west to the popular shrine of St. Etheldreda in the cathedral at Ely. Not many miles to the northwest lay Thetford, where the villagers could pray before the magnificent altarpiece in the newly built Blackfriars priory and venerate the image of the Virgin, renowned for its miraculous cures, at the Cluniac priory close by (see figure 13). More conveniently, the well and chapel of Our Lady at Woolpit, which was just down the road, provided a regular supply of restorative and curative waters, and whenever the monks of Ixworth permitted it, large groups walked barefoot the short distance from Walsham to the priory, to worship before the high altar. William Lene, however, was far more adventurous. In remembrance of his long dead father’s devotion to St. Thomas of Lancaster, who had been executed for treason a quarter of a century earlier, he decided to ride his mare a couple of hundred miles northward to visit St. Thomas’s tomb before the high altar of Pontefract priory, in fervent hope that the saint would work one of his many miracles for him and preserve his family from harm.
Though most households in the village had their favorite saints, whose images were found in little shrines in their cottages, it was generally appreciated that the most efficacious pilgrimage by far was that to Our Lady of Walsingham, one of the most famous and holy shrines in the whole realm. To the great fortune of the folk of Walsham, this sacred site lay less than thirty miles away, close to the coast of north Norfolk. So venerable was this shrine and so powerful were the miracles that the milk of Our Lady could work, that kings of England had worshiped there on many occasions. Edward III had repeatedly journeyed to the shrine in the early years of his reign, and one of his first acts on returning to England from France, just a few years before, had been to ride to pray before Our Lady. Thus it was in late May that Margery Wodebite, sister-in-law of John Wodebite and one of the most vocal and ferociously devout of all Master John’s parishioners, began persuading a group of prominent Walsham villagers to organize a pilgrimage to Walsingham, to draw succor from the milk of the sweet Virgin Mary, some of which was preserved there in a vial, and to see her fabulously bejeweled wooden image, which time and again had worked the most wondrous miracles (see figure 14). The pilgrims would entreat the Blessed Virgin to stay the hand of God and spare them all, and they had faith that she would not fail them.
Within a short time a host of men and women had offered to join the pilgrim band and were busily making arrangements with their families, friends, and neighbors for the care of their households and farms during their absence; promising in return to pray for them and bring back a precious souvenir, a waxen image, a pewter badge, or a little palm leaf blessed by the monks who cared for Our Lady. Most of the pilgrims proudly swore that in penance they would walk the whole way instead of riding, and a few vowed to trudge barefoot or with their feet covered only in rags. All agreed to follow custom and remove their shoes at the newly built chapel, which had been swiftly named the slipper chapel, to trudge unshod over the final mile or so to the shrine itself.
Reluctantly, Master John decided that neither he nor any of his assistant clergy could be spared from their duties in the parish, but he urged his employer, the aging Robert Shepherd, to go. Despite being the official incumbent of the benefice of Walsham and still drawing a stipend from the prior of Ixworth, Robert was now performing scarcely any religious duties in the parish. Master John was delighted that Robert responded so readily to his encouragement that the pilgrimage would be good for his soul, and purchase for Robert some pardon for all the years he had devoted to the love of money rather than the spiritual welfare of his parishioners. But in truth, Robert saw it as an opportunity to seek the Virgin’s help in finding the key to his strongbox, which contained a great deal of money and many of his property deeds; he had mislaid it some weeks earlier.
Master John willingly lent his expertise to the very careful planning which went into determining which route the pilgrims would take to Walsingham. This was to be no ordinary pilgrimage, but a spiritual journey lasting well over a week, perhaps even two. The itinerary would start with prayers before the altar of Ixworth priory. Then the band would proceed to the shrine of the Virgin at Thetford and include worship at many more churches and shrines along the way. There would be abundant opportunities for venerating the relics, rood screens, images, and veils to be found in numerous churches, and for looking with adoration at the holy scenes carved on their fonts and portrayed in the colored glass of their windows. All this would be done with the certain prospect that each sacred object and image would extend the depth of their devotion and raise the intensity of their rapture.
On a sunny morning in mid-June a band of more than fifty pilgrims was met by a further dozen or so villagers who had decided at the last minute to go with them. Even as they headed north out of Walsham toward the road to Thetford, a few more people gave way to their emotions on seeing the procession pass by and came hurrying to join, though poorly prepared for the journey. Young and old, men and women, moved off slowly, chanting prayers and psalms in unison. Their clothes and hats were adorned with many tokens, and in their hands they carried small palms or branches with newly sprouted leaves, and held strong staffs, some of which were embellished with silver or pewter. Margery Wodebite took up a prominent position toward the head of the band, clothed entirely in white, as if she were as pure as a maid. Her husband had died many years before, and, as she was fond of telling anyone who would listen, she had engaged in no carnal relationship with any man since, and was instead wedded to Christ.
When the Walsham pilgrims came to Thetford the next day, they were surprised and delighted to find themselves among many such bands making their way on the main route northward. Gaining strength and optimism from their shared purpose and from the intensity of the repeated demonstrations of spiritual passion among their fellow travelers, they flowed confidently and expectantly along the ways to Walsingham. Wondrous to behold, the crowds swelled still further as they drew nearer to the shrine of Our Lady. The faithful and the hopeful thronged in their hundreds through the streets of Fakenham where the roads to the shrine from the south, west, and east converged. So many people were gathered together that food and drink became difficult to obtain. But rather than being discomfited, most pilgrims rejoiced in the opportunity for fasting and drinking simple water. Accommodation was impossible to find, except for the elderly and infirm, but inconvenience and hardship became a welcome penance. Long queues formed at all the stalls and little shops along the way that sold wax, palms, and tokens, brooches and badges of lead and tin, and, most precious of all, the tiny sealed lead flasks containing holy water and a drop of milk from the breast of the Virgin. Though it was tempting to buy such precious mementos and sacred objects while they were still available, since the vendors warned that supplies were running perilously short, wiser and more experienced heads advised waiting to make purchases in Walsingham itself, where they could be sure that they were genuine and of better quality.
Later the next day the Walsham band reached Houghton St. Giles, where they found excited, agitated crowds of pilgrims gathered around the church, mingling with those returning inspired from the shrine. It seemed to those who came from country districts that the whole population of England must have been on the move, and even those who lived in the bustling towns of King’s Lynn, Norwich, Bury, Cambridge, and London professed themselves amazed by the unceasing flow of humanity backward and forward. With a flourish the Walsham party removed their shoes at the slipper chapel, kindly provided by the monks of Walsingham for the pilgrims. Walking barefoot and chanting in unison, they slowly made their way the short distance to the priory and its shrine, ostentatiously carrying money in their hands for offerings, as well as candles and wax to place at the shrine, some of which had been fashioned into the image of absent loved ones.
On drawing close to the priory gates, they found their way barred by servants who sought to direct them to the rear of the buildings, there to form orderly queues. Those who had not been to Walsingham before were greatly disappointed at the small size of the priory, which despite its fame was tiny compared to the massive abbey of Bury, and scarcely bigger than their own little priory of Ixworth. Their hearts sank further at the size of the crowds ahead of them, and the prolonged wait they would have to endure before they were admitted into the shrine.
Word had long been circulating among the pilgrims that they would not be permitted to view the milk of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and the priory’s guards confirmed that the milk was kept on the high altar of the priory church, to which only the most important visitors were admitted. At this, Margery Wodebite, who had been seeing visions of Our Lady and the Passion of Christ nightly in her dreams since leaving Walsham, waking her neighbors with her convulsive weeping and loud lamentations, became greatly distressed and swooned, appealing loudly to God as she collapsed. This brought monks running to her side, who were quizzical rather than sympathetic. They demanded to know why she was dressed all in white when she was not a maid, and why she, a simple rustic woman, proclaimed to have visions sent to her by God that were not sent to learned clerics, monks, and other men who were clearly more holy than she. Margery replied that God had chosen her, and they had not chosen God. For the monks had long since failed to obey the orders under which they were founded, and St. Benedict in Heaven had appeared to her in a vision and entreated her to do all she could to put them back on the paths of righteousness. At this the monks became angry, and the eldest in the group warned that if her companions did not keep Margery quiet, he would have her fettered and imprisoned in a stone house nearby where she would be unable to speak with any man. Her brother assured the monks that she would cause no more disturbance, and meanwhile Robert Shepherd created a diversion by asking each monk in turn for evidence that Our Lady of Walsingham had a special talent for finding lost keys. He was disappointed to learn that this ability was reserved to St. Sithe, who had no connection whatsoever with Walsingham.
Soon after, as had happened frequently in the past, Margery became subdued and compliant, and she was content to be led on a tour that included the Gate of the Knight, which had miraculously stretched itself to shelter a noble fugitive on horseback who found himself pursued by enemies and in need of sanctuary. Because of the unprecedented press of people making the pilgrimage in recent weeks, the monks of Walsingham had opened up a small chapel dedicated to St. Laurence, in which a number of holy relics had been housed, including the finger joint of St. Peter. But the first stop of the Walsham pilgrims was at a well filled by a spring sacred to the Holy Virgin, which long ago had burst forth at her command. The water was renowned for its ability to cure pains in the head and the stomach, and they found it wonderfully refreshing and cleansing as they eagerly gulped it down. Believing that it might also protect against the pestilence, they filled leather flasks to carry back home for their loved ones.
Then the Walsham folk joined the queue for admission to the Lady Chapel, which inched forward at an unbearably slow rate. While they waited, peddlers and hucksters walked up and down bearing trays of badges, brooches, and tokens of the shrine, which pilgrims eagerly purchased to pin on their hats and breasts. Among the favorites were a square cast picture of the Annunciation and, though more expensive, the representation of the Virgin seated with a fleur-de-lis scepter resting on her right shoulder and the Holy Child to her left. This, they were assured by the young woman selling them, was a perfect copy of the sacred image which they were about to see in the shrine. Yet more desirable were the versions of these badges bearing the name “Walsingham” along the base. Perhaps most popular of all, however, were the miniature lead flasks made in the form of brooches and badges, each guaranteed to contain a droplet of the Virgin’s milk diluted by holy water from the Virgin’s well, and each inscribed with a large W to signify the authenticity of their origin. Also irresistible for many in the party were the meat pies sold piping hot by vendors from handcarts with clay ovens on them.
When, after a very long wait, they had shuffled far enough forward to catch their first glimpse of the Lady Chapel, they could scarcely believe that this modest building housed the Shrine of Our Lady. Despite having been told about its modest dimensions, those visiting Walsingham for the first time were still expecting a magnificent edifice, radiating with the glory of the Virgin. But what they saw was a building of strange design, in some ways less impressive than the High Hall manor house in Walsham, and in fact not much bigger than Lady Rose’s barn. It was built largely of undecorated stone, and barely twenty feet in width. However, their spirits were soon lifted by the bliss and contentment which they observed on the faces of all who were leaving through the far door, and by the frequent shrieks of delight and spiritual ecstasy from within which could be heard above the continuous chanting of prayers by those who queued. When at last they entered through the arch, all were entirely overcome by a profusion of gold, silver, and jewels, brilliantly lit by an abundance of shimmering candles. Then their eyes were swiftly drawn to the Blessed Virgin. Although it was of no extraordinary size, material, or workmanship, the image of Our Lady was overpowering. It visibly glowed as if illuminated from within by a hundred candles, and it radiated the love and compassion of the Blessed Virgin herself to all who looked on her.
Set all about the Virgin’s image was an abundance of gold and silver statues, dishes, cups, candlesticks, paintings, brooches, and ornaments of all kinds and shapes. These in turn lay on cloths of gold and the finest scarlet that were not merely decorated with threads of gold but also set with a profusion of precious jewels of prodigious size and wonderful colors. Beside these treasures, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of coins were piled high, with a few stacks soaring almost to the rafters. As the pilgrims inched along the display, servants of the priory pointed out some of the finest and most famous items: a solid gold statue in the likeness of Henry III, given by the king himself, a gold brooch given by his son when he ruled as the first king Edward. Of special interest to the pilgrims were the many fine gifts donated by the present king Edward when he worshiped at the shrine, including the collection of exquisite cloths and a gold brooch set with jewels, which he had laid by the Virgin in September 1328. All gasped when told that these gifts were worth 83s 4d.
Standing in the most holy of shrines, in the very place where kings and queens must have stood before, and with such examples of generosity before them, the Walsham folk were encouraged to offer up their own pittances to the attendant monks, who took them and placed them at the side of the heaps. Somewhat more reluctantly, the monks also took the wax images of loved ones that some of the pilgrims had brought, and placed them on the floor at the foot of the shrine.
Margery Wodebite, of course, had spent most of her time in Walsingham in a trance of spiritual ecstasy. But there was not a member of the party who was not transformed by the visit to the shrine, whose spirit was not greatly inspired and strengthened by being in the presence of the Blessed Virgin, drinking from her water, and praying for her assistance. On the journey back to Walsham, excitedly talking and praying among themselves, the pilgrims were for a time able to push from their minds the news that they had repeatedly heard on their journey of the ravages of the pestilence overseas and its inexorable advance toward the shores of their land.
During their holy pilgrimage the humble rustics of Walsham met with other pilgrims of all ranks of society, drawn from many parts of the world, including gentlefolk, rich merchants, and high clergy. They sat spellbound while a wizened old lady told them of the pilgrimage she had made by herself, on the death of her husband many years before, from her humble cottage in Norfolk to the most holy city of Jerusalem. At the same fireside gathering, the miraculous story told by this frail and venerable pilgrim was immediately followed by one from a middle-aged man of obvious substance, who described his religious journey to Rome. The audience had next gasped in admiration at the sheer number and variety of badges and tokens which one seasoned old palmer, a tall, thin man from Leicester, wore on his cap and cape, and at the incredibly long list of holy shrines that he proudly claimed to have visited in person, which he subsequently verified by the intimate knowledge he displayed of every one of them. The palmer claimed to have devoted himself full-time to God’s service many years ago, and since then to have lived entirely from the alms freely given by pious folk. With no further prompting, the pious folk gathered around the fireside gave him their pennies to support him on his next journey, which was to pray for the sixth time at the tomb of the blessed martyr St. Thomas at Canterbury.
But there were few occasions when the conversation and storytelling at resting places did not turn to the pestilence. Among the people journeying to and from Walsingham many recounted personal experiences of the horrors they had witnessed or narrowly escaped. Indeed, as they eagerly explained, it was for this very reason they were making the pilgrimage. So, they lost little time in apprising their fellows of what fate awaited them, saying such things as, “So great a plague has never been heard of from the beginning of the world to the present day,” or “It is more awful than any ever heard of or to be read about in any books.” Nobody had any hope to offer, saying instead, “Doctors know no remedy,” and “Those who fall ill last little more than two or three days, many die suddenly, as if in the midst of health.” While those who professed knowledge of overseas told the same story of how, “Despite all the efforts to halt the plague made by the rulers of towns and villages, such as barring entry to outsiders and cleaning the streets, and all the advice offered by the most learned doctors on avoidance and cure, and the supplications of the most holy clergy, and even by the pope himself, beseeching God to be merciful, the death moves unhindered from place to place, as if it were an invisible cloud of infection blown on the wind.”
Gathered together for the night in a large barn near Thetford, two days after leaving Walsham, the pilgrims heard an account that was to alarm them more than any of the multitude of tales they heard on their journey. It was delivered with calm authority and great eloquence by Sir Robert de Godington, the clerk and auditor of the household of the bishop of Ely, who had been in the papal curia in Avignon when the pestilence broke out there. This gentleman, and his three attendants, displayed an intimate grasp of the ravages of the pestilence in Avignon, and he expressed himself so clearly and so powerfully that the fears imparted from hearing second- and third-hand versions of the testimony of the clerk who had lodged at Bury St. Edmunds abbey some weeks before were immediately multiplied, and the hazy outlines of the terrible images which had formed in their minds on first hearing were flooded with color and precision. The audience sat in awed silence as Sir Robert addressed them.
First, this lord set out his credentials: “I can assure you that the information I am about to impart is both accurate and up-to-date, for I have seen all these terrible things with my own eyes. Not only was I in the holy city when the pestilence erupted, I remained there for many weeks, and since my return to Ely I have been in frequent correspondence with friends who are still there concerning a future visit that might be made by my lord bishop to Avignon.”
He stopped for effect and then proclaimed, “Whatever else you might have heard or hoped, the plague has indeed killed tens of thousands in the city, and left many thousands of houses entirely vacant, with nobody at all living in them.”
When Sir Robert announced that the pestilence had recently abated in the holy city and that few of its residents were taking sick and even fewer dying, there were gasps of relief. But he immediately stifled the tremors of hope in his audience with a dismissive wave of his hand and went on to report that, having ruined this great city and destroyed the greater part of its people, the plague had moved on with renewed ferocity, and was at this very moment spreading northward through France toward Bruges and Ghent, eastward toward the Holy Roman Empire and westward toward Bordeaux and Calais, and thence perhaps to England. With his arms held wide before him, as if to symbolize how the pestilence was encompassing the whole world, Sir Robert intoned, “Wherever it goes, just as it did in Avignon, it is leaving thousands and thousands dead in its wake, with rotting bodies overflowing the churchyards and even the hastily consecrated new burial grounds, so that an infinity of good Christians end up being cast without ceremony into pits dug in the fields.”
With cold detachment, Sir Robert reported his conclusions: “Nothing can halt the progress of the pestilence; it will continue to ravage unchecked. In Marseilles, we are told, all the gates of the city except two posterns had been closed, but there four out of five of the people died. In Avignon, not even the pope could halt it or even weaken its force. We must abase ourselves and ask for forgiveness. In Avignon while I was there, devout processions were held frequently at the behest of the pope, attended by two or three thousand people, chanting litanies, many barefoot, others wearing hair shirts or smeared with ashes, beating themselves with cruel whips until the blood ran. But I cannot deny it, all these lamentations scarcely affected the dreadful work of pestilence. God knows what the end will be or what the beginning was.”
At this point, Sir Robert was finally overcome with emotion and ceased to speak. But his audience, after listening in total silence, except for occasional gasps or groans, burst into life with a torrent of questions: “Cannot people save themselves by fleeing from the plague?”
“No,” replied Sir Robert, “flight did not help, for the pestilence reigned in every settlement and city in Provence, and strangers were not welcome anywhere. And besides, what would those who fled live off? Only the rich could afford to flee, and many of those hesitated to leave their goods behind, fearing that they would be stolen and their houses ransacked.”
Another member of the audience called out, “We heard some time ago that the pestilence in Avignon was of a new and previously unknown type. Is that true?”
Sir Robert responded, “I am no medical man, but I can tell you from what I saw that not one but three types of pestilence struck the city, each of which was new and terrible. The first visitation was an infection of the lungs, in which victims suffered continuous fever and the coughing of blood. No one who had this corruption escaped death; all died within two or three days. What is more, the victim passed the sickness on to everyone who saw him during his illness. All who visited a sick person or carried his body to burial immediately followed him to the grave. A few weeks after this type of plague had taken hold of the city, another form struck. This also caused fever, but this time great boils as well, which erupted suddenly in the armpits. Then yet another form appeared, in which victims of both sexes were attacked by boils and carbuncles in the groin.”
It was then that John Wodebite, one of the leaders of the Walsham villagers, stood up and with bowed head said, “We heard in our village that a young priest who had fled from Avignon told the monks of Bury abbey that the sick were deserted by their families and friends and left to die alone. And that there were even some priests who refused to visit the dying, thus leaving their souls in peril. Surely such stories cannot be true?”
At this the senior cleric looked down at the floor and said simply that unbearable burdens had been placed on the clergy by the vast numbers of people who were infected and dying. “Priests were not spared by the pestilence, but died in numbers at least as great as lay folk. And so, at the height of the deaths and sickness, it was not always possible for those priests who remained alive to provide sufficient spiritual care for everyone in the city who needed it. That is why the pope gave permission for confession to be heard by laymen when there was no other alternative.”
The spirits of the party were doused by these revelations, and a couple of days later more blows were inflicted on their inherent optimism. While the bulk of the Walsham pilgrims were settling down to spend the warm night in a field on the outskirts of Fakenham, a small number decided to walk into the town to find an alehouse. There they were regaled in exuberant style by an Ipswich sea captain who had just returned from a voyage to Bruges, the great Flemish port where ships from all over the world berthed, and merchants and seamen traded, relaxed, and mingled with traders who had journeyed to the city across land and by river. The captain enjoyed informing his audience, most of whom he guessed had never seen a great city, that in Bruges he had met a multitude of merchants and seamen from Genoa, Venice, and Florence, and from the great northern cities of the Hanse, including Cologne, Dinant, Magdeburg, Hamburg, and Lübeck. Indeed, he boasted, he had also recently mixed with men from all parts of France, as well as the occasional Spaniard selling wine, iron, and rabbit skins. With this lengthy prologue he thoroughly convinced the alehouse audience that no one could have better or more up-to-date news on the current state of the pestilence than he.
“My news comes not from letters or distant recollections,” he said, “but from my own experiences just a couple of weeks ago.” Having gained everyone’s attention, the captain curtly announced, “What I heard in Bruges was so dreadful that I forthwith abandoned the plans I had to buy more goods to sell in England, and instead I boarded my ship and sailed it as fast as I could back home to Ipswich.” With a satisfied smile he continued, “That is not all. The future of the world looks so short and so dreadful, that as soon I arrived in port I set out on a pilgrimage for the very first time in the whole of my sinful life.”
Having frightened his listeners in this manner, he then cunningly soothed them with words of reassurance. “You can believe me that the pestilence has not yet reached the North Sea or any of those countries closest to England. There is no sign of it in Bruges, nor in the whole of Flanders or Normandy. Nor even, in the lands of the Holy Roman Emperor to the east. What is more, I heard it reliably reported on a number of occasions that the far northern lands of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden have not been touched.
“But,” he warned, “do not believe that you have been spared. As every day passes Death is coming ever nearer, and it is only a matter of time before he arrives in this kingdom. This most awful pestilence is spreading rapidly toward us, like a fire out of control. I was planning to sail from Bruges to Bordeaux, to buy some tuns of good red wine that I could sell at a fair profit in Ipswich. But as I prepared to put to sea, I was warned that many people in that fair city had started to die from a strange new disease. So beware of drinking any wine, it carries the plague!” His audience laughed as it downed draughts of good English ale.
“Do not laugh, but pray instead,” the captain bellowed. “When the pestilence comes to us, as it surely will, it will crush us all to dust. It has left the greatest cities of southern France and of all of Italy in ruins, and their people totally destroyed. In Bruges I met a merchant from Florence who had been rich and powerful when he had arrived a few months before to sell his luxurious wares, but was now reduced to poverty and forced to live in exile. For fear of the plague he could not return to his mansion in his native city, and he had learned that his family, friends, and business partners had all been killed. As we were talking, we were interrupted by a rough seaman who hailed from a town near Rome, who told us, ‘When the plague had done its work in my birthplace there was not a dog left pissing against the wall.’ ”
With this the shipman launched into a torrent of words, each uttered with total conviction. “Nowhere will be spared, everywhere will be struck and probably in a very short time. It was first thought that Jews and lepers were spreading plague by poisoning the wells, but the well poisoners have been burned and still the plague drives onward. Jews and lepers, and Saracens too, have all died in their thousands at the hands of angry crowds believing they were deliberately spreading disease, but many more have died in agony stricken by the disease itself.
“Now it is believed that the terrible infection is carried in ships. People tell how Genoese carracks, fleeing from the Tartars at Caffa, first brought the plague to Messina and thence to Genoa. In Genoa scarcely one in seven survived, and the carracks sailed on and the plague next seized Venice, where seven out of every ten perished. Nobody in Bruges will now eat, or even touch, freshly imported spices from those regions, and they hesitate to eat fish because they fear the infection is carried in the sea. Scarcely anyone sails to places where the pestilence rages, just as I was too afraid to sail to Bordeaux. A fleet of fine Genoese and Florentine carracks, laden with wares they long to sell in the East, remain anchored in Bruges harbor because their crews are too frightened to return home.
“You must realize that this terrible disease cannot be stopped. It is carried by the fish in the sea as well as by the ships that sail on it, and it is borne invisibly in the air by the wind. As I speak the fatal infection continues to spread toward us, and there is no way of halting or avoiding it.
“Nor is the disease itself the worst thing to be feared. I have heard the most terrible tales of human cruelty when the plague strikes. The sick are often treated like dogs by their families who put food and drink next to their bed and then flee the house, leaving the poor creatures to die alone, uncared for, and unconfessed. Few doctors visit the sick for fear of certain infection, even if they are promised riches. Many frightened priests fail to perform their sacred duties, denying their parishioners the last rites of shrift, housel, and annealing, and so abandon their souls trembling on the edge of everlasting damnation. So contagious is this pestilence, and so fearful are people of being infected by it, that fathers will not visit their sons, mothers their daughters, brothers their sisters, friends their friends. Thus it is that an uncountable number of people have died without any mark of affection, piety, or charity. And, if truth be told, many of those who have died might have escaped if they themselves had refused to visit the sick.
“So it is that everyone who is still healthy looks after himself. And even when a rich man dies, he is fortunate if his body is carried to a pit by a gang of vagabonds, with no mourners and only a few lights. While the corpse is borne along the street, neighbors and friends hide away indoors instead of accompanying the funeral procession. But perhaps they are wise, for in a short time the ruffians who are not afraid of carrying the bodies to burial die themselves.”
The brave sea captain then prayed loudly and fervently, professing himself to have been a sinful man with frail beliefs throughout most his life. But now, he assured the Virgin Mary, he had been transformed into a pious pilgrim. He was going to Walsingham to wash all the stains of sin from his soul with her milk and to gain shrift and housel. For the short time remaining to him he would live as blamelessly as he could. When the pestilence came for him, as it surely would, there would be no priest to confess to, and he would die alone in agony without comfort or support from family or friends.
The captain was a good storyteller who had a frightening tale to tell, yet the more positive spirits among his audience soon pointed out that he had actually brought them good tidings. A stocky miller from near Lincoln, while not questioning the honesty of the captain, urged that what he had said was of comfort to Englishmen and women. “This new and terrible pestilence is ravaging hot lands in faraway places, where the sun always shines and the rain does not fall, where fabulous creatures and strange diseases have always abounded.” As the old lady who had journeyed to Jerusalem nodded her head vigorously, there was a murmur of agreement that nothing like this pestilence had ever been seen in England.
Encouraged, Robert Shepherd turned to his companions and confided, “The captain has told us the pestilence has definitely not reached as far north as Bruges. If we believe these tales, it may have killed large parts of the populations of such hot and distant places like Genoa, Marseilles, and Avignon, but it has failed to take hold in Flanders or in any of the lands of our neighbors across the North Sea that have climates like ours.”
On the journey back to Walsham a warm glow of optimism bathed the pilgrim band. Uplifted by having been in the presence of the Virgin, drunk copiously from her water, and prayed fervently for her assistance, the pilgrims were in good heart. The spiritual refreshment they had imbibed in the holy places they had visited mingled with the warmth they had drawn from companionship and shared experiences. As they returned to their homes, they had renewed faith in the ability of the kindly Virgin to stay God’s hand, persuade him to be merciful, and spare them and their loved ones. And if she should not hear at once, the precious mementos they had purchased would afford them protection.