Page 16 - Illustrated Reditch History

Worcester Is Burned Down

The city of Worcester belonged to Waleran and in the autumn of 1140, news came
that his enemy, the Empress, was in England and her army was going to attack
Worcester. Unfortunately, Waleran was away in France. Those who lived in the town
decided to take refuge in Worcester Cathedral. One of the local scribes complained
later that:
“The cathedral church was crammed with furniture, it became a public inn
and a hall of arguments while the chanting of the monks blended with the
wailing of the women and the cries of infants at the breast. ‘O misery of
miseries to behold’.”
Early in November Worcester was attacked. An entrance was forced on an unguarded
side of the city. Many houses were burned down, cattle and property were carried
off, the citizens were made prisoners and tied together in pairs for ransom.

Later that month Waleran returned to England. When he saw the damage that had
been done, he ordered his army to burn down Sudeley and Tewkesbury, two towns
owned by The Empress. The scribe reports, ‘He took ample vengeance. What he did
is scarce fit to record; he returned evil for evil’.

This was one of the most terrible times in English history. Civil war is dreadful. Your
neighbour could be your enemy, or your partner or one of your children. The battle
could reach your house at any time. Hungry armies marched across the land, burning
and looting. Crops were burned, animals stolen, houses robbed. There was no-one
to enforce law and order. The fighting lasted for about 19 years and today we call
it ‘The Anarchy’, meaning a time without any law.
The monks kept a record of events in a book known as The Anglo Saxon Chronicles.
One of the monks wrote:

“I have neither the skill nor the will to tell all the horrors nor all the torments
they inflicted upon wretched people in this country; and that lasted the
nineteen years while Stephen was king, and it was always going from bad to
worse. They made the villagers pay taxes every so often, and called it
'protection money'. When the people had no more to give, they robbed and
burned the villages, so that you could easily go a whole day's journey and
never find anyone occupying a village, nor land tilled. Then corn was
expensive, so was meat and butter and cheese, because there was none in
the country. Some people died of starvation; some lived by begging for alms,
even those who had once been rich; some fled the country.”

The war came to an end in 1153. King Stephen wanted his son to be king but his
son died suddenly. The Empress and King Stephen agreed that Stephen would be
king until the end of his life, but then the Empress’s eldest son, Henry, would become
Henry II. How proud the old king, Henry I, would have been!

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