Loremen Podcast - Loremen S5Ep47 - The Treasure in the Tower LIVE Part 1

Episode Date: September 5, 2024

What connects a traitor, a Sandwich and a mushroom farmer from Kent? It's the lost treasure of 'Invisible' John Barkstead, which is buried somewhere underneath the Tower of London. Although there are those who say ... it isn't. In Part 1 of this LIVE episode, we meet a regicidal bum bailiff, Alasdair unearths the TRUTH™ about the death of Oliver Cromwell and James is ravin' about ravens. Come see the loreboys LIVE in spooky West Norwood Cemetery on Friday 11th October 2024 (2024): https://choose-se27-comedy-festival.designmynight.com/66968247e76bce06372992c8/loremen-podcast-live-recording LoreBoys nether say die! Support the Loremen here (and get stuff): patreon.com/loremenpod ko-fi.com/loremen Check the sweet, sweet merch here... https://www.teepublic.com/stores/loremen-podcast?ref_id=24631 @loremenpod youtube.com/loremenpodcast www.instagram.com/loremenpod www.facebook.com/loremenpod Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Loremen, a podcast about local legends and obscure curiosities from days of yore with me, Alistair Beckett King and me, James Shake Shaft. And James, I have got part one of a live show for you. Yes. Yes. Yes, you. Yes. Yes. Yes. You were there. And so were a gaggle of lore folk. And I told the tale of John Barksdead's hoard with many a spooky interjection from you. Have a listen. It was light. Yes. So here it is. The treasure in the tower. Part one. ["The Star Spangled Banner"] New guys, some new guys.

Biggest group, biggest group. Hello, hello folk. Welcome, welcome law folk. We've got so much to tell you about today. I got pooed on by a bird just before the show. And they say it's good luck, don't they? Yeah. But it's not true. It's not. I was pooed on by a bird twice.

Two different birds, I hope, in one day. Or just one bird with a vendetta. He's coming back to finish the job. Just goes off and eats a load of seed. Like, I'm going to get him. Going to get him. And and that same day, I'm gonna get him, I'm gonna get him. And that same day, I got burgled. So not good luck. Yeah, by the same bird.

Well, they could have dusted for the feather prints, but we think it was. We think it was. That could be because an odd number of bird poos is lucky, and an even number is unlucky. We don't know. My bird poo went in my coffee, so I think that's definitely bad luck. I didn't finish it, you freaks! Err me! I immediately poured it away after going like... I only heard the word cream, but it was... I heard enough of the heckle to enjoy it. It's bought me enough time to come up with the pun crapachino.

I don't know how to work into a sentence apart from saying, hey, I have a new joke. Well, welcome to Lawmen Live. I'm already sweating. I think it's the effect of the dad joke. I've got a question for you, James. Yeah. What connects a traitor, a sandwich and a Kent mushroom farmer? Oh, I think is it like a high street sandwich shop, like a upper crust or Pret-a-Monger?

Would there be a traitor in a Pret-a-Monger? What experiences have you had? It sounds French. Sounds French. If British history is anything to go by, then we're fighting the French. Most of the time, a hundred years in one go, one war, a hundred years. Well, it's not it's not the French in this case. It's not Pret a Moranger. The answer I was looking for, James, is the search for John Barks Dead's treasure in the Tower of London.

Thank you. You're going to have to make your appreciative noises a bit louder just to make sure they come out on the recording. So everyone thinks there's a really good vibe going in the room. Okay. Now I want to start with a spoiler alert because I don't want to be like those American podcasts that are not to name anyone in particular where they're like, oh, someone knows something about this.

And then like 19 episodes later, you find out nobody knew anything. I have to come out and be honest with you, the treasure that I'm going to be talking about has never been found. So there isn't, oh, I thought you would be disappointed. What that means is that there is no big reveal at the end of this where I say, and it's here now. And James is made of gold or anything like that. It's not going to happen.

The treasure has never been found. But- What about the friends we make along the way? James, I'm just going to refer James to my notes. It says here, see if you can work out what the real treasure was along the way. I thought if I put it right up top, there's no way James can ruin what is obviously going to be one of the categories at the end.

But you know, just keep an open mind, it might not be that. Think about what the real treasure was. Now this story, I discovered it in John Tim's Odyssey of History, 1872, and it's all about the Tower of London. But it's not very supernatural. It's quite historical. And so I'm going to throw to James, as we start, hello, Mr. James Shakespeare. Hello. Jimmy Shakespeare.

I'm going to throw to James for a few Tower of London legends. Okay. Well, welcome. Friend of the show, Steve Roud's London Law. Lovely book, isn't it? It's got a map on the cover. Nice. That's how good this book is.

Okay. So what do we know about the Tower of London? The Ravens. That's right. That people are shouting out. The American podcast was like the Ravens. When you think about the Tower of London, you probably think about Ravens.

Or you miss here and think about raisins. Can you build these raisin box? It's a it's a mystery box every month where you get raisins. Can you bill these raisin bucks? It's a mystery box every month where you get raisins. Or ravens. I've read another mystery. Oh yeah, raisins or ravens. That's the mystery.

Which will be... My eyes. Also my coffee. That was also the ravens. And you think the ravens on the Tower of London, they're good luck, right? Yeah, famously. If the Ravens were ever to go, England would fail. Imagine what that would look like.

Okay, so why Ravens? First of all, Ravens are usually associated with bad luck. As the example given here, from the 26th of May 1873, John Vincent said that a man was sick at Derry Hill. Two ravens flew over at the house crying, corpse, corpse. The man died the next day. Ravens, bad luck. Wow.

They really did endurty. That guy who was clearly already dying. Corpse, corpse. Oh, real sick bird. Wow, they really did endurty. That guy who was clearly already dying. Cops, cops! Real sick bird. That's just the noise that they make. Okay. So, why ravens? So, what else?

What do the eagle memory of us? What do we remember about the Tower of London? What's underneath it? Yes, that's right. They're shouting out again. It's Bran the Blessed's head. Do you remember Bran the Blessed from the Mabinogi Yarn? I'm Bran the Blessed.

Played by Alistair Plain, it was Brian Blessed. It's a big old head of a giant they cut off and it kept chatting for five years after it had died and they ended up burying it under the Tower of London, facing towards France because of the traitors. It's underneath there and Bran is apparently Welsh for raven. And that's why they think that the ravens are there. And this story surely goes back 900 years.

Apparently, Charles II made an edict that the ravens had to be protected there. No, not true. According to Steve Roud's London law, Dr. Jeff Parnell, the official Tower of London historian, in 2004 announced that he could find no reference to raisins in Tower Records. Was there a sort of Control F situation there? And he typed in raisins and maybe announced it a little bit too soon.

Before 1895, there's no reference to ravens or raisins in the Tarot Line between 1895. A subsequent piece by Boria Sacks in History Today, January 2005, confirmed that no record of them could be found before the mid 19th century. The earliest reference they could find for the legend that Britain would fail if the Ravens were to leave the tower is 1955. Wow. And weirdly, so many of the names and years you've mentioned are going to come into my half of the story.

Really? Yeah. Borea Sacks. Not that one. Brand of blessings. Honestly, I don't know what noise that Yeah. Borea Sax? Not that one. Random Essex? Honestly, I don't know what noise that is. Borea Sax. Borea Sax. It's a cool name. Got any ghosts for me there, James? Because my story could do with a few. No, I've got a raven biting a Nazi. It was a zoo. They used to keep lions in the Tower of London. An elephant was there at one point, this is going back to 1235.

In 1252, the King of Norway gave the King Henry a pale bear, possibly a polar bear, which would sit by the banks of the Thames catching its dinner. It's really sad. It's such a sad image. No, that polar bear's on holiday. And apparently, the lions were very popular. You could get in free if you would simply feed your pets to the lions. Ah, we should do that for our live shows. How much do you want to see whatever this is?

Who you've prepared to sacrifice. Give me your pets. The Lions were so famous in 1709, they were referred to in the Tatla. An unnamed person said, I took three lads who are under my guardianship, a rambling in a hackney coach to show them the town as the Lions, the Tombs, the Bedlam. So in the older days, the three great sites of London were the Lions at the lions, the tombs, the bedlam. So in the older days, the three great sites of London were the lions at the tower, the tombs at Westminster Abbey and the people in bedlam, basically.

So nowadays, my modern version of that is London Eye, Shrek's Adventure, M&M World. Yes! Boom. I haven't got any ghosts though, I'm afraid. No ghosts, not yet. Not yet, okay. I'll have a look for some ghosts. I haven't got any ghosts though, I'm afraid. No ghosts, not yet. Yeah, I'll have a look for some ghosts.

See if you can find a ghost for the next chapter break. Let us begin with chapter one. Barksdead's Hoard. We've got a visual aid for possibly the first time in Lawmen. That is a picture of John Barkshead. James, would you like to describe the man we're seeing? Yes. He has got some of the Cardinal Richelieu about him.

I think they're trying to get across the idea of a thin moustache, but it's a little bit pointed which makes him look a bit of a baddie. And underneath it says column. I think that's a little bit pointed, which makes him look a bit of a baddie. And underneath it says Colm. I think that's Colm. Colm? Colonel? Colen? I don't know what COWL stands for.

He was a Major General, so I don't know why it says Col. Colonel, it does look like the abbreviation for Colonel. But it could be that's a big U. Like it's a U and they've written it wrong, it's cool. Barks did. Yes. Regicide. Which as we all know means he killed Reg.

The story begins during the interregnum. Now I assume people who listen to this podcast know what that is. James, would you like to define the interregnum? Safe search off. Is it somebody who did the perineum? Is it around the body? It's sort of history's perineum, yeah. It's the bit between...

...Charles the First. Right. England's Willie and his son Charles the second, the bumhole of Britain. It refers to, I don't think it was as much fun as we've made it sound, Oliver Cromwell's reign or really the period after the Civil War, before the restoration. It didn't last that long. It wasn't that much fun, especially if you were Irish. It was quite dramatic and full of political intrigue. And people like Barksdead, who started out as a goldsmith on the Strand, became very

influential people. He became a very successful politician. Now, he was at the time Major General Sir John Barksdead, but nobody calls him the Sir anymore. I think if... No, they call him Coooooooo. I think if Cromwell made him a Sir, it doesn't count, I think. He's been uncirred. He was one of the judges who signed the death warrant of Charlie Wong, King Charles I. And he became Lieutenant of the Tower of London. And he was known for squeezing money

out of royalist prisoners. And this seems to be more than just like royalist propaganda. Everybody seems to have hated him. It were lots of rumors about his cruelty and his avariciousness and his dirty dealings. Would you like to hear a contemporary conspiracy theory about old Johnny Barks? Yes, please. All right, it's not related to the story, but it's a a contemporary conspiracy theory about old Johnny Barks? Yes, please.

It's not related to the story, but it's a good old conspiracy theory. So we all know that Oliver Cromwell was exhumed after his death and sort of posthumously executed, right? Yeah, we all know that. I think we've done a whole episode on it. Or do we? Maybe that's what the mainstream media want you to think. Some of us do our own research.

Did they exhume his twin? There's a proper JFK style conspiracy theory here. So if you do your own research in the Halean Miscellany of 1810, you'll hear a rumor that I think originated with John Barkshead's son, who was called John Barksdead II, the Squeakwell. The secret of the ooo's. This theory is that Cromwell on his deathbed conferred with Barksdead, and they arranged a secret burial for him in an unmarked grave in Naseby, and then held a second sham funeral, I quote, having all the theatrical honours

of a pompous funeral paid to an empty coffin, into which afterwards was removed the corpse of the martyr, that is, Charlie I. That if any sentence should be pronounced upon his body, it might effectually fall upon that of the King. Oh. In King Charles the Second's time, the tomb was broken down and the body taken out of a coffin so inscribed was from thence conveyed to Tyburn and to the utmost joy and triumph of that crew of miscreants hung publicly on the gallows amidst an infinite crowd of spectators.

No. Infinite. Impossible. That's... It was not infinite. There wasn't enough space. Because then we'd have all been there. This crowd was almost infected with the noisiness of the stench.

The secret being only amongst that abandoned few, there was no doubt in the rest of the people, but that the bodies so exposed were the bodies they were said to be, had not some whose curiosity had brought them nearer to the tree, observed with horror the remains of accountants they had little expected there, and that on tying the cord there was a strong seam about the neck by which the head had been fastened again to the body. Ah, so was it. That was going to be my, I'm going to blow this case wide open moment. When they came to re-behead, well behead the body of Oliver. Yeah, they would have said this body's been re-headed. It's my son. You're just making work for yourself. And then this time the executioner was a woman, you sexists. No, I thought maybe the executioner went,

that was very easy. That was worryingly easy. I think you've just been like, I'm so good at this. I have been really worried about myself as an executioner, but I think today it clicked. Well, you might say, that's I don't know. Maybe it was standard to sew the head back on for burial. But I do have this picture of Charles the First.

And you can see the head of Charles the First. There's a clear seam and on the neck, you can see the stitching. And there are three women representing England, Scotland and Wales who are mourning. And some of them are so sad that their baps have come out. I think I know which one's England. England is showing a lot of décolletage. I think it's that kind of crying where your shoulders shake with those kind of dresses it's a risk. And there's a clear seam on his neck,

you can see the stitching on his neck. He's dead. So Cromwell died in 1658. And after that, things start to get sticky for John Barksdead. In 1659, Barksdead was called up to face the Committee of Grievances. And he was publicly accused of being, quote, a minister of mischief. And remember, in those days, mischief was way worse than it is now.

It does sound like he's got it. People were always like, I met the devil, minister of mischief. And remember in those days, mischief was way worse than it is now. People were always like, I met the devil, king of naughtiness. Mischief was very bad. He was accused of being a minister of mischief and a bum bailiff. A what? A bum. It does not mean what it sounds like it means. A bum with an M.

A bum bailiff. That's just like dates, isn't it? Or like a fibrous diet is a bum bailiff. You know what I mean? It's absolutely not about repossessing anything in the vicinity of a bum. Which is removing things from the bum to sell them off, to pay the debt. That's what I mean. A bum bailiff was like somebody who collected on, I think, like dubious debts.

So like, you know, extortionist really, like a loan shark extortionist, somebody who was taking money that they shouldn't have been taking. Okay. He was accused of those things in a short pamph or pamphlet entitled, Invisible John Made Visible or A Grand Pimp of Tyranny Portrayed. And yeah, it was hard to tell who was a pimp in those days because they all wore those hats with the feddies. But there it is.

Oh wow. Yeah, Invisible John Made Visible. And basically he had been extorting money for years and years and years and now finally the heat was on. So in Mysteries of the Tower of London by Geoff Abbott, there's a very detailed account of this story. And Geoff Abbott writes, fearing the worst, Barkshead was galvanized into action. Such was the vigilance of the yeoman warders and soldiers on duty at the gates.

The removal of the fortune from the precincts of the tower was obviously out of the question. Accordingly, he packed his ill-gotten gains, doubtless comprising gold coins, into Butterfurkins. A friend of the family. Let's hope no bumbe lifts come by. Let's hope no bumbe lifts come by. No, of course. Of course, Butterfurkin's was not. A cute, shorter gentleman, as I picture him. A furkin is a barrel. Yeah, we know this.

I learned this from my old school teacher, Noel Jackson, who claimed that it was the origin of the phrase, two furkin big and two furkin small. Oh, cheeky teacher. Yeah. Butter barrels, essentially. So he packed the gold coins into barrels and buried them in a cellar within or near the lieutenant's lodgings, now called the Queen's House, hoping that should the worst come to the worst, perhaps he could return to the tower someday and retrieve the loot. His presentiments proved correct, for on the 10th of June that year, he was severely reprimanded

and being dismissed from his post, he retired to his estate at Acton in Middlesex. So that's the words of Geoff Abbott on the subject. It gets a lot worse after that for him, of course, because 1659 is the return of Charlie II, the legend of Curley's gold, to England. Barxhead realises which way the wind is blowing. He escaped to Germany, but he was arrested during a visit to Holland, which I mentioned principally because it happened on a place called Hoeftstrad. Oh.

Hoeft. Hoeft. Strad. Strad. He was arrested with two other regicides, John Oakey and Miles Corbett. And basically they were sold out by Sir George Downing of Downing Street fame. Oh. Yeah. And nobody likes Downing. fame. Oh, yeah.

And nobody likes Downing. He's the worst guy in history. So he was loyal to Cromwell, but very quickly switched sides. And he's famous for being sort of a conniving cheat. So it's possible, possibly an opportunity for some Radio 4 style satire. Imagine Dining Street being associated with just political expediency and saying, whatever you need to say. Yeah, I can't.

That's good, wasn't it? Needless to say, Barksdale and the back in England hung, drawn and quartered along with Oakey and Corbett in 1662. And that is the end of chapter one. James. Yes. Would you like to give me another legend and please tell me there's a ghost in it? Oh, yes. OK, then. OK, then.

First of all, in a book published in 1860, referring to October 1817, Edmund Lenthal Swift, he was serving as keeper of the crown jewels and he was sitting at dinner with his wife, son and sister-in-law and then, and this is going to be him, what sort of voice do you think he should have old Edmund Lenthal Swift? I looked up and saw a cylindrical figure like a glass tube. It's Alan Bennett I said. Seemingly about the thickness of my arm and hovering between the ceiling and the table.

I said it to Bowie. about the thickness of me arm and hovering between the ceiling and the table. I said it to Bowie. Sentence of Bowie. Its contents appear to be a dense fluid, white and pale azure, like to the gathering of a summer cloud, and incessantly rolling and mingling within the cinders. The countdown for it to become Harry H. Corbett is on. Mingling within the cylinder. The countdown for it to become Harry H. Corbett is on.

Mingling within the cylinder, this lasted about two minutes when it began slowly to move before my sister-in-law, then following the oblong shape of the table before my son and myself. Passing behind my wife, it paused for a moment. I think it's Fagin now. Over her right shoulder, instantly she crouched down and with both hands covering her, I don't know what's happened, it's crumpled. Instantly she crouched down and with both hands covering her shoulder she shrieked

out, oh Christ, it has seized me. Even now while writing I feel the fresh horror of that moment. I caught up my chair, struck at the wainscot behind her. Neither my sister-in-law nor my son beheld this appearance. A cylindrical ghost. Yes, basically a glass, a floating glass full of milk. A ghost of a glass of milk attacked a man and his wife, but his sister-in-law and his son did never see it. Another time, a ninth century was alarmed by a figure of a huge bear coming from underneath a door.

Like sliding... like Flat Eric. Yeah, someone put a big picture of a bear, maybe. One of those like cinema standees and just shoved it under the door. We need to get this out of the room. There's no time to open the door. Just slide it under. Hopefully there's no night sentries in there that are going to get scared. But yes, he thrusted it with his bayonet, and it struck the door,

and it was carried senseless to the guard room. Two or three days later, he was dead. Did anyone say corpse corpse? Maybe the bear did. Cops, cops. I tried to get the idea, the thing about a bear is the wobbly nose when it roars. You know, when a bear roars

and the little end of its face goes like. It's not as good as my T-Rex impression, when a bear roars and the little end of its face goes, ah. Ah. Ah. Ah. Ah. It's not as good as my T-Rex impression, I'll give you that, but it's pretty good. Ah. Ah. Ah.

It's a bit Cliff Richard playing that bear, isn't it? Ah. Ah. So what, you want another ghost? You want a royal ghost now? Yeah, yes, yeah please, yes. Fine, it's also haunted by Anne Boleyn. Of course.

Mmm. And apparently one time, I don't know why I keep saying apparently, because we all know it's apparently. But one time a sentry looked into the church where an ethereal light was glowing and all the people, the royal people and the people of, you know, landed gentry that had been executed there over the years. We're having a big church service and Anne Boleyn was like the sort of the main DJ, the main guy. Yeah. Clap your hands. Superman. They're all in like different outfits based up to their times. What did those ghosts make of the thing? Do they know they were ghosts? And they're like, oh, these are ghosts from other times. What's going on? We'll never know. We'll simply never know. Answers on a postcard, if you have the answer. So, was that ghostly enough? That was very ghostly.

Thank you, James. You're welcome. Let's return to chapter two, enter the sandwich. Oh. There's only one more chapter after this. The titleism is good. So, while Barksdead was in prison, a woman calling herself Mary Barksdead,

apparently his wife, tried to visit him, but was turned away. Now there's no record of him having a wife called Mary. Some people seem to think he had a wife called Elizabeth, but either way, Mary is the source of the rumors of Barksdead's hoard. The next date in the story is the 30th of October 1662. That's very specific, isn't it? How do we know it was exactly that day? I'll tell you why because we are dealing with none other than famous diarist. Okay. Have you seen that TikTok where the kid can't pronounce Schweppes? Right.

He's talking about Pepsi Cola and he says, I don't know how to say that word, shaw-a-peepies? And the internet being a kind place, swiftly corrected him on his pronunciation of Schweppes. I can't read Samuel Peeps' name without wanting to call him Samuel Pepees. Now, but we're talking about Samuel Peeps, the famous London diarist. And he wrote on the 30th of October, 1662, good sleep, but little tonight for thoughts of my business. We've all been there.

Hmm. Bum, bum, bum, Samuel, are you thinking about your business in there? So up by candlelight and by water to Whitehall, and so to my Lord Sandwich. Oh, yes. Not an actual sandwich. Shame, shame.

Who was up in his chamber and all alone. Now, what had happened was an old friend of Sandwich had come by, Mr. Wade of Axiard, and he'd arrived with the rumors of Barksdead's treasure. Apparently, 7,000 pounds was buried in a cellar near the lieutenant's lodgings. Now, it seems to have gone from Mary Barksdead to someone called Captain Everett, then to Wade and finally to Sandwich.

I did the inflation calculator to work out how much money this is, but I did it backwards. So £7,000 now would be £45 in 1662. So that should put it in context for you. That's barely enough for a butter dish. I quickly realised my mistake and did it the other way around. It's over a million pounds. It's a lot of money. It's a lot of money, which is also over a million dollars, of course.

So it was going to be divvied up. It had been decided two grand to Wade, two grand to Lord Sandwich and three grand to Charlie to... Secret of the Ooze. Secret of the Ooze. We don't know, are there any other sequel suffixes we haven't used. Back in the Habit. Back in the Habit.

Of being King. Which seems unfair because the King's not involved in it at all. None of the money is going to go to Peeps, but Gessie's job it was going to be to dig it up. Yeah. Not Peeps, but some guy's Peeps pace to do it. But he's going to go there. He writes, if we get it, it may be I may be 10 or 20 pounds, the better for it.

And it's really hard to read some of his diary because you realize I've never really read any of Peeps' diary, but Peep Peep's diary. It's just a guy's diary. So in the entry where he's charged with finding buried treasure on behalf of the king, half of it is about going to the pub and realizing he should have brought his coat. There's more about that than there is about the treasure. Eventually, he had to send the boy back to the house to get his cloak, and then they go off and they look for treasure.

Anyway. And also his spelling is terrible. He's Barkstead and then he's Baxter. Like within paragraphs, he changes the spelling of people he knows his names. It's very weird. So peeps, along with a small ragtag team, had been given permission to dig and look for Barkstead's treasure.

They were looking for an arched vault with a floor of earth in or near the Lieutenant's lodgings. We went into several little cellars and then went out of doors to view and to the coal harbor. But none did answer so well to the marks which was given him to find it by as one arched vault. We set to it, to digging. We went to almost eight o'clock at night

but could find nothing. On November 1st, they try again to make one trial more where we stayed two or three hours digging and dug a great deal all under the arches and so we went away a second time like fools. He starts to doubt the information he's been given and the informants and they make a final try on November the 7th. And now privately the woman, Barksdead's great confidante, although he actually writes confident.

Just saying, supposedly a good writer. Wrong word. Bach says great confidant is brought who do positively say this is the place where he did say the money was hidden and where he and she did put up the £50,000 in Butterforkins. Which is a lot more money to put in Butterforkins. So that's £50,000. It's gone up to £50,000. which is a lot more money to put in Butterfork instead. So that's 50,000. It's gone up to 50 grand. Jeff Abbott has a theory about this. It could be that obviously that she's lying and keeps changing the amount of money. But the other possibility is that someone along that line,

Everett and Wade and Sandwich, shrunk the amount of money that was supposedly there so that the king didn't have to get as much of it. And so it could be either way, could be either way. 50,000 pounds will be like eight million quid. It's loads. It's a ridiculous amount. We full of hope did resolve to dig all over the cellar,

which by seven o'clock at night we performed. At noon we sent for a dinner, which I think must be the noon of night. The noon of night. Welcome return. Yeah, we're bringing it back. Friend of the show, noon of the night. And upon the head of a battle dine very merrily, and to work again.

But at last we saw we were mistaken, and after digging the cellar quite through, we were forced to pay our porters, who presumably had been doing the actual digging, and not just standing there wearing a ruff or something. I don't know. I don't know. And give over our expectations, though I do believe there must be money hid somewhere by him, or else he did delude this woman. So in conclusion, either there is money there, or there isn't.

Whoa, makes you think, doesn't it? Wow, wow, wow. And that, Cliffhanger, is the end of chapter two. The sandwich chapter. Yeah, that's the end of Enter the Sandwich. Exit the Sandwich. Mmm. Beyond Sandwich.

Got another bit of legend there for me, James. You've got a little bit more. This is unusually well structured. I'm alarmed. Okay, so, there's a couple of beliefs about the Tower of London. Things in the Tower of London will do things for you. In Peter Bushell's London Secret History, apparently women would stick pins in Henry VIII's codpiece, which was on show in the White Tower, not whilst it was on him. It would explain why he was in such a bad mood.

And apparently that would enhance their own chances of getting pregnant. And apparently so much blood has been spilt in the outer ward that grass refuses to grow there. In 1715, one of the Jacobites was incarcerated there. Sir William Wyndham, who was a very superstitious man, who had twice been warned by soothsayers that he needed to beware of a white horse. And now he took very good care never to get on a white horse. He would never go on a white horse. Much harder for him to avoid that than for us nowadays to avoid getting on a white horse,

because horse was one of the main forms of transport in those days. And he was carried to the tower because the Jacobite rebellion and he glanced up and above the door was the Hanoverian coat of arms. And that's what it is. It's a white horse. And he'd spent a bunch of time incarcerated at the tower. And on his release, he thought the prophecy was spent.

So he bought himself a magnificent white charger, which threw him and kicked him in the head. Wow. Wow. Yeah. But I've been rewatching the Final Destination films recently. And it really, really reminded me of that. Like, what? It added injury to injury. It threw him, and then it kicked him. That's a terrible business.

So yeah, that's a little bit of law from the tower there. That's the curse of the white horse. Brilliant. That's the curse of the white horse. Well, we've got an option now, and I think we might need to vote. Because I could go on to Chapter Three and then the scores, or we can have a little break for wee-wees and drinks. And so I suppose, should I throw that to the law folk?

Yeah, law folk. All right, let's have a quick break then. And I think James and I are just gonna stay here. Yes. You can go to the loo as well, people on the internet. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that was part one. And if you'd like to hear a whole live show with no break in the middle, come and see us on the 11th of October, right James?

2024. 2024. And it's going to be in a cemetery yeah but it's not and if you want more stuff join us at patreon.com forward slash lawmen pod and that's where stuff will be and thank you very much to all the people that do already support us there and come back here next week for part two of the Of the treasure in the tower. I did wonder who has come from the furthest today. California. California? You didn'tthest today. California? California! You didn't come today from California.

I came on Wednesday from California. In America? Seattle! Seattle, is that slightly further away? Oh, depends on the route, depends on the route. I'm from California too. What the... Where in California?

Wait a minute, Where in California? San Jose. Super San Francisco. You seem to be from two different places. At the same time. The San Jose Bay Area. Ah! South Bay.

Have you ever seen the old man of Monterey Bay? Is that your neck of the woods? A little further south, but yes. I've seen the old man of Monterey Bay. Is that your neck of the woods? A little further south, but yes. Wow. Yes, you've seen him? No.

Oh yes, that is the way. Okay, fair enough. Am I wrong? Seattle, is that the Pacific Northwest? The spookiest part of America. Is that near Spokane? Spokane. Spokane.

It's nearer than here. Shut up, Americans!