button to main menu  Gents Mag 1849 part 2 p.253
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Gentleman's Magazine 1849 part 2 p.253
man to remain quiet under the injury he had received. He quickly assumed the offensive, and having, as the song says,

-- -- gathered a band
Of the best who would ride at his command,
the day after the siege was raised, rode to Kendal to make reprisals; passing the watch on duty at the outskirts, he was told that Colonel Briggs, it being Sunday, was at prayers, whereupon, without a moment's hesitation, he proceeded to the church. Having stationed his men to guard the approaches, he rode directly forward into the building in search of Briggs, dashing down the principal aisle into the midst of the congregation. Whatever were his intentions, whather to shoot the Colonel on the spot, or merely to carry him off prisoner, they were defeated; his foe was not present. The people were at first too much surprised at the appearance of such a warlike appartition to offer opposition, and in the confusion into which they were thrown the dauntless intruder, discovering that his object could not be effected, was suffered to ride out of the church through another aisle. In making his exit his head struck violently against the arch of the doorway, which was much lower than that under which he had entered, when his helmet, unclasped by the blow, fell to the ground. Stooping to recover it, the saddle-girths gave way, or as some have said he was assaulted, the griths cut, and himself unhorsed. The congregation, recovering from their amazement, and taking advantage of his discomfiture, hastened to seize him; but his followers, rushing in to his assistance, drove back the assailants, and rescued him by their vigorous charge. In the melée the major killed the man who had seized him, threw the saddle upon his horse, and, ungirthed as it was, vaulted into the seat. His men closed around, and riding full speed through the streets, by an early hour in the afternoon made good his retreat to the strong-hold on the lake. The captured helm was afterwards hung aloft as a momento of the action, and to this incident the world is indebted for the following poetical description in "Rokeby" of a similar scene:

All eyes upon the gateway hung,
When through the gothic arch there sprung
A horseman armed, at headlong speed.
Sable his cloak, his plume, his steed;
Fire from the flinty floor was spurn'd,
The vaults unwonted clang return'd!
One instant's glance around he threw,
From saddle bow his pistol drew,
Grimly determined was his look,
His charger with his spurs he struck.
All scattered backward as he came,
For all knew Bertram Risingham.
Three bounds that noble courser gave,
The first had reach'd the central nave,
The second clear'd the chancel wide,
The third he was at Wycliffe's side.

While yet the smoke the deed conceals,
Bertram his ready charger wheels,
But floundered on the pavement floor
The steed, and down his rider bore,
And bursting in the headlong sway,
The faithless saddle-girths gave way.
'Twas while he toil'd him to be freed,
And with the rein to raise the steed,
That from amazement's iron trance
All Wycliffe's soldiers waked at once.
This exploit of the Major's was long held in general rememberance by the country round, and the fame of its excessive temerity preseved in a ballad of the times, entitled "Dick and the Devil," which is exceedingly rare
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