ROBERT DYMOKE, Layman., 1580

HEREDITARY CHAMPION OF ENGLAND

Biography

SCRIVELSBY COURT (demolished 1961), Lincolnshire,

the home of the Dymokes, was one of the centres of the Rising in that county. The " articles of grievance " devised by the insurgents were drawn up by the Dymokes. Robert had so far conformed as to attend the Protestant service, while he harboured a priest, B. Kirkman, in his house disguised as a schoolmaster to his sons. This act of hospitality, with the risks it involved, seems to have procured for him the grace of complete conversion. On July 24, 1580, Robert and his wife, Lady Bridget, were indicted for hearing Mass and for non-attendance at the Protestant service. Though helplessly paralysed, he was carried to Lincoln, and in a miserable prison there fell dangerously ill. Even when dying he was not left in peace. " They come," writes Father Persons, "when he is wrestling with the pangs of death. Even then the ministers do not permit him to die, as he desires, a Catholic death. They urge him to pray such sorry prayers of their own making as in health he contemned, in sickness with open voice he rejected, and now dumb and half dead, by his countenance, by signs and tokens, and by gesture of his body, he did utterly contemn and abhor."

" Who by faith conquered kingdoms, wrought justice, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions."—HEB. xi. 33.