Secret Chambers and Hiding Places - Historic, Romantic, & Legendary Stories & Traditions About - Hiding-Holes, Secret Chambers, Etc. by Allan Fea
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page 16 of 142 (11%)
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by, without throwing the least suspicion upon such unsuspicious
places. And whereas divers funnels are usually made to chimneys according as they are combined together, and serve for necessary use in several rooms, so here were some that exceeded common expectation, seeming outwardly fit for carrying forth smoke; but being further examined and seen into, their service was to no such purpose but only to lend air and light downward into the concealments, where such as were concealed in them, at any time should be hidden. Eleven secret corners and conveyances were found in the said house, all of them having books, Massing stuff, and Popish trumpery in them, only two excepted, which appeared to have been found on former searches, and therefore had now the less credit given to them; but Mayster Abbingdon would take no knowledge of any of these places, nor that the books, or Massing stuff, were any of his, until at length the deeds of his lands being found in one of them, whose custody doubtless he would not commit to any place of neglect, or where he should have no intelligence of them, whereto he could [not] then devise any sufficient excuse. [Illustration: HINDLIP HALL, WORCESTERSHIRE] Three days had been wholly spent, and no man found there all this while; but upon the fourth day, in the morning, from behind the wainscot in the galleries, came forth two men of their own voluntary accord, as being no longer able there to conceal themselves; for they confessed that they had but one apple between them, which was all the sustenance they had received during the time they were thus hidden. One of them was named Owen, who afterwards murdered himself in the Tower; and the other Chambers; |
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