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ANCIENT PLACES OF SANCTUARY IN LONDON AND WESTMINSTER.

"No place indeed should murder sanctuarise."
SHAKSPEARE.


The principal sanctuaries were those in the neighbourhood of
Fleet-street, Salisbury-court, White Friars, Ram-alley, and Mitre-court;
Fulwood's-rents, in Holborn, Baldwin's-gardens, in Gray's-inn-lane; the
Savoy, in the Strand; Montague-close, Deadman's-place, the Clink, the
Mint, and Westminster. The sanctuary in the latter place was a structure
of immense strength. Dr. Stutely, who wrote about the year 1724, saw it
standing, and says that it was with very great difficulty that it was
demolished. The church belonging to it was in the shape of a cross, and
double, one being built over the other. It is supposed to have been
built by Edward the Confessor. Within this sanctuary was born Edward V.,
and here his unhappy mother took refuge with her son, the young Duke of
York, to secure him from the villanous proceedings of his cruel uncle,
the Duke of Gloucester, who had possession of his elder brother. The
metropolis at one time (says the Rev. Joseph Nightingale,) abounded with
these haunts of villany and wretchedness. They were originally
instituted for the most humane and pious purposes; and owe their origin
to one of the sacred institutions of the Mosaic law, which appointed
certain cities of refuge for persons who had accidentally slain any of
their fellow creatures. The institution, as Marmonides justly observes,
was a merciful provision both for the manslayer, that he might be
preserved, and for the avenger, that his blood might be cooled by the