But the thoughts of that nobleman were far removed from such trivial subjects, if credence was to be placed in his words and actions. By sound of trumpet and proclamation the inhabitants of the Isle of Wight were summoned to a general muster at Shide Bridge, a place already celebrated by a previous muster to take account of the military strength of the island in the reign of King Edward the Second, held by John de la Hoese and John de Lisle.
Thither on the day appointed the gentry of the island, with the yeomen and country people, wended their way. The Bailiffs of Newport, Newtown, Yarmouth, and Brading, accompanied by the richer of the burgesses of those boroughs, attended. There were the bailiffs and stewards of the various estates held by the ecclesiastical bodies of Winchester College, Whorwell Monastery, Christchurch Priory, and Ashey; while the Abbot of Quarr, the Prior of Carisbrooke, representing the Carthusian monastery of Shene, and the Bailiff of Appuldurcombe, for the nunnery of St Clare, without Aldgate, were also present. There came, besides, the reeves of the manors belonging to the imprisoned Earl of Warwick, from Brixton and Swainston. There were representatives of all the island families: Sir Nicholas Wadham, Sir John Oglander, Sir William Lisle of Wootton, Master Meaux, recovered from his rough handling of five months before, a Bowerman from Brooke, Trenchards from Watchingwell and Shalfleet, a Dineley from Woolverton, a Cheke from Mattistone, the Bowermans of Austerborne or Osborn, John Racket of Knighton, and his relative by marriage, Leigh of Woolverton in Bembridge, a Hawles of the ancient family of De Aula from Stenbury Manor. There were Urrys, Keyneys, De Heynos, Bruyns, with many others too numerous to mention, and a crowd of the lesser yeomen and common people. When all were assembled, the Captain of the Wight, in full armour, but with bare head, mounted on his splendid charger, and surrounded by his seneschals, esquires, and pages, addressed the crowd.
In a stirring speech he explained the situation. He told how many evils the French had inflicted upon their forefathers. How in Edward the First's reign they had threatened the island, but were daunted by the stout preparations of the ancestors of many there present. How again in Edward the Third's time they harassed the island by their evil depredations, until under the brave Sir Theobald Russel of Yaverland, who gave his life for his people, they were driven out with loss and shame. How again in Richard the Second's reign the whole island was overrun, and cruel damage inflicted, when all their towns were in flames, and no place safe but the Castle of Carisbrooke. But here again the ancient valour of their race broke out, and under the stout Sir Hugh Tyrrel, "that right hardy knight," they chased the false Frenchmen to their ships, slaying them by scores, "insomuch that from that day Deadman's Lane went by no other name, and Neddie's Hill is still there to show the burial place of the marauders." Again how valorously they drove off Waleran de St Pol, that "noble knight of haut lineage," and frightened away the caitiffs again a few years after; while in Henry the Fifth's time they slew many who were running away to their ships.