The burning of the North Gate, 1497, Exeter

Greetings card showing the burning of the North Gate, 1497, Exeter

A painting held in the Royal Albert Memorial Museum reproduced on the Mayor of Exeter's Christmas card.

The North Gate of Exeter was one of the four gates into the city and offered access from north Devon. It was the narrowest of the four gates and reached by crossing the muddy slope and a stream in the Longbrook valley below before climbing to enter the gate. By Townsend’s day the Iron Bridge had been constructed as one of several attempts to resolve the problems of access through this gate. The North Gate was one of the first to be demolished, in 1769. A weathervane in the form of a winged wyvern flew over the gate, as seen in this image. The wyvern is a mythological bird, the symbol of the Roman legion which came to Exeter in AD50-55. A replica now sits on a post opposite the City Gate hotel on the site of the lost gate and the original wyvern can be seen in the RAM museum.

The scene imagined by Townsend in this painting is of the assault on the North Gate by supporters of Perkin Warbeck, the pretender to the English throne, in 1497. Attempts are being made to burn down the wooden gates while local residents continue to enjoy their ale at the tables outside the public house. Warbeck was finally captured and hanged on the orders of Henry V11. Townsend never saw this gate so must have used old engravings to create this imagined reconstruction of the event.

This picture is watercolour on paper and was painted in the mid-19th century.

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