Jewish Ritual Murder, England Before 1290
“THE first known case happened in 1144; after that, cases cropped up from time to time until the Jews were expelled from the realm by Edward I. The most famous of these cases was that of Little St. Hugh of Lincoln in 1255.
“I record these cases in chronological order; and I do not deny the possibility of some of them in which details are lacking, being “trumped-up” ones, where death may have been due to causes other than ritual murder and the jews blamed for it; but the case of St. Hugh, particularly, was juridically decided, and the Close and Patent Rolls of the Realm record definitely cases at London, Winchester and Oxford. There seems no reason to doubt that many cases of ritual murder have been unsuspected and even undiscovered.
“1144. Norwich. A twelve-year-old boy was crucified and his side pierced at the jewish Passover. His body was found in a sack hidden in a tree. A converted jew, called Theobald of Cambridge, confessed that the jews took blood every year from a Christian child because they thought that only by so doing could they ever obtain their freedom and return to Palestine, and that it was their custom to draw lots to decide whence the blood was to be supplied; Theobald said that last year the lot fell to Narbonne but in this year to Norwich. The boy was locally beatified and has ever since been known as St. William. The Sheriff, probably bribed, refused to bring the jews to trial.
“1160. Gloucester. The body of a child named Harold was found in the river with the usual wounds of crucifixion. Sometimes wrongly dated 1168. Recorded in Monumenta Germaniæ Historica, Vol. VI (Erfurt Annals); Polychronicon, R. Higdon; Chronicles, R. Grafton, p. 46.
“1181. Bury St. Edmunds. A child called Robert was sacrificed at Passover. The child was buried in the church and its presence there was supposed to cause ‘miracles.’ Authority: Rohrbacher, from the Chronicle of Gervase of Canterbury. (more…)


