Letter from Queen Elizabeth I soon back home in Ghent
On 30 December 1578, Elizabeth I, Queen of England and Ireland, signed a letter in Richmond addressed to the Ghent official Jan van Hembyse. This historic unique document was saved at the last minute from an auction in Great Britain. It will be kept in the Ghent city archives.
Jan van Hembyse governed his city under protestant rule from 1578 until his death in 1584. There, he led the so-called Calvinist Republic, that resisted the Spaniards and royalist Catholics. The British monarch, Elizabeth I (1533-1603), was concerned about the fate of captured Catholic nobility in Ghent and urged Jan van Hembyse to give them a fair trial before a recognised jury. She addressed him in his capacity as First Alderman of the Keure, the most important of the two benches of aldermen in Ghent.
Neither the archivists nor the researchers of the archive sources of the Ghent Calvinist Republic knew of the existence of this government document. Until it popped up last month at an auctioneers in Edinburgh, Scotland. Fortunately, they agreed to Ghent's request to transfer the letter, for a payment in pounds amounting to €23,177 to the current owner. In its appeal, the city made reference to the widely acknowledged destination principle in professional archiving and the fact that it concerns a political document sent to a person in their public rather than private position.