the town ran high between Catholics and reformers, plebeians and richer citizens, sects and town-council. A number of disturbances took place in the town, usually involving the lower classes and frequently resulting in acts of violence against the Catholic monks. On 14 April 1521, a ‘Letter of the 12 Apostles and 72 Disciples’ was posted up in the town, addressed to the Lutheran/Humanist reformer Johann Sylvanus Egranus, who had crossed swords with Müntzer and Storch on several occasions already. Egranus was described now as the “desecrator and slanderer of God ... who hounds God’s servant ... a heretical rogue”. The letter was almost certainly the work of Storch's group, but it defended both Storch and Müntzer jointly. It enumerated, in verse, all the false doctrines of Egranus, his denial of the suffering of the soul, his worship of the ‘world’ and of money, and his preference for the company of ‘bigwigs’ : “And you seek mere chattles, cash and praise, But that’s the last thing you’ll get from the 72 Disciples, And just watch what you’ll get from the 12 Apostles, And then even more from the Master... And we want to prove in writing that you’re an arch-heretic” In a defamatory letter of that same month, Müntzer was depicted thus: “at that time preacher at St Katharine’s, [he] made them [the Storchites] his supporters, won over the weavers, particularly one named Nichol Storch, whom he praised so mightily from the pulpit, raised him above all other priests as the only one who knew the Bible better and who was highly favoured by the Spirit...that Storch dared to give corner-sermons beside Thomas... Thus this Nichol Storch was favoured by Master Thomas; who recommended from the pulpit that laymen should be our prelates and priests”. Although this same report talked of the ‘Storchite sect’, there is no indication that this included Müntzer: indeed, the report states that the ‘secta Storchitorum ... conspired and gathered together as Twelve Apostles and Seventy-Two other Disciples ... reinforced by Master Thomas and his followers’, which strongly suggests that there were two separate groupings. In the event, the town-council retained enough authority in April to crack down on the unrest. Müntzer was forced to flee the town on 16 April, after yet another riot by Storch's supporters, 56 of whom were put behind bars. One of Müntzer's friends, Markus Stübner (or Thoma) of Elsterberg, accompanied Müntzer