quotes Udall to the effect that Holdsworth, his successor at Newcastle, was already acting as pastor when he arrived. Udall was asked whether his ministry at Newcastle was authorised by the bishop of the diocese. He replied that both the bishopric of Durham and the archbishopric of York were vacant during the period of his ministry. He refused to say whether he was the author of the Demonstration and Diotrephes. He acknowledged that Penry had passed through Newcastle three months before, but had merely saluted him at his door. The council ordered Udall's detention in the Gatehouse Prison at Westminster. A second examination by the council followed on 13 July 1590, when similar questions were put to the prisoner and similar answers made by him. Courtroom and aftermath On 24 July 1590 Udall was placed on trial at the Croydon assizes, before Justice Robert Clarke and Serjeant John Puckering, on a charge of having published ‘a wicked, scandalous, and seditious libel’ entitled A Demonstration. The indictment was laid under the statute 23 Eliz. cap. 3, which was aimed at attacks on the government made in print by Roman Catholics. Udall had Nicholas Fuller as counsel, though he was expelled for protesting the judge's directions to the jury. The prosecution depended on the written depositions previously obtained from witnesses in the high commission court. The judges invited Udall to deny on oath that he was author of the incriminated tract. This he refused to do. He was found guilty, but sentence was deferred, and he was ordered to be imprisoned in the White Lion prison in Southwark. Subsequently, he was offered a pardon if he would sign a recantation, but he declined to accept the terms proposed. In February 1591 he was brought to the bar of the Southwark assizes, and raised some arguments in arrest of judgment. Sentence of death was passed on him, and he was carried back to prison. No attempt was made to carry out the sentence, but Udall remained a prisoner. Past supporters, who had shown sympathy with Udall's religious views in earlier days, including Sir Walter Ralegh and Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, interested themselves on his behalf. Alexander Nowell visited Udall bringing Lancelot Andrewes as his chaplain, on behalf of the privy council; and efforts were made for his release particularly by Nowell. Udall sued for liberty to go to church; permission was