A Heavy Price to Pay

According to Peter Ackroyd, there was a “thriving homosexual community" in London in 1339  (London: The Biography). You would not know this from reading most history books about the city or, indeed, anything very much about homosexuality before or after the 14th century. However, historiography has caught up a little in recent years so I am only going to give one small example of what happened to gay men in the early 18th century.

The following are verbatim accounts of cases that were tried at the Old Bailey in the year 1726-7 [taken from the wonderful Old Bailey Online website, http://www.oldbaileyonline.org/ ]. The charges were what was almost invariably described as “the heinous and detestable Sin of Sodomy.” Interestingly, in similar accounts of the time, reference was also often made to the fact that the “crime” was “unknown in Christian countries” although this was rather belied by the number and regularity of the charges brought. In most cases the defendants were acquitted for lack of evidence. I have chosen all of my extracts from the year 1726-7, although the accounts are quite typical of any in the late-17^th and 18^th centuries. Some of the 17^th–century cases aren’t suitable for a blog, not this blog anyway, as the accounts are quite detailed and luridly (I hesitate to use the word ‘lingeringly’) described. Some of them are taken from Ordinary’s Accounts, which were written up by the chaplain of Newgate prison after a last interview with a condemned prisoner. They were supposed to give an opportunity for the admission of guilt and repentance. Sometime they were.

The events below mostly took place in the unfortunately-named Mrs. Clap’s house in Holborn, London. She kept what was well-known as a “molly house,” a pejorative name for a place where homosexuals and cross-dressers met. Three of the men who were convicted, Gabriel Lawrence, William Griffin and Thomas Wright, were hanged at Tyburn on 9^th May 1726. Others were sentenced to a time in the public pillory. In case anyone thinks this was a lenient sentence, contemporary accounts describe prisoners being pelted with “with tubs of blood, garbage, and ordure from their slaughter-houses, and with this ammunition, plentifully diversified with dead cats, turnips, potatoes, addled eggs, and other missiles.” Homosexuals who were pilloried were quite often also hit by stones and bricks and it was not uncommon for them to receive fatal injuries. It all seems to me to be a heavy price to pay for love.

"9^th May 1726, Ordinary’s Account

Gabriel Lawrence was indicted for feloniously committing with Thomas Newton, aged 30 Years, the heinous and detestable Sin of Sodomy. Thomas Newton thus depos'd. At the End of last June, one Peter Bavidge (who is not yet taken) and - Eccleston (who dy'd last Week in Newgate) carry'd me to the House of  Margaret Clap (who is now in the Compter) and there I first became acquainted with the Prisoner. Mrs. Clap's House was next to the Bunch of Grapes in Field-lane, Holbourn. It bore the publick Character of a Place of Entertainment for Sodomites, and for the better Conveniency of her Customers, she had provided Beds in every Room in her House. She usually had 30 or 40 of such Persons there every Night, but more especially on a Sunday. I was conducted up one pair of Stairs, and by the Perswasions of Bavidge (who was present all the Time) I suffer'd the Prisoner to commit the said Crime. He has attempted the same since that Time, but I never would permit him any more. When Mrs. Clap was taken up, in February last, I went to put in Bail for her; at which Time, Mr. Williams, and Mr. Willis told me, they believ'd I could give Information, which I promis'd to do, and I went next Day, and gave Information accordingly. - Samuel Stephens thus depos'd. Mrs. Clap's House was notorious for being a Molly-House. - In order to detect some that frequented it, I have been there several Times, and seen 20 or 30 of 'em together, making Love, as they call'd it, in a very indecent Manner. Then they used to go out by Pairs, into another Room, and at their return, they would tell what they had been doing together, which they call'd marrying. The Prisoner acknowledg'd, that he had been several Times at Clap's House, but never knew that it was a Rendesvouz for such Persons. - He call'd several to his Character. Henry Hoxan thus depos'd. I have kept the Prisoner Company, and served him with Milk these 18 Years, for he is a Milk Man , and I am a Cow-Keeper, I have been with him at the Oxfordshire Feast, and there we have both got drink, and come Home together in a Coach, and yet he never offer'd any such thing to me. Thomas Fuller thus depos'd. The Prisoner married my Daughter, 18 Years ago; She has been dead these 7 Years, and he has a Girl by her, that is 13 Years old. - Several others deposd, that he was a very sober Man, and that they had often been in his Company when he was drunk; but never found him inclinable to such Practices. Guilty . Death . He was a 2d. Time indicted, for committing Sodomy with   Mark Partridge , Nov. 10 . But being Convicted of the Former, he was not Try'd for this.

"20^th May 1726

William Griffin was indicted for Committing Sodomy with Thomas Newton, May 10. Thomas Newton thus depos'd. The Prisoner and Thomas Phillips (who is since absconded) were Lodgers for near 2 Years at Clap's House. I went up stairs, while the Prisoner was a Bed, and there he committed the Act with me. Samuel Stevens depos'd, That he had seen the Prisoner, and his Gang at Clap's House. Guilty. Death.

"20^th May 1726

George Kedear, alias Kegar, was indicted for committing Sodomy with Edward Courtney, aged 18 Years, July 15. Edward Courtney thus depos'd. I first became acquainted with the Prisoner, when I was a Servant at the Yorkshire Gray in Bloomsbury Market, but I went afterwards to live at a Cook's Shop in  St. Martins Lane and there the Prisoner follow'd me He came there to Dine in July last, and sat in a back Room in the Yard. I went to fetch away the Plates, he took me in his Arms and kist me, and sollicited me to let him commit Sodomy with me. I consented, and he committed the Fact. I afterwards went to live at Thomas Orme 's a Silk-Dyer, at the Red Lyon in Crown Court in Knaves Acre, and he kept a House for entertaining such Persons, and sold Drink in private back Rooms; and there the Prisoner came often after me to persuade me to do the same again. The Prisoner thus made his defence. Ned Courtney ask'd me to do it; but I told him I could not, for I had got an injury. What, says he, I suppose I am not handsome enough for you, but if you don't like me, I have got a pretty younger Brother, and I'le fetch him fir you. - As for going to Tom Orme 's, he was my School Fellow, and sold a Pot of good. Drink Ned there again solicited me to do it, and beg'd me to go into the Privy . He was afterwards turn'd out of his Place, and I met him in a very poor Condition, and he told me that he had nothing to subsist upon but what he got by doing such things. - I advis'd him to leave off that course of Life; but he said he wanted Money, and must have it, and if I would not help him to some, he'd swear my Life away. The Prisoner call'd 2 or 3 Women to his Character, who Swore that he was a very civil courteous Fellow. The Jury found him Guilty. Death .

"22^nd Feb 1727

Richard Skews and  James Coltis, were indicted for Sodomitical Practices at a  Tavern in Drury-Lane, (where 'tis thought they might had a more Natural Entertainment) on the 19th of Jan. last. Roger Davis depos'd. That some Time after the Prisoner came to his House, his Drawer told him there was two Men above Stairs, which he did believe to be Sodomites, for he heard them kissing each other, and saw such Actions as was very unseemly for Men to offer; upon which he raised a Ladder in the Yard, and which the Drawer look'd into the Chamber-Window; where they both had an ocular Proof of what they both suspected: But the particular Relation being too Beastly to appear in this Paper, we refer the Reader to the Pillory, where he may see the Heads, &c. the Jury found them both guilty .

"Richard Skews and James Coltis, for Sodomitical Practices, to stand on the Pillory, to suffer one Year's Imprisonment, and to give Security for one Year more."

Shakespeare & Suffolk

This isn't really a blog as it's taken from an article written by Emma Cullum. First published in the East Anglian Magazine, April 1964:

So few facts are known about the first 28 years of William Shakespeare's life, that some very doubtful legends have gathered round them. The borough of Stratford-on-Avon, swelling with pilgrim-tourists, has not unnaturally claimed as much as possible of the poet-dramatist. A close study of the early plays indicates that Shakespeare was travelling around England when he was much younger than is suggested in the hitherto generally accepted accounts.
Why are the Wars of the Roses the theme of the first plays attributed to Shakespeare? If, as is at present urged, Shakespeare attended Stratford Grammar School from the age of 11 to 16; was then buried in this small provincial town until he was 24 or 25 and wrote the plays as a poor hireling, he would have had small opportunity to acquire interest in or a knowledge of history. We know that English history was not included in the curriculum of Stratford Grammar School and there is no evidence that copies of the chronicles which he uses were available there.
The reasons advanced for the choice of the subject are the patriotic fervour consequent on the victory over the Armada in 1588 and the expedition of the Earl of Essex to Normandy in 1592. Yet Henry VI tells not of England's glory but of its disintegration and the loss of overseas possessions.
In the 1580s, the Earl of Oxford gathered round him a group of poets, playwrights and men of letters. He had houses in London, a manor at Lavenham, a favourite 'country muses' at Wivenhoe and his ancestral castle at Hedingham. If Shakespeare was present at one of his literary house-parties, he might well have had occasion to contrast the castle of Hedingham with the neighbouring castle at Clare.
Even to-day, Hedingham castle stands triumphant. Clare castle is a sombre warning to those who, like its former owners, the Mortimers, aspire to power and are laid low. In Shakespeare's time the new ruins must have been even more awe-inspiring. The three parts of Henry VI and the sequel, Richard III, unfold the story of the claims of the Plantagenet-Mortimers to the throne and their eventual downfall. The Duke of Clarence, son of Edward III, and Edmond Mortimer, their bones brought home from foreign lands, are both buried in the nearby Priory of Clare.
It is significant that although Shakespeare drew his material from the chronicles of Halle and Holinshed, he gave the story of the Wars of the Roses a different slant. He tells it as it would have been related by a member of the East Anglian De Vere family, Earls of Oxford. The De Veres first upheld the Lancastrian cause and then protected and advanced to the throne, Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond. Although the Earl of Oxford, who appears in the play, has only a minor role, he is one of the very few who is consistently praised in a drama in which most of the characters appear as weak or evil:
'Oxford that did ever fence the right . . .' It is improbable that the early plays  of Shakespeare which we know, the fragments thought to be his and some pieces of his which are no doubt lost, were the work of a single author composing in seclusion. The plays 'grew in action'. One man made a draft; another revised it; actors improvised. There were few theatres in our sense. Performances took place for various occasions and before widely different audiences—the Queen and her nobles; the law students of the Inns of Court; a crowd of burgesses or 'country bumpkins' in a market place. Shakespeare showed great skill in adapting his plays and introducing passages to please the different localities through which a group of touring players passed: his introduction of 'the men of Bury', for example, and of the grievance of the enclosure of the common lands of Long Melford. Since there was no scenery, the actors no doubt made the fullest possible use of the background against which a piece happened to be performed— the garden of a stately home, a castle wall, the balcony of an inn yard. It is tempting to think that the tremendous scenes of Henry VI part II, which are set in Bury St. Edmunds, were originally played in the buildings of the Abbey, where the nobles really had gathered 150 years before. Through the still magnificent gateway, Henry VI and his peers must have ridden to that fatal parliament, which Shakespeare so vividly describes; and in an inner chamber the Duke of Gloucester was foully murdered. It is claimed that the early plays are full of the images of the Warwickshire countryside and reflect the life of sixteenth century Stratford and its neighbourhood. Such a general claim might be made on behalf of almost any county in the southern half of England. What is more striking is how many phrases and turns of speech, occurring in the plays, are still alive in Suffolk today:
'Lards the lean earth as he walks along . . .' (Henry IV). (To lard is to sweat heavily, as a horse does.)
'Your sauciness will jet upon my love . . .' (Comedy of Errors.)
(This line has long puzzled scholars. A 'jet'—a peculiarly Suffolk word—is a scoop with a long handle for clearing ponds and ditches. I take the phrase to mean 'diminish'. The word also appears in Titus Andronicus.)
'I'd rather be a canker in the hedge than a rose in his grace.' (Much Ado.)
(The 'canker' is the Suffolk word for a rose hip.)
'I know a hawk from a handsaw.'   (Hamlet.)
('Handsaw' or 'Harnser' is still the Suffolk word for a heron.)
'I doubt he will be dead.'   (King John.)
'Now they are clapper clawing one another.' (Troilus and Cressida.)
(This was a game of pulling off caps, played by boys at school.)
'We will draw cuts for the senior.' (Comedy of Errors.)
(Drawing lots by pieces of cut straw held in the
 hand.)
'Sowle the Porter of the Roman Gates by the ears.' (Coriolanus.)
(To pull, especially a dog tugging at a pig's ear.)
'In a twink she won me to her love.' (Taming of the Shrew.)
"Twere not amiss to keep our door hatched.'' (Pericles.)
An expression I have not heard out of Suffolk is a 'tizzicking' cough (Troilus and Cressida).
'Finnick' is used here of giving oneself airs. In Lear there occurs 'a finical rogue'.
The old lady down the road (who is one of my main sources of dialect) once said: 'tomorrow'll be enough to flee yar.' 'Flee' of course is Suffolk for 'skin' but Hamlet speaks of 'flaw', referring to the wind, probably the same derivation.
In his delightful book The Suffolk Dialect of the 20th Century (Norman Adlard 1960), Mr. A. O. D. Clayton gives further examples.
It may be that such expressions once existed in other counties also and that they have survived in Suffolk because it has been less subjected to the destructive effects of so-called modern civilisation.
Shakespeare spoke for all England but at least such metaphors as
'With russet yeas and honest kersey noes . . .' (L.L.L.) and Prince Hal's description of Falstaff as 'that roasted Manningtree ox with the pudding in his belly' sprang from our own part of the countryside.

Evil May Day: Hostility to Immigrants in London, 1517

David Cameron’s decision to make a speech about immigration in the run up to local elections may be surprising to some. It is unusual for a political leader in Britain, whether a monarch or a Prime Minister, to make such an overt statement about immigration http://www.anhourago.co.uk/show.aspx?l=8377478&d=501 Nevertheless, there is a history of violent, albeit short-lived outbursts of anti-foreign feeling in Britain, usually as a result of rabble-rousing by a demagogue like Oswald Mosley.

One example took place in London in 1517 and became known as “Evil May Day.” This sudden, and probably terrifying, riot occurred two weeks after an inflammatory sermon by a Dr. Bell, in which he appealed to "Englishmen to cherish and defend themselves, and to hurt and grieve aliens for the common weal." Attacks on foreigners began immediately, but events came to a head on the first of May when apprentices, later joined by Thames watermen and city porters (these three groups seemed always to be up for a riot) ran wild in the city of London, attacking foreigners, looting their homes and shops. In this case, the “foreigners” were mainly French, but such outbreaks of aggression took place periodically, aimed at Jews, or the Dutch or other groups who were identified as being an economic threat to the indigenous population.

Here’s a contemporary account from Hall’s Chronicle (ca. 1548) which was sympathetic to the rioters: "[The Eighth year of King Henry VIII.] In this season, the Genevese, Frenchmen and other strangers said and boasted themselves to be in such favour with the king and his council, that they set nought by the rulers of the city; and the multitude of strangers was so great about London, that the poor English artificers could scarce get any living; and, most of all, the strangers were so proud, that they disdained, mocked and oppressed the Englishmen, which was the beginning of the grudge."  ... Allegations of assaults and a murder follow before the account continues, "For, amongst others that sore grudged at these matters, there was a broker in London, called John Lincoln, which wrote a bill before Easter, desiring Doctor Sandish at his sermon at Saint Mary Spital, the Monday in Easter week, to move the mayor and aldermen to take part with the commonalty against the strangers.  The doctor answered, that it became not him to move any such thing in a sermon." Lincoln then succeeded in persuading a Dr. Bele or Bell to give a sermon about the dangers the foreigners posed to those "born in London."...  "Of this sermon many a light person took courage, and openly spake against strangers.  And, as the devil would, the Sunday after, at Greenwich, in the king's gallery was Francis de Bard, which, as you heard, kept an Englishman's wife and his goods.  And with him were Domingo, Anthony Caueler, and many more strangers; and there they, talking with Sir Thomas Palmer, knight, jested and laughed that Francis kept the Englishman's wife, saying that if they had the Mayor's wife of London, they would keep her.  Sir Thomas said, 'Sirs, you have too much favour in England.' There were divers English merchants by, and heard them laugh and were not content, in so much as one William Bolt, a mercer, said, 'Well, you whoresome Lombards, you rejoice and laugh; by the mass, we will one day have a day at you, come when it will;' and that saying the other merchant affirmed." 

The chronicle then goes on to describe the riots of the following May Day: "Then suddenly there was a common secret rumour, and no man could tell how it began, that on May day next, the city would rebel, and slay all  aliens ...” The rioting involved many hundreds of people and there was considerable destruction to "foreigners' " property, although it was not recorded whether anyone was killed or not.

After intervention by Sir Thomas More, the riot was quelled and hundreds were arrested. Henry VIII pardoned most of them but 13 rioters, including John Lincoln, were executed for treason. It is interesting to compare how, even in the 16^th century, the authorities were aware of the dangers of allowing tensions about immigration to boil over into violence and hatred. 

I'm sure that the last thing Cameron intends is to encourage aggression or violence towards immigrants or asylum seekers, but history tells us that the smallest thing can exacerbate tensions, particularly at a time of economic hardship. Perhaps our current leaders should study a little more history.

Insurrection: A Suffolk Tradition

Visit Suffolk [ http://www.visitsuffolk.com/ ] is an organisation that has the task of promoting tourism to the county and is one of many bodies marketing Suffolk as a picturesque and bucolic retreat for jaded city-dwellers & holiday home buyers. According to its website Suffolk has “a countryside dotted with quintessential English villages and thriving market towns.” It alludes to the county’s history, too, as a selling point. “Suffolk has its place in history,” it says, “tales of Anglo Saxon kings and Tudor Queens.” 

All this may well be true, but just as in the 18th century, when Constable and Gainsborough’s paintings portrayed a landscape and society at odds with the sordid reality and enormous social unrest of the time,  Suffolk’s pretty aspect hides real hardship and social division. There are many towns and villages where local people have simply been driven out by the high costs of housing (or even of beach huts). Closures and cuts in local services have resulted in the people of Suffolk taking to the streets in protest. But this is nothing new, the county has a long history of rebellion.  Here is my brief survey of the long tradition of insurrection in Suffolk.

In 1214, the Norman Barons of England met at the abbey in Bury St Edmunds and swore an oath to force King John to accept Magna Carta. The Barons, of course, were merely protecting their own interests. It would be a long time until the lower orders were even regarded as human beings. However, Bury itself would be the scene of many more open acts of revolt. In The History & Antiquities of the Abbey of Bury St Edmunds by Richard Yates (1843, 2^nd  ed.) there is a chapter with the odd title of “Contests with Townsmen.” This, in fact, describes the ongoing political unrest in the town for almost the whole of the period of the Abbey’s power. During the mediaeval period, the Abbots had supreme power over the inhabitants of the town. Yates describes many of the conflicts  from 1264 onwards. He clearly feels that the Abbey had the right to hold totalitarian power over the town, and so his history has to be read in that light. In “1292 we find the convent and the townsmen again involved in a dispute, that appears to have been conducted with much asperity and animosity on both sides." There was more trouble in 1305 when the Alderman and burgesses were brought to court for "withholding fines ...  resisting the officers employed in distraining, throwing stones upon, and damaging, the roof of the church; stoning the workmen employed in repairing the same; beating the servants of the Abbey; etc." In 1327 "a vast force from the neighbouring towns and villages made several attacks upon the monastery and its possessions."

The events of 1327 in Bury were perhaps the most violent and certainly the most serious. What Yates describes as a “vast force” has been estimated at around 20,000 local people. They attacked the abbey and, over a period of several days, burned down and destroyed buildings in the abbey grounds and satellite  properties in nearby villages like Horningsheath (Horringer) and Fornham St. Martin. The Abbot still clung to power but concessions had to be made. Unrest continued until the Abbey lost its powers during the Dissolution of the Monasteries and gradually fell into disuse.

The image that the mediaeval peasantry were compliant or servile is not borne out by historical documents. The Court Rolls of Walsham le Willows, 1351-1399; edited by Ray Lock (Boydell Press, 2002) give hundreds of examples of low-grade acts of rebellion and petty law-breaking amongst the bonded labourers of Suffolk in the fourteenth century. It’s hard to know whether these examples of “contempt of the lord” were political in any sense that we would recognise today but it certainly doesn't give an impression of docility:

   “Elias Typetot made an assault on the reeve of this manor, threatening him in breach of the peace and in contempt of the lord. Elias being questioned could not deny [the charge] and placed himself on the lord's mercy...” [Walsham Court, 15 July, 1363] ... “John Manser and John Pye each amerced 12d because in the autumn they made an assault on John Baner, the lord's bailiff, in contempt of the lords.”  [Walsham Court, 16 September, 1376] ... “Edmund Patel amerced 3s 4d for contempt of the lord, openly abusing all the jurors in full court.”  [Walsham Court 22 February, 1380] ... “William Grocer, the son of William, amerced ½ mark for contempt of the lord, making an assault on the lord's bailiff and beating him.”  [Walsham Court, 26 September, 1385]

There is an extensive account of the poll tax rebellion known as the Peasants' Revolt which took place across the whole of England in 1381, in Edgar Powell's The Rising in East Anglia in 1381 (Cambridge University Press, 1896). The principal leader of the rebels in East Anglia was John Wrawe of Sudbury, described in contemporary documents as a chaplain.  In June 1381, he led an attack at the manor of Overhall in Essex, near Long Melford, directed against the lord of the manor Richard Lyons, who was notoriously corrupt. The rebels proceeded to Cavendish and attacked the parish church where they took the goods of John de Cavendish which had been hidden in the church tower. They then visited various towns and villages in the area, such as Lavenham, Sudbury and  Bury,  their attacks being directed upon the property of the lords of the manor. Although condemning the violence in his account of the peasants' revolt in East Anglia, Powell admits that "we cannot...  withhold a large measure of sympathy both for the ideas which prompted, and for the results which followed the action." The rebellion was crushed and the ringleaders were punished severely. In Cavendish, the village sign still celebrates those events.

Although Suffolk was relatively quiet during the Tudor period, some Suffolk people joined up with the Norfolk-based Kett’s rebellion in 1549, in what became known as the “year of the many-headed monsters.” The rebellion was caused by increasing enclosure of common land by the wealthy. Although historians generally regard enclosure as a progressive move which eventually led to the agricultural revolution, the issue of enclosure was a matter of life and death for peasants who had traditionally survived by grazing livestock on common land. A contemporary account of Kett's rebellion, Stow's Summarie (1565), the earliest account, played down the fact that there were similar rebellions at the same time in Devonshire, Cornwall, Oxfordshire, and Buckinghamshire and the contribution "made by the commoners of Suffolk to the commotion time.” But the work did admit that those who had 'encamped them selves' on Mousehold Heath (near Norwich) had come from both 'Norffolke and Suffolke' and gave as much attention to the execution on 5 February 1550 of Robert Bell of Gazeley, the leader of the Suffolk insurrection, as it spent upon the execution of William and Robert Kett.

From The 1549 Rebellions and the Making of Early Modern England by Andy Wood (Cambridge University Press, 2007): “The most powerful surviving plebeian memory...  comes, appropriately enough, from the town of Lavenham. Early Tudor Lavenham provides a strong example of continuity in local traditions of popular protest. In 1525, and again in 1549, the weavers and farmers of the Lavenham area rose in armed rebellion. In the spring of 1525, thousands of local people had gathered in the town in order to demonstrate against Cardinal Wolsey's Amicable Grant. ... Twenty years later, a Lavenham man named James Fuller admitted to plotting the new rising with John Porter. The target of the insurrection was to be the 'rich churles' and 'heardemen' of the locality, whom they intended to kill. They had had enough and in defending themselves, alluded to being let down over promises made  to the poor after the Kett rebellion: ‘we wyll not be deceived as we were at the last rysinge, for then we were promised ynough and more than ynoughe. But the more was an hawlter.’ ”

The Captain Swing period and the “bread or blood” riots, the rick-burning, machine-breaking and attacks on the clergy of the late 18^th and early 19^th centuries have also been well-documented. In fact the labourers and farmers in Suffolk were accused of collusion, as  both were hostile to the parsons who insisted on taking a tithe of the farmer’s income. The Ipswich Journal repeatedly reported on court cases resulting from allegations that labourers had sent threatening letters to their “betters.” These are just two cases that were brought to court:

In By a Flash & a Scare, John Archer quotes from examples of such letters. One, from someone called Grimwade of Polstead begins: "Sir, This is to inform you that unless your tenant, Mr. Brown of Polstead, pays his men an advance of wages... he will be visited with a blaze..." In 1844, the subject of “incendiarism” in Suffolk was debated in Parliament http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1844/jul/19/incendiarism-in-suffolk

At Rushmere Heath, near Ipswich, villagers from miles around attended meetings to discuss labourers wages in 1830.  This was amid a huge amount of unrest in Norfolk, Suffolk and Essex about wages, agricultural changes such as the introduction of threshing machines which meant that labourers were thrown out of work, and the tithe system which entitled clergymen to a substantial percentage of farmers' incomes.  The meeting at Rushmere was banned, troops were called in and three Ipswich craftsmen were prosecuted for inciting labourers to engage in "illegal assemblies."  Around the same time, “ in Ipswich the magistrates dispersed a ‘Disputing Club’ in an ale-house consisting of ‘very Inferior people’ ” [EP Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class, p. 125]

The violence of the labourers against their masters seems extraordinary today, but this was the age of the Houses of Industry, the Poor Law (which meant that if you were poor you could be forced to return to the parish of your birth), transportation to the colonies for petty crimes like poaching. There were no trade unions and no franchise for the labouring classes, in a county notorious for its rotten boroughs and corrupt politicians. Behind the images of the haywain and Flatford Mill, lay poverty and hardship, cruelty and murder. Luckily, the people of Suffolk would never put up with it.

Just Another Saturday, Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday... Night in Glasgow

Last night’s Scottish Cup match between Celtic and Rangers was the fifth Old Firm derby of the 2010-2011 season, but it sometimes feels like Glasgow football supporters have asked the perennial question, Can we play you every week? and the Scottish F.A. has answered in the affirmative.

With the unlikely figure of El Haj Diouf apparently at the centre of tensions on (and off) the pitch, the match erupted into a predictable mixture of childish abuse and real violence. On Twitter, fans and non-fans seemed to be enjoying the fisticuffs more than the football. That seems a shame – or maybe the football wasn’t very entertaining. I don’t know because I won’t watch Old Firm derbies.

I was reminded of a Radio 5 Live phone-in a few years back when Alan Green received a call from a worse-for-wear fan of Celtic/Rangers (I neither know nor care) who was only interested in making some unpleasant sectarian remarks. Although I often find Belfast-born Green irritating, I had to applaud him for his reaction. He said (and I paraphrase): “Where I come from, son, that sort of thing leads to people being killed.”

I support a club, Ipswich Town,  which has an intense local rivalry. It has been dubbed the “Old Farm” derby, but that’s a media creation, as is the term “Tractor Boys.” No-one should underestimate the feeling between supporters of the two East Anglian clubs. There is occasional trouble, but it's relatively minor and the rivalry usually stops with the football. I’m sure that applies in Sheffield, Manchester, even in Liverpool, but things are very different in Glasgow.

Have no doubt about it, the Old Firm rivalry is sectarian. I won’t rehearse the background to it here. There are lots of reasons why the Irish Sea ferries are full of Rangers and Celtic fans when these matches take place and many of them are nothing to do with sport. It’s hard to imagine any other such hatred being tolerated, let alone celebrated. Kick It Out, the campaign against racism in football, which also campaigns against sectarianism and homophobia, is reporting this morning on racist abuse suffered by Diouf at last night’s game [http://www.kickitout.org/news.php/news_id/5038] but Celtic supporters were posting photographs on the internet last night of Rangers’ fans giving Nazi salutes before the game had even started.

It’s easy to bandy statistics about but they are shocking. Violence in Glasgow increases dramatically on days when the Old Firm matches take place and although in 2010 the BBC stated there had been a 24% decrease in (reported) domestic violence incidents on match days [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/glasgow_and_west/8557504.stm], it’s a decrease on the 88% increase in domestic violence on derby days that was reported in 2009. The figures are still appalling and  match-related violence in general is on the increase. And let no-one forget that domestic violence often involves the abuse of children as well as women.

For anyone who thinks that sectarianism in Glasgow is a kind of “fun” version of that in Northern Ireland (Troubles Lite, perhaps), I can recommend the 1975 film on the subject Just Another Saturday (with a cameo by Billy Connolly). There is too much history – well, not history exactly, it’s based on prejudice, not historical research. Why on earth are Rangers supporters still singing about a famine that took place in the 1840s? OK, so some English fans sing songs about the Munich disaster, but that doesn’t make it all right. That’s all wrong too.

The saddest thing for me about the resurgence of sectarianism yesterday was that it was on the same day that the Ireland cricket team performed so brilliantly in the Cricket World Cup in Bengaluru, India. Like the Ireland Rugby Union team, it represents the entire island of Ireland and does not seem to attract the same hostilities and rivalries. I look forward to the day when there is an All-Ireland football team. Think how much better the football team would be for one thing.

And, while we’re thinking along those lines, Glasgow United, anyone? No. Thought not.

The Academic, the Minister and the Schoolmaster: Arson in North Wales, 1936

In 1936, 174 men, most of them miners from South Wales, volunteered for the International Brigades and went to fight against Franco's fascist troops in Spain.  During the Spanish Civil War, approximately 300 people from Wales enlisted in the International Brigades and about 35 of them did not return home. This was an enormous contribution from a small country. Meanwhile, in North Wales, another – very different - battle was being fought.

On the 17th of September, 1936 a short item called “Fire at R.A.F. Camp,” appeared in The Times, which signalled the beginning of a pivotal episode in the history of Welsh Nationalism:

"A new charge of feloniously and maliciously setting fire to certain buildings, the property of the King, was preferred at Pwllhelli yesterday in the case brought against three members of the Welsh Nationalist Party, consequent on a fire at the new R.A.F. Armament Training Camp at Penrhos, near Pwllhelli.

"The defendants were committed for trial on the original charge, slightly amended, of causing malicious damage to contractors' huts and stacks of timber valued at approximately £1,000 and on the new charge under section 5 of the Malicious Damage Act, 1861. They are Professor John Saunders Lewis, of Swansea University; the Rev. Lewis Edward Valentine, Baptist minister, Llandudno; and Mr. D. J. Williams, senior master at Fishguard County School."

So why were three such respectable figures in the dock for setting fire to a few huts and who were they?

All three of the accused were ardent Welsh nationalists. Lewis and Valentine later became founder members of Plaid Cymru and leaders of the Welsh-language movement. They had attempted the arson attack because the "R.A.F. Camp" was destined to be the site of a bombing practice area, or “bombing school” on the Llŷn (Lleyn) Peninsula (Penrhyn Llŷn or Pen Llŷn) in north west Wales, near to Anglesey, in the modern county of Gwynedd.

What appeared to be most galling to Welsh people about the choice of that site was that the government in Westminster had looked at and rejected two sites in England: Abbotsbury in Dorset and Holy Island in Northumberland. Both had been rejected because they were the home of rare birds. There was no such wildlife on the Llŷn Peninsula and, as one of the defendants, D. J.  Williams, remembered in a BBC documentary Yesterday's Witness, made shortly before he died in 1970: "In the spring of 1932 there was an International Disarmament Conference under the auspices of the League of Nations held in Geneva. And at that conference it was the almost unanimous opinion of all the nations there that aerial bombardment of innocent citizens in towns and cities was too horrible a thing to be allowed to go on. ... A law-abiding, faithful nation, always loyal to the Empire in its day of need - surely this nation would oblige, and take the site of an aerodrome or bombing school within their territory? In 1935, when this project was finally decided upon, public opinion straight away became forcible against the very idea...  The whole nation stood on its feet in protest against it."

Although the proposed bombing school was unpopular, the local population was not as united as Mr. Williams seemed to think. Many people were in favour of it as a much-needed source of jobs at a time of high unemployment. It is difficult to know how closely in touch the three defendants were with local people, although the case became a cause célèbre and they received a lot of support from nationalists in Wales generally, none of them were local people. Saunders Lewis (1893-1985) was a historian, poet, dramatist, critic, and activist, one of the founders of the Welsh National Party (later Plaid Cymru). Acknowledged to have been among the most important figures in modern Welsh literature, Lewis would be nominated for a Nobel prize in 1970. Lewis Valentine (1893-1986) was a Baptist minister from Conwy, who was also a prime mover in the Welsh language movement. The son of a quarryman, his studies for the Baptist ministry had been cut short by the outbreak of the First World War. David John Williams (1885-1970) was also a leading nationalist and Welsh-language writer from Carmathenshire. He would later say that he had had the privilege of being educated at three universities: University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, Oxford and Wormwood Scrubs. He was a schoolteacher and a socialist and again a founder of Plaid Cymru.

When the then Conservative Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin, refused to hear the case against the bombing school, despite huge protests, many people in Wales must have felt disenfranchised. D. J. Williams later said; “The swannery in Abbotsbury and the duckery in Northumberland had been sufficiently powerful means of desisting the English Government from going on; well, there was nothing for us to do but to take direct action. Three of us were selected to do the job, of whatever nature. ...  So we three met on Monday night, 7 September 1936 and decided to do what we thought was our duty. Namely, to set the aerodrome site on fire. It was not an act of vandalism, but a direct protest in the name of the whole Welsh Nation, in order that we could plead our case in a public court of law. ... My particular spot of setting on fire was a shed. It was a windy night. I had only one box and I used every match that I had, and I failed to get the fire going. So I had to go to my friend Valentine to borrow some more matches, but they failed."

According to the Times report, the night watchman, a disabled ex-serviceman named David Davis, came upon two of the arsonists and was assaulted by them. This does not appear in the slightly romanticised reminiscences of the BBC documentary, Yesterday’s Witness.

D. J. Williams may have failed to start his fire, but some of his colleagues succeeded. The three were arrested and taken to the nearest police station in Pwllhelli. There they handed in a letter addressed to the Chief Constable:

"We who sign this letter acknowledge a responsibility for the damage which was done to the buildings of the bombing camp this evening. Ever since the intention to build a Lleyn bombing camp was first announced we, and many other leaders of the public life of Wales, did everything we could to get the English Government to refrain from placing in Lleyn an institution which would endanger all the culture and traditions of one of the most Wells regions in Wales.

"But in spite of our pleading, in spite of the letters and protests forwarded from hundreds of religious and lay societies throughout the whole of Wales, and although thousands of the electors of Lleyn itself signed a petition imploring prevention of this atrocity, yet the English Government refused even to receive a deputation from Wales to talk over the matter.

"Lawful and peaceful methods failed to secure for Wales even common courtesy at the hands of the Government of England. Therefore, in order to compel attention to this immoral violation of the sure and natural rights of the Welsh nation, we have taken this method, the only method left to us by a Government which insults the Welsh nation."

The trial took place at the Assize Court at Caernarfon. In the Yesterday's Witness documentary, it was described vividly by Catrin Daniel:

"The scene at the court was quite extraordinary. The judge...  looked a little apprehensive, because I think the streets of Caernarvon were so crowded and the noise outside was so menacing that the judge grew more nervous as the trial wore on. There was deathly silence in the court as the three men made their defence, and when applause broke out, the judge got extremely nasty and rebuked Saunders Lewis several times for a rousing enthusiasm in the court." 

After ninety minutes the jury returned having failed to agree a verdict. A retrial was ordered, this time at the Old Bailey in London. Local people felt that this meant the defendants had no chance of winning the case.  At the Old Bailey, the defendants refused to speak in English as D. J.  Williams recalled:

"Saunders Lewis and Valentine refused to give their evidence in any language but their own, in Welsh. And that wasn't allowed, so they didn't say a word at all. But as it happened, no one of the prosecutors had heard me speak any English at all, with the result that I was allowed to speak in Welsh...  The funny part about it was that I had been English Master in the Fishguard Grammar School for fifteen years, and nobody knew apparently that I knew any English."

The trial ended with convictions and sentences of nine months. When they were released the three men were greeted with a huge audience of supporters at the Great Pavilion, Caernarfon. The bombing school opened a year later, but was found to be completely unsuitable for purpose and it was closed four years later.

Saunders Lewis later became a controversial figure. He had converted to Catholicism in 1932 (from a Calvinistic Methodist background) and resigned from Plaid Cymru in 1939, citing that he felt Wales was not ready to accept the leadership of a Catholic as his reason. His position during the Second World War was controversial as he felt that Wales should take a completely neutral position and supported the campaign for the Welsh to become conscientious objectors. He argued with the left of the Welsh nationalist movement and was seen by some as having an elitist approach. Perhaps his most controversial statement, though, was when he appeared to show admiration for Adolf Hitler – as late as 1936, the year of the arson attack, when he wrote: "At once he fulfilled his promise — a promise which was greatly mocked by the London papers months before that — to completely abolish the financial strength of the Jews in the economic life of Germany."

 Valentine returned to his ministry and Williams to his teaching, although both remained active nationalists all their lives. Despite feeling hard done by as nationalists who did not recognise the jurisdiction of English law, the three men may have been lucky to receive relatively light sentences. Arson on military premises was considered to be an extremely serious offence. (“Arson in a Royal Dockyard” was a capital offence until 1971.) Sympathy for this case will depend upon feelings for the nationalist cause. However, what is striking is that the government’s lack of willingness to engage and compromise with the protestors led to a few people taking an extreme form of action. It may not have worked as far as the Llyn Peninsula was concerned but it probably helped galvanise nationalist feeling in Wales for many years to come.

"Ireland from One or Two Neglected Points of View"

Yesterday, for the first time since I started publishing reprints of out-of-print books in 2005, I faced a dilemma about whether it was right to publish a book at all. In the end, I decided that it was, but with a kind of health warning like the ones that are found on packets of cigarettes. The book in question is called Ireland from One or Two Neglected Points of View and it was first published by Hatchards of Piccadilly in 1888, price ‘one shilling and sixpence.’

On the cover of the copy that I have, which I picked up in a box of ‘hard to sell’ books in a secondhand bookshop in Norfolk, it says that the book was written by "the Author of Hints to Country Bumpkins, etc." Written on the front cover in ink is the name of that author, H. (Henry) Strickland Constable, of Wassand Hall. Wassand is in Sigglesthorne parish, near Hornsea Mere, in the East Riding of Yorkshire.

I'm interested in Irish history but when I started to read the book I discovered that it was possibly one of the most vilely racist pieces of literature that I've ever come across - and I've read Mein Kampf (well, sort of, I read the first few chapters) and quite a few works by minor and very forgettable British fascists. This book, however, appears to have been written by someone who was completely insane. To put it briefly, it is a racist attack on the Irish, or as the author sometimes refers to them "Celts," with, unsurprisingly, a little bit of anti-Semitism thrown in. Oh, and he doesn't much like the French either. I've seen things like this before, but it's the virulence of the hatred in this book that is really shocking which is why I seriously doubt the author’s sanity.

Allowing him to be mad is a cop-out, though. Unfortunately, Henry Constable had done some "research," and is keen to demonstrate that he was not alone in his opinions. He quotes some very reputable sources, such as Thomas Carlyle ("the Celts of Connemara are white, not black; but it is not the colour of the skin that determines the savagery of the man"), the Spectator and Charles Kingsley, who says "But I was haunted by the human chimpanzees I saw along that hundred miles of horrible country. I don't believe they are our fault. I believe, on the contrary, that they are happier and better for being under our rule. But to see white chimpanzees is dreadful; if they were black, one would not feel it so much."

It feels quite painful even to copy that last statement. The “horrible landscape" by the way, is the Sligo of William Butler Yeats' poetry, of Lissadell and Innisfree. There are many more similar examples in the book and, naturally, Constable throws a chapter on Socialism in for good measure. I haven’t read the book, just skimmed through it, but it appears that it was intended mainly to be an attack on Gladstone and his policies in Ireland.

Henry Strickland Constable eventually became a Baronet. This is a description of Wassand Hall from Bulmer's Directory of Yorkshire,  1892:

 "Wassand, is a distinct manor and estate containing about 400 acres, situated two miles south-west from Hornsea. It anciently belonged to the Abbey of Meaux, and about the beginning of the sixteenth century it was in the possession of St. Mary's Abbey, York. In 1530, it was purchased by Dame Joan, widow of Sir William Constable, of Caythorpe, Knt., and is now the property of Henry Strickland Constable, Esq.

  "Wassand Hall, the seat of this gentleman, is a fine mansion in the Italian style, erected in 1813, by the Rev. Charles Constable. It stands in a well wooded park, at the west end of Hornsea mere. The lawns, pleasure grounds, and gardens are of considerable extent, and all tastefully laid out.

          "The remote ancestor of the Constables was Roaldus, Constable of Richmond. The Wassand branch are descended from William Constable, Esq., of Caythorpe, youngest son of Sir Robert Constable, Knt., of Flamborough. Henry Strickland Constable, Esq., the present owner of the estate, is the third son of the late Sir George Strickland, Bart., who in 1865, assumed the name of Cholmley, by Mary, daughter of the late Rev. Charles Constable, of Wassand. He married in 1860, Cornelia Ann, daughter of the late Colonel Dumaresq, and has besides other issue, a son and heir, Captain Frederick Charles Strickland Constable, J.P.

          "The family has held a distinguished position in the county from a very early period. From a list compiled by Mr. Hockney, it appears that between the years 1206 and 1701, the Constable family furnished 28 High Sheriffs to the county."

But to return to my problem, I decided that the book should be republished. There is still a great deal of ignorance about the level and violence of anti-Irish racism at least amongst the British upper classes. The book will mainly be of interest to academics but I think it's important for people to know what was thought about other races, however uncomfortable it is for us to read now. It is not rational or morally right, but it is was the mentality of at least some in the late nineteenth century.

So to continue my dilemma, I had to find a cover illustration for the CD on which I was republishing the book as a facsimile. I was not short of examples of appalling cartoons of Irishmen depicted as apes, or gurning monsters. If you click the link below, you’ll go to an excellent online article by Gwen Sharp, and see some mainly American examples, but it's not for the faint hearted. http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2008/10/06/negative-stereotypes-of-the-irish/

Punch magazine seem to be particularly keen on this kind of thing and there are many examples of their jollity at portraying Irish people as fools or animals. But I've decided to leave the cover illustration as a simple map of Ireland rather than reprint any of them.

No doubt Henry Constable was “100% Anglo Saxon with perhaps just a dash of Viking,” as Tony Hancock so memorably puts it in The Blood Donor, or perhaps his ancestors immigrated after the Norman Conquest, like so many of the aristocracy. No doubt the Constables had a pleasant life in their fine mansion “in the Italian style” with their pleasure gardens and lawns, as part of the local Yorkshire squirearchy and magistracy, sentencing local people for poaching and suchlike activities. We can only speculate as to how the name Constable should be pronounced.

http://www.bibliopolis.co.uk/catalog/i260.html