Category Archives: Northamptonshire

(1607) The Poor Mans Joye & the Gentlemen’s Plague

A very old ballad borrowed from the private library of some aristocrat by a friend of Roy Palmer’s, who spent years trying to obtain a copy. Probably connected to the Midland Revolt.

You gentlemen that rack your rentes, and throwe downe Land for corne
The tyme will com that som will sigh, that ever they were borne.

Small care you have for to maintayne trueth or godlines.
Yee seek your gayne and still the poore oppresse.

Yee throw downe townes and houses to, and seek for honors more.
When we your tenantes arre constraynde to beg from doore to doore.

Redres we will have, or we will knowe whye no.
We will adventure lief & goods and so the matter shall goe.

The king commaundes and wisheth all thinges well
he askes if all be don nothing but lies you tell.

Therfoer we have agreed even for the comons sake
a blooddye entreprise to take.

Yet meanyng no harme to our gracious King Quene Prince or any of those
But to pull downe those hawghty myndes which against his commandmentes themselves oppose.

For usurping Jupiter we will throwe downe
and restore dispossessed Saturne to his princely Crowne.

Then will not Ambicious Phaeton seeke Phebus chariot to guide.
nor hunger sterved Midas covet gold or worldly pride.

It is that which our Tyrantes have, and we do lack
for they cary whole townes upon their back.

They are as Cruell as Titius which never did good
nay, worse than Meda for seeking after blood.

They lyve secure and think to mak a golden voiage
But what was Scipio Africanus either, when he had won great Carthage

Here they lyve in pompe & glory and may not be Controulde
they think scorn of there faultes for to be told.

Lyving the poore doth wante, and lyving they shall have
and the prowdest of all at our handes mercie shall crave

Their peacock plumes and golden coates, shall them nought avayll
When soden death shall sodenly them call.

Do not Looke to Dye in bed, as others have don before
But let som think to hand upon the dore.

This taske shall well be performed eare Martilmas be one fortenight gone.
and of your goodly howses we will not leave one stone upon a stone

we will be merry and take our full of ioye (joy)
as Priamus had to trayle Hectors body about the walles of Troye

Yee arre lyke to Esops curre in greediness
which snatched at the shadow and so lost the flesh

Your Dealinges arre so bad, the peoples harts they break
in tyranny you excell Gelon which not let his subiectes speak

what was his end, histories do shew
as yyt was with him, so shall yt be with you

you feare naught, but we will make you all to quake
with canon shot, we will your greedy myndes oure shak

when we com out, you tyrants to ynvade
we neede not feare for helpe, thowsandes have sworn to Ayde

Then let som feare when the night ye hear the Drum or goon to enquire in the woodde
that shalbe the true foreteller of his blood.

Yet that tyme you must Leave your whores & dainty dames
whose lascyvious apparell & dainty chere, the poore man still maintaynes

therfore take order som, which be very good
orelles as we have saied, yt shall cost the price of blood

but we care not, whether you order or noe
forwardes the enterprise is lyke to go

yet Pelham & Hatton take courage still
to you & Shefford we owe all good will

the howse of the Henneage let us call to mynde
men good to the poore & to the commons Kynde

And so all otheres that arre Knighte or stand in Justice stedde
Aganst them our sword the cause shall pleade

Oh yt shall do us good to see, these tyrantes wallowed in their Blood

God bless our King Quene and prince all waies
God send them happy lief & old Nestors dayes.

An Atlas of Rural Protest in Britain 1548-1900 by Andrew Charlesworth

We get sent, given and recommended a lot of books by people who’ve seen the show. They are nearly always very useful and often even get read. Every so often one comes along that wins. This is such a book. What a title! And full of lovely maps and considered prose too. Copies come up 2nd hand for about the £20 mark fairly often, well worth it.

Needless to say this book is a glorious source of academically thorough research into peasant struggles against the greed and tyranny of the aristocracy.

Newton Rebels of 1607 in Northamptonshire

Nick Hayes just put me on to this amazing page about the Newton Rebels of 1607 in Northamptonshire which was part of the Midlands Revolt concerning enclosure. Have a look at the photos from their 400th anniversary in 2007

http://www.newtonrebels.org.uk/rebels/history.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Midland_Revolt

 

Who Owns England blog – one year on

Guy Shrubsole is doing some excellent work here digging into data to find out who owns our land – https://whoownsengland.org/2017/09/12/who-owns-england-one-year-on-what-we-now-know/

(1820) The Mores by John Clare

John-Clare

Far spread the moorey ground a level scene
Bespread with rush and one eternal green
That never felt the rage of blundering plough
Though centurys wreathed spring’s blossoms on its brow
Still meeting plains that stretched them far away
In uncheckt shadows of green brown, and grey

Unbounded freedom ruled the wandering scene
Nor fence of ownership crept in between
To hide the prospect of the following eye
Its only bondage was the circling sky

One mighty flat undwarfed by bush and tree
Spread its faint shadow of immensity
And lost itself, which seemed to eke its bounds
In the blue mist the horizon’s edge surrounds

Now this sweet vision of my boyish hours
Free as spring clouds and wild as summer flowers
Is faded all – a hope that blossomed free,
And hath been once, no more shall ever be

Inclosure came and trampled on the grave
Of labour’s rights and left the poor a slave
And memory’s pride ere want to wealth did bow
Is both the shadow and the substance now

The sheep and cows were free to range as then
Where change might prompt nor felt the bonds of men
Cows went and came, with evening morn and night,
To the wild pasture as their common right

And sheep, unfolded with the rising sun
Heard the swains shout and felt their freedom won
Tracked the red fallow field and heath and plain
Then met the brook and drank and roamed again
The brook that dribbled on as clear as glass
Beneath the roots they hid among the grass
While the glad shepherd traced their tracks along
Free as the lark and happy as her song

But now all’s fled and flats of many a dye
That seemed to lengthen with the following eye
Moors, loosing from the sight, far, smooth, and blea
Where swopt the plover in its pleasure free
Are vanished now with commons wild and gay
As poet’s visions of life’s early day

Mulberry-bushes where the boy would run
To fill his hands with fruit are grubbed and done

And hedgrow-briars – flower-lovers overjoyed
Came and got flower-pots – these are all destroyed
And sky-bound mores in mangled garbs are left
Like mighty giants of their limbs bereft

Fence now meets fence in owners’ little bounds
Of field and meadow large as garden grounds
In little parcels little minds to please
With men and flocks imprisoned ill at ease

Each little path that led its pleasant way
As sweet as morning leading night astray
Where little flowers bloomed round a varied host
That travel felt delighted to be lost

Nor grudged the steps that he had ta-en as vain
When right roads traced his journeys and again –
Nay, on a broken tree he’d sit awhile
To see the mores and fields and meadows smile

Sometimes with cowslaps smothered – then all white
With daiseys – then the summer’s splendid sight
Of cornfields crimson o’er the headache bloomd
Like splendid armys for the battle plumed
He gazed upon them with wild fancy’s eye
As fallen landscapes from an evening sky

These paths are stopt – the rude philistine’s thrall
Is laid upon them and destroyed them all
Each little tyrant with his little sign
Shows where man claims earth glows no more divine
But paths to freedom and to childhood dear
A board sticks up to notice ‘no road here’
And on the tree with ivy overhung
The hated sign by vulgar taste is hung
As tho’ the very birds should learn to know
When they go there they must no further go

Thus, with the poor, scared freedom bade goodbye
And much they feel it in the smothered sigh
And birds and trees and flowers without a name

All sighed when lawless law’s enclosure came
And dreams of plunder in such rebel schemes
Have found too truly that they were but dreams.