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Rebelious
Wingham
Extracts from Wingham:
A Kentish Village
reproduced by permission of the Wingham Local History
Society
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| Kent
has a long tradition of being a rebellious county, a tradition of
which I think it is proud. Ignoring the resistance mounted by Kentish
people to the invasions of Julius Caesar (55 & 54 BC), Claudius
(AD43) and William, Duke of Normandy (1066), there is, in the Kentish
race, a strong rebellious character manifest by various uprisings from
1381 to 1830.
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Six
outbreaks of unrest may be distinguished:
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| The
Peasants' Revolt 1381 |
Jack
Cade,s Rebellion 1450 |
| Buckingham's
Rebellion 1483
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Wyatt's Rebellion 1554
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| The
Kentish Revolt 1647-48 |
Agricultural
Labourers, Unrest 1830
("Swing Riots") |
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| Buckingham's
Rebellion of 1483 largely involved members of the Woodville family in
the Maidstone area supporting the Duke of Buckingham against Richard
III.
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| Wyatt's
Rebellion in January 1554 again arose in
Maidstone
(he lived at
Allington
Castle
)
in protest at the Catholic Mary Tudor's religious policies and her
betrothal to the equally Catholic Philip, King of Spain.
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| Neither
of the above involved men of
E. Kent
and of the Wingham area, in particular. All the other
rebellions/uprisings did so.
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| Peasant's Revolt
- 1381
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| The
most serious of the rebellions, from the Government of the
day's point of view was the extraordinary Peasant's Revolt of 1381
- a rising by mainly Kentish and Essex people of largely humble
origins, against an unpopular government and particularly against
recent heavy government taxes and certain prominent government
officials. The general details are well-known. Wat Tyler
and John Ball in Kent
raised a large peasant army (some say 100,000 in strength) and marched
on London
to meet the King Richard II. The situation was extremely serious for
the King and his government. The Archbishop of Canterbury,
Sudbury
(the builder of the Westgate in
Canterbury)
was hauled out of the Tower
of
London
together with other prominent Royal officials (Sudbury
was also Chancellor of
England
)
and summarily executed. Richard II eventually appeased the rebels and
promised them reforms and pardons and they melted back to the Kent
and
Essex
countryside. There were subsequent severe Government reprisals and of
course the reforms never took place.
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| Locally
several prominent local citizens in Canterbury
and the surrounding district were killed by the rebels. The jury
presentments for the subsequent trials exist for Kent and for the
Hundreds of Wingham and Eastry (given jointly) and the Jurors found
that: |
| "Laurence Smyth of Chylendenne and
John Gunne, of Monkton, maliciously and against the peace, made insurrection at
Chilendenn against our Lord the King and his people, and continued
that insurrection till .... 15th June, and they say that Richard atte
Denn (?Deane) violently and maliciously killed William Wottone, at
Wotton. And they say that John de Feveresham and Sarah his wife made
complaint against John Twytham and John Clerk of
Preston
concerning a certain trespass."
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The four Constables of Wingham
were named as Thomas de Gwodnestone, William atte Ware,
Robert
Kylera and Henry Peny and the two Warders as
John Gustone and
John Kedyntone.
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| Jack Cade's Rebellion
- 1450 |
| In
contrast, Jack Cade's Rebellion in May-June 1450 consisted of
respectable upper middle class support for a rebellion aimed against
oppressive local officials, particularly William Crowner, Sheriff of
Kent. It largely involved people from
W. Kent
and the Weald but there were
sizeable contingents from the Hundreds of Eastry, Wingham,
Preston
,
Petham and the
Isle of Thanet
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Cade's forces camped at Blackheath, withdrew toward Sevenoaks and
defeated a Royalist force there, killing Sir Humphrey Stafford. They
then returned to
London
and were masters of the City for 3 days, the King (Henry IV) having
fled. They executed Lord Say whose seat was Knole and who was
Constable of Dover Castle. Eventually Cade's forces were driven out of
London
by its citizens and the revolt melted away when free pardons were
offered.
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| The
pardons issued still survive and include for the whole of Kent, one
knight, 18 esquires, 74 gentlemen and several hundred yeomen. Two
gentlemen of Wingham were involved ‑ James Hope and
John Oxenden
and the two constables at the time were James Cluterynden
and Richard Pury. More noteworthy is the mention of a citizen of Wingham in
Shakespeare (Henry IV Part 11, Act IV, Scene 11);
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Goerge Holland
and John Bevis are at Blackheath |
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HOLLAND: |
I
see them! There's Best's son, the Tanner of Wingharn |
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BEVIS: |
He
shall have the skins of our enemies to make dog's leather
of Top |
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| The
Kentish Revolt of 1647-48 |
| The
Kentish Revolt of 1647-48 occurred during the aftermath of the
English Civil War between Charles I and Parliament. It was really a
revolt by local Kentish gentlemen against the misdeeds of the County
Committee
and not, initially, a rebellion against central government. By
May
1648 there were reported to be 10,000 under arms but these were
eventually defeated piecemeal by General Fairfax with 7,000 trained
soldiers of the New Model Army.
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| The
local gentry involved were under the leadership of Sir Thomas Peyton
of KnowIton Court and Sir Richard Hardres of
Upper Hardres
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Associated with them were 20 closely related families including the
Oxindens of Deane (just S. of Wingham) and Sir Thomas Palmer of
Wingham, and of the lesser families, the Austens of Eastry, the
Paramores of Paramore in Ash
and
the Houghams of Ash.
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| Agricultural
Labourers, Unrest 1830
("Swing Riots") |
| The
last of the Kentish risings was in 1830 when the so‑ called
"Swing Riots" occurred. These came about largely as a result
of the introduction of mechanical threshing machines which put
agricultural labourers out of work, in combination with a series of
poor harvests in the later 1820's and 1830 itself, which had many
agricultural labourers an their families fighting for survival from
starvation.
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| Although
the riots eventually involved 20 or more counties in Southern and
Eastern
England,
Kent
(inevitably!) was the first with the disturbances. Initially there had
been sporadic acts of incendiarism in
W. Kent
around Orpington but on
28th
August 1830
at
Upper Hardres
the first threshing machine was destroyed by a gang of
men from Elham,
later joined by men from Lyminge and Stelling. The destruction
increased over the ensuing weeks and by late October over 100
machines,
mainly
in
E.
Kent
had been destroyed. Further acts of incendiarism occurred in
W.
Kent
and the
burning
spread to
E. Kent
, Michael Becker's property
at Ash being gutted. Such was the fear of local farmers that some
voluntarily destroyed their own machines and this occured in Wingharn
although the parish had not yet received any visits from the rioters.
Over the next weeks and months the rioting spread west and north to
affect most of S. and
E.
England
. Much alarm was caused by these riots but they
eventually died down during 1831. Sentencing of the prime offenders
was severe - in the whole country 644 were jailed, 252 were
sentenced to death of which 19 were executed, and 481 were transported
to
Australia
and
Tasmania
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Of these totals, 48 Kentish men were jailed, 5 were sentenced to death
and four were executed (more than any other county) and 25 were
transported.
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| Local
events are quite well recorded. The following incidents occurred:
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| 5.10.30
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Ash
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Arson
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| 25-26.10.30
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Ash-Wingham
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Destruction threshing machine
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| 9.11.30 |
Preston |
Destruction threshing machine
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| 9.11.30
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Wingham
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Destruction threshing machine
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| 11.11.30
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Eastry |
Destruction threshing machine
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| 11.11.30
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Wingham
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Destruction threshing machine
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| 29.11.30
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Wingham
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Destruction threshing machine
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| 14.12.30
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Wingham
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Arson
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27.8.31
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Wingham
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Destruction threshing machine
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