These grievances of the common people were at that time heightened by other causes. The arts of manufacture were much more advanced in other European countries than in England; and even in England these arts had made greater progress than the knowledge of agriculture; a profession which of all mechanical employments, requires the most reflection and experience. A great demand arose for wool both abroad and at home: pasturage was found more profitable than unskilful tillage: whole estates were laid waste by enclosures; the tenants, regarded as a useless burden, were expelled their habitations; even the cottagers, deprived of the commons on which they formerly fed their cattle, were reduced to misery; and a decay of people, as well as a diminution of the former plenty, was remarked in the kingdom.[*] This grievance was now of an old date, and Sir Thomas More, alluding to it, observes in his Utopia, that a sheep had become in England a more ravenous animal than a lion or wolf, and devoured whole villages, cities, and provinces.
* Strype, vol. ii. Repository, Q.
The general increase, also, of gold and silver in Europe, after the discovery of the West Indies, had a tendency to inflame these complaints. The growing demand in the more commercial countries had heightened every where the price of commodities, which could easily be transported thither; but in England, the labor of men, who could not so easily change their habitation, still remained nearly at the ancient rates, and the poor complained that they could no longer gain a subsistence by their industry. It was by an addition alone of toil and application they were enabled to procure a maintenance; and though this increase of industry was at last the effect of the present situation, and an effect beneficial to society, yet was it difficult for the people to shake off their former habits of indolence; and nothing but necessity could compel them to such an exertion of their faculties.
It must also be remarked, that the profusion of Henry VIII. had reduced him, notwithstanding his rapacity, to such difficulties, that he had been obliged to remedy a present necessity by the pernicious expedient of debasing the coin; and the wars in which the protector had been involved, had induced him to carry still further the same abuse. The usual consequences ensued: the good specie was hoarded or exported; base metal was coined at home, or imported from abroad in great abundance; the common people, who received their wages in it, could not purchase commodities at the usual rates: a universal diffidence and stagnation of commerce took place; and loud complaints were heard in every part of England.
The protector, who loved popularity, and pitied the condition of the people, encouraged these complaints by his endeavors to redress them. He appointed a commission for making inquiry concerning enclosures; and issued a proclamation, ordering all late enclosures to be laid open by a day appointed. The populace, meeting with such countenance from government, began to rise in several places, and to commit disorders; but were quieted by remonstrances and persuasion. In order to give them greater satisfaction, Somerset appointed new commissioners, whom he sent every where, with an unlimited power to hear and determine all causes about enclosures, highways, and cottages.[*] As this commission was disagreeable to the gentry and nobility, they stigmatized it as arbitrary and illegal; and the common people, fearing it would be eluded, and being impatient for immediate redress, could no longer contain their fury, but sought for a remedy by force of arms. The rising began at once in several parts of England, as if a universal conspiracy had been formed by the commonalty. The rebels in Wiltshire were dispersed by Sir William Herbert: those in’ the neighboring counties, Oxford and Glocester, by Lord Gray, of Wilton. Many of the rioters were killed in the field: others were executed by martial law. The commotions in Hampshire, Sussex, Kent, and other counties, were quieted by gentler expedients; but the disorders in Devonshire and Norfolk threatened more dangerous consequences.
* Burnet, vol. ii. p. 115. Strype, vol. ii. p. 171.
The commonalty in Devonshire began with the usual complaints against enclosures and against oppressions from the gentry; but the parish priest of Sampford Courtenay had the address to give their discontent a direction towards religion; and the delicacy of the subject, in the present emergency, made the insurrection immediately appear formidable. In other counties, the gentry had kept closely united with government; but here many of them took part with the populace among others, Humphrey Arundel, governor of St. Michael’s Mount. The rioters were brought into the form of a regular army, which amounted to the number of ten thousand. Lord Russel had been sent against them at the head of a small force; but finding himself too weak to encounter them in the field, he kept at a distance, and began to negotiate with them; in hopes of eluding their fury by delay, and of dispersing them by the difficulty of their subsisting in a body. Their demands were, that the mass should be restored, half of the abbey lands resumed, the law of the six articles executed, holy water and holy bread respected, and all other particular grievances redressed.[*] The council, to whom Russet transmitted these demands, sent a haughty answer; commanded the rebels to disperse, and promised them pardon upon their immediate submission. Enraged at this disappointment, they marched to Exeter, carrying before them crosses, banners, holy water, candlesticks, and other implements of ancient superstition; together with the host, which they covered with a canopy.[**] The citizens of Exeter shut their gates; and the rebels, as they had no cannon, endeavored to take the place, first by scalade, then by mining; but were repulsed in every attempt. Russel meanwhile lay at Honiton, till reënforced by Sir William Herbert and Lord Gray with some German horse, and some Italian arquebusiers under Battista Spinola. He then resolved to attempt the relief of Exeter, which was now reduced to extremities. He attacked the rebels, drove them from all their posts, did great execution upon them, both in the action and pursuit,[***] and took many prisoners. Arundel and the other leaders were sent to London, tried, and executed. Many of the inferior sort were put to death by martial law:[****] the vicar of St. Thomas, one of the principal incendiaries, was hanged on the top of his own steeple, arrayed in his Popish weeds, with his beads at his girdle.[v]
* Hayward, p. 292. Holingshed, p. 1003. Fox, vol. ii, p.
861Mem. Cranm. p. 186.
** Heylin, p. 76.
*** Stowe’s Annals. p. 597. Hayward, p. 295.
**** Hayward, p. 295, 296.
v Heylin, p. 76. Holingshed, p 1026.
The insurrection in Norfolk rose to a still greater height, and was attended with greater acts of violence. The populace were at first excited, as in other places, by complaints against enclosures; but finding their numbers amount to twenty thousand, they grew insolent, and proceeded to more exorbitant pretensions. They required the suppression of the gentry, the placing of new counsellors about the king, and the reëstablishment of the ancient rites. One Ket, a tanner, had assumed the government over them; and he exercised his authority with the utmost arrogance and outrage. Having taken possession of Moushold Hill near Norwich, he erected his tribunal under an old oak, thence called the oak of reformation; and summoning the gentry to appear before him, he gave such decrees as might be expected from his character and situation. The marquis of Northampton was first ordered against him; but met with a repulse in an action, where Lord Sheffield was killed.[*] The protector affected popularity, and cared not to appear in person against the rebels; he therefore sent the earl of Warwick at the head of six thousand men, levied for the wars against Scotland; and he thereby afforded his mortal enemy an opportunity of increasing his reputation and character. Warwick, having tried some skirmishes with the rebels, at last made a general attack upon them, and put them to flight. Two thousand fell in the action and pursuit: Ket was hanged at Norwich Castle, nine of his followers on the boughs of the oak of reformation; and the insurrection was entirely suppressed. Some rebels in Yorkshire, learning the fate of their companions, accepted the offers of pardon, and threw down their arms. A general indemnity was soon after published by the protector.[**]
* Stowe, p. 597. Holingshed, p. 1030-34. Strype, vol. ii. p.
174.
** Hayward, p. 297, 298, 299.