To take instances of hardship. In 1642 the people in the Strand, who chiefly lived by letting lodgings, were in despair, having to pawn their furniture in order to pay the rent, their lodgings being all empty. The lawyers at the Guildhall were busy, but it was over the affairs of an incredible number of bankrupts; at the Royal Exchange there was no business transacted, nor any discourse all day long except about the news of the day. In the shops the keepers had nothing to do but to visit and to condole with each other. London, as it always had been, was a receiving house and a distributing house for the whole country, and in this time of civil war there was nothing to distribute and nothing to receive. As a finishing stroke, it is added that the ladies who formed the greater part of the population of Covent Garden, Drury Lane, and Long Acre were reduced to a condition which is described in a tract of the time as a “lump of amazement.” For this quarter and these ladies existed not by the citizens, though the morals of the City were by no means without reproach, but by the visitors who in quiet times flocked to London.
Amid a confused babble of petitions and letters, and imprisonments and fines, one episode stands out clear and strong. It is the petition of the women, calling themselves “many civilly disposed women,” to the Parliament, praying for a peace. The petition was cleverly drawn up—one suspects a masculine hand:—
“That your Petitioners (tho’ of the weaker Sex) do too sensibly perceive the ensuing Desolation of this Kingdom, unless by some timely Means your Honours provide for the Speedy Recovery thereof. Your Honours are the Physicians that can, by God’s special and miraculous Blessing (which we humbly implore), restore this languishing Nation, and our bleeding Sister the kingdom of Ireland, which hath now almost breathed her last Gasp.
We need not dictate to your Eagle-eyed Judgements the Way; Our only Desire is, that God’s Glory, in the true Reformed Protestant Religion, may be preserved, the just Prerogatives and Privileges of King and Parliament maintained, the true Liberties and Properties of the Subject, according to the known Laws of the Land, restored, and all honourable Ways and Means for a speedy Peace endeavoured.
May it therefore please your Honours, that some speedy Course may be taken for the Settlement of the true Reformed Protestant Religion, for the Glory of God, and the Renovation of Trade, for the Benefit of the Subject, they being the Soul and Body of the Kingdom.
And your Petitioners, with many Millions of afflicted Souls, groaning under the Burden of these Times of Distress, shall (as bound) pray, etc.”
It was taken to Westminster by two or three thousand women with white ribbons in their hats. The Commons received and heard the petition; they even gave them an answer. They had no doubt of speedily arriving at a peace; meantime the petitioners were enjoined to return to their own homes. By this time their numbers were swollen to five thousand and more, among them being men dressed as women. They flocked round the door of the House of Commons, crying “Peace! Peace!” and presently, “Give us those Traitors that are against Peace, that we may tear them to pieces! Give us that dog Pym!” The trained bands were sent for, but were received by these Amazons with brick-bats, whereupon the soldiers fired upon the women, killed some, and dispersed the rest.
The violence and insolence of the mob during this unhappy time shows the want of executive strength in the City. Measures are passed; no one heeds them; a riot is suppressed and it breaks out again; disbanded soldiers swarm in the streets and rob and plunder as they please. We have seen how the mob murdered Dr. Lamb. On another occasion the mob had forced its way into the Court of High Commission. They had assembled at Westminster, crying “No Bishops!” They had been driven down King Street by officers with drawn swords. After the war broke out the mob was divided between the two factions, each having its own badge. When the war brought the usual troubles, with want of money and of trade, both sides joined and riotously clamoured for peace. As early as 1643, with six years of war before it, the mob besieged the House of Commons, clamouring for peace. The most remarkable effort of the mob was that of the “Solemn Engagement” in 1647 related by Sharpe:—
“A week later (21 July) a mob of apprentices, reformadoes, watermen and other disaffected persons met at Skinner’s Hall, and one and all signed a solemn Engagement pledging themselves to maintain the Covenant and to procure the king’s restoration to power on the terms offered by him on the 12th May last, viz. the abandonment of the episcopacy for three years and the militia for ten. An endeavour was made to enlist the support of the municipal authorities to this engagement, but a letter from Fairfax (23 July) soon gave them to understand that the army looked on the matter as one ‘set on foot by the malice of some desperate-minded men, this being their last engine for the putting all into confusion when they could not accomplish their wicked ends by other means.’ On the 24th both Houses joined in denouncing the Solemn Engagement of the City, their declaration against it being ordered to be published by beat of drum and sound of trumpet through London and Westminster, and within the lines of communication. Any one found subscribing his name to the engagement after such publication would be adjudged guilty of high treason.”
Another serious outbreak took place later, on Sunday, April 10, 1648. A multitude was assembled in Moorfields to drink and play. A company of trained bands endeavoured to suppress the profanation of the day, and were themselves set upon and dispersed. The mob, gathering greater strength, went off to Whitehall, where they were driven back by the troops. Returning to the City, they broke open houses and magazines, seized the gates and chains, attacked the Lord Mayor’s house, and called upon everybody to join them for God and King Charles. General Fairfax let them alone one night, and in the morning sent out troops, and after some resistance dispersed them.
Every success or partial success made the Royalist party in the City more fearless and undisguised; sometimes they mounted cockades; sometimes they burned bonfires; sometimes they openly cried for the King; the ’prentices, who had been so ready to petition against the Bishops, turned round. Though the actual weight of numbers and of opinions was in favour of the Parliament, there was a very strong party who were always looking for an opportunity to demonstrate, if not to rise, for the King. One has only to consult the pages of Evelyn in order to understand the strength of the Royalist party even in times of the deepest adversity.
I have already quoted from Howell. Let him speak again concerning the condition of the City at this time:—
“Touching the condition of Things here, you shall understand that our Miseries lengthen with our Days; for tho’ the Sun and the Spring advance nearer us, yet our Times are not grown a whit the more comfortable. I am afraid this City has fooled herself into a Slavery; the Army, tho’ forbidden to come within ten Miles of her by order of Parliament, quarters now in the Bowels of her; they threaten to break her Percullies, Posts, and Chains, to make her previous upon all occasions; they have secured also the Tower, with Addition of Strength for themselves; besides a famine doth insensibly creep upon us, and the Mint is starved for want of Bullion; Trade, which was ever the Sinew of this Island, doth visibly decay, and the insurance of ships is risen from two to ten in the hundred; our Gold is engrossed in private hands, or gone beyond Sea to travel without License; and much I believe of it is returned to the Earth (whence it first came) to be buried where our descendants may chance to find it a thousand years hence, if the world lasts so long; so that the exchanging of white earth into red (I mean Silver into Gold) is now above six in the hundred; and all these, with many more, are the dismal effects and concomitants of a Civil War. ’Tis true, we have had many such black days in England in former Ages; but those paralleled to the present are as a Shadow of a Mountain compared to the Eclipse of the Moon.”