"The World Turned Upside Down"....The Levellers today ..... on the wireless

Now I have always been fascinated by that upsurge of political debate before, during and after the English Civil War.

An Agreement of the People, 1647

From discussions on politics and democracy, to arguments about how the land and wealth should be more equitablty distributed, to competing religious visions,  the middle decades of the 17th century had the lot.

I often return to the Putney Debates when the army of Parliament sat down and talked out the future of England  after the Civil War.  Debates which were echoed again in Februray 1944 when members of the Eighth Army in Cairo, met, and debated on their expectations of a post war Britain, voting for the nationalisation of banks, land, mines, and transport in the United Kingdom.*

All of which means I have booked my seat beside the wireless today to listen to the "Levellers", from the BBC Radio Four programme In Our Time.**

In which "Misha Glenny and guests discuss the group which came to be known as the Levellers and emerged during what would become arguably one of the bloodiest and most turbulent periods of English history. 

After the First English Civil War, the Levellers started calling for reforms to achieve legal and social equality. They pushed for a new constitution, extended franchise, popular sovereignty, and religious toleration. 

To do this, the Levellers pioneered the use of pamphlets and petitions, as well as taking to the streets in their thousands to demonstrate wearing their signature sea-green ribbons and sprigs of rosemary. 

To some they were radical, and to others not radical enough. Though the Leveller movement itself may have been short-lived, the arguments that they made have both inspired and challenged generations since.

Private John Church, Corporal Perkins, and Cornet James Thompson, 2024

With, Teresa Bejan, Professor of Political Theory and Fellow of Oriel College, University of Oxford, Ted Vallance, Professor of History and Dean of Research and Doctoral Study at the University of Roehampton, and, Clare Jackson, Honorary Professor of Early Modern History and Walter Grant Scott Fellow in History at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge

Producer: Martha Owen"

And because I can I will remember the three soldiers who were sympatheic to the Levellers and who took part in the Banbury Mutiny and were executed.

Location;In Our Time, BBC, Radio 4

Burford Church, 2024

Pictures; An Agreement of the People, 1647,Private John Church, Corporal Perkins, and Cornet James Thompson, 2024, and Burford Church, 2024 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

 *Cairo Forces Parliament, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cairo_Forces_Parliament as well as The Troops' Parliament, Karl Hansen, Tribune, May 8, 2023, https://tribunemag.co.uk/2023/05/the-troops-parliament and The Desert Parliament , Olivia Humphreys October 26th, 2019, Tribune, https://tribunemag.co.uk/2019/10/the-desert-parliament

**The Levellers, In Our Time, BBC, Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m002wkhq 

“Theyr moving father’s grave to build a sewer” ….. from Victoria Street to Wythenshawe

To be accurate this is not a story about moving dad, but more about Oliver Cromwell and his journey from the city centre to a park.

Happy, circa 1900

And I have Tony Flynn that excellent Salford historian to thank for the idea.

Like many I am ambivalent about Cromwell. He was the man behind the New Model Army which wopped the forces of King Charles 1 during the English Civil War, was head of England’s only republic, and allowed Jews to return to the country.

But as Lord Protector his later years had hints of monachal rule while the invasion of Ireland, the brutality of the conquest, and the confiscation of land along with the denial of rights for Catholics in the Act Of Settlement have marred his reputation.

Moving, 1968

None of which I suspect had anything to do with the moving of his statue from close to the Cathedral in May 1968 to Wythenshawe Park.

For 93 years he had stood on his stone plinth facing the Royal Exchange and flanked by the Cathedral on one side and Exchange Railway Station on the other.

He was a gift to the City Council from Mrs Heywood and the bronze figure with its granite plinth cost £1,600. The council made much of the statue at a special meeting held on December 1st, before “the Corporation accompanied by a large number of friends proceeded to the statue which was unveiled in the presence of many thousands of spectators.  Three cheers were given for the queen, the Royal Family and Mrs. Heywood and the Mayor.”**

I have long wondered at exactly why it was moved.  The official line was that it got in the way of traffic.

It’s arrival in the park was not an easy one, and just a week later it was daubed with red paint which “Mr. R.C Mcmillan director of the city parks believed there was more in the daubing than ordinary vandalism”***

Nor was it a good year all round for Oliver.

Later in the year just before British Rail phased out the last steam locomotives, it chose a Britannia Class steam engine, Oliver Cromwell, No 70013  to haul a special “London to Manchester tour train to mark the centenary of the opening of the London-Manchester railway service”.****

All of which seems fine and fitting, except that according to the same report “A diesal was substituted for the last stage of the journey from Nottingham”.

Flat bed indignity, 1968

A double whammy of ingratitude.

Pictures;  Cromwell in his original home, circa 1900, Judge Picture Postcard, from the collection of V & G Harris, the chaps moving him, 1968 courtesy of Tony Flynn

*Musical Hall song, "Theyr moving father's grave to build a sewer

They're moving it regardless of expense.

They're moving his remains to lay down nine-inch

drains

To irrigate some rich bloke's residence".

**The Cromwell Statue, Manchester Guardian, December 2nd, 1875

***Paint daubed on Cromwell statue, The Guardian, June 4th, 1968

****Final Journey, The Guardian, June 10th, 1968

Adventures in Middle England ……… from Leicestershire into the Cotswolds … No. 2 ..... a mutiny

 This is St John The Baptist in Burford, and it was here that three soldiers of the New Model Army were executed in 1649, following a mutiny over pay and political demands.

Burford Church, 2024

The issue of back pay was resolved, but the political demands went back to the Putney Debates which occurred two years earlier when in the middle of a bitter Civil War in which one in four died the army of Parliament sat down to discuss the future of England after the war with the King.

An Agreement of the People, 1647

Reading the discussions there is something very modern about the position of Colonel Rainsborough who argued that “... the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live, as the greatest he; and therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear, that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under...”

And this in turn reminded me of the Forces Parliaments which took place in the British Army in India and Egypt during the Second World War.  The Cairo Forces Parliament met in February 1944 and voted for the nationalization of the banks, land, mines and transport.

In their way it replicated those debates three hundred years earlier where the men who were fighting debated the future they wanted.

Now the Putney Debates and much more of the visions of the men who fought for Parliament was never taught to me.  

Part of the reason may well have been that the records of the discussions were lost until the beginning of the 20th century but I suspect the absence of this story may also be down to content.

Inside the church, 2024

In an age when history was still taught from top down the idea that there should be an alternative history where ordinary people wanted a share in how their country was run and believed that they had as much a right to that say as the rich and powerful was indeed a challenging one.

And in the case of the three soldiers who were executed it ran against the opinions and interests of the leading members of the army.

The mutineers were Levellers who had argued at Putney for a radical vision of the future including  popular sovereignty, extended suffrage, equality before the law and religious tolerance.

Private John Church, Corporal Perkins, and Cornet James Thompson, 2024

Dissatisfied with the opposition from the leading members of the army known as the Grandees, 400 troopers under the command of Captain William Thompson who were sympathetic to the Levellers set off from Banbury, where they were billeted, to speak with other regiments at Salisbury about their political demands.

The unit was engaged by loyalist forces, defeated, imprisoned in Burford Church where three of the the leaders were shot:

These were  Private John Church, Corporal Perkins, and Cornet James Thompson on  May  17th 1649.

According to the church web site “during their imprisonment,[ some of the the imprisoned  prisoners] left evidence of their time there, in particular a carving by Anthony Sedley in the lead on the font, which is dated 1649. There is also a "nine men's morris" board carved into one of the tombs in the Bartholomew Aisle”.

Walking into the church, 2024

It was by chance that as we headed through the Cotswolds last week we realized we would pass close to Burford, and so chose to break the journey, and after a fine meal at the Angel Inn headed on to the church and the rest is a collection of pictures and sense of walking through a bit of our radical history.

And ever since 1975 people gather each year to remember the Levellers, the Putney Debates and  Private John Church, Corporal Perkins, and Cornet James Thompson.** 

Location; Burford

Pictures; An Agreement of the People, 1647, and the church at Burford, 2024, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*The Levellers, Burford Church, https://www.burfordchurch.org/the-levellers

**Levellers Day, https://levellersday.wordpress.com/whats-happening-2024/

“... the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live" The Putney Debates ....... visions of a future England in the October of 1647

There is something exciting in the idea that in the middle of a bitter Civil War in which one in four died the army of Parliament sat down to discuss the future of England after the war with the King.

Reading the discussions there is something very modern about the position of Colonel Rainsborough who argued that “... the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live, as the greatest he; and therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear, that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under...”

And this in turn reminded me of the Forces Parliaments which took place in the British Army in India and Egypt during the Second World War.  The Cairo Forces Parliament met in February 1944 and voted for the nationalization of the banks, land, mines and transport.

In their way it replicated those debates three hundred years earlier where the men who were fighting debated the future they wanted.

Now the Putney Debates and much more of the visions of the men who fought for Parliament was never taught to me.  What we got was pretty much what was produced in The Pictorial History Book*

It is an interpretation which is replicated in other children’s history book.

Part of the reason may well have been that the records of the discussions were lost until the beginning of the 20th century but I suspect the absence of this story may also be down to content.

In an age when history was still taught from top down the idea that there should be an alternative history where ordinary people wanted a share in how their country was run and believed that they had as much a right to that say as the rich and powerful was indeed a challenging one.



Pictures; An Agreement of the People, 1647, and from The Pictorial History Book

* The Pictorial History Book, & Co, Ltd Sampson Low, Marston, 1955

One of the bits of history ...... they never taught me ... the Interregnum .... on the wireless today

Now much of the history I was taught at Samuel Pepys Secondary Modern revolved around the doings of Kings and Queens.

And if I think back it was more Kings, with just a handful of Queens, who pretty much just got walk on parts.

So, the period when we did with out a King, became a Republic, and called ourselves a Commonwealth were left out, of the great sweep of English history.

All of which means I shall be listening to the Interregnum, today on the wireless, in which "Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the period between the execution of Charles I in 1649 and the unexpected restoration of his son Charles II in 1660, known as The Interregnum. 

It was marked in England by an elusive pursuit of stability, with serious consequences in Scotland and notorious ones in Ireland. 

When Parliament executed Charles it had also killed Scotland and Ireland’s king, without their consent; Scotland immediately declared Charles II king of Britain, and Ireland too favoured Charles. 

In the interests of political and financial security, Parliament's forces, led by Oliver Cromwell, soon invaded Ireland and then turned to defeating Scotland. However, the improvised power structures in England did not last and Oliver Cromwell's death in 1658 was followed by the threat of anarchy. 

In England, Charles II had some success in overturning the changes of the 1650s but there were lasting consequences for Scotland and the notorious changes in Ireland were entrenched.

With Clare Jackson, Senior Tutor at Trinity Hall, University of Cambridge, Micheál Ó Siochrú, Professor in Modern History at Trinity College Dublin, and, Laura Stewart, Professor in Early Modern History at the University of York

Producer: Simon Tillotson"

Picture; Oliver Cromwell c. 1649 by Robert Walker. National Portrait Gallery, London, and The New Model Army, from Pictorial History, 1955

*The Interregnum, In Our Time, Radio 4, https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000wcxn, 

Visions of a future and the not so gentle and tender touch of Royal power

Now I know that south east London is a long way from Chorlton-cum-Hardy but the blog Transpontine featured a nice piece on The Fifth Monarchists, 17th century London religious radicals. 
http://transpont.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/history-corner-fifth-monarchists-17th.html.

The period has always been a fascinating one for me,* not least because of the Putney Debates, when the army of Parliament sat down to discuss the future of England after the war with the King.

Reading the discussions there is something very modern about the position of Colonel Rainsborough who argued that “... the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live, as the greatest he; and therefore truly, Sir, I think it's clear, that every man that is to live under a government ought first by his own consent to put himself under that government; and I do think that the poorest man in England is not bound in a strict sense to that government that he hath not had a voice to put himself under...”

And this in turn reminded me of the Forces Parliaments which took place in the British Army in India and Egypt during the Second World War.  The Cairo Forces Parliament met in February 1944 and voted for the nationalization of the banks, land, mines and transport.

In their way it replicated those debates three hundred years earlier where the men who were fighting debated the future they wanted.

But unlike the Forces Parliament which saw much of what they voted for come to reality after the election of the Labour Government in 1945 the expectations of many of the 17th century progressives, and visionaries came to nought in the face of Royal repression  which Transpontine chronicles.


*http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/the-not-so-soft-and-gentle-touch-of.html

Picture; Thomas Venner from Transpontine