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By Root 1316 0

rising tide of hostility to the parliamentary regime. The failure to settle, the continuing burden of the army, and fear of social and religious radicalism all fed impatience with those in control in London. These were hard times: a second bad harvest in succession made for a ‘sad, dear time’ for the poor in Essex, where ‘money [was] almost out of the country’. In Wiltshire there were food riots and attacks on soldiers and excisemen at Chippenham on New Year’s Eve.3 These miscellaneous discontents were the basis for mobilizing support, as in 1642; but, as in 1642, it was not clear that any of the national platforms really addressed them.

The festive calendar was a powerful focus for political mobilization. In Kent there was opposition to the reformed liturgy and in many places worship continued according to the Prayer Book. During 1647 the county committee heard reports of ‘sundry seditious sermons’ and ‘dangerous speeches… darkly implying threats against the parliament and a course to be taken with the Roundheads about Christmas’. As a result they took a hard line, publishing an order throughout the county underlining the prohibition of Christmas celebrations. This proved badly misjudged. One minister’s sermon was protected by armed men at the door of the church, and when the mayor of Canterbury ordered that the market should stay open only twelve shopkeepers complied. They were told to shut up again ‘by the multitude’, and when they did not their goods were ‘thrown up and down’. In the ensuing melee the sheriff was ‘stoutly resisted’ and the mayor knocked down. Despite his torn and dirty gown the mayor commanded everyone to go home, and those who resisted were briefly imprisoned. But only briefly – they soon broke out and were jeering at the aldermen. Shortly afterwards some of the leaders, along with some soldiers, appeared on the high street with two footballs. Joined by large crowds the football game quickly became a tumultuous demonstration, surging through the streets to cries of ‘Conquest’. Holly bushes were set up at doorways and free entertainment offered. The gaol was opened, aldermen chased and beaten into their houses and Richard Culmer, the Puritan minister, pelted with mud.4

Over the weekend Canterbury became the focus for a wider protest as people from surrounding parishes flocked into the town. On Monday a heated argument with ‘a busy prating’ Puritan led to pistol shots and cries of ‘Murder’. Crowds surged through the town, calling out ‘For God, King Charles, and Kent’. The sheriff, trying to keep the peace, was knocked down, receiving a serious head injury in the process. Windows were broken in the houses of the mayor and other prominent men, and some of the godly ministers and members of the accounts committee were assaulted, imprisoned and ‘laid in irons’. Worse, the city magazine was seized, and there were reports of similar, smaller riots elsewhere in the county. This was quickly becoming a pro-royalist rising: when news arrived of the King’s attempted escape from Carisbrooke on 29 December a number of gentry were reported to have openly declared their willingness to support the King and the Engagers. Their aim, they said, was to ‘release the King’s Majesty out of thraldom and misery,… restore him to his just rights,… and… endeavour the preservation of the honourable constitution of parliament… and all the just privileges thereof’.5

In the event the county committee was able to muster sufficient support to re-establish control in Canterbury. Elsewhere, however, festive pastimes became a means of expressing political dissent. A hurling match between the men of Devon and Cornwall was thought to be a pretext for anti-army action. In Bury St Edmunds on May Day a crowd gathered around a maypole or May bush as a troop of Fairfax’s cavalry rode into town. The soldiers were attacked to cries of ‘For God and King Charles’, before the gates were shut, streets barricaded and the magazine secured. There followed attacks on parliamentarians by a crowd containing 600 armed men and another hundred on horseback.