God's Fury, England's Fire_ A New History of the English Civil Wars - Michael J. Braddick [387]
38. A Seasonable Lecture, or A most learned Oration: Disburthened from Henry VValker, a most judicious Quondam Iron-monger, a late Pamphleteere and now (too late or too soone) a double diligent Preacher. As it might be delivered in Hatcham Barne the thirtieth day of March last, Stylo Novo. Taken in short writing by Thorny Ailo; and now printed in words at length, and not in figures (London, 1642). Taylor used this pseudonym on a number of occasions. For Taylor’s remarkable career see Bernard Capp, The World of John Taylor the Water-Poet 1578–1653 (Oxford, 1994).
39. According to Fortescue, the lowest monthly total during 1642 was 117. Across the whole period 1640–1651 there were only twenty-seven months in which the total exceeded 100 titles. Sixteen of them were in a continuous run from January 1642 to April 1643: G. K. Fortescue (ed.), Catalogue of the Pamphlets, Books, Newspapers, and Manuscripts Relating to the Civil War, the Commonwealth and the Restoration, Collected by George Thomason, 1640–1661, 2 vols. (London, 1908).
40. For characterizations of the motives of activists in these terms see Fletcher, Outbreak, pp. 405–6; John Morrill, Revolt in the Provinces: The People of England and the Tragedies of war 1630–1648, 2nd edn (Harlow, 1999), pp. 68–9, and the reservations expressed at pp. 185–90.
41. Figures quoted or calculated from Keith J. Lindley, ‘The Impact of the 1641 Rebellion upon England and Wales, 1641–5’, Irish Historical Studies, 18:70 (1972), 143–76, at p. 144; Anon., No pamphlet but a detestation Against all such pamphlets As are Printed, Concerning the Irish Rebellion, Plainely demonstrating the falshood of them (London, 1642), quoted in Lindley, ‘Impact’, at p. 146. For the influence of the Foxean tradition, and its rival, see Ethan Howard Shagan, ‘Constructing Discord: Ideology, Propaganda, and English Responses to the Irish Rebellion of 1641’, JBS 36:1 (1997), 4–34.
42. Lindley, ‘Impact’, pp. 154–9. For the extent to which this fear of local Catholics was exaggerated see William Sheils, ‘English Catholics at War and Peace’, in Christopher Durston and Judith Maltby (eds.), Religion in Revolutionary England (Manchester, 2006), pp. 137–57, at pp. 138–42. After the Restoration Catholics made up about 1 or 1.5 per cent of the population, with estimates for particular places varying from 0.4 to 2 per cent or more. Most studies emphasize their political loyalty: Michael J. Braddick, State Formation in Early Modern England, c. 1550–1700 (Cambridge, 2000), pp. 324–30; for numbers see p. 325, n. 132.
43. Anon., A bloody plot, Practised by some Papists in Darbyshire (London, 1642): the date of the plot is 18 January, but there is no Thomason date. The pamphlet is bound with others dealing with events in late January.
44. This was a recurring feature of the Catholic scares of these months: Clifton, ‘Popular Fear of Catholics’, pp. 29–31, 45; Fletcher, Outbreak, pp. 204–6; [John Davis], A great discovery of a damnable plot at Rugland castle in Monmoth-shire in Wales related to the High Court of Parliament, by Iohn Davis, November the 12, 1641 (London, 1641); Anon., Gods late mercy to England in discovering of three damnable plots by the treacherous Papists and Iesuits in England and Wales, and many other places, & c. (London, 1641).
45. See above, p. 183.
46. Anon., A bloody plot, sig. A2r.
47. Braddick, State Formation, pp. 304–6, 324–30.
48. See above, pp. 171–2. Clifton, ‘Popular Fear of Catholics’, pp. 30–31; Robin Clifton, ‘Fear of Popery’, in Conrad Russell (ed.), The Origins of the English Civil War