At least the Second Barons War only involves two battles to remember.
You may recall from the previous post that Henry III formally rejected the Provisions of Oxford in 1261 after Louise of France gave a ruling in Henry’s favour known as the Mis of Amiens. Fighting and skirmishing was wide spread but the two key dates are:
14 May 1264 – The Battle of Lewes- Simon de Montfort won the battle when the cavalry led by Prince Edward left the battlefield thinking only to rout the men they were chasing. It left the king exposed and he was captured. He was forced to sign the Mise of Lewes that gave power to Simon de Montfort, his brother-in-law. The document no longer exists but he was required to accept the Provisions of Oxford and to hand over his eldest son, Prince Edward, as a hostage of this good behaviour.
1265 The Great Council – also called the 1265 Parliament. Simon invited 2 knights from every county and burgesses from every borough. Its not quite a parliament but this was the foundation of the House of Commons. Simon de Montfort has sometimes been called the Father of Democracy – but it is over egging the omelette. Ordinary people – the peasants and villeins still had no say in how the country was governed. However, it was a radical departure from what went before.
Many of the barons thought that it was going a bit far too imprison the king and the Prince of Wales, so Simon said he would release Edward and return his castles to him. In Derbyshire, this irritated the Earl of Derby who refused to comply. Simon sent him to the Tower – this caused the barons even more concern – because Simon wasn’t the king, he was one of them. Gilbert de Clare, Earl of Gloucester changed his mind about supporting the barons and helped Prince Edward escape.
4 August 1265 Battle of Evesham – round two. Having learned from his Uncle Simon how to win battles the prince and his supporters won the day at Evesham. As a lesson to every one else, Simon de Montfort’s body was quartered and sent to several towns to remind everyone not to rebel against the king.
King Henry III ruled until 1272 but never called another meeting of the Great Council. When Edward ascended the throne as King Edward I he knew that he would have to keep the barons on side – and that meant making concessions – like having a parliament to give them a say – of course, it also turned out he was rather good at winning battles – all of which pleased the barons.
Let’s say that the power of the monarch was limited after the signing of Magna Carta in 1215. Well, yes that’s as maybe, but the king didn’t always understand that the terms of the relationship between kings and their most important subjects had undergone a change…
King John’s son Henry III did not always abide by Magna Carta. As he matured he was determined to be an absolute monarch. In his early years his regents used Magna Carta and the Forest Charter to unite the kingdom. Henry III was only 9-years-old when he became king, the French had invaded the south of England and the country was still at war. William Marshal and his co-regents used Magna Carta as a means to draw the barons together against the French, commanded by Louis the son of King Louis VIII. The regency councils knew that while the monarchy was weakened that it was essential to ensure that the barons did not rise in rebellion. Magna Carta allowed reconciliation between the two factions and ensured that the king was able to retain his throne.
During Henry’s minority, his regents chose to make Henry a papal vassal to avoid the threat of further invasion and rebellion; had to rule with few funds and had to agree that during Henry’s minority that royal castles in the hands of the barons should remain there. This meant that the king did not have access to all his estates and as a consequence fewer funds.
When Henry began to rule for himself in 1227, after a period of gradual resumption of power from 1219 onwards, he came to resent the restrictions imposed on him. The barons objected to his poor decision making. He married a frenchwoman, Eleanor of Province, who had a large family who wanted positions at court. Henry himself had a large number of half-siblings, the Lusignans, who also wanted promotion – resentment of foreign favourites contributed to the barons’ dissatisfaction. Then the king decided that he would regain his father’s empire which King John had lost. One of the golden rules for medieval kings that if they went to war they must win. Victory on the battlefield demonstrated that God favoured you – ruling by Divine Right was all very well if you won- if you started losing and costing money, people started to ask questions.
Henry III’s foreign policy was disastrous. As well as going to war in France – which the barons understood, Henry accepted an invitation from Pope Innocent IV that his younger son Edmund should become King of Sicily. In exchange for the kingship, Henry promised to support the papacy in its struggle against the Hohenstaufen dynasty – both of which would cost his realm and his barons lots of money. Henry ended up in debt to the pope for £100,000 (for the Sicilian campaign), wanted to exact more taxes from his barons, retrieve his castles and domain land and backed out of the terms of the Forest Charter (to help pay for his armies and their equipment) – even worse none of the foreign policy, especially the expensive Sicilian one, had any noticeable benefit for the barons.
In fact, if the king didn’t pay the pope back, people knew that he might be excommunicated – and when a king was excommunicated, or placed under interdict as it might also be called, so was his kingdom. People believed in Heaven and Hell – without the sacraments they feared eternal damnation…and it would all be the king’s fault. And further more they knew all about excommunication because King John managed to get himself, and the whole of his realm, excommunicated between 1209 and 1213 when he refused to accept the appointment of Simon Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury – all church services were cancelled, people couldn’t be buried in churchyards, babies who died and hadn’t been baptised were believed to have been sent to limbo – and in a society with a high child mortality rate that was a terrible thought.
The barons, under the leadership of Simon of Montfort, who was the king’s brother-in-law, decided enough was enough, especially when the king also suffered a series of defeats in Wales.
April 1258- Westminster – the barons refused to pay any more taxes unless Henry agreed to reform. They were represented by seven of their number, their leading being Simon de Montfort, who confronted the king.
The ‘Mad Parliament’ of 1258 – It was held at Oxford in June. It is sometimes described as the ‘First Parliament’ and it met under the conditions imposed by the barons and to which Henry had agreed when he was confronted.
1258 Provisions of Oxford – the barons, led by Henry III’s own brother-in-law, Simon de Montfort, placed the king under the control of a Council of Fifteen (remember Magna Carta tried to impose something similar with a council of 25) – the men were to be chosen by 12 nominees of the king and 12 nominees of the barons.
The council would appoint chief ministers, justiciars and the chancellor.
The men would be answerable to the Council of Fifteen – Effectively Crown officers would be publicly accountable to an instrument of state.
Parliament would be held three times a year – this was a revolutionary idea.
The reformers also demanded an investigation into local abuses and a reform of local government – regions were controlled by barons but it demonstrated that discontent further down the social hierarchy could not be ignored.
To summarise – it would be the barons who held the balance of power – not the king. Barons would also be required to listen to their tenants in future.
The provisions would help pave the way for later reforms but the pope excused Henry III his debt over Sicily – removing the necessity of Henry abiding by his agreement. Even worse, King Louis IX was given the task of arbitrating between the barons and Henry – the result was the Mise of Amiens – which saw Louis find in favour of his fellow monarch and overturn the Provisions of Oxford (to do otherwise would have been a bit like a turkey voting for Christmas). In 1261 the pope gave Henry permission to break his word to the barons.
The barons were not a happy bunch of campers – the end result was the Second Barons War which broke out in 1264…yup – that’ll be the next post.
In 2021 – the AQA exam board set this question: Explain the significance of the Provisions of Oxford and the Parliament of 1265 – it was worth 8 marks.
Here’s the start of a response – Like Magna Carta the Provisions of Oxford and the Parliament of 1265 were a challenge to the king’s authority. The Provisions of Oxford were a response to the arbitrary nature of Henry III’s rule and his failure to fulfil the traditional expectations of a medieval monarch, losing wars against the French in 1230 and 1242, relying on his foreign favourites and getting into debt with the Pope meant that the barons no longer trusted him. They accused him of breaching the terms of Magna Carta and sought to restore the terms of the earlier agreement which limited royal authority. Although the voice of protest still belonged to the barons the provisions represent the growing voice of the people raised in a demand for reform, especially as by 1258 there was unrest lower down the hierarchy at abuses the barons were committing against their own tenants. The demand for change was growing.
So I had a nice cup of tea and a think – this is the result!
Both Magna Carta and the Great Reform Act of 1832 were landmarks in the development of democracy. Both Magna Carta and the Great Reform Act did give more people a say in the decision making process. However, in the case of Magna Carta it was only the barons and the Church who benefited from the 63 clauses that sought to limit the king’s power. In the case of the Great Reform Act, it was the wealthy middle classes who benefitted – only 1 in 7 men received the vote after 1832. The working classes were excluded from the plebiscite.
In both cases, the changes were a response to years of criticism about the way the system operated. In the case of Magna Carta the barons had come to distrust King John who misused feudal dues such as scutage, the entry of heirs to their estates, and the remarriage of widows as well as other taxation to extort money from his barons, all of which is reflected in the clauses of the charter. In addition he imprisoned men or their families without trial and confiscated their land without redress to the law. Infamously, in 1210 he imprisoned Matilda de Braose and her son and left them to starve to death in Corfe Castle when her husband William fell from power. Magna Carta sought to bring royal abuses to an end, limit the number of taxes levied and ensure that the barons had access to judgement according to the laws of the land administered by men qualified to be judges and juries of their equals. New taxes were not to be levied unless they were agreed by the important men of the kingdom beforehand. Clause 61 wanted to ensure that a council of 25 barons could monitor the king’s behaviour. The charter limited royal power in some ways, brought greater freedom and justice the barons but it did not change the lives of the vast majority of England’s population who continued to labour in a feudal society. What it did was introduce the concept of ‘every man’ and ‘free men’ as well as the ideas of habeas corpus exemplified in clauses 39 and 40 of the charter and which are still enshrined in British law today.
In the case of the Great Reform Act of 1832, there had been many years of criticism about the electoral system which was neither fair nor representative, a bill passed in 1831 by the House of Commons was rejected by the lords and the Tory prime minister, the Duke of Wellington. As a consequence there were riots across the country. In some ways the discontent and its longevity were a reminder of the discontent prior to the First Barons War and certainly an echo of fears experienced by Britain’s elite associated with the French Revolution of 1789. The Reform Act which became law a year after the riots sought to reform electoral abuses. It removed rotten boroughs, like Old Sarum, which only had a few voters but two MPS, increased the number of constituencies to reflect the change in population in places like Manchester and Birmingham which previously had no representation and extended the franchise to men who held land worth more than £10 a year. This included tenant farmers, small land holders and shopkeepers – so that more people had a say.
Like Magna Carta, the Reform Act was also significant for what did not change. Only 1 in 7 men were allowed to vote because of the land holding qualification. Women were formally excluded as voters were now defined as being male. The vote was still not a secret which meant that men could still be intimidated or their votes brought (voting only became secret in 1872 with the passing of the Ballot Act). Just as Magna Carta did not answer the needs of everyone and King John’s son, King Henry III, failed to abide by the charter leading to further resentment among the aristocracy and the Second Barons War, so the working classes were denied the franchise by the 1832 Reform Act. This led to further unrest and the growth of the Chartist movement during the late 1830s and more demands for reform.
Note for any G.C.S.E. students – plebiscite is a really good word for this unit of study – it means the direct vote of all the members of the electorate. Franchise – the right to vote.
The dissatisfaction of the barons with King John led to the Magna Carta in 1215. There are 63 clauses setting out what the king could and could not do. Most of them are about regulating feudal customs, taxes and finances of one kind or another.
There are four main provisions of Magna Carta that anyone doing G.C.S.E. History needs to know and its quite handy for everyone else rather than remembering 63 points – 1) church rights, 2) protection from illegal imprisonment, 3) swift justice for free men according to the laws of the land and 4) a limit to taxes and feudal dues ( or no making up new taxes without asking the important men in the kingdom first.)
Of the 63 clauses 4 are still enshrined in the law -clause 1, 13, 39 and 40. The words ‘no one’ and ‘no free man’ gave the clauses a universal quality that did not apply at the time as the barons were only thinking of themselves- but by the 17th century they were very important indeed. In effect Magana Carta was a treaty between the king and his people and it meant that the king was not above the law.
Clause 1: The king was not to interfere in the Church.
Clause 13: The City of London must be allowed to enjoy its liberties and customs without interference. The clause went on to grant all other cities, boroughs, ports and towns the same right to enjoy their liberties and customs.
Clause 39: no free man could be arrested, imprisoned, disposed, outlawed or exiled until he was judged by a court according to the laws of the land by his equals – this establishes the principle of Habeas Corpus
Clause 40: No one was permitted to sell, delay or deny a man justice and no force was to be used against him until such time as he received a judgement according to the law. This is about due process.
Clauses 7 and 8 are specifically about women’s rights – that’s wealthy women not the unwashed masses.
Clause 7: Widows are not to be treated badly by their husband’s heirs – they are to receive their dower (one third of all their husbands estates at the time of marriage) and any jointures (property held by both husband and wife) without argument and they are allowed to stay in their husband’s home for 40 days before having to find somewhere else to live.
Clause 8: No forcing widows to marry against their wishes.
Clause 11: No impoverishing widows and orphans by making them pay their late husband/father’s debts.
For those of you who are feeling brave – in 2022 G.C.S.E. students were asked to explain two ways in which Magna Carta and the Great Reform Act of 1832 were similar. The question was worth 8 marks. And there’s something to ponder over a nice cup of tea! May be I’ll even have a stab at answering it next time.
I hope that followers of the History Jar are enjoying ‘guest post Mondays’ as much as I am. It’s wonderful to meet fellow writers over the Internet, if not in person. Today’s guest post is by Jo Romero, a talented writer and artist. Like me, Jo is fascinated by the women who end up as footnotes in history and like me she has written about Anne Neville (Hickey, Julia A., The Kingmaker’s Women, Pen and Sword). I love the vibrancy of her portraits and the cross section of society that she has drawn upon.
Forgotten Women of the Wars of the Roses and Their Portraits
I have always been fascinated by ‘forgotten’ stories, the ones history books tend to skip over. Over the years I’ve uncovered tales of Elizabethan pirates, a sword fight in seventeenth century Reading and some local allegations of witchcraft. But one area of history I’ve always been drawn to are stories of forgotten women. My book, Forgotten Women of the Wars of the Roses has recently been published by Pen and Sword Books, and was the result of two years’ research into letters, family documents, public records and chronicles. It was fascinating to uncover the many ways women from all sections of society shaped and were influenced by the fifteenth-century fight for the crown between the Houses of York and Lancaster.
Among them were women of power who needed a new, modern assessment. Alice Chaucer Duchess of Suffolk was initially a loyal supporter of Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou, but historians later dismissed her as selfish and power hungry after her switch from Lancaster to York. A fresh look at the evidence simply demonstrates that she was an adept politician who made intelligent and informed decisions for the benefit of her son and his future. Anne Neville, Richard’s III’s queen, is also often ignored in history books dealing with the period, but was one of the wars’ central characters.
There were others, too: Joan Conys, an innkeeper who ran The Swan Inn during the Second Battle of St Albans in 1461, when archers and foot soldiers fought in the streets. Gonnora Dowtton, the abbess of Delapré, assisted, according to one source, in the burial of the dead after the Battle of Northampton in 1460. And in 1450, one innkeeper would have mopped dried blood from her courtyard after the murders of local officials on her premises.
While writing the book, it was important for me to present these woman as three-dimensional characters to try and help readers ‘get to know’ them. I researched items in their wills and inventories and visited places they worked, lived and worshipped. In many cases I was able to see brasses and effigies that commemorate their lives. This formed the basis for a number of portraits that I also completed to help us see beyond the stylised depictions of them in brass or stone.
Elizabeth Fitzherbert was the wife of a Derbyshire Sheriff, Ralph Fitzherbert. Ralph was a supporter of Richard III, and the king’s boar badge – a sign of allegiance – can be seen carefully carved onto his effigy. I created Elizabeth’s portrait based on her effigy at Norbury, although there is also a cast of the monument at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Elizabeth wears a butterfly headdress with an elaborate cap, along with a stunning necklace depicting the Virgin and Child on a pendant. A visitor to Norbury in the nineteenth century noted that traces of red, gold and green paint could be seen on her clothing and I have represented this in my portrait of her. I was lucky to find out a lot about Elizabeth, her children and other aspects of her life during the 1480s.
Another often-forgotten woman from the period is Joan Canynges. Joan was the wife of William Cangynges, a celebrated Medieval celebrity of Bristol and wealthy merchant. He served repeatedly as Mayor, and was known to both Henry VI and Edward IV. In 1461 the couple were recorded hosting Edward at their home shortly after his accession. A look at women’s roles in the household during the fifteenth century revealed that it would have been Joan behind many of these arrangements ensuring rooms were ready, food was ordered and suitable entertainments were provided for the king. The Canynges’ lived near St Mary’s Church in the Redcliffe area of the city in a large and extravagant building with a viewing tower so William could spot his ships laden with goods approaching the harbour. Joan’s effigy can be found with William’s in St Mary’s Church, and my portrait of her was based on this likeness. Medieval effigies are often very stylised and it is difficult to find distinguishable, individual features. Very often these likenesses were created as a symbol of their person rather than as a faithful representation of how the person looked in life. However Joan and William’s effigies do have definite individual characteristics and it is likely that this is how we would have seen them if we could time-travel back to fifteenth-century Bristol. I’ve drawn her in the clothing and colours she wears in her monument.
Finally, I wanted to bring Anne Neville to life in my drawing. She experienced so much of the conflict, and is not often acknowledged for the effects it had on her, as well as her role as a participant. Her father, grandfather and first husband were all killed in or immediately after battle, while her marriage to Edward Prince of Wales forged a Lancastrian alliance between Margaret of Anjou and her father, the Earl of Warwick. Tudor historians portrayed Anne as the depressed and tragic wife of Richard III, but traces of her role as consort suggest she was, from what we can see, in fact a dutiful and active queen. It is unfortunate that she was, to some extent, overshadowed by the actions of her father and second husband. I based my likeness of Anne from two very stylised contemporary depictions of her: on the Salisbury Roll and the Rous Roll. I love how Anne’s expression is a little off guard, as if we’ve caught a glimpse of her across a room.
About the book:
Forgotten Women of the Wars of the Roses: The Untold History Behind the Battle for the Crown by Jo Romero
The book seeks to acknowledge the wider roles of women during the Wars of the Roses at all levels of society. It dives into their families, daily lives, homes and fashions, depicting them as the flesh and blood participants they were, against the backdrop of these wars. They were involved behind the scenes of battles, suffered legal consequences, and supported their families commercially and politically. They were negotiators, diplomats, commanders, rebels and spies but they were also wives, mothers and daughters.
Jo Romero has loved history for as long as she can remember, and achieved her BA (Hons) degree in History: Medieval and Modern, at the University of Hull in 1998. She is a history blogger at the Love British History blog and is active on social media. Jo is also an artist, and posts work depicting historical buildings and people under the social media profile @sketcherjoey.
Medieval society, in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest, was based on the feudal system. The king, was essentially owned his kingdom. Society worked on the basis that the king gave land and privileges to his tenants in chief, whether they were barons or bishops, in return for their loyalty and service. The tenants-in-chief then provided their knights with land. At the bottom of the heap were the peasants, who came in two varieties – free and serf. They had to work for their lord of the manor as well as paying fines and fees.
So far, so good. Ideally a medieval king was supposed to win battles, ensure that the country was peaceful by maintaining order, have good relations with the Church and the Pope, put down rebellions and have a good working relationship with his barons. Unfortunately, King John succeeded King Henry II who expanded his empire and Richard the Lionheart who was an excellent warrior and commander. John, on the other hand, lost his father’s empire when the French invaded in 1204 , ran out of funds trying to win back his territories and caused the barons to rebel. In fact, John had such a poor reputation as a warrior that he was nicknamed ‘Softsword’
In no particular order:
John quarrelled with the pope over the appointment of Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury, and ultimately got himself, and as a consequence, his country excommunicated.
Chronologies were written by monastic foundations and as a consequence of John’s poor relationship with the Church he was rarely written about in a positive light.
Richard the Lionheart left the country in debt in order to pay for the crusades but John needed even more cash to pay for the soldiers, equipment and transport to try and win back his European lands.
The barons were not pleased to have lost their territories in Normandy, less pleased to have to pay feudal dues including scutage, or shield tax, to fund a military campaign to try and retake the lost territories and did not appreciate John being permanently in England looking more closely at what was happening within the realm. Ultimately they would present him with the Magna Carta, a charter composed of 63 points based on King Henry I’s coronation charter.
GCSE Students – its really important to know this bit! King John not popular especially as he did not live up to the medieval model of a king – he lost Normandy and most of the Angevin Empire. He levied too many taxes including scutage. The barons raised an army and threatened to rebel. They presented him with the Magna Carta, or Great Charter, that identified 63 rules that they wanted John to abide by. Clause 61 stated that a council of 25 barons would be created to ensure that John abided by the agreement which he signed on 19th June 1215 at Runnymede. The Magna Carta did not mean that everyone would have a say in running the country- only the most important barons. John applied to the pope to have the agreement annulled. As a consequence, the Barons’ declared war and invited the French Prince Louis to be king instead. The First Barons War started.
When I began university, I was told that by the time I finished I would be able to unwrap layers of history in the landscape where I lived, rather like an onion. I’m not so sure about the onion simile and the word palimpsest doesn’t exactly roll off the tongue.
A palimpsest was originally a term used to described text written over an older layer of writing at a time when parchment was expensive. One layer is scraped off and another applied.
The truth of the matter is that in Derbyshire, and all the counties I’ve ever lived, elements of the past sit alongside the present, intertwining with one another like different fabrics in a patchwork quilt. Each one adds a new layer of meaning and in Derbyshire, it begins with geology. The landscape has shaped the people who lived here just as much as they shaped it.
One of my favourite links between landscape and the people who lived in Derbyshire is T’Owd Man of Wirksworth. He’s a small carved figure of a miner with a pick and workman’s basket, or kibble, dating from the Saxon period. He can be found on one of the stones in the south transept of St Mary’s Church.
Not that he began life in Wirksworth – The old man, or ‘T’Owd Man’ as the carving is known, was found during the restoration of the largely fourteenth century St James’ Church in the nearby village of Bonsall. T’Owd Man is thought to have originated from an earlier church and was reused as part of the foundations of the medieval building. From Bonsall he found his way to the garden of the local churchwarden, John Broxup Coates. At some time between 1870 and 1874 T’Owd Man was rescued from his role as a garden ornament and incorporated into the walls of St Mary’s which was undergoing its own restoration.
The carving is thought to be Britain’s earliest representation of a miner – which is a seriously cool claim.
The Little History of Derbyshire will be available at the end of May.
Today is a bit different. This is probably a longer read than usual, and one that I found while I was having a spring clean of my laptop but I hope that you enjoy it.
Marsden, situated at the top of the Colne Valley, nestles into the millstone grit of the Pennine hills. It’s a gateway to open spaces and beautiful moorland scenery, home to curlews and rare twites. It is also the last town in the West Riding before crossing into Lancashire. The Romans passed this way building a road between York and Chester in AD 79. From medieval times onwards, Marsden was the natural crossing point for travellers, merchants and goods as they travelled from east to west. It became the home for mill masters and revolutionaries. Just eight miles from Huddersfield along the A62, Marsden boasts ancient tracks and pathways, turnpike roads, and the Huddersfield Narrow Canal.
I park in the National Trust car park at the top of the town. This vast space used to be the old goods yard. I head towards the National Trust Estate Office and exhibition centre where I discover a small but informative display about Marsden’s past, the richness of its moors and the diversity of its wildlife, its role as a transport hub, textile town and the fact that it has, on average, forty inches of rain each year.
I pause on the brow of the hill opposite the Railway Inn to take in the hills on the far side of the valley, the tall chimneys – relics of Marsden’s industrial heritage, the church and the snug looking folds of houses. Then I turn right onto the tranquil towpath alongside the canal towards Tunnel End. The canal arrived here in 1804 but then the navvies faced the task of crossing the Pennines. The canal tunnel I’m heading for is the highest, longest at 3.2 miles and deepest in the country. Thomas Telford engineered it. Since 2001 the Huddersfield Canal Society have lovingly restored the waterway and turned it into a haven for wildlife, fishermen and for visitors. The first canals hugged the contours of the land whereas the Huddersfield Narrow Canal climbs to Marsden and then cuts straight through the hills to Diggle in Lancashire. No wonder it is an example of a heroic canal- built during the second phase of canal building when nature was seen as an obstacle to be overcome. The Industrial Revolution was in full swing. Anything was possible – so long as it involved picks, shovels and the odd keg of gunpowder.
When it was complete men legged their boats through the long deep dark tunnel because there was no towpath at this point. A towpath would have added enormous construction costs to the tunnel that took seventeen years to complete. The horses that usually towed the barges were led over the top of the hill giving them a well-earned rest from their loads while the crew ‘walked’ their vessel through the tunnel by laying on their backs and walking along the top of the tunnel.
I follow the canal back in the direction of Marsden before taking a wooded path through the picnic area. It brings me down the hill and across Mellor Bridge. There are no packhorses wending their way or clattering over the narrow stone bridge this morning. There’s just me and the sound the River Colne singing as it laps and splashes on its way. Marsden boasts not one but two packhorse bridges built specifically to allow winding caravans of merchandise and supplies across the river. Packhorses and weary folk trudged along centuries old trails that radiated out from Marsden until 1759 or 1760 when Blind Jack Metcalfe of Knaresburgh built a turnpike road that followed a more direct route.
Bundles of heather were laid on the boggy ground to stabilise it for the road builders. The road was built on top of this. The turnpike was the name for a gate lowered across the road to ensure that travellers using it paid their toll. Part of Blind Jack’s road survives today as Old Mount Road. Unsurprisingly, given its strategic location, Marsden had not one but three turnpikes. Each one was designed to improve on the one that came before. The A62 follows the line of the last turnpike road though I’m beginning to be very grateful to the Highways Agency. Travelling across the Pennines in times past sounds rather a hazardous, not to mention gruelling, business.
From the bridge, which looks like it might be the ideal residence for a troll, it is a few short steps to the shadow dappled and very substantial looking church of St Bartholomew built in 1899. It’s sometimes called the ‘Cathedral of the Colne Valley’. I’m looking for something rather smaller today though. I cross the road. Although the original church was demolished, its memory lingers still. Old tombstones form the path into a green space delineating the former site for worship. Here I discover a soot and lichen darkened memorial to Enoch and James Taylor.
The Taylor brothers are closely associated with the Luddites. Skilled workers called croppers worked finished woollen cloth using enormous hand-held shears. During the opening decade of the Eighteenth Century croppers were being put out of work by a new technology- the cropping frame- that did the work more quickly and which did not require the numbers of men. The workers, fearing for their jobs, their homes and the lives of their families petitioned the government of the time for help. Finally, seeing no alternative croppers banded together and smashed the machines that were destroying their livelihoods. They worked under the leadership of the mysterious General Ludd. The term Luddite was born.
And the Taylors? The Taylor brothers were blacksmiths. Their forges made both the machines and the huge iron hammers that the Luddites used to break them in and around the Huddersfield area. A popular joke at the time was ‘Enoch made them, Enoch breaks them’. Strangely, the Luddites never targeted the Taylor brothers- possibly because they were republican sympathisers. Instead, the Luddites focused their anger on the masters who put them out of work. William Horsfall of Marsden owned Ottiwells Mill employing some four hundred men, women and children. He had no sympathy for the Luddites or for the plight of his workers. He was deeply unpopular because of his outspoken desire to put down the Luddite unrest with whatever force necessary. Perhaps it is not surprising that the authorities stationed both infantry and cavalry in Marsden to deal with any trouble. It did not save Horsfall. He was killed on his way home from Huddersfield one market day in April 1812. Today his mill is gone as are the forges where the Taylor brothers made the machines that did the work of five men. Their foundry has been replaced by a primary school. Basking in the sun it is hard to believe that Marsden was once a hotbed of discontent.
I continue across the green encountering an old set of stocks before cutting between a block of new flats and over a footbridge that brings me into the Market Place where I’m delighted by a three dimensional model sculpted by Mick Kirkby-Gedded entitled Marsden’s Canal offering a bird’s eye view of the town and its surroundings. I pause to look at the river as it gushes over the weir. A row of ducks slumber on the edge of the water. Today they have the river to themselves but on sunny weekends the banks ring to the sound of laughing children paddling in the Colne. An elderly gentleman in a flat cap nods and tells me that ‘It’s a grand day for it.” It is too.
Peel Street is a bustling place with the post office, a grocer’s, cafes, restaurants, assorted craft shops and even a pub with its own microbrewery. The red and cream clock tower of the Mechanics Institute is a natural focus. It was opened in 1861 by public description and today houses the local library. The Information Point is across the road. Its helpful and friendly staff advises me on walks and other places of interest that I might like to visit in the afternoon. They also point out where to find some very famous locations indeed. Auntie Wainwright’s shop from Last of the Summer Wine lurks around the corner in Oliver Street.
My visit is all but ended now. There’s just the climb back up Station Hill to the car park with a backwards glance in the direction of the buttery sandstone shell of a mill that once employed hundreds of people. Then I’m surprised to hear the clip-clop of hooves. Am I dreaming? For a moment I wonder if it’s the ghost of a pack horse beginning its journey across the moors towards Manchester. My dreams are interrupted by the chunter of the Trans-Pennine train service drawing to a halt and by the sound of a dog barking. “Grand day for it,” says its owner. And for the second time today I agree.
This handsome little squirrel can be found in Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford.
Squirrels could represent friendship or diligence, thrift and caution – they could also be symbolic of greed and worse (medieval monks liked jokes of their own and the association of squirrels and nuts produced some rather rude ones and the occasional eyebrow raising illustration in a psalter). The jest remained so popular that there are many 14th and 15th century seals in existence featuring a squirrel and the words ‘I crack nuts’ which, put politely, has a bawdy overtone.
In some medieval bestiaries squirrels were described as small angry creatures who died from rage. The Lost Language of Symbolism suggests the reason why the squirrel features in the cathedral window. Medieval belief suggested that squirrels kept to the tops of trees so that they could not be hunted. For humanity to be safe from the wiles of treacherous devils they should be like squirrels staying on the high ground – i.e. keeping our eyes and thoughts on heaven.
I now think I know why there was a squirrel on the unstitched coif – a Catholic would have to be cautious in the 17th century and of course, they were keeping their mind on their beliefs while all around them various officers of the state sought them out.
Bayley, Harold, The Lost Language of Symbolism (2013)
Part of the GCSE syllabus is a module focusing on power and the people. We tend to think of Magna Carta as our starting point but nothing happens in a vacuum, so without getting too carried away we need to head back to 2 August 1100. William Rufus, the king of England is hunting in the New Forest. After a rather rocky relationship with his elder brother, Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy, the two brothers have come to an agreement. If one dies the other will inherit his throne. Unfortunately for Curthose, when Rufus has a hunting accident on the 2 August, it’s their younger brother Henry who is on the scene.
Henry dashes off to Winchester, leaving William’s body where it lays, in order to secure the royal treasury. Three days later he is crowned King of England. Curthose is still on his way back from the crusades, having stopped en route to marry Sybilla of Conversano, a wealthy heiress whose dowry will go some way to paying his debts. (Curthose was eventually beaten by Henry at the Battle of Tinchbray in 1106 and spent the rest of his life in captivity. He’s buried in Gloucester Cathedral.)
Henry has claimed the throne but now he needs to keep it.
King Henry I’s hold on the throne relies on the support of the Church and his barons. In order to bind them to him he issues a coronation charter, sometimes called the Charter of Liberties, that promises the church and individuals certain rights. Henry was an admirer of Edward the Confessor, he sought to make Edward’s law the common law of England (with a Norman firm hand) and to tell his new subjects that he was returning to the ways of his own father – ie he would be a strong king and there would be peace in the realm…or else. But that also the corruption of William Rufus were at an end. Henry was promising a return to the good old days.
Of course, Henry ignored his own coronation charter but the point had been made and the promises it contained would be the precedent for Magna Carta. King’s after Henry issued similar coronation charters to Henry I. His successor, King Stephen issued a similar ‘deal’ between king, people and Church. A copy can be found at Exeter Cathedral.
Key words: coronation charter, Charter of Liberties
