PROTEST & PROGRESS - The Cade & Cornish Rebellions

My purpose in writing this Protest & Progress blog post, is to explore for myself the history of English Protest Movements. What effect they had, and the changes they may ( or may not ) have instigated. Today, it's The Cade's & Cornish Rebellions.

1450 CADE'S REBELLION 

Was Jack Cade his real name?, this is hard to ascertain. He was also referred to as Mortimer, with the swashbuckling nickname of - The Captain of Kent. It was common place for rebel leaders to use an alias. It created a useful anonymity. An elusiveness over who you really were, when the authorities were trying to capture and charge you. Cade became the figurehead of one of the largest rebellions in 15th century England. This rebellion has very self conscious echoes of the Peasants Revolt, nearly eighty years previous.

The Peasants Revolt had moved from living memory, into being an exemplary folk tale. This informed the rebellion about to arise. And where did it arise? In the self same south east of England, as did the Peasants Revolt. And from there too they marched on London, with a series of demands. There were grievances over local corruption, but quickly they began to see their local situation was a symptom of much larger maladministration and corruption coming from the king's ministers. They wanted reform of that administration and the removal of the 'traitors' as they called them. Also the exorbitant cost of that seemingly endless Hundred Years War with France, an aggregating factor in the Peasants Revolt, was still disrupting the economy and increasing the tax burden upon the people.

Rebellion broke out in April, and ran on into the early summer. Once the rebels reached London, Cade's disciplined control over them slipped, and widespread looting broke out. So, rather than garnering the support of Londoners to their cause, they aroused their wrath instead. Londoners quickly formed a militia that cleared the rebel army out, decimating their numbers in a horrendous blood bath at London Bridge. Cade was caught, but died before he could be brought to trial. Popular unease with the nobilities manner of administering the country, made the rebellion feel a precursor to the War of the Roses, which broke out five years later.

1497 THE FIRST CORNISH REBELLION

The War of the Roses ended in 1487, after which medieval Plantagenet England came to an close. A feeling that the economy and in the country, was that England was overdue a period of financial stability, after over a century of wars and perpetually stretched expenditure. Henry 7th, though of royal descent, was of an extremely weak line in terms of right of succession. With years of turbulence between two royal houses fighting over prevalence, Henry needed to avoid causing unnecessary dissent, lest the whole question of his own legitimacy kicked in. Within a year of ascending the throne he'd already had to crush the rebellion of Lambert Simnel, a pretender to the throne, who is said he was a surviving son of Edward 4th. Having successfully stifled that challenge , Henry adopted a steady safe pare of hands approach. Which appeared to become financially more tight fisted as his reign progressed

However, in 1497, their two Cornish Rebellions broke out, which did exactly what he had most feared. It all started, as ever, over taxes, this time on tin mining. There were privileges and exemptions with regard to tax, that had been granted by Edward 1st to tin mines. Henry wanted to scrap these, a d when he encountering opposition  decided to suspend tin mining licenses indefinitely. This was a serious misjudgment on Henry's part. Tin mining was a major engine of the Cornish economy, and had been so for several centuries. At the same time, there was an increased threat of invasion from Scotland and there was the recent arrival of Perkin Warbeck, yet another pretender to the royal throne. Suddenly Henry needed to mobilise troops in three directions at once. This required money. The double whammy of the suspension of tin mining, plus war loans, taxes and levies, tipped Cornish men from disgruntled into outright revolt.

An army of around 15,000 left Devon, progressed quickly through Somerset and onwards in the direction of London. Henry's attention, primarily focused on preparing for conflict with Scotland, suddenly had to change tack, and deal with this rebellion moving at pace from the southwest. Skirting around London the rebels headed towards Blackheath, where they expected a rebel contingent from Kent to join them. The men of Kent did arrive, but to oppose, not to join them. With the King at their head they vastly outnumbered the rebels. The ensuing battle was a rout in which the rebel leadership were captured. Though a he'd defeated the Cornishmen, this was not enough for Henry. His vindictiveness revealed itself, through not lifting his prohibitions on tin mining for a further eleven years.

A drawing allegedly of Perkin Warbeck

1497  THE SECOND CORNISH REBELLION

This echoed the first rebellion, later that same year. Perkin Warbeck observed the dissent in Cornwall and thought it an ideal base from which to stake his claim to the throne and march on London. He arrived by boat in September. Taking a populist tack. He declared he'd remove all the offending extortionate taxes. Unsurprisingly, he was made very welcome in Cornwall, quickly garnering the backing of local aristocracy and surviving rebels. A Cornish rebel army numbering 6,000 men mustered in Taunton, Henry's response this time was swifter. Sending his chief General Lord Daubeney to staunch the rebellion. Warbeck panicked and found himself arrested, taken to the Tower and quickly hung at Tyburn. Henry arrived in Taunton in time to accept the rebels surrender. They were either executed or compelled to pay cripplingly heavy fines.

All these rebellions seem similar in nature, modelling themselves on the Peasants Revolt template. Always the usual mixture of unfair practices, unpopular wars and extortionate tax regimes. The rebels tended to blamed the corruption on the people around the king, not the king himself. No one risked open criticism of the monarch, nor called for Henry's removal. That would be treasonous and lead to certain death. Perkin Warbeck, however falsely, presented himself as a claimant to the crown. A direct attack on Tudor legitimacy. Once a monarchs divine right to rule becomes questionable, then rebels diplomatically avoiding criticising the king would become a less respected position. And the issue of legitimacy and succession would become the Tudor's neurotic preoccupation for the next century.

As we move into the 16th century, a whole smorgasboard of treachery, rightful succession, religious disputes, wars, taxes and criticism of the monarch, all became easier to hear sotto voce in the backstreets of England - with the arrival of the printing press.

Next Episode - 1536 The Pilgrimage of Grace