Lessons from History: Wat Tyler and Occupy

In 1381 June 15th was a Saturday. The weather was warm and Smithfield was full not only of the great and horrible smells and mortal abominations for which it was then infamous but also with the rebels, the peasants who had revolted against the poll-tax and other oppressive measures of King Richard II and his court. We know nothing of the character or previous career of the leader of this rebellion; he is known to us as Wat Tyler. It was the hour of Vespers and the great Priory bell, lost in the Great Fire, would have rung out to call the canons to their prayers. They were, however, probably more interested in what was going on outside for before the doors of the church was the young King on his horse and at his side William Walworth, Mayor of London. If the King was afraid, he did not show it, though he had already been roundly abused by the rebels and they, only the day before, had penetrated the Tower of London and beheaded the Archbishop of Canterbury, Simon of Sudbury, whose head was now mounted over London Bridge.

Tyler crossed Smithfield to join the group of horseman surrounding the King’s person. Accounts vary as to what happened in the next two minutes. By one version Tyler put forward the rebels’ demands for the abolition of outlawry, the disendowment of the Church, and for free forestry. Whatever his demands he treated the King with such friendly familiarity, and his attendants with such contempt, that tempers flared, and the nobles answered him back roundly. They began, perhaps, to quarrel with him and, as Walworth determined to arrest him, Tyler drew his weapon. Walworth was wearing armour beneath his official robes and, thus defended, struck back at Tyler.

Tyler was dragged across Smithfield by his horse. The rebels now knew what had happened. A thousand long-bows were bent in the direction of the King and his party; a thousand arrows aimed at him. The danger was awful. The boy king never lost his head but with the coolness of an old general quelling a mutiny he rode alone across the square and told the rebels “I am your leader.” It was enough to disarm them.

Tyler, not yet dead, was dragged by arms and legs either into the Priory Church or else, which is more likely, into the nearby Hospital. Walworth, when he discovered this, had him dragged back out into the market place and cut off his head there. By evening it replaced the Archbishop’s head over London Bridge.

This was not one of the great moments in our history. The rebels were vicious and uncontrolled, doing to death those who were perceived as having responsibility for the wrongs they suffered, real or imagined. The Mayor set up a block on Cheapside and every peasant found in London was executed there together with any rioters falling under his jurisdiction. The King began a bloody assize in Essex and the fighting Bishop of Norwich, brother to a captain of Italian mercenaries, established peace in East Anglia by force of arms.

We cannot, of course, tell whose side we would have taken in the rebellion. At its heart was a demand for personal freedom and for the emancipation of serfs. The freedoms that the rebels wanted were well below the level of freedom that we enjoy. The process of releasing serfs did proceed but it was slow and the last remains of serfage were not swept away until the Tudor monarchs. Under James the First of England and Sixth of Scotland it became a maxim that every Englishman was free. It would take longer for every Englishwoman to be free.

1381 was a terrible year but the Rising was itself a sign of national energy, a sign of the independence and self-respect in medieval peasants, from whom three-quarters of our race, of all classes and in every continent, are descended. In England that same spirit has generated a continuous resistance to tyranny of all sorts.

The lessons of history are rarely clear or straight-forward. Noble and peasant alike subscribed to the doctrines of a Redeemer who bade us love our neighbours and our enemies, and pray for those who persecute us, but that religious belief did not prevent oppression or stay the hand of violent revolt or more violent suppression of the rising.

We count ourselves as civilised men and women, inheritors of the freedoms won by hard struggle and protected from enemies within and without over the centuries. We must be grateful for that. We are also privileged, sometimes by birth and inheritance, more often by skills and application. And that to should be a cause for thankfulness. We may well count ourselves as those who subscribe to values embodied in Christian moral teaching if not to the tenets of faith, or else we may uphold equally demanding humanistic values. But we know as well that we are capable of ignoring those values because of self-interest, of seeking to protect our privileges against the less privileged, and that social, cultural and racial tensions can erode these same civilised values.

Events of enormous proportions and consequences, far beyond our control, may make us feel impotent, but civilised values are maintained by relatively small acts, acts of which we are all capable. Each of us is able to play our part in the social, political and religious structures of our nation, in our communities, and in our trade. Each of us is able to vote in elections, to find opportunities for personal service, to support good causes, and to ensure that personally and professionally we do not discriminate against others because of background, gender, disability, race, or religion but rather try to increase our understanding of what is foreign to us. In the City we uphold these hard-won freedoms and continue to believe that there must be opportunities for those who can make much of them as well as protection and support for those genuinely unable to provide for themselves.

Smithfield has seen much blood, much injustice, much cruelty through the centuries, just as it has seen faith, courage and commitment. The two can so easily exist together that we must ever be vigilant and active in pursuing what is good and right and just and render to God humble and hearty thanks for all his goodness and loving-kindness.