Welcome to Between The Stools on 4th September 2022. Our theme today follows on from last month, when our topic took in land rights. It was due to the actions last year by those connected to the land – those in trucks and tractors – that caused me to think not only on the contribution of those connected to food production and distribution make to the world, but their power and courage to alter it. I did not know that once again, lorry drivers and farmers in different countries would be involved in protests against their governments.
Although there are many worldwide examples, I have chosen 4 events in the East of England where rustics rebelled for us to think on tonight, because it is where I come from. I hope that wherever you’re listening from, that you’ll find something you can relate to in these. Do write in (or stay on after the call) and tell me about anyone who’s inspired you, where you are.
This day was chosen because it is the anniversary of three of these.
Let’s open in prayer, then I’ll tell you about them
I’d like to start with the rebellion in a village just north of Diss in Norfolk; apart from its disused station on the Norwich line, there may be little for you to know about Burston, if it wasn’t for the following.
After meeting someone who had visited, I picked up a leaflet about this place, which was having its annual rally this first Sunday of September to commemorate the what they claimed was longest strike in history. On 31st March 1914, the married school teachers, Tom and Annie or Kitty Higdon, were unfairly sacked by the state school authorities. They were replaced, but the children and parents of the village stood with Tom and Kitty and refused to go to school. Instead, they were taught by the couple privately in an alternative free school which was built on the common from national donations. Many children of Burston did not attend the official school for 25 years; instead Tom and Kitty continued to teach them until the end of their lives.
Today, the simple stone covered schoolroom survives, next to the parish churchyard, where the teachers are buried. Inside the school are cardboard cut outs of children in period dress with slogans and banners: ‘We want our teachers back!’ A slab outside summarises the tale, ending that the school was to be “a centre of rural democracy and a memorial to the villagers’ fight for freedom”.
I loved that the children instigated the strike; that the Higdons cared about the poor wages and treatment of the farm labourers, whose children they mostly taught; that they provided for those in need out of their own pocket; that they defied the gentry and vicar who assumed himself as leader of the village, trying to impose hierarchy and anglicanism – for the Higdons, like many local families, were nonconformist, in all senses. They showed the judiciary for the travesty it is – parents were fined for their children’s nonattendance at the official school, but the courts gave up. Even evictions didn’t deter the villagers. The parish church was near empty too.
I was impressed (and angered), but then I dug a little more. Although the charges of child bashing against the Higdons were clearly invented by their enemies, it seems that Tom did assault a farmer over child labour. And despite their supposedly radical views on education, the Higdons trained children for traditional employment – typing, cookery and sewing classes for girls. I’m unhappy that Mrs Higdon got the schoolgirls to do her washing, as practice!
The leaflet implies that it was the Higdons’ trade union involvement which was objected to by the council, although the unions failed the Higdons and were weak. The leaflet is littered with modern union logos. It was they who organise the festival being held today, with speakers from their own. They use this rural rebellion as support for themselves, and they run the official website.
I too have experience of school striking.
Growing up in the 1980s, I recall not infrequent letters home from school about Baker Days. As such and such union called a strike over teachers’ pay and conditions, certain teachers under that union would not attend school. And if were in their class, neither would we.
Many of us thought that this was great: we may have hated school, been bullied there and even already seen through the child conditioning system of mainstream education. But for others, we were lonely, we were forced to be with abusive families, and we caused childcare headaches for our parents. I was happily too young to be at a critical stage for school qualifications, and this was before those hated Standard Attainment Tests [SATs] came in. But for those a little older, your Ordinary and Advanced level examinations were affected, and thus your ongoing life plans.
Years later, I had some experience of the opposite situation. As an overgraduate, I was keen to obtain teaching experience whilst studying for a higher degree, as well as the income it generated. Delighted to be offered some hours, I was dismayed that academic staff were striking and there was some pressure that the research students should join them, in solidarity, not effectively fill in for them. We did not benefit from the advice nor the references of our experienced colleagues, who may also have been our academic supervisors…might this affect our vivas and references?
Of course, the strike pressure could have been much greater, as many can attest.
I must say that I am uneasy about striking as a political tool. It is hostage-like, for it hurts a third party so much that the people you are trying to influence give in to your demands. Pay alone is often not sufficient a cause, in my view; many industries who strike are often quite well paid – I know many who are poorer, and often with less dependable income. At present, postal workers are joining a spate of train strikes. The latter affected even those who don’t use the railways as loved ones and clients were unable to meet and colleagues unable to get to work. I felt anger not sympathy – not because I don’t care about the way in which people are treated at work. Rising prices affect us all. I am aware that a larger game may be being played and I’m wary of a repeat of the 1970s here when too much union power and constant striking led to a robust right wing government curtailing those powers whilst helping itself to more.
I’m thinking about the right and wrong way to use noncompliance and consent against unjust authorities or figures who think that they have it. In Burston, the pair of teachers were already out of a job, so actually the Strike School gave them back their work. Because much of the community stood with them – and 25 years involves several generations of kids – the children didn’t lose out either. It was a win for both the Higdons and for the village. The people who lost out were the authorities; the vicar, who Rev Charles Eland left a bequest [says Diss Museum]. However, I wonder about the teachers of the other school. There were still about six children out of 72 attending in 1914, although the proportion changed over the next quarter century. What of the families who wished to go to the state school? Was there pressure or censure or division?
I am aware of this tale being curated and possibly more complicated.
Even so, it seems that there’s something positive to be learned at Burston, whatever our own view of socialism and trade unions. Burston was a little place that, like the local motto, did different. It made something constructive. It didn’t make a community go without – it created anew. It gave a message to the right people – the rector, school board, courts and council – without hurting unrelated people.
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There is another anniversary this weekend. This action lasted nearly as long as at Burston. It too attracted much wider attention. In 1981, a group of women from Cardiff in Wales walked 120 miles to Greenham Common in Berkshire. They set up camp next to the military one, which was due to receive nuclear weapons. The Peace Camp remained women only, and their nonviolent protest garnered them international coverage, although they were often arrested and charged. They inspired other such groups – I read the testimony of someone who had done similarly at Sculthorpe air base in Norfolk. What’s interesting to me is that although the women’s camp successfully removed the weaponry and the military within a dozen years, the Peace Camp remained until this weekend in 2000 – making exactly 19 years, moving out on their birthday.
I have been for nuclear disarmament since I heard of the term and I am proud of the achievement of the Peace Camp; but it’s the other aspect of why the women stayed that I’m interested in and it is the common ground between the other three.
Literally – common ground. Except that commons are uncommon.
You may have heard of this vast heathland near Newbury because of the airbase. If you’re a British child of a certain era, you’ll know The Wombles of Wimbledon Common – yes, land of tennis tournaments – but also Elizabeth Beresford’s creation of rubbish tidying subterranean snouted creatures. Southampton, Tunbridge Wells and Newcastle also maintain their ancient commons (or moors). But do you know of many others?
If you roam around the English countryside, you’ll often come across the appendix to a village name —Green, but you may wonder where the green is. Yes, the fields and foliage can be green, but that’s not why it’s called Green. A green was literally an open grassy space, a common. My understanding is that every village and town had them. Some had more than one. But it’s remarkable if they do now. That’s because of what I am about to tell you.
I’ve noted that there is a swathe of old style greens and commons around the Norfolk/Suffolk border – in the region of Diss, where I just spoke of. I wish to know why this area was able to keep them when so many others were lost.
A common was a place where folk could graze their animals; they could also collect fuel, soil, and perhaps fish. However, they were not, as I thought, communally or non owned spaces for anyone to do anything. They were the property of the lord of the manor, who granted specific rights to his tenants. The term ‘commoner’ comes from those who were granted such rights.
Yet from the 1500s, these started to be enclosed. Later, this was through legal acts, but in the story I wish to tell you next during Edward VI’s reign, it was being done illegally by the gentry to make more wealth for themselves. It meant that the common people did not have these opportunities, and so their livelihood was affected. They needed their animals to survive; they needed to gather wood and turf to keep their houses warm and their fires going.
Instead, the rough open spaces – often left thus because they are unsuitable for crops – became fields or housing. If you go to Haughley Green near Stowmarket, as we’ll shortly be doing, you’ll see that the older houses are further back from the road than modern ones. That’s how most greens have become, but it’s a hint that once there was communal open pasture. (In fact, Haughley Green does still have such a space, called The Cricket).
I wonder if we can see a parallel between the historic loss of commoner’s rights and fuel hikes, which today threatens many of the less rich from doing what is necessary. Note too the house building frenzy whereby many farmers are selling their fields to property developers, and that governments are creating schemes – or pressure – for farmers to relinquish their fields to them. Think of who now has power over the creation of food; and that land for food growing is being lost, potentially permanently – including the deceptive encouragement of it going back to nature.
The next person that I want you to meet involves going a bit north of Diss, to a town about eight miles south west of Norwich, called Wymondham. It’s July 8th 1549, and a landowner called Robert Kett sees a band of men pulling down the fences that shut them out of land they used. This band believed that they had the support of the man standing in lieu of the boy king, Lord Protector Somerset. They’d been bribed by Kett’s neighbour Flowerdew to leave him alone and attack wealthy Kett. But Robert listens and is sympathetic to their cause: in fact, he becomes their leader. He assists them disassemble his new fences and hedges, and then they do Flowerdew’s. Many more join Kett and his brother, and via an oak at Hethersett (still there, allegedly) they march upon Norwich, the regional capital and then arguably England’s second city. (York and Bristol, I hear you!)
They encamp on a common – see how key they are to this – which you can still visit, although it’s much smaller than it was in the mid 16th century. In fact, Mousehold Heath is much smaller than it was at the time that our final story is set. From this hill which surrounds Norwich, Ketts’ army came into the city (on Magdalene day!) and held it. They set up their own council with representatives from each hundred and began arresting and trying gentry and civic leaders.
This is quite incredible. So is the fact that the purported 16,000 rebels outnumbered the population of the city itself. I’m told that Kett’s was not the only such gathering in England at that time, but it was the largest. In Norfolk, it’s known as The Commotion. It could have been era-making.
There was a place in the heath known as the Oak of Reformation – the second time that tree features in the tale. It was a place to pray and gather; the kernel of the camp.
The crude version focusses on the rebel’s ire over enclosures, but the 29 grievances which Kett signed and handed to the Lord Protector also concerned priests and releasing of slaves. Their demands were specific and courteous. They were delivered to London, but not upheld.
Kett had already refused two requests to disband and fought two successful battles. But the crown’s foreign mercenaries arrived, and Kett’s gathering was officially called a rebellion. They were offered pardon but Kett said that he was doing nothing treasonous and declined. A battle was fought at Dussindale, led by the Earl of Warwick, who became the new lord protector.
This is the part where I am suspicious, and this story was given a warped angle for 400 years. We’re told (note my phrasing) that many rebels were killed in battle or executed, including both Ketts. I promise no gory details, but I’d like you to note something dreadful. That Robert was hung from the castle isn’t a surprise – it’s a building about power and punishment. But that William was hung from Wymondham Abbey’s tower appals me. A house of God, it is meant to be literally and legally a place of solace. That the church were involved – and note, this is post reformation, so it’s the Anglican church – is disgusting, although not surprising. There is a large crack in this tower, fittingly. They also used both oak trees.
The Norwich authorities sponsored preaching against rebellion and created a public holiday – it would have fallen this week – to commemorate the battle which defeated the rebels, on August 27th. It lasted for a century. Note that in England we have a national public holiday around this time. Norwich’s Lord Mayor’s celebration falls at the start of Kett’s rebellion, around 9th July.
Compare this with Guy Fawkes night, six decades later.
Although we’re told that Robert failed, we also celebrate him. I wrote a post about attending an outdoor play on the heath about him – note the ironies regarding the beacon. But this group, The Common Lot, who received council support, recognised that the Kett-led struggle was a universal one that continues. Kett has the hill and garden where he camped in Norwich named for him, and a bookshop in Wymondham – with the acorn symbol. There is a Robert Kett school, and his story is on many curriculums. A public mural about Norwich’s dissent includes him among other historic people we’re proud of: it was created at the time of a proposed police act that would curtail the right to protest (although it blocks out a space homeless people used). Despite the fact that Kett, like local Boudicca, did not apparently win, and that he, like Boudicca, allegedly was part of violence which I do not condone, that it is he who is celebrated half a millennia years later, not those who brought his downfall. Four years on the Earl of Warwick was executed for treason.
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I’d like to pause as we did at that play. I haven’t got a beacon handy to light, but if you have something that you can, do so – or just visualise a flame burning over a city or village. Think of those who have suffered under injustice, anyone and where on your heart. You may be very aware of this oppression yourself. You may even be an oppressor. Let us send prayers and energy to oppression so that it may stop; that oppressors are challenged and changed; that injustice is reversed and that healing happens. Help us to be aware of where this occurs, to open our eyes and hearts, and to ask what we can do to assist. Thank you for those in the past who stood up and may we be shown how their stories can inspire ours.
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The last place we’re going is to Haughley Green, a satellite of a mid Suffolk village, and a woman in living memory (1898-1990) who lived on the edge of a former common, a landowner, with a title, from an illustrious family. Like Robert Kett, this lady led the plight against injustice.
Eve Balfour is best known as the woman who set up the Soil Association. Here was its first headquarters, Walnut Tree Manor Farm. Although less known, Lady Eve had an important companion in the Haughley Experiment: Alice Debenham. In prefab drab blocks that later served as classrooms and now dormitories they tested new ways to farm which are in tune with the land, in contrast to the government subsidised chemical and productivity based methods that were usual. Eve lived in a farm further along, New Bells.
Although I’m intrigued by Alice and Eve’s organic farming methods, I’m going to talk about Eve’s involvement in the Tithe Wars. If you’re Christian, you’re probably familiar with tithing – the concept of giving at least a tenth of your income to the Lord (read, your church). We’re told that it’s biblical (so therefore you should). In nonconformist circles, it’s a social pressure, but formerly in the Anglican church, it was a legal duty. Now they have parish shares – an amount set by the diocese for the congregation to fulfil. But for centuries, everyone was expected to give to the church, even when there were other kinds, and some people didn’t go to any.
So a Baptist farmer would be expected to give up his produce for the local rector and bishop. If not, bailiffs could come and take what they decided was due – often far more than the tithe.
Again around Diss, I found someone who had suffered this but stood up to it in a timeless way.
Wortham has commons, one of which is known as the Ling. It’s an atmospheric village with a round towered church; and next to it is the manor, once home of the Rashes, and an author, Doreen Wallace (Eve also wrote novels). In the 1930s, they refused to pay their tithes, and had wide public support. Farmers under threat would sound bugles, fireworks, and even church bells to alert others to gather and help prevent the bishop’s bailiffs. Rowland Rash felled a tree across his drive just as they were coming so that they couldn’t enter his farm. Other tactics were digging ditches, lying in front of the bailiff’s trucks; and if things were taken to market, their friends would buy them back at low prices, or refused to bid, and threw things at the auctioneer.
Wales and Ireland had done away with established church tithing a century earlier. Wales, like East Anglia, is a hotbed of nonconformity; but Ireland has many Catholics. Both countries asked why, when so many of their farmers worshipped at a church other than the established chain, that they should be forced to finance it. It’s noteworthy that a search for ‘tithe wars’ brings up more Irish results, even when you have an English IP address. My most detailed sources I found on England were Australian contemporary newspapers.
In England, these tithes were especially unpopular during the depression, and small farmers struggled to pay – giving a tithe away could mean ruin for them.
After the bailiffs did take goods from Rowland and Doreen, they thought of a wonderful way to memorialise their indignity. Next to a muck heap is a small headstone, simply stating what was taken and the date. In Elmsett near Hadleigh in the south of the county, Mr Westren did likewise, but his monument is taller and directly faces the church gate. For £385 of alleged debt, £1200 was taken, including a baby’s bed.
Thus the church’s shame is immortalised – and shame it is. The shame also falls on Oxbridge who are connected to many church livings and were behind these atrocities.
I would say to anyone worried about bailiffs – and last year I was living under than fear – don’t fear bailiffs or think they’re inevitable or unstoppable. They are corrupt and acting criminally, whatever legal framework that they think they have, and will be called to account.
Reading those newspapers was empowering, and even amusing. Hundreds gathered to side with the farmers and the bailiffs and police often had to give up, looking farcical. The Rashes defied them again; as they were bankrupted, Doreen was lifted high by her supporting crowd, looking triumphant. The auctioneer was a friend and I understand that much was recovered. Meanwhile, Doreen lampooned this ancient practice with her pen’s sharp nib, on which she could now focus.
In 1936, a new English tithe law changed what the church could have, and it’s said that tithes entirely finished here in the 1970s – the truth is a bit more complicated as the requirements kind of changed shape and became more secular.
I’d like to draw this to a close by asking us to consider which of these we admire and consider successful. Which of these could en-courage us? What might we consider about the nature of nature, education, ownership and obligation from these tales? What is the modern equivalent of tithe wars? How might a new people-led form of governance look? What could we do?
I also exhort thinking about the sources and uses of these stories. Whereas the trade unions utilising the Higdons does seem appropriate and what they might have wanted, why is Eve Balfour’s tithe war activity so hard to find – and would she approve of what has happened to the Soil Association? (Several trustees in 2014 didn’t think so, and I was alarmed by their campaigns).
Of course, there is much more to say about all of these and I hope you might wish to research yourselves to answer these fully.
I’d like to wind up with a coda, and then a brief meditation with an image.
I was delighted to read that Greenham Common restored its pre-military rights, but then I read its online document and felt alarmed. “Obey” they tell us. To have common rights, you have to sign up and give various personal details. Many ancient rights – such as acorn snuffling for your pigs – aren’t relevant, yet they’ve appended the power to require permission to film there. Wortham also has a Common Charter with old turbage (turf) – no fishing; but its great greens are mostly wired off – did I see electric fencing at Mellis? – and not accessible. They try to discourage overnight staying and require permission of the landowner, which is in part the council (note who took the Peace campers to court), or in Wortham’s case, a family from the West who own a tobacco empire, to do almost anything. They say how long grass can be, and wish to protect wildlife, but then Wortham says that they will use pesticides to manage weeds! Those appealing greens didn’t seem so welcoming now.
Here is my picture: Greenham’s empty missile bunkers and the dark caverns beneath…. but then being filled with spirals of colour and new life; the bee enjoying the unspoilt wild flowers of a common; the acorn and oak (Burston kids sang “Heart of Oak” as their protest song); Burston’s Strike School and the workshop on the common given to the strike school by Ambrose Sandy who was ousted from the village for it; the tithe war memorial casting a shadow over Norwich cathedral (and Bury St Edmund’s too).
I reflected that common ground may be seen as a wasteland because it’s not fertile, but it’s essential to nature; that oaks are slow growing, strong wise long living trees that give shelter; that acorns represent new life; that the real work of nature goes on underground, just as the real work of world transformation is yet not visible on the surface – but it is happening. Perhaps you, like me, feel like an oak and a common, but I hope that you can find some encouragement there. You are valuable to God and doing something important. I pray that we find an oak of reformation that cannot be sawn nor shaken nor used against us, but that symbolises a true and lasting doing different.
Thanks for joining me… I’d like to leave with a blessing
Next month is about John Lennon, someone else who stood for his beliefs in innovative ways
We’re meeting on his birthday, October 9th
Do make yourself known to me, Elspeth, on betweenthestools@hotmail.co.uk
Elspeth R - A skewed world view 