\

Contents
Earliest times
Cbapter 1

The foundation stones

The island ' Britain's prehistory ' The Celts . The Romans . Roman life

Chapter 2

The Saxon invasion

The invaders ' Govemment and society ' Christianity: the partnership of Church
and state . The Vikings . Who should be king?

11

Chapter 3

The Celtic kingdoms

Wales . Ireland . Scotland

18

The early Middle Ages

Chapter 4

Conquest and feudal rule

The Norman Conquest . Feudalism . Kingship: a family business. Magna Carta
and the decline of feudalism

23

Chapter 5

The power of the kings of England

Church and state . The beginnngsof Parliament . Dealing with the Celts

29

Chapter 6

Government and society

The growth of govemment . Law and justice . Religious beliefs . Ordinary people
ln country and town ' The growth of towns as centres of wealth . Language,
literatureand culture

3+

The late Middle Ages

Chapter 7

The century of war, plague and disorder

War with Scotland and France . The age of chivalry . The century of plagues .
The poor in revolt . Heresy and orthodoxy

43

Chapter 8

The crisis of kings and nobles

The crisis of kingship . Wales in revolt . The strugglein France . The Wars of the
Roses . Scotland

51

Chapter 9

Government and society

Govemment and society . The condition of women . Languageand culture

57

The Tudors
Chapter 10

The birth of the narion srare

The new monarchy ' The Reformation . The Protestant-Catholic struggle

67

Chapter 11

England and her neighbours

The new foreign policy ' The new trading empire . Wales . Ireland . Scotland and
England ' M"ry Queen of Scots and the Scottish Reformation . A Scottish king for
England

73

Chapter 12

Government and society

Tudor parliaments . Rich and poor in town and country . Domestic life .
Languageand culture

79

7-

The Stuarts
Chapter 13

Crown and Parliament

Parliament againstthe Crown . Religious disagreement' Civil war

87

Chapter 14

Republican and Restoration Britain

Republican Britain . Catholicism, the Crown and the new constitutional
monarchy ' Scotland and Ireland ' Foreign relations

9Z

Chapter 15

Life and thought

The revolution in thought . Life and work in the Stuart age ' Family life

98

The eighteenthcentury
Chapter 16

The political world

Politics and flnance . Wilkes and liberty . Radicalism and the loss of the American
colonies' Ireland' Scotland

107

Chapter 17

Life in town and country

Town life ' The rich ' The countryside ' Family life

I4

Chapter 18

The years of revolution

Industrialrevolution . Society and religion ' Revolution in France and the
Napoleonic Wars

IzI

The nineteenth century

Chapter 19

The years of power and danger

The dangerat home, I8L5-32. Reform . Workers revolt ' Family life

131

Chapter 20

The years of self.confidence

The railway . The rise of the middle classes. The growth of towns and cities '
Population and politics . Queen and monarchy ' Queen and empire ' Wales,
Scotland and Ireland

138

Chapter 21

The end of an age

Social and economic improvements . The importance of sport ' Changes in
thinking . The end of "England's summer" . The storm clouds of war

151

The twentieth centurv

Cbapter 22

Britain at war
The First World War ' The rise of the Labour Party ' The rights of
women . Ireland . Disappointment and depression . The Second World \ar

Chapter 23

The age of uncertainty

The new intemational order . The welfare state ' Youthful Britain ' A popular
monarchy . The loss of empire . Britain, Europe and the United States ' Northem
Ireland . Scotland and Wales . The years of discontent ' The new politics '
Britain: past, presentand future

r59
168

E,arlest
tmes
1

The foundation stones

The island ' Britain's prehistory. The Ceks , The Romdns. Roman life

The island

Britain's prehistory

However complicated the modem industrial state

may be, land and climate affect life in every
country. They affect social and economic life,
population and even politics. Britain is no
exception. It has a milder climate than much of the
Europeanmainland becauseit lies in the way of the
Gulf Stream, which brings warm water and winds
rrom the Gulf of Mexico. Within Britain rhere ale
Jifferencesof climate betweennorth and south,
eastand west. The north is on average5oC cooler
an the south. Annual rainfall in the east is on
everageabout 600 mm, while in many parts of the
nest it is more than double that. The countrysideis
t.ariedalso. The norhand west are mountalnousor
hilly. Much of the south and easr is fairly flat, or
iorv-lying.This means that the south and easron
-jre whole have better agriculturalconditions, and
:: is possibleto harvestcrops in early August' wo
=onths earlier than in the north. So it is not
s-uprisingthat southeastBritain has alwaysbeen
i-re most populatedpart of the island. For this
:asonit has alwayshad the most political power.

Britain has not alwaysbeen an island. It became

one only after the end of the last ice age. The
temperaturerose and the ice cap melted, flooding
the lower.lying land that is now under the North
Sea and the English Channel.

3rltain is an island, and Britain's history has been

;l"rselyconnected with the sea. Until modern times
:: s'as as easy to travel acrosswater as it was across
rnJ, where roadswere frequentlyunusable.At
arments of greatdangerBritain has been saved
:.-rn dangerby its surroundingseas.Britain's
and its strongnational sensehave been
-:-r-.ton
#"apedby the sea.
lurc;ange is the most powert'ul monument of B"i:rc,in,sprehstory.Is
W]r]sdLJ stilJrct properly wersnod' Thoeuho buili Stonehengeknew
llrufj ..ut and move very large piecesof stone, and plrce horzonal stone
luoms lloss t}teupright pilbrs They also hol the authority to control lttrge
nimrrcrs ol uurers, ad to fetch someof the stonefrom distntt parts of

The Ice Age was not just one long equally cold
period. There were warmer times when the rce cap
retreated,and colder periodswhen the ice cap
reached as far south as the River Thames. Our first
evidence of human life is a few stone tools, dating
from one of the warmerperiods, about 250,000 nc.
These simple objects show that there were rwo
different kinds of inhabitant. T[e. e_arliergroup
made their tools from flakesof iil{t|ti*it". in kind
to stone tools found across the north European
plain as far as Russia. The other group made tools
from a central core of flint, probably the earliest
method of human tool making, which spreadfrom
A hand axe, madc from flint, founl at Swanscombe in north Kent

7
An Illustrated History of Britain

Africa to Europe. Hand axes made in this way have

been found widely, as far north as Yorkshire and as
far west as Wales.
However, the ice advancedagain and Britain
becamehardly habitable until another milder
period, probablyaround 50,000 oc. During this
tmea new type of human being seemsto have
arrived, who was the ancestorof the modem
British. These people looked similar to the modem
British, but were probably smaller and had a life
span of only about thirty years.
Around 10,000 BC, as the Ice Age drew to a close,
Bli,!,a.ipwas peopled by small groups of hunters,
gatherersand flshers.Few had settledhomes, and
they seemedto have followed herds of deer which
provided them with food and clothing. By about
5000 sc Britain had finally become an island,
and had also become heavilv forested.For the
s"l."'..-hunter culture ths was a disaster, for the
cold-loving deer and other animals on which they
lived largely died out.
About 3000 ac Neolithic (or New Stone Age)
people crossed the narrow sea from Europe n small
round boats of bent wood covered with animal
skins. Each could carry one or two persons.These
people ke-ptanimals and grew corn crops, and knew

how to make pottery. They probably came from

either the Iberian (Spanish) peninsula or even the
North African coast. They were mall,dark, and
long-headed people, and may be the forefathersof
dark-haired inhabitants of !7ales and Cornwall
today. They settled in the westem parts of Britain
and lreland, from Comwall at the southwestend of
Britain all the way to the far north.
These were the first of several waves of invaders
before the first arrival of the Romans i 55 sc. It
used to be thought that thesewavesof invaders
marked fresh stagesin British development. However, although they must have brought new ideas
and methods, i is now thought that the changing
pattem of Britain's prehistory was the result of local
economic and social forces.
The great "public works" of this time, which
neededa huge organisationof labour, tell us a little
of how prehistoric Britain was developing. The
earlier of theseworks were great "barrows", or'
burial mounds, made of earth or stone. Most of
these barrows are found on the chalk uplands of

1 The foundation stones

easily habitable part of the countryside.Eventually,

and over a very long period, these areasbecame
overfarmed,while by 1400 sc the climate became
drier, and as a result this land could no longer
supportmany people. It is difficult today to imagine
theseareas,particularly the uplandsof Wiltshire
and Dorset, as heavily peopled areas.
Yet the monumentsremain. After 3000 nc the
buildine greatcirclesof
chalklandpeople,started

.u'tn'B'{t8&"a-[fit$ Inside,teybulltwooden

buildings and stone circles. These "henges", as they

are called, were centresof religious,political and
economic power. By far the most spectacular,both
then and now, was Stonehenge,which was built
in separatestagesover a period of more than a
thousandyears.Thg precisepurposesof Stonehenge
remain a mysteryr'butduring the second phase of
buildng,after about 2400 sc, huge bluestoneswere
brought to the site from south Wales. This could
only have been achieved becausethe political
authority of the area surroundingStonehengewas
recognisedover a very large area, indeed probably
over the whole of the British Isles.The movement
of thesebluestoneswas an extremely important
event, the story of which was passedon from
generationto generation.Three thousandyears
later, these unwritten memorieswere recordedin
Geoffrey of Monmouth's History of Britain, written
in 1136.
Stonehengewas almost certainly a sort of capital,
to which the chiefs of other groupscame from all
over Britain. Certainly, earth or stone hengeswere
built in many parts of Britain, as far as the Orkney
lslandsnorth of Scotland, and as far south as
Comwall. They seem to have been copies of the
greatStonehengen the south. In Ireland the
centre of prehistoric civilisation grew around the
River Boyne and at Tara in Ulster. The importance
of theseplaces in folk memory far outlastedthe
buildersof the monuments.
After 2400 BC new groupsof people arrived tn
southeastBritain from Europe. They were roundheadedand stronglybuilt, taller than Neolithic
Britons. It is not known whether they invaded by
armedforce, or whether they were invited by

The grave of one d the "Beaker" people, dt Bmtack, Canbridgeshire,

about 1800 ac Ic contains a fine$ decorated potter1 beakcr at d coppeTUr
bronTe dagger Both items distinguishedthe Beal<erpeopb from the earlier
nhabians This grave uas the main buridl place betleath one of a group of
"burows", or bwial mouis

Neolithic Britons becauseof their miltaryor metal.

working skills. Their influence was soon felt and, as
a result, they became leadersof British society.
Their arrival is marked bv the firstindividual
graves' fumished with pottery ak,#,"m
which
thesepeople get their name: the "Beaker" people.
Why did people now decide to be buried separately
and give up the old communal burial barrowsl It is
difficult to be certain, but it is thought that the old
barrowswere built partly to pleasethe godsof the
soil, in the hope that this would stop the chalk
upland soil getting poorer. The Beaker people
brought with them from Europe a new cereal,
barley, which could grow almost anywhere.Perhaps
they felt it was no longer necessaryto pleasethe
godsof the chalk upland soil.

7
An lllustratedHistory of Britain

Maiden Castle, Dorset, is one of the hrgest Celtic hill-forts

of the early lrm Age Its streng1hcu still be clearl1 seen,
but even thesefortficationswere no defelrce aganst

discipliLed
Ro-an
toops
,

,,

A reconstrurted Iron Age farm F arms like rhis were estabLishpdin southeastBitain
or euen onl1 builng; lttrge
from about 700 Bc onuards This may have been the main
,,Their
housescn'eklrge, round,
rounl huts ncreasinglytook the plrce of smal'Ierones.

* ffiffi,,:#T:Y:iliy,:}:n:lruy#:
t
. ,,
' l ,1 '
,

The Beaker people probably spoke an IndoEuropeanlanguage.They seem to have brought a

single culture to the whole of Britain. They also
brought skills to make bronze tools and thesebegan
to replace stone ones. But they acceptedmany of
the old ways. Stonehengeremained the most
important centre until 1300 ac. The Beaker
people'srichest graveswere there, and they added a
new circle o thirty 9!s!.ecolumns, this time
or cross-pieces.Brtsh
connected by s1o'a9!t.1rrq9-$
society continued to be centred on a number of
hengesacrossthe countryside.
However, from about 1300 ec onwardsthe henge
civilisation seemsto have become less important,
and was overtakenby a new form of society in
southem England, that of a settledfarming class.
At first this farming society developedin order to
feed the people at the henges,but eventually it
became more important and powerful as it grew
richer. The new farmersgrew wealthy becausethey
leamed to enrich the soil with natural waste
materialsso that it did not become poor and
useless.This change probablyhappenedat about
the same time that the chalk uplandswere
becoming drier. Family villages and fortifled
enclosuresappearedacrossthe landscape,in lower'
lying areasas well as on the chalk hills, and the old
central control o Stonehengeand the other henges
was lost.
6

thrGreek
urote

' ,' ,i .1 '

From this time, too, power seemsto have shifted to

the Thames valley and southeastBritain. Except for
short periods,political and economic power has
remained in the southeastever since. Hill-forts
replacedhengesas the centresof local power, and
most of these were found in the southeast,
suggestingthat the land successfullysupportedmore
people here than elsewhere.
There was another reasonfor the shift of power
eastwards.A number of better-designedbronze
swordshave been found in the Thames valley,
suggestingthat the local people had more advanced
metalworkingskills. Many of these swordshave
been found in river beds, almost certainly thrown
in for religiousreasons.This custom may be the
orginof the story of the legendaryKing Arthur's
sword, which was given to him from out of the
waerand which was thrown back into the water
when he died.

The Celts
Around 700 sc, another group of people began to
arrive. Many of them were tall, and had fair or red
hair and blue eyes.These were the Celts, who
probablycame from central Europe or further east,
from southernRussia, and had moved slowly
westwardsin earlercenturies.The Celts were
technically advanced.They knew how to work with

1 The foundation stones

iron, and could make better weaponsthan the

people who used bronze. It is possiblethat they
drove many of the older inhabitantswestwardsinto
Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The Celts began to
control all the lowland areasof Britain, and were
joined by new arrivals from the Europeanmainland.
They continued to'arrive in one wave after another
over the next seven hundred years.
The Celts areimportant in British history because
they are the ancestorsof many of the people n
Highland Scotland, Wales, Ireland, and Cornwall
today. The Iberian people of Wales and Cornwall
rook on the new Celtic culture. Celtic languages,
u'hich have been continuously used in some areas
since that time, are still spoken. The British today
are often describedas Anglo-Saxon. It would be
better to call them Anglo-Celt.
Our knowledgeof the Celts is slight. As with
previousgroupsofsettlers, we do not even know for
gertain whether the Celts invaded Britain or came
peacefullyas a result of the lively trade with Europe
trom about 750 ec onwards.At frrstmost of Celtic
Britain seemsto have developedin a generally
similar way. But from about 500 Bc trade contact
rvthEurope declined, and regional differences
betweennorthwest and southeastBritain increased.
The Celts were organisedinto different tribes, and
ribal chiefs were chosen from each family or tribe,
sometimesas the result of flghting matchesbetween
individuals, and sometimesby election.
The last Celtic arrivalsfrom Europe were the Belgic
tribes. It was natural for them to settle in the
southeastof Britain, probably pushing other Celtic
tribes northwards as they did so. At any rate, when
Julius Caesar brelyvisited Britain in 55 sc he saw
that the Belgic tribes were differentfrom the older
inhabitants. "The interior is inhabited", h9;ffi,,
..bypeopleswho consider themselve ik!"ng,7y,',,;*
"
the coast by people who have crossedfrom
Belgium. Nearly all of these still keep the names of
the [European]tribes from which they came."
The Celtic tribes continued the same kind of
agriculture as the Bronze Age people before them.
But their use of iron technology and their

The Stanwick hcnse mask shows thz fine artistic wark of Celtic metalworkers
in about AD 50 The simplelines andlrck of deailhave a very pouerful
effect

introduction of more advancedploughing methods

made it possiblefor them to farm heavier soils.
However, they continued to use, and build, hill.
forts. The increaseof hese,particularly in the
southeast,suggeststhat the Celts were highly
successfulfarmers, growing enough food for a much
largerpopulation. . j
J'
1
t! I

lLit,

i. aa. , . , "(

The hill-fort remained the centrerforlocal groups,

The insidesof these hill.forts were filled with
houses,and they became the simple economic
capitals and smaller "towns" of the different tribal
areasinto which Britain was now divided. Today
the empty hill-forts stand on lonely hilltops. Yet
they remained local economic centres long after the
Romans came to Britain, and long after they went.

An Illustrated Historv of Britain

Within living memory certain annual fairs were

associatedwith hill-forts. For example, there was an
,annualSepternber.fairon the site of a Dorset hillfort, which was used by the writer Thomas Hardy in
his novel Far from theMallingCrowd, published in

18?4.

The Celts traded across tribal borders and trade was

probably important for political and social contact
between the tribes. Trade with Ireland went
through the island of Anglesey. The two main trade
outlets eastwardsto Europe were the settlements
along the Thames River in the south and on the
Firth of Forth in the north. It is no accident that
the present-daycapitals of England and Scotland
stand on or near these two ancient trade centres.
Much trade, both inside and beyond Britain, was
conducted by river and sea. For money the Celts
used iron bars, until they began t copy the Roman
coins they saw used in Gaul (France).
According to the Romans, the Celtic men wore
shirts and lreeplreg (kqee-lengthtrousers),and
striped orffift#t&^ks
fastened by a pin. It is
possible that the Scottish tartan and dress
developedfrom this "striped cloak". The Celts were
also "very careful.aboutcleanlinessand neatness",
as one Roman wrote. "Neither man nor woman,"
he went on, "however poor, was seen either ragged
or dirty."
The Celtic tribeswere ruled over by a warrior class,
of which the priests,or Druids, seem to have been
particularly important members. These Druids
could not read or write, but they memorisedall the
religiousteachings,the tribal laws, history,
medicine and other knowledgenecessaryin Celtic
society. The Druids from different tribes all over
Britain probablymet once a year. They had no
temples,but they met in sacredgrovesof trees,on
certain hills, by rivers or by river sources.We know
little of their kind of worship except that at times it
included human sacrifrce.
During the Celtic period women may have had
more independence than they had again for
hundreds of years. When the Romans invaded
Britain two of the largesttribes were ruled by
women who fought from their ghariots. The most

olfuut''!r;)
/,\i/t,t

powerful Celt to stand up to the Romans was a

woman, Boadicea. She had become queen of her
tribe when her husband had died. She was tall,
with long red hair, and had a frightening
appearance. In ao 61 she led her rribe against the
Romans. She nearly drove them from Britain, and
she destroyedLondon, the Roman capital, before
she was defeated and killed. Roman writers
commented on the courage and srength of women
in battle, and leave an impression of a measureof
equaliry between the sexesamong the richer Celts.

The Romans
The name "Britain" comes from the word
"Pretani", the Greco-Roman word for the
inhabitants of Britain. The Romans mispronounced
the word and called the island "Britannia".
The Romans had invaded because the Celts of
Britain were working with the Celts of Gaul against
them. The British Celts were giving them food, and
allowing them to hide in Britain. There was
another reason.The Celts used cattle to pull their
ploughs and this meant that richer, heavier land
could be farmed.Under the Celts Britain had
become an important food producer because of its
mild climate. It now exportedcom and anmals,as
well as hunting dogs and slaves, to the European
mainland. The Romans could make use of British
food or their own army fighting the Gauls.
The Romans brought the skills of reading and
writing to Britain. The written word was important
for spreading ideas and also for establishing power.
As early as no 80, as one Roman at the time noted,
the governorAgricola "trained the sons of chiefs in
the liberal arts . . . the result was that the people
who used to reject Latin began to use it in speech
and writing. Further the wearingof our national
dresscame to be valued and the toga [the Roman
cloak] came into fashion." While the Celtic
peasantryremained illiterate and only Celticspeaking,a number of town dwellersspoke Latin
and Greek with ease,and the richer landownersin
the country almost certainly usedLatin. But Latin
completely disappearedboth in its spoken and
written forms when the Anglo-Saxons invaded

1 The foundation stones

Britain in the flfth century ao. Britain was probably

more literate under the Romans than it was to be
again until the fifteenth century.
Julius Caesar first came to Britain in 55 ric, but it
was not until almost a century later, in ao 43, that
a Roman army actually occupied Britain. The
Romans were determined to conquer the whole
island. They had little difficulty, apart from
Boadicea'srevolt, becausethey had a better trained
army and becausethe Celtic tribes fought among
themselves.The Romans consideredthe Celts as
war-mad, "high spirited and quick for battle", a
descriptionsome would still give the Scots, Irish
and Welsh today.
The Romans establisheda Romano-British culture
acrossthe southernhalf of Britain, from the River
Humber to the River Sevem. This part of Britain
was inside the empire. Beyond were the upland
areas,under Roman control but not developed.
These areaswere watched from the towns of York,
Chester and Caerleon in the westem peninsula of
Britain that later becameknown as \Wales.Each of
these towns was held by a Roman legion of about
7,000 men. The total Roman army in Britain was
about 40,000 men.
The Romans could not conquer "Caledonia", as
they called Scotland, although they spent over a
century trying to do so. At last they built a strong
wall along the northern border, named after the
Emperor Hadrian who planned it. At the trme,
Hadrian's wall was simply intended to keep out
raidersfrom the north. But it also marked the
border between the two later countries, England
and Scotland. Eventually, the border was
established a few miles further north. Efforts to
change it in later centuriesdid not succeed,mainly
becauseon either side of the border an invading
army found its supply line overstretched.A natural
point of balance had been found.
Roman control of Britain came to an end as the
empire began to collapse. The first signs were the
attacksby Celts of Caledonia in ,c.o37. The
Roman legions found it more and more dificult to
stop the raidersfrom crossingHadrian's wall. The
samewas happeningon the Europeanmainland as

Germanic groups, Saxons and Franks, began to raid

the coast of Gaul. In ao 409 Rome pulled its last
soldiersout of Britain and the Romano-British, the
Romanised Celts, were left to flght alone against
the Scots, the Irish and Saxon raidersfrom
Germany. The following year Rome itself fell to
raiders.When Britain called to Rome for help
against the raiders from Saxon Germany in the
mid-fifth century, no answercame.

Roman life
The most obvious characteristicof Roman Britain
was its towns, which were the basisof Roman
administrationand civilisation. Many grew out of
Celtic settlements,military camps or market
centres. Broadly, there were three different kinds of
town in Roman Britain, two of which were towns
establishedby Roman charter. These were the
coloniae,towns peopled by Roman settlers,and the
municipia,largecities in which the whole
population was given Roman citizenship. The third
kind, the ciuias, included the old Celtic tribal
capitals, through which the Romans administered
the Celtic population in the countryside.At flrst
these towns had no walls. Then, probably from the
end of the second century to the end of the third
century ao, almost every town was given walls. At
first many of these were no more than earthworks,
but by ao 300 all towns had thick stone walls.
The Romans left about twenty large towns of about
5,000 inhabitants. and almost one hundred smaller
ones. Many of these towns were at flrst army camps,
and the Latin word for camp, cdsta,has remained
part of many town names to this day (with the
ending chester,casteror cester):Gloucester, Leicester, Doncaster, l7inchester, Chester, Lancaster
and many others besides.These towns were built
with stone as well as wood, and had planned
stteets,marketsand shops. Sorne buildings had
central heating. They were connected by roads
which were so well built that they survived when
later roads broke up. These roads continued to be
used long after the Romans left, and became the
main roadsof modem Britain. Six of these Roman
roadsmet in London, a capital city of about 20,000

a
An lllustratedHstoryo Britain

The reconstntttion of a Romar.

kicchenabout eo .l00 shows Pc :
and equipment The nLI Pots,,'
amphorae, werefor uine or ot.
The Romans Produted wine in
Binin. but they alsoimPorted:
from southernEnoPe

people. London was twice the size of Paris, and

possiblythe most important trading centre of
northern Europe, becausesoutheastBritain
producedso much corn for export.
Outside the towns, the biggestchange during the
Roman occupation was the growth of largefarms,
called "villas". These belongedto the richer Britons
who were, like the townspeople,more Roman than
Celt in their manners. Each villa had many
workers.The villas were usually close to towns so
that the crops could be sold easily. There was a
growing differencebetweenthe rich and those who
did the actual work on the land. These, and most
people,still lived in the samekind of round huts
and villages which the Celts had been living in four
hundred yearsearlier, when the Romans arrived.
In some ways life in Roman Britain seemsvery
civilised, but it was also hard for all exceptthe
richest. The bodiesburied in a Roman graveyardat
York show that life expectancywas low. Half the
entire population died between the agesof twenty
and forty, while 15 per cent died beorereaching
the age of twenty.
10

It is very dificultto be sure how many people were

living in Britain when the Romans left. Probably rr
was as many as ivemillion, partly becauseof the
peace and the increasedeconomic life which the
Romans had brought to the country. The new war'.
of nvaderschanged all that.

The Saxon invasion

) Goqlernmentand society, Clwistianity:thepartnershipof

The inuades
Church and state, The Vikings . Who should"be king?

The invaders
lAe wealth of Britain by the fourth cenrury, rhe
:=sultof its mild climate and centuriesof peace,was
. :emptationto the greedy.At first the Germanic
;.bes only raided Britain, but after ao 430 they
:ganto settle. The newcomerswere warlike and
-.lterate.We owe our knowledgeof this perod
:,.inly to an English monk named Bede, who lived
-::ee hundred yearslater. His story of events in his
-:;IesiasticalHistory of the EnglishPeopk has been
::;,.-edgenerallycorrect by archaeological
=-,'lJence.
:eJe tells us hatthe invaderscame from three
:'-'*'erfulGermanic tribes, the Saxons, Angles and
-res. The Jutes settledmainly in Kent and along
:--,esouth coast, and were soon consideredno dif::rent from the Angles and Saxons. The Angles
".:rled in the eas,and also in the north Midlands,
'hrle the Saxons setledbetweenthe Jutes and the
l-nsles in a band of land from the Thames Esruary
uesnvards.The Anglo.Saxon migrationsgave the
r.igerpart of Britain its new name, England, "the
;:rJ of the Angles".
]f'e BritshCelts fought the raidersand settlers
-:-m Germany as well as they could. However,
: -nng the next hundred years they were slowly
: -.hed westwardsuntil by 570 they were forced
=srof Gloucester. Finally most were driven into
'r',
--:-emountains in the far west, which the Saxons
:.lled "Weallas", or "'Wales",meaning"the land of
:-e foreigners".Some Celts were driven into
-,:rnwall, where they later acceptedthe rule of
j=ron lords. In the north, other Celts were driven
L::-,rhe lowlands of the country which became

1^

JA n

lv

\
i;.
l-

Y-

rvrEBcrA

i EA s r

/ aNGr I
(,
ANOlln

W ESSE X

The Angb-Saxon inuosioru and the kingdoms they esublished

known as Scotland. Some Celts stayedbehnd, and

many becameslavesof the Saxons. Hardly anything
is left of Celtic languageor cukure in England,
except for the names of sornerivers, Thames,
Mersey, Sevem and Avon, and two largecities,
London and Leeds.
The strengthof Anglo-Saxon cukure is obvious
even today. Days of the week were named after
Germanic gods:Tig (Tuesday),Wodin
(Wednesday),Thor (Thursday),Frei (Friday).New
place-namesappearedon the map. The first of
11

An lllustrated Histow of Britain

these show that the earliestSaxon villages, like the

Celtic ones, were family villages. The ending'ing
meant folk or family, thus "Reading" is the place of
the family of Rada, "Hastings" of the family of
Hasta. Ham means farm, ton means settlement.
Birmingham, Nottingham or Southampton, for
example, are Saxon place.names.Becausethe
Anglo-Saxon kings often establishedsettlements,
Kingston is a frequentplace.name.
The Anglo-saxons establisheda number of
kingdoms, some of which still exist in county or
regional names to this day: Essex (East Saxons),
Sussex (South Saxons), Wessex (West Saxons),
Middlesex (probablya kingdom of Middle Saxons),
East Anglia (East Angles). By the middle of the
seventh century the three largestkingdoms, those
of Northumbria, Mercia and Wessex' were the

_896) ' offa

Left: A siluu permy showingoffa' kngof Mercia (ao 757
was moe yruefuJ thon any of the oler Angla.Saxon kings ol his tiflle c
b"fa,e hn. Hs coiru were of a h;f,v quahitythan any coills used sinte the
dzparane of dv Ronwts fou'r hundred years emlier'
Right: A gold coin of Kng Offa, a direct copl of an Arab dirw of the yar
or 774. tvlott of ic is in Arabic, but on one sidt.it also hds "OFFA REX"'
It ulk us tlvt the Angla-Saxor of B'i:a;linwere well awarc of a more
aduanced ecurmnic system in the diswrt Arab empire, anl' ako that e'ten a
as Brinin and rcrthmt Ewope, Arab'type gold coins were mme
away-tlran
far
'muttd
any otllers. It slu:wshou greatuere thediswnces couered b1
intenatiaultradeatthistime.

riii,.i. t lr, .',.'"{., , rl",'{ i])

It was not until a century later that'one of these i

kings, King Offa of Mercia (757-96), claimed
"kingship of the English". He L.radgood reasonto
do so. He was powerfulenoug!;to employ thousandsof men to build a huge flyl5,or eafth wall,
the length of the Welsh bordto keep out the
troublesome Celts. But although he was the most
powerfulking of his time, he did not control all of
England.

The power of Mercia did not survive after Offa's

death. At that time, a king's power dependedon
the personal loyalty of hs followers. After his death
the next king had to work hard to rebuild these
personalfeelingsof loyalty. Most people still
believed, as the Celts had done, that a man's first
I2

duty was to his own family. However, things

changing. The Saxon kings began to replace
to family with loyalty to lord and king.

Government and society

The Saxons createdinstitutions which made the
English state strongfor the next 500 years.One
these institutions was the King's Council, called
Winn. The Witan probably grew out of informal
groups of senior warrorsand churchmen to
kings like Offa had turned for advice or support
difficult matters. By the tenth century the W
was a formal body, issuinglaws and charters.It
not at all democratic, and the king could decide
ignore the \7itan's advice. But he knew that it
might be dangerousto do so. For the V7itan's
authority was basedon tsright to choose kings,
and to agreethe use of the king's laws. Withour
supportthe king's own authority was in dangerThe Witan establisheda systemwhich remai
important part of the king's method of gove
Even today, the king or queen has a Pnvy
a group of adviserson the affairsof state.
The Saxons divided the land into new adminis'
trative areas,basedon shires,or counties. These
shires, establishedby the end of the tenth
remained almost exactlv the same for a
years."Shire" is the Saxon word, "county" the
Norman one, but both are still used. (ln 1974
counties weereorganised,but the new system
verv like the old one.) Over each shire was appointed a shireeeve,the king's local admini
[n time his name becameshortenedto "sheriff"Anglo-Saxon technology changed the shape of
English agriculture.The Celts had kept small,
squarefields which were well suited to the light
plough they used, drawn either by an animal or
people. This plough could tum comers easily.
Anglo.Saxons introduced a far havierplough
which was better able to plough in long straighr
lines acrossthe field. It was particularly useful
cultivating heavier soils. But it requiredsix or
oxen to pull it, and it was dificultto turn. ThLs
heavier plough led to changesin land
and organisation. In order to make the best use

2 The Saxon invasion

land. As a result, almost all the villages which

appear on eighteenth-century maps already existed
by the eleventh century.
In each district was a "manor" or large house. This
was a simple building where local villagerscame to
pay taxes, where justice was administered,and
where men met togetherto join the Anglo-Saxon
army, the fyrd. The lord of the manor had to
organiseall this, and make sure village land was
properly shared. It was the beginning of the
manorial system which teached its fullest
developmentunder the Normans.
?e:onsmrction of ar Angb-Saxar viilage Each house had probably only
]ft' rn, uith a wooden flaar with a pit beneath it. The pit ma1 haue been
Ml astIage,
but mcre ptobab$ n l,e'epthe house off the danp ground'.
=-l villagehad is knd. The ward,,.kvd,' nwans ,,loaf ward', or ,,heol
eg"
, while "lady" neans "In{ krcafur" ar "bread.mal<er", a reninder
w.:r re bas's of Saxtrn societywa fatming. The dut1 of the llage head, cr
r-j. uas tD potecttlv fann and its p.roduce

..-illageland, it was divided into two or three very

-argefields. These were then dtvided again into
,-'ngthin strips. Each family had a number of strips
:n each of these fields, amounting probably to a
:amily "holding" of twenty or so acres. Ploughing
fiese long thin stripswas easierbecauseit avoided
:he problem of tuming. Few individual families
;ould afford to keep a team ofoxen, and thesehad
:.rbe sharedon a co-operativebasis.
Cne of these fields would be used for planting
=pringcrops, and another for autumn crops. The
-:hirdarea would be left to rest for a year, and with
rhe other areasafter harvest, would be used as
common land for animals to feed on. This AngloSaxon pattem, which became more and more
common, was the basisof English agriculturefor a
rhousandyears,until the eighteenth century.
It needsonly a moment's thought to recognisethat
rhe fair division of land and of teamsof oxen, and
e sensiblemanagementof village land sharedout
berweenfamilies, meant that villagershad to work
more closely togetherthan they had ever done
i.efore.
The Saxons settledpreviouslyunfarmedareas.They
cut down many forested areas in valleys to farm the
ncher lowland soil, and they began to drain the wet

At first the lords, or daemen,were simply local

officials. But by the beginning of the eleventh
century they were warlords, and were often called
by a new Danish name, earl. Both words, alderman
and earl, remain with us today:aldermen are
elected officersin local govemment, and earls are
high rankngnobles. It was the begnningof a class
system, made up of king, lords, soldiers and workers
on the land. One other important class developed
during the Saxon period, the men of leaming.
These came from the Christian Church.

Christianity: the partnership of

Church and state
We cannot know how or when Christianity first
reached Britain, but it was certainly well before
Christianity was acceptedby the Roman Emperor
Constantine in the early fourth century ao. In the
last hundred years of Roman govemment
Christianity becamefirmly establishedacross
Britain, both in Roman-controlled areasand
beyond. However, the ,{nglo-Saxonsbelonged to
an older Germanic religion, and they drove the
Celts into the west and north. In the Celtic areas
Christanity continued to spread,bringing paganism
to an end. The map of Wales shows a number of
place-namesbeginning or ending withLIan,
meaning the site of a small Celtic monasteryaround
which a village or town grew.
In 597 Pope Gregory the Great sent a monk,
Augustine, to re.establishChristianity in England.
He went to Canterbury, the capital of the king of
Kent. He did so becausethe king's wife came from
t3

An lllustratedHistory of Britain

to village teachng Christianity. In spite of the

differences between Anglo'saxons and Celts, the
bishops seem to have been readily accepted rn
Anslo.Saxon areas. The bshops from the Roma:

Church lived at the courts of the kings, which tb'

made centresof Church power acrossEngland' T.two Christian Churches, Celtic and Roman' cor-':
hardly have been more dfferentin character' or.:
was most interestedin the hearts of ordinary
people, the other was interestedin authority ani
organisation.The competition between the Celr':
and Roman Churches reached a crisis becauseth'
disagreedover the date of Easter. In 663 at the
Synod (meeting) of Whitby the king of
Northumbria decided to supportthe Roman
Church. The Celtic Church retreatedas Rome
extended its authority over all Christians, even ''
Celtic parts of the island.
England had become Christian very quickly. Br
only Sussexand the Isle of Wight had not acceF:
the new faith. Twenty Yearslater, English teach.
retumed to the lands from which the Anglo'Sar
had come, bringing Chrstianity to much of
Germany.
Saxon kings helped the Church to grow, but tht
Church also increasedthe power of kings. Bishc
gave kings their support, which made it harder:
royal power to be questioned.Kings had "God's
approval". The value of Church approvalwas a-

gaue the Angb-Saxan wrvrw ng.u)certaintJ

Europe and was alreadyChristian. Augustine

became the first Archbshop of Canterbury n 601.
He was very successful.Several ruling familesin
England acceptedChristianity. But Augustine and
his group of monks made little progresswith the
ordinary people. This was partly becauseAugustine
was interestedin establishingChristian authority'
and that meant bringing rulers to the new faith'
It was the Celtic Church which brought
Christianity to the ordinary people of Britain. The
Celtic bishopswent out from their monasteriesof
Wales, Ireland and Scotland, walkngfrom village
I4

the greater because of the uncertainty of the ro" i

succession. An eldest son did not automaticalh
become king, as kings were chosen from among
members of the royal family, and any member v
had enough soldiers might ffy for the throne. Ir
addition, at a time when one king might try to
conquer a neighbouring kngdom, he would
probably have a Son to whom he would wsh to

this enlargedkingdom when he died. And so t':

King Offa arrangedfor his son to be crowned a,
successor,he made sure that this was done at a
Christian ceremony led by a bishop. It was goo:
political propaganda,becauseit suggestedthat i
were chosen not only by people but also by Gc':

There were other ways in which the Church

increasedthe power of the English state. It
esrablishedmonasteries,or minsters,for examp,

2 The Saxon nvasion

\ilestminster,which were places of leaming and

education. These monasteriestrained the men who
could read and write, so that they had the necessary
skills for the growth of royal and Church authority.
The king who made most use of the Church was
Alfred, the greatking who ruled Wessex from 871899. He used the literate men of the Church to
help establisha systemof law, to educatethe
people and to write down important matters.He
started the Anglo-SaxonCl'tronicle, the most
important source, together with Bede's Ecclesiatical
History of the EnglishPeople,for understanding the
period.
During the next hundred years,laws were made on
a large number of matters. By the eleventh century
royal authority probablywent wider 4nd deeperin
England than in any other European country.
This process gave power into the hands of those
who could read and write. and in this wav class
divisions were increased.The power of landlords,
who had been given land by the king, was increased
becausetheir nameswere written down. Peasants,
who could neither read nor write, could lose their
traditional rights to their land, becausetheir rights
were not registered.

The Vikings
Towards the end of the eighth century new raiders
were temptedby Britain's wealth. These were the
Vikings, a word which probably means either
"pirates" or "the people of the sea inlets", and they
came from Norway and Denmark. Like the AngloSaxons they only raided at first. They burnt
churches and monasteriesalong the east, north and
west coastsof Britain and Ireland. London was itself
raided in84Z.
In 865 the Vikings invaded Britain once it was
clear that the quarrelling Anglo-Saxon kingdoms
could not keep them out. This time they came
to conquer and to settle. The Vikings quickly
acceptedChristianity and did not disturb the local
population. By 875 only King Alfred in the west
of Wessex held out againstthe Vikings, who had
alreadytaken most of England. After some serious
defeatsAlfred won a decisive battle n 878, and
eight years later he capturedLondon. He was strong
enough to make a treaty with the Vkings'

The Anglo-Saxon kings also preferred the Roman

Church to the Celtic Church for economic reasons.
Villages and towns grew around the monasteries
and increased local trade. Many bishops and monks
in England were from the Franksh lands (France
and Germany) and elsewhere.They were,invitedby
English rulers who wished to benefit from closer
Church and ecc'nomiccontact with Europe. Most
of these bishops and monks seem to have come
from churches or monasteries along Europe's vital
trade routes. In this way close contact with many
partsof Europe was encouraged.In addition they all
usedLatin, the written languageof Rome, and this
encouragedEnglish trade with the contnent.
Increasedliteracy itself helped trade. Anglo-Saxon
England became well known in Europe for its
exportsof woollen goods, cheese,hunting dogs,
potteryand metal goods. It imported wine, fish,
pepper,jewellery and wheel-madepottery.
The ViLing invar;iclr.sand the areas they brought under tJwir cutrol.

15

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

Tlu swrl of the battle d Hastings ard

Nonun can4uest of Saxon England b
told in the Bayeux apestry cartoon
"HaroW the hngis killed" say the
I-atin writing, andbercath it standsa
man with an anow inhis eye, belieud
n be Kng Harold. ln the picture str
below the main scene,men arc seen
steahngthe clothingfrorn the dcad anl
wounled, d, conlmon practice on
battbfields tLtroughe centuies.

The OsebergViking ship, made m

about en 800, was 2 1 netres k^C *rd
cartied about 35 men- Although this
partculn ship was yobably only used
dongtle coasl ships of similar siTe
were used.to inuade Biuin
Their
design was brilliart- When an exact
copy d similar shipwa used ta ooss
t]u Atlanac to Ameca in |893' its
captinwote,,,thefircst merchant
ships of our day . . . have practically
the same type of botmm as ]rvil,jnr
siups."

Viking rule was recognisedin the easr and north of

England. It was called the Danelaw, the land where
the law of the Danes ruled. In the resr of the
country Alfred was recognisedas king. During his
struggleagainstthe Danes, he had built walled
settlementsto keep them out. These were cafled
bwghs.They becameprosperousmarket towns, and
the word, now usually spelt borough,is one of the
commonestendings to place names, as well as the
name of the unit of municipal or rown
administrationtoday.

Who should be king?

By 950 England seemedrich and peacefulagain
after the troublesof the Viking invasion. Bur soon
afterwardsthe Danish Vikings starredraiding
weswards.
The Saxon king, Ethelred, decided to
pay the Vikings to stay away. To indthe money he
set a tax on all.his people, called Danegel.d.,
or
"Danish money". It was the beginning of a regular
tax systemof the people which would provide the
money for armies.The effectsof this tax were most
heavily felt by the ordinary villagers, becausethey
had to provide enough money for their village ,
landlord to pay Danegeld.
16

When Ethelred died Cnut (or Canute), the leader

of the Danish Vikings, controlled much of
England. He becameking for the simple reason
that the royal council, the Witan, and everyone
else, feareddisorder.Rule by a Danish kng was
better than rule by no one at all. Cnut died
1035,and his son died shortlyafter,in 1040.
Witan chose Edward, one of Saxon Ethelred's
to be king.
Edward, known as "the Confessor", was more
p. Chu
interestedin the Church than in kingship.
building had been going on for over a century,
he encouragedit. By the time Edward died there
was a church in almost every village. The pa

the English village, with its manor house and

church, datesfrom this time. Edward starteda
church fit for a king at lTestminster, just outside
the city of London. In fact Westminster Abbey
a Norman, not a Saxon building, becausehe haJ
spent almost all his life in Normandy, and his
mother was a daushter o the duke of Normandv.
As their name suggests, the Normans were peo
from the north. They were the children and

grandchildrenof Vikings who had captured,anJ

settled in, northern France. Thev had soon becr

2 The Saxon invasion

:':ench n their languageand Christian in their

:=-rgion.But they were still well known for their'
::hting ski1ls.
:juvardonly lived until 1066,when he diei
an obvious heir. The question of who
'*'-:hout
---.uld follow him as king was one of the most
-:-porrantin English history. Edward had brought
-,.ny Normans to his English court from France.
l:.ese Normans were not lked by the more
., ,,r'erful
Saxon nobles, particularly by the most
:'.rverfulfamily of 'Wessex,the Godwinsons. It was
r iodwinson, Harold, whom the Witan chose to
:e rhe next king of England. Harold had already
-i,r\\'nhis braveryand ability. He had no royal
-L'od, but he seemeda good choice for the throne
i England.
right to the English throne was challenged
-.rold's
',, Duke William of Normandy. William had two
- :1msro the English throne. His flrst claim was
-:-:rKing Edward had promisedit to him. The
'=:cndclaim was that Harold, who had visited
'illlliam in 1064 or 105, had promisedWilliam
-^,:rhe, Harold, would not try to take the throne
' himself. Harold did not deny this second claim,
'",-:said that he had been forced to make the

promise, and that becauseit was made unwillingly

he was not tedby it.
Harold was faced by two dangers,one in the south
and one in the north. The Danish Vikings had not
given up their claim to the English throne. In 106
Harold had to march north into Yorkshire to defeat
the Danes. No sooner had he defeatedthem than
he learnt that William had landed in England with
an army. His men were tired, but they had no time
to rest. They marched south as fast as possible.
Harold decided not to wait for the whole Saxon
'William's
army
army, the fyrd, to gatherbecause
was small. He thought he could beat them with the
men who had done so well againstthe Danes.
However, the Norman soldierswere better armed,
better organised,and were mounted on horses.If he
had waited, Harold might have won. But he was
defeatedand killed in battle near Hastings.
William marched to London, which quickly gave
in when he began to burn villages outside the city.
He was crowned king of England in Edward'snew
church of \WestminsterAbbey on Christmas Day,
1066.A new periodhad begun.

T7

The Celtic kingdoms

WalBs' lreland' Scotlatd

England has always played the most powerful part

in the history of the British Isles.However, the
other three countries,Wales, Ireland and Scotland,
have a differenthistory. Until recently few
historians looked at British history except from an
English point of view. But the storiesof Wales,
Ireland and Scotland are also important, because
theii people still feel differentfrom the Anglo'
Saxon English. The experienceof the Welsh, Irish
and Scots helps to explain the feeling they have
today.

Wales
By the eighth century most of the Celts had been
driven into the Welsh peninsula. They were kept
out of England by Offa's Dyke, the huge earth wall
built n ao 779. These Celts, called Welsh by the
Anglo-Saxons, called themselvesc)mry, "fellow
countrymen".
BecauseWales is a mountainouscountry, the cymrl
could only live in the crowdedvalleys. The rest of
the land was rocky and too poor for anything
except keeping animals. For this reasonthe
populq;ion remained small. It only grew to over
half a mllion in the eighteenthcentury. Life was
hard and so was the behaviour of the people.
Slavery was common, as it had been all through
Celtic Britain.
Society was basedon amily groupings,each of
which owned one or more village or farm
settlement.One by one in each group a strong
leadermade himself king. These men must have
been tribal chiefs to begin with, who later managed
to become overlordsover neighbouringfamily
groups. Each of these kings tried to conquer the
others, and the idea of a high, or senior, king
developed.
18

Wa\es and its Cekic kingdoms

The early kings travelled around their kingdoms

remind the people of their conffol. They travell
with their hungry followersand soldiers.The
ordinary people ran away into the hills and woo&
when the king's men approachedtheir village.
Life was dangerous,treacherousand bloody. In
1043 the king of Glamorgan died of old age. It
an unusual event, becausebetween 949 and1066
no less than thirtv-five Welsh rulers died vi
usually killed by a cJnLrJ,a fellow countryman'
In 1039 Gruffydd ap (son of ) Llewelyn was the
Welsh hlgh king strong enough to rule over all
Wales. He was also the last, and in order to
in control he spent almost the whole of his reign
fighting his enemies.Like many other Welsh ru
Gruffydd was killed by a cymry while defending'
Wales against the Saxons. Welsh kings after him
were able to rule only after they had promised
loyalty to Edward the Confessor, king of
The story of an independentand united Wales
over almost as soon as it had begun.

3 The Celtic kingdoms

lreland
-.-and was never invaded by either the Romans or
' . Anglo-Saxons. It was a land of monasteries and
, j a flourishing Celtic culture. As in Wales,
-: p1e were known by the family grouping they
to. Outside ther tribe they had no
-.lnged
-:.)tection
and no name of their own. They had
ly the name of their tribe. The kings in this
- :al society were chosen by election. The idea was
-...tthe strongest man should lead. In fact the
.:em led to continuous challenges.
I e kingdoms grew up in lreland: Ulster in the
rth, Munster in the southwest, Leinster in the
,.rl'reast,Connaught in the west, witl-rTara as the
,.,: of the higli kings of lreland.
- ristianity came to Ireland in about ao 430. The
:.inning of Ireland's history dates from that time,
: - ruse for the first time there were people who
..J write down events. The messageof
-:rstianity was spread in Ireland by a British slave,
. ick, who became the "patron saint" of Ireland.
Lstianitybrought writing, which weakened the
. :ion of the Druids, who depended on memory
-: rhe spoken word. Christian monasteries grew
.requently along the coast.
, period is often called Ireland's "golden age".
.-lers were unknown and culture flowered. But it
:.) true that the five kingdoms were often at
- each trying to gain advantage over the other,
.::-.rvith great
cruelty.
Ceitic /tingdoms

, '!':J

-{ ;}\/

The round tower of Devenshis one of onl1 tu,o that still stnd at Celtic
monnsticsiresln
ter, Irelnnd This one uas buih in the twelt'thcenturl
AD' The entTanc about threemetresabovepround leuel,and ha| ,t k,iler
that cou].dbe pulled in so that enemie:couLl nt
' Tis desrgnma1 uell
",t,,
haue been introducedaf ter theViking raidsbegan
in the nnthcentw1,

TABA
( sea tof t h e
h igh kin gs
olre|a n d)
{n
,
:l

t,

MN:'

-q
^ < v'

(
\^
1*

19

An Illusaated History of Britain

This "golden age" suddenly ended with the arrival

of Viking raiders,who stole all that the monasteries
had. Ve little was left except the stone memorials
that the Vikings could not carryaway'

859 Ireland chose its first high king, but it was not
an effective solution because of the quarrels that

establisled his abbet

Iau, tlwtrestern Scotcish island m uluch St Colunrba
came lrelanl'. Fron lotw Cohlmba.sent hts misianarb'
he
*n^
ii
sal
';
Sco*' The pTesent cathBdtal was built in abut
b";;A"ltd""lty
' 'tn

r500

growth of organisation - in the Church, in

dministration, and in leaming..
Brian Boru died in battle againstthe Vikings' One
of the five Irish kings, the king of Leinster, fought

enlargetherkingdom.

Scotland
As a result of its geography,Scotland has two
different societies. In the centre of Scotland
mountains stretch to the far north and across to the
west, beyond which lie many islands' To the east
to te south the lowland hills are gentler, and
",,d
much of the countryside is like England, rich,
welcoming and easy to farm. North of the
"Highl"nJ Line", as the division between highland
and-iowland is called, people'stayed tied to their
own family groups. South and east of this line
society was more easily inluenced by the changes
taking place in England.

z0

ot
Scotland was populatedby four separate.groups
in
lived.mostly
Picts,
people. The main group' the
well
as
Celtic
it .ro.th und ,rorlheuti. Th"y spoke
"
as another' probably older, languagecompletely
unconnecte with any known language today, and
they seem to have been the earliest inhabitants of
the land. The Picts were different from the Celts
becausethey inherited their rights, their names a
not from their fathe
frop"rry from their mothers,
The non-Pictish inhabitants were mainly Scots'
The Scots were Celtic settlerswho had startedto
move into the western Highlands from Ireland in
the fourth century.

In 843 the Pictish and Scottish kingdoms were

united under a Scottish king, who could also
probably claim the Pictish throne through his
*oth"r, in this way obeying both Scottish and
Pictish rules of kingshiP.
The third group were the Britons, who inhabited
the Lowlands, and had been part of the Romano'
British world. (The name of their kingdom'
Strathclyde, was used again in the countyreorganisationof 1974.) They had probably given
up tLeir old tribal way of life by the sixth centur)"
Finally, there were Angles from Northumbria wtu
had pushed northwards into the Scottish Lowl
Unity between Picts, Scots and Britons was
achieved for several reasons' They all shared a

3 The Celtic kinedoms

eB
::iii!'
oRKNEY

ff

peoples their way of life. Although they kept some animals'

s,o,t,,a'itseal,

they spent more time growing crops. This meant

that land was held by indvidualpeople, each man
working in his own field. Land was distributedfor
farming by the local lord. This systemencouraged
the Angles of Scotland to develop a non-tribal
systemof conffol, as the people of England further
south were doing. This increasedtheir feeling of
differencefrom the Celtic tribal Hiehlanders further
north.

eP!*

SF

t sr n l os $

The'Highland Line'

Hadran,sWall

languageand background.
:iron Celtic culture,
-r ^.^^_o--o-:.:1r economy mainly dependedon keeping
ir:.nals. These animals were owned by the tribe as
r unole, and for this reasonland was also held by
::r:es,not by individual people. The common
:: -:lomic systemincreasedtheir feeling of
:,o-:ngingto the same kind of society and the
r:=-rngof differencefrorn-the agriculturalLowlands.
_-l
S D S of common culfure may have been
r::eased by marriagealliances between tribes. This
,,:,:rof common landholding remained strong until
: =rribesof Scotland, called "clans", collapsed in
,- =eighteenthcentury.
---e spreadof Celtic Christianity also helped to
rr-:r'ethe people. The first Christian mission to
r- -'rlandhad come to southwestScotland in about
-: {00. Later, in 563, Columba, known as the
'l''-'r-eof the Church", came from Ireland.
--:ough his work both Highland Scots and Picts
=rebrought to christianity. He even, so it is said,
'r,,
.*:eateda monster in Loch Ness, the first mention
n :his famouscreature.By the time of the Synod of
^ ltby in 3, the Picts, Scots and Britons had all
:.=n brought closer togetherby Christianity.
T:.e Angles were very differentfrom the Celts.
_-.ev
had arrived n Britain in family groups,but
::..r'soon began to accept authority from people
partly due to
'-:sidetheir own family. This was

Finally, as in Ireland and in \7ales, foreign invaders

increasedthe speedof political change. Vikings
attacked the coastal areasof Scotland, and they
settledon-many of the islands, Shetland, the
Orkneys, the Hebrides, and the Isle of Man
southwestof Scotland. In order to resist them, Picts
and Scots fought togetheragainstthe enemy raiders
and settlers.When they could not push them out of
the islands and coastal areas,thev had to deal with
them politically. At first the Vikings, or
"Norsemen", still servedthe king of Norway. But
communicationswith Norway were difficult. Slowly
the earls of Orkney and other areasfound it easier
to accept the king of Scots as their overlord, rather
than the more distant king of Norway.
However, as the Welsh had also discovered,the
English were a greaterdangerthan the Vikings. In
934 the Scots were seriouslydefeatedby a Wes'sex
army pushing northwards.The Scots decided to
seek the friendship of the English, becauseof the
likely lossesfrom war. England was obviously
strongerthan Scotland but, luckily for the Scots,
both the north of England and Scotland were
difficult to control from London. The Scots hoped
that if they were reasonablypeacefulthe
Sassenachs,as they called the Saxons (and still call
the English), would leave them alone.
Scotland remained a difficult country to rule even
from its capital, Edinburgh. Anyone looking at a
map of Scotland can immediatelysee that control
of the Highlands and islandswas a great problem.
Travel was often impossiblein winter' and slow and
difficult in summer. It was easyfor a clan chief or
noble to throw off the rule of the king.

Z1

The earlyN,tilleAges
Conquest and feudal rule

The N ormanConElest' Fer,rlalism'Kingship:a familybusiness'

Magna Carta and thedeclineof feudalism

The Norman Conquest

l$illiam the Conqueror's coronation did not go as
p'bnned. When the people shouted "God Save the
King" the nervous Norman guards at Westminster
Abb.y thought they were going to attack William.
fin their fear they set fire to nearby houses and the
omonation ceremony ended in disorder.
Nrhough William was now crowned king, his
&mquest had only just begun, and the fighting
bmed for another frve years. There was an Anglo'
Saxon rebellion against the Normans every year
uunril1070. The small Norman army marched from
uillage to village, destroying places it could not
mnmol, and building forts to guard others. It was a
rmuearmy of occupation for at least twenty years.
The north was particularly hard to control, and the
ilf{ormanarmy had no mercy. \il7henthe Saxons
fuht back, the Normans bumt, destroyed and
hlled. Between Durham and York not a single
house was left standing, and it took a century for
e north to recover.
ffien'Saxon lords kept their lands and those who did
rere the very small number who had accepted
W"illiam immediately.All the others lost
werything. By 108, twenty years after the arrival
rhe Normans, only two of the greater landlords
llguftentbetween King Henr1 II ant his orchbishop,Thomas Becl<ct.
Becket srand two knights, probabfu thosewho l,ilbd him to please
The picune tlustratesthe strugp;bbetween C|unch and snte dwng
az|y Mtdle Ages. The Cfunch controlled mone1, land (including eoums
feuda! esntes), and men As a resuh, the hngs of England had n be
cmeful in their dzalngswtth tht Chwch. The1 tried to veuent dny
in Chwch powet, anl tried to appoir|tbishopswho wou] be more
o the kng than to cheChurch Becket died because he tried to prevent
'uary
ftcm gatnng mcrg. control of Clwtch affairs

and only two bishopswere Saxon. William gave the

Saxon lands to his Norman nobles. After each
English rebellion there was more land to give away.
His army included Norman and other French land
seekers.Over 4,000 Saxon landlordswere replaced
bv 200 Norman ones.

'-Feudalism
William was careful in the way he gave land to his
nobles. The king of France was less powerful than
many of the great landlords, of whom \DTilliarnwas
the outstanding example. In England, as each new
area of land was captured, William gave parts of it
as a reward to his captains.This meant that they
held separatesmall pieces of land in differentparts
of the country so that no noble could easily or
quickly gatherhis fighting men ro rebel. William
only gave some of his nobles larger estatesalong the
troublesome borders with lJalesand Scotland. At
the same time he kept enough land for himself to
make sure he was much stronger than his nobles.
Of all the farmland of England he gave half to the
Norman nobles, a quarterto the Church, and kept
a fifth himself. He kept the Saxon system of
sheriffs, and used these as a balance to local nobles.
As a result England was different from the rest of
Europe becauseit had one powerful amily, instead
of a large number of poweul nobles. William, and
the kings after him, thought of England as their
personal propery.
William organised his English kingdom according
to the feudal system which had already begun to
develop in England before his arrival. The word .;--

An Illustrated History of Britain

cdsl Risng N crfolk, a fuv example of tlv stme.built ln"p' dn Normaru built in t}v early
'n These replaced the earker'Nrnmon "motte andbaiby" costles, which werc emth
twelfth centiry.
t roirrd"dby a^woodenferce cr pal)isadc.A stone'builtl. ep of tlv Tteu k4 *f .
^o*r^
difficult to apure, exceptby unpse. Keeps of this kindhad a weII, providingfresh
extreme$
waterfcn along siege.

''feudalism"comes from the French wordfeu, which

the Normans used to refer to land held in return for
duty or service to a lord. The basisof feudal socety
was the holding of land, and its main purposewas
economic. The central idea was that all land was
owned by the king but it was held by others, called
"vassals",in return for servicesand goods.The king
gave largeestatesto his main nobles in retum for a
promise to servehim in war for up to forty days.
The nobles also had to give him part of the produce
of the land. The greaternobles gave part of their
lands to lessernobles, knights, and other
"freemen". Some freemenpaid for the land by
doing military service, while others paid rent. The
noble kept ie$,} to work on his own land. These
were no.te to leave the estate' and were often
little better than slaves.
There were two basic principles to feudalism:every
man had a lord, and every lord had land. The king
was connected through this "chain" of people to
the lowest man in the country. At each level a man
had to promise loyalty and service to hi lord. This
promisewas usually made with the lord sitting on
his chair and his vassalkneeling beforehim, his
hands placed betweenthose of his lord. This was
z4 e sLup(. pr-txi,u{
V

: ,*
t'.\t

l, i
'

The great hall in Castb Headmf,vtn, built in 1 140' glvesan

iaeaf the hside of aNmnon casrle' The f|ncr uas covered
with'rushesor reeds, cuefra,n a rcarby morsh cr wetland
area The walk were decoratzd widt wouen wool]en
emhoidned lwngings, fcr which Englanl was famous. v
funiture sof a muchlater dnte. InNornan times therc wu
robabb a Inge but simpletablc ann chalr fcr the lurd o t]v
cr.stle. Others sat onbenches, ar mighthaue smodfat meak.

A thirteenth-centurylotight paJs honage. The

rwbiktyof Blriinstiilpa1 lwnagenthe
souereigndwing tlv cororation ceremonl Euer
since the Millh, Ages, west Ewopean Chrisraru
position whm
Iaue used thefeulallnnWe
praying a remindet of their relaciortshipto God,
their lmd andYotecrn

- ,,.ej "hurmase",and has remainedpart of the

queens
- :rnation ceremonvof British kings and
had
. -:rinorv.On the other hand, each lord
-:.:rrnsibilitiesto his vassals.He had to give them
, ,.j and protection.
:.en a noble died his son usuallytook over hs
. But first he had to receive permissionfrom
:.r-.-re
=krng and make a special payment' If he was still
:rrld the king would often take the produce of
-: estateuntil the boy was old enoughto look
.l]:: th estatehimself.In this way the king could
' ::.ehtfrom the death of a noble. If all the noble's
,-.iivdied the land went back to the king, who
,,, -.lJ be expectedto give it to another deserving
- :le. But the king often kept the land for some
::rs. using its wealth, beforegiving it to another
' :le.
- .:e king did not gvethe nobles land they would
;ght for him. Between 10 and the mid, :eenth century there were only thirty yearsof
--':letepeace. So eudalduties were extremely
- -'--rtant.
The king had to make surehe had
:- ,sh satisfiednobles who would be willing to
:- tbr him.

"

il -:amgave out land all over England to hrs

r : -es.By 1086 he wanted to know exactly who
. eJ whch piece of land, and how much it was
'
,; :.n. He neededthis informationso that he could
l i-. his economy' indout how much was produced
,i': now much he could ask in tax. He therefore
i.: ] team of people all through England to make
, - :npleteeconomic survey. His men askedall
I - :. of questionsat each settlement:How much
-: u'asthere?Who owned it? How much was it
., rh] How many famlies,ploughs and sheepwere
ll,: ;l And so on. This surveywas the only one of
' ..:ndin Europe.Not surprisingly,it was most
:: '-'pularwith the people,becausethey felt they
-.1 not escapefrom its findings.It so reminded
1':::.
of the paintingsof the Day of Judgement'or
'. i'r", on the walls of their churches that they
r r =i it the "Domesday"Book. The name stuck.
*'.
lomesday Book still exists,and givesus an
---.-,rdinary
amount of information about England
rrr
-.

- .! t lm e.

Kingship: a family business

To understandthe idea of kingship and lordship in
the early Middle Ages it is important to realisethat
at this time there was little or no idea of
nationalism. William controlled two large areas:
Normandy, which he had been given by his father,
and England, which he had won in war. Both were
personalpossessions,and t did not matter to the
iulers that the ordinary people of one place were
English while those of another were French' To
William the important differencebetween
Normandy and England was that as duke of
Normandy he had to recognisethe king of France
as his lord, whereasin England he was king with no
lord above him.

When William died, in 1087,he left the Duchv of

Normandy to his elder son, Robert. He gave
England to his second son, William, known as
"Rufus" (Latin for red) becauseof his red hair and
red face. When Robert went to fight the Muslims in
the Holy Land, he left Willam II (Rufus) in charge
of Normandy. After all, the managementof
Normandy and England was a family business'
William Rufus died in a hunting accidentin 1100,
shot dead by an arrow. He had not married, and
thereforehad no son to take the crown. At the
time of William's death, Robert was on his way
home to Normandy from the Holy Land. Their
youngerbrother, Henry, knew that if he wanted
the English crown he would have to act very
quickly. He had been with William at the time of
the accident. He rode to Winchester and took
charge of the king's treasury.He then rode to
Westminster, where he was crowned king three
days later. Robert was very angry and preparedto
invade. But it took him a year to organisean army'
The Norman nobles in England had to choose
betweenHenry and Robert. This was not easy
becausemost of them held land n Normandy too.
In the end they chose Henry becausehe was in
London, with the crown alreadyon his head.
Robert's invasion was a failure and he accepted
payment to return to Normandy. But Henry wanted
more. He knew that many of his nobles would
willingly follow him to Normandy so that they

z5

An Illustrated History of Britain

T-l |andsinheri|edomhis
l-l ather,Georey
Planlagenet,counl
oAniou
'
m lands inheritedfromhis
W mother,Oueen Matilda
of England
f-.] lands gained_byhis
!
marr|aoelo E|eano
oAqui1aine
T--'l lands qained bv his son
| |Geory,s
maiage to
uonstanceor Ermany
fl lands belonginglo. and
L---Jdirect|yu|edby, the
FrencnKrng
f l landswhichrecognised
[-l the Frenchking
as ovefloro
-

boundaryoHeny||,s
FrenchIands

Henry II's emPire

could win back their Norman lands. In 110 Henry

invaded Normandy and capturedRobert.
Normandy and England were reunited under one
ruler.
Henry I's most important aim was to passon both
Normandy and England to his successor.He spent
the rest of his life frghting to keep Normandy from
other French nobles who tried to take it. But in
1120 Henry's only son was drowned at sea.
During the next fifteen years Henry hoped for
another son but finally accepted that his daughter,
Matilda, would follow him. Henry had married
Matilda to another great noble in France, Geoffrey
Plantagenet.Geoffrey was heir to Anjou, a large
and important area southwest of Normandy. Henry
hoped that the family lands would be made larger
by this marriage.He made all the nobles promise to
accept Matilda when he died. But then Henry
himself quarrelledpublicly with Matilda's husband,
and died soon after. This left the succession in
questron.
26

At the time both the possibleheirs to Henry were

on their own estates.Matilda was with her husband
in Anjou and Henry's nephew, Stephen of Blois,
was in Boulogne, only a day'sjourney by sea from
England. As Henry had done beforehim, Stephen
raced to England to claim the crown. Also as
before, the nobles in England had to choose
betweenStephen, who was in England, and
Matilda, who had quarrelledwith her father and
who was still in France. Most chose Stephen, who
seemsto have been good at fighting but little else.
He was describedat the time as "of outstanding
skill in arms, but in other things almost an idiot,
except that he was more inclined towardsevil."
Only a few nobles supportedMatilda's claim.
Matilda invaded England four yearslater. Her fight
with Stephen led to a tenible civil war in which
villages were destroyedand many people were
killed. Neither side could win, and finally in 1153
Matilda and Stephen agreedthat Stephen could
keep the throne but only if Matilda's son, Henry,
could succeedhim. Fortunatelyfor England,
Stephen died the followngyear, and the family
possessionsof England and the lands in France were
united under a king acceptedby everyone. It took
years for England to recover from the civil war. As
someonewrote at the time, "For nineteen long
winters, God and his angelsslept." This kind of
disorderand destructionwas common in Europe,
but it was shocking in England becausepeople were
used to the rule of law and order.
Henry II was the first unquestionedruler of the
English throne for a hundred years.Hedestroyed
the castleswhich many nobles had built without
royal permissionduring Stephen'sreign, and made
sure that they lived in manor housesthat were
undefended. The manor again became the centre of
local life and administration.
Henry II was ruler of far more land than any
previousking. As lord of Anjou he added his
father'slands to the family empire. After his
marriageto Eleanor of Aquitaine he also ruled the
lands south of Anjou. Henry II's empire stretched
from the Scottish border to the Pyrenees.

4 Conquest and eudal rule

Fon kings of the earty Mddb

Ages; (top row) Henrl ll, Richard
I, (bottom row\ John cadHenry
lll Richard's shieB carries the
badge of the Englishkings The
tlvee goB liots (called "leopmds"
in heraWc Ir Sr-sd on a red fieA
stllfrrm two of the fow
"qr.+arrers"of the Ro'1al Stailmd
or shield toda1.

:rgland provided most of Henry's wealth, but the

.;artof his empirelay in Anjou. And although
.ienry recognsedthe king of France as the overlord
. allhis French lands,he actuallycontrolleda
-:.ater area than the king of France. Many of
-enry's nobles held land on both sidesof the
l-slish channel.
- u'ever,Henry quarrelledwith his beautiful and
. .,reulwife, and hs sons, Richard and John' took
-.-anor'ssde.It may seemsurprisingthat Richard
, .J ]ohn fought againsttheir own father. But in
'.:: they were doing their duty to the king of
:-.nce, their feudaloverlord,in paymentfor the
...Js rhey held from him. In 1189 Henry died a
-: ken man, disappointedand defeatedby hrs sons
-: b-vthe French king.
.;rrv wss followedby his rebelliousson, Richard.
; :hard I has alwaysbeen one of England's most

popular kings, although he spenr hardly any rime in

England. He was brave, and a good soldier, but his
nickname Coeur de Lion, "lionheart", showsthat
his culture, like that of the kings beforehim, was
French. Richard was everyone'sidea of the perect
feudal king. He went ro the Holy Land to make war
on the Muslims and he fought with skill, courage
and honour.
on his way back rom the Holy Land Richard was
capturedby the duke of Austria, with whom he had
quarrelledin Jerusalem.The duke demandedmoney
beforehe would let him go, and it took two years
for England to pay. Shortly afrer, in 1199, Richard
was killed in France. He had spent no more than
four or five yearsin the country of which he was
king. When he died the French king took over
parts of Richard's French lands to rule himself.

2?

An lllustrated Hstory of Britain

Richard had no son, and he was followed by his

brother, John. John had alreadymade himself
unpopularwith the three most important groupsof
people, the nobles, the merchantsand the Church.
John was unpopular mainly becausehe was greedy.
The feudal lords in England had always run their
own law courts and profited from the fines paid by
those brought to court. But John took many cases
out of their courts and tried them in the king's
courts, taking the money for himself.
It was normal for a feudal lord to make a payment
to the king when his daughterwas married, but
John askedfor more than was the custom. In the
sameway, when a noble died, his son had to pay
money beforehe could inherit his father'sland. In
order to enlargehis own income, John ncreased
the amount they had to pay. In other caseswhen a
noble died without a son, it was normal for the land
to be passedon to,anothernoble family. John kept
the land for a long time, to benefit from its wealth.
He did the same with the bishoprics.As for the
merchantsand towns, he taxed them at a higher
level than ever before.
In 1204 King John became even more unpopular
with his nobles. The French king invaded
Normandy and the English nobles lost their lands
there. John had failed to carry out his duty to them
as duke of Normandy. He had taken their money
but he had not protectedtheir land.
In 1209John quarrelledwith the pope over who
should be Archbishop of Canterbury. John was n a
weak position in England and the pope knew it.
The pope called on the king of France to invade
England, and closed every church in the country.
At a time when most people believed that without
the Church they would go to hell, this was a very
seriousmatter. In I2I4 John gave in, and accepted
the pope'schoice of archbishop.
In I7I5 John hoped to recaptureNormandy. He
called on his lords to fight for him, but they no
longer trustedhim. They marched to London,
where they were joined by angry merchants.
Outside London at Runnymede, a few miles up the
river, John was forced to sign a new agreement.
28

Magna Carta and the decline of

feudalism
This new agreementwas known as "Magna Carta",
the Great Charter, and was an important symbol of
political freedom.The king promisedall "freemen"
protection from his officers,and the right to a fair
and legal trial. At the time perhapsless than one
ouarerof the Enslish were'..freemen''.Most were
*".,lPf #ii?tr" better. Hundreds of
.,ot f."".
",,d
yearslater, Magna Carta was used by Parliament to
protect itself from a powerfulking. In fact Magna
Caragave no real freedomtp.lbg "ryajorityof
people in England. The iib].{'fi *rote it and
forcedKing John to sign i
mind. !\9y h.adpDqmau

..d!dLqrgpbcye...{'_b'l:
ite!
Magna Carta marks a clei
English feudalism.Feudal
between lord and vassal.
were not acting as vassals
.
established' e&d"ii'.."
make sureJohn kept his 1
"feudal" thing to do. In a
acting in co-operationwi
towns.
The nobles did not allow
this charter and its promi
Magna Carta, until the N
disorderand a new kind c
being in the sixteenth cer
There were other small si
changing. When the kin5
right to forty days' flghtin
lords. But forty days were
fighting a war in France.
for longer, so the king wa
fight for him. (They were
solidnrius,a Latin word frr
"soldier"comes.)At the
preferredtheir vassalsto 1
than in services.Vassals'
to change into tenants. F
in return for service, was
it took another three hur
disappearedcompletely.

The power of the kings of England

' Dealing withthe

of Parlio;rnent
Chwch and state, The beglnnings
Celts

Church and state

fudal lord. William refused to accept this claim'

Eflehad created Norman bishops and given them
hJ on condition that they paid homage to him'
,As a result it was not clear whether the bishops
dDilld obey the Church or the king' Those kings
rml popes who wished to avoid conflict left the
ulo.,". But some kings and popes wanted to
-*a.".
iiimreasetheir authority. In such circumstances
mrble could not be avoided.
The strugglewas for both power and money' During
ffie eleventh and twelfth centuries the Church
mrted the kings of Europe to accept its authority
omerboth spiritual and earthly affairs, and argued
ffiat even kings were answerableto God' Kings, on
e other han, chose as bishops men who would
ffieloyal to them.
'l[he first serious quarrel was between William Rufus
m'J Anselm, the man he had made Archbshop of
C,mrterbury.Anselm, with several other bishops,
&ming the king, had escapedfrom England' After
Silliam's death Anselm refusedto do homage to
William's successo'Henry I. Henry, meanwhile,
&nd created several new bishops but they had no
of the
ryuirual authority without the blessing
ruchbishop. This left the king in a dificult position.
fo tmk seven yearsto ettlethe disagreement.

wishes of the king in the appointment of bishops

remained important. But after Anselm's death
Henry managed to delay the appointment of a new
archbishop for flve years while he benefited from
the wealth of Canterbury. The struggle between
Church and state continued.
The crisis came when Henry II's friend Thomas

changed his mind again and ran away to France,

and ii seemedas if Henry had won' But in 1170
Beciket returned to England determined to resist the
king. Henry was very angry' and four knights who
heaid hi- speak out went to Canterbury to murder
Becket. They killed him in the holiest place in the
cathedral, on the altar stePs.
All Christian Europe was shocked, and Thomas
Becket became a saint of the Church' For hundreds
of years afterwardspeople not only from England
but also from Europe travelled to Canterbury to

years later was to upset both Church and obles at

the same time.

29

An Illustrated History of Britain

The beginningsof Parliament

King John had signed Magna Carta unwillngly,
and it quickly became clear that he was not going
to keep to the agreement.The nobles rebelled and
soon pushedJohn out of the southeast.But civil
war was avoided becauseJohn died suddenly in
T216.
John's son, Henry III, was only nine yearsold'
During the first sixteen yearsas king he was under
the control of powerful nobles, and tied by Magna
Carta.
Henry was finally able to rule for himself at the
age of twenty-five.It was understandablethat he
wanted to be completely independentof the people
who had controlled his life for so long. He spent his
time with foreign friends, and became involved in
expensivewars supportingthe pope in Sicily and
also in France.

Edwardl's Parltununt. Edwmd sirsin

frctntof his nobles, bishopsand shire
knighrs. on his ighrsits Alzxondg,
hng of Scocs, and cn his left is
I)ewelyn, Prirce of Va)es. h is
unlil<clyeidw euer satinEdward's
parlianent, buthehlrcd n think d
mt as tner his aut)umty. Be1md
Abxaler andlkwel1n sit t}v
archbishopsof Canwbwl andYatk,
and there ate mrvrebislwps on tfu left
of t)vpicnne, orenndn d the
pokrical and.ecmonic strngh of t)le
Church at this ane. In the centreo:re
tloolsaclcs, sym}rlkcof England's
weahh.

30

Henry's heavy spending and hsoreignadvtsers

upset the nobles. Once again they acted as a class,
under the leadershipo Simon de Montfort, earl of
Leicester. In 1258 they took over the government
and elected a council of nobles. De Montfort called
or parlemen,a French word meaning
ft a pdTlidment,
a "discussionmeeting". This "parliament" took
conffol of the treasuryand forced Henry to get rid
of his foreign advisers.The nobles were supported
by the towns, which wished to be free of Henly's
heavy taxes.
But some of the nobles did not support the
revolutionarynew council, and remained loyal to
Henry. With their help Henry was finally able to
defeatand killsimon de Montfort in 1265.Once
aganhe had full royal authority, although he was
careful to accept the balance which de Montfort
had createdbetweenking and nobles. When Henry
died in IZ7Zhs son Edward I took the throne
without question.

5 The power of rhe kings of England

E,vardI brought togetherthe first real parliament.

de Montfort's council had been called a
3rarliament,but it included only nobles. It had been
e to make statutes, or written laws, and it had

able to make political decisions.However, the

J. were less able to provide the king with money,
ept what they had agreed to pay him for the
they held under feudal arrangement. In the
s of Henry I ( I 100-35), 85 per cent of the
's income had come from the land. Bv IZTZ
;ome from the land was less than 40 per cent of
royal income. The king could only raise the rest
mxation. Since the rules of feudalismdid not
:lude taxation, taxescould only be raisedwith
agreementof those wealthy enough to be taxed.
eral kings had made arrangementsfor taxation
. but Edward I was the first to create a
tative institution" which could provide

money he needed.This institution becamethe

of Commons. Unlike the House of Lords it
lned a mixture of "gentry" (knights and other
freemen from the shires) and merchants
the towns. These were the two broad classesof
who producedand controlled England's
1275Edward I commandedeach shire and each
(or borough) to send two repesentatives to

ptarliament.These "commoners" would have

away if they could, to avoid giving Edward
. But few dared risk Edward's anger. They
unwilling representativesof their local
ity. This, rather than Magna Carta, was
Leginning of the idea that there should be "no
ion without representation",later claimed by
-{merican colonists of the eighteenth century.
.r*rerparts of Europe, similar "parliaments" kept
re gentry Separatefrom the commoners.
was special becausethe House of
contained a mixture of gentry belonging
e feudal ruling class and merchants and
who did not. The co-operationof these
, through the House of Commons, became
to Britain's later political and social
nt. During the 150 yearsfollowing
's death the agreement of the Commons

Harbch Catlc, uv d seueral castlesbuih by Edward. I in oilsr n cantrol

theruvtthand west of Waks. The mtrunainors cowtrl of Snoutdmriain the
baclcgroffid was a plore of safetyfor the Vekh rebek. Vlhib it was
extremelyffiult
for Edward a reach the rebek in thesemounuht, it wa
oko mpossiblefor srch rebek evet to captue castlesas strangu Harlech.
These huge\ exPensive castlaswere so suong tlvt tley persuaded tlw Welsh
was wtlil<clyto strcceed.
that arcthn risingagahstEndjshr.te

became necessaryfor the making of all statutes, and

all special taxation additional to regular taxes.
ft
'

?Wla
wat
""""^I 'l

^i

Dealing with the Celts

';u"f''
, Lc

,.,,'^.,''t
\\rcl wo&rt I h{',,.'.r''
',
Edward I was less interested in winning back parts
of France than in bringing the rest of Britain under
his control.

William I had allowed his lords to win land by

conquest in Wales. These Normans slowly
extended their control up the Welsh river valleys
and by the beginning of the twelfth century much
of Wales was held by them. They built castles as
they went forward, and mixed with and married the
Welsh during the eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth
centuries. A new class grew up, a mixture of the
Norman and Welsh rulers, who spoke Norman
French and Welsh, but not English. They all
became vassalsof the English king.
31

An Illustrated History of Britain

G.-'.J.r ecc

The only Welsh who were at all free from English

rule lived around Snowdon, the wild mountainous
area of north \ales. They were led by Llg-yqtyn'ap -

!+fua,-ptift9"-qf Aq

to become
$q who.tried

of-th" English. Edward was determined

i"d"p";6;t
to d"f""t him and bring Wales completely under his
control. In 1282 Llewelvn was capturedarld \i1-1ed'
Edward th"n begu.ta programmeof castle building
which was extremely expensive and took many

The Irish chiefs continued to live as they always

had done, moving from fllace to place, and eating
out of doors, a habit they only gave up in the
sixteenth century. The Anglo'Irish lords, on the
other hand, built strong stone castles,as they had
done in Wales. But they also became almost
completely independentfrom the English Crown'
ro*" became "more Irish than the Irish"'
"rrd

yearsto comPlete.

to trouble with his nobles'

queen has usually been made Prince of Wales'

Ireland had been conquered by Norman lotds in

lords to accept his lordship. He did so with the

authority of ih" pope, who hoped to bring the Irish
Celtic Church under his own control'
Henry II made Dublin, the old Viking town, the
capital of his new colony. Much of westernlreland
remained in the hands of Irish chiefs, while
Norman lords governed most of the east' Edward I
took as much money and as many men as he could
for his wars againstthe Welsh and Scots' As a
result Irelandwas drained of tswealth. By 1318 it
was able to provide the English king with only
one-third of the amount it had been able to give in
Z?2, TheNorman nobles and Irish chiefs quietly
avoided Enghsh authority as much as possible' As a
result, the nglish Crown only controlled Dublin
and a small area around it, known as "the Pale"'
3Z

and he ruled over all the south and east of Scot'

land. Only a few areas of the westem coast were
still completely independent and these all came
under the king's control during the twelfth and
thirteenth centuries.In Ireland and Wales Norman
knights were strong enough to fight local chiefs on
their own. But only the English king with a large
army could hpe to defeat the Scots. Jv1ostEnglish
kings did not;ot even try' but Edward I was diffe
The Scottish kings were closely connected with
England. Since Saxon times, marriageshad
freq,rently taken place between the Scottish and
fngtisntroyal families. At the same time' in order
to stablish strong govemment, the Scottish kings
offered land to Norman knights from England in
retum for their loyalty. Scotland followed England
in creating a feudal state. On the whole Celtic
society acceptedthis, probably becausethe
Normans married into local Celtic noble families'
The feudal system,however, did not develop in
Highlands, where the tribal "clan" system
continued. Some Scottish kings held land in
England, just as English klngs held lands in France
And in exactly the same way they did homage,
promising loyalty to the English king for that land'
In 1290 a crisis took place over the successionto
the Scottish throne. There were thirteen possible
heirs. Among these the most likely to succeed
NormanJohn de Balliol and Robert Bruce, both
war the
civil
avoid
to
In
order
cottish knights.
the
settle
I
to
Edward
Scottish nobles invited
matter.

5 The power ofthe kings ofEngland

EJward had alreadyshown interest in joining

Scotland to his kingdom. In 1286 he had arranged
:rr his own son to marry Margaret, the heir to the
Scottish throne, but she had died in a shipwreck.
-\ow he had another chance. He told both men
-hatthey must do homage to him, and so accept his
:r'erlordship,beforehe would help settle the
i-restion.He then invaded Scotland and put one of
-jrem,John de Balliol, on the Scottish throne.
le Balliol's four yearsas king were not happy. First,
:Jrvard made him provide money and troops for
:-,eEnglish army and the Scottish nobles rebelled.
lhen Edward invaded Scotland again, and captured
r,i the main Scottish castles.During the invaston
from
-lq,ard stole the sacredStone of Destiny
i';one Abbey on which, so the legend said, all
lrottish kings must sit. Edward believed that
w:rhoutthe Stone, any Scottish coronation would
:'. meaningless,and that his own possessionof the
:.-.ne would persuadethe Scots to accept him as
r.:lq. However, neither he nor his successors
L;ame kings of Scots, and the Scottish kings
n;naged perfectlywell without it.

?
{

:;:n'ard'streatmentof the Scots createda popular

rssi-<tance
movement. At first it was led by William
]1li'.:llace,
a Norman-Scottish knight. But after one
,,,:rory againstan English army, Wallace's "people's
i[::\-''
was itself destroyedby Edward in 1297. The
5: -rs had formed rings of spearmenwhich stood
t:: againstthe English cavalry attacks, but
il.:nard'sWelsh longbowmenbroke the Scottish
rnr:Etions, and the cavalry then chargeddown on
.ilflTt.

r ,cemedas if Edward had won after all. He

:1c':.rred
Wallace and executedhim, putting his
twaj on a pole on London Bridge. Edward tried to
um,rui.e
Scotland a part of England, as he had done
\Vales.
Some Scottish nobles acceptedhim,
'rllrrr:nru-Ie people refusedto be ruled by the English
|trunq
Scottshnationalism was bom on the day
...............
u-ace died.
{ len leader took up the struggle.This was Robert
Mumrlc=.
who had competedwith John de Balliol for
rltt'c:lrone. He was able to raise an army and defeat
nrtm
laglish armv in Scotland. Edward I sathered

another great army and marched against Robert

Bruce, but he died on the way norrh in 1307. On
Edward'sgrave were written the words "Edward, the
Hammer of the Scots''. He had ntendedtcl
hammer them into the ground and destroythem,
but in fact he had hammeredthem into a nation.
After his death his son, Edward II, tumed back to
England. Bruce had time to defeathis Scottish
enemies, and make himself acceptedas king of the
Scots. He then began to win back the castlesstill
held by the English. When Edward II invaded
Scotland n I3I4 in an effort to help the last
English-held castles,Bruce destroyedhis army at
Bannockburn, near Stirling. Six yearslater, in
1320, the Scots clergy meeting at Arbroath wrote
to the pope in Rome to tell him that they would
never accept Englshauthority:..foras long as even
one hundred of us remain alive,,we will never
consent to subjectourselvesto the dominion of the
English."
Edward l,s cryronatiut chai The Scottlsh Stone of Destin1 which Edward
tookfromScorc Abbey is uner the seat,a symbolof Englm,s dcsreto
rule Scotland On either sideof the throrc stand the slmbolic stote swryrdanl
shield oEduard III

Government and society

, I-aw and justice. Relig1ous

beliefs.
The growthof gouenment
Ordinary peoplein countryand town ' The growthof townsas centresof
weakh' I-angtage,Literattneand cuhwe

The growth of government

William the Conqueror had govemed England and
Normandy by travelling from one place to another
to make sure that his authority was accepted.He,
and the kings after him, raised some of the money
they neededby trying casesand finngpeople in the
royal courts. The king's "household" was the
government,and it was alwayson the move. There
was no real captalof the kingdom as there is today.
Kings were crowned in Westminster, but thetr
treasurystayedin the old Wessex capital,
Winchester. When William and the kngsafter him
moved around the country staying in towns and
castles,they were accompaniedby a large number
of followers. Wherever they went the local people
had to give them food and somewhere to stay. It
could have a terrible effect. Food ran out, and
prices rose.
This form of govemment could only work well for a
small kingdom. By the time the English kings were
ruling half of France as well they could no longer
travel everywherethemselves.Instead,they sent
nobles and knights from the royal household to act
as sheriffs,But even this systemneededpeople who
could administertaxaton,justice, and carry out the
king's instructions.It was obviously not practical
for all these people to follow the king everywhere.
At first this "administration" was based in
'Winchester,
but by the time of Edward I, in 1290,
it had moved to Westminster. It is still there today.
However, even though the administrationwas in
l7estminster the real capital of England was still "in
the king's sadd)e".
34

The king kept all his recordsin Westminster,

including the DomesdayBook. The king's
administrationkept a careful watch on noble
families. It made sure the king claimed money
every tlme a young noble took over the lands of his
father, or when a noble's daughtermarried. In
every possible way the king always "had his hand i
his subject'spocket". The administrationalso
checked the towns and the ports to make sure that
taxeswere paid, and kept a record of the fines
by the king's court.
Most important of all, the officialsin Westminster
had to watch the economy of the country carefully.
Was the king getting the money he needed in the
most effectiveway? Such questionsled to import
changesin taxation between 106 and 1300. In
1130 well over half of Henry I's money came from
his own land, one-third from his feudal vassalsin
rights and fines, and only one'seventh from taxes.
One hundred and fifty years later, over half of
Edward Ils money came from taxes, but only one'
third came from his land and only one'tenth from
his feudal vassals.It is no wonder that Edward
called to his parliament representativesof the
people whom he could tax most effectively.
It is not surprising,either, that the administration
began to grow very quickly. When Wtlliam I
invaded Britain he needed only a few clerks to
managefuispaperwork.Most business,including
feudal hmage, was done by the spoken, not
written, word. But the need for paperworkgrew
rapidly. In 1050 only the king (Edward the
..sign''official
Confessor)had a seal with which o
papers.By the time of Edward I, just over two

, IU

:r,,*- W[0"
hundred years later, even the poorest man was
expected to have a seal in order to sign official
Fapers,-even if he could not read. From 1199 the
aministrationin Westminster kept copies of all the
tremers
and documents that were sent out.
The amount of wax used for seals on official papers
gives an idea of the rapid growth of the royal ad'
ministration. In 1720, at the beginning of Henry
[II'sreign, 1.5 kg were used each week. Forty years
iater, in 1260, this had risen to 14 kg weekly. And
govemment administration has been growing ever
srnce.

Law and justice

The king, of course, was responsible for law and
Srstice.But kings usually had to leave the
nlmnistrationof this important matter to someone
uho lived close to the place where a crime was
committed. In Saxon times every district had had
rts own laws and customs, and justice had often
Leen a family matter. After the Norman Conquest
mbles were allowed to administerjustice among
*re villages and people on their lands. Usually they
mixed Norman laws with the old Saxon laws. They
bad freedom to act more or less as they liked. More
seriousoffences, however, were tried in the king's
courts.
Henry I introduced the idea that all crimes, even
ose inside the family, were no longer only a
tamily matter but a breaking of the "king's peace".
[t was therefore the king's duty to try people and
punish them. At first the nobles acted for the king
:rr their own lands, but Henry wanted the same
tind of justice to be used everywhere. So he
rypointed a number of judges who travelled from
placeto place administeringjustice. (These
uavelling, or "circuit", judgesstill exist today.)
They dealt both with crimes and disagreements
!'er property. In this way the king slowly took over
e administrationfrom the nobles.
At first the king's judges had no special knowledge
,r training. They were simply trusted to use
ommonsense. Many of them were nobles or
hishopswho followed directly the orders of the
king. It is not surprising that the quality of iudges

Govemment and sociecy

depended on the choice of the king. Henry II, the

most powefflEnglish king of the twelfth century'
was known in Europe for the high standardsof his
law courts. "The convincing proof of our king's
strength," wrote one man, "is that whoever has a
just cause wants ro have it tried before him,
whoever has a weak one does not come unless he is
dragged."
By the end of the melfth century the judges were
men with real knowledge and experience of the
law. Naturally thesejudges,travelling from place to
place, administered the same law wherever they
went. This might seem obvious now, but since
Saxon times local customs and laws had varied from
one place to another. The law administered by
these travelling judges became known as "common
law", because it was used everywhere.
England was unlike the rest of Europe because it
used common law. Centuries later, England's
common law system was used in the United States
(the North American colonies) and in many other
British colonial possessions,and accepted when
these became nations in their own right. In other
parts of Europe legal practice was based on the Civil
Law of the Roman Empire, and the Canon Law of
the Church. But although English lawyers referred
to these as examples of legal method and science,
they created an entirely different system of law
based on custom, comparisons, previous cases and
previous decisions. In this way traditional local laws
were replaced by common law all over the land.
This mixture of experience and custom is the basis
of law in England even today. Modem judgesstill
base their decisions on the way in which similar
caseshave been decided.
The new class of judges was also interested in how
the law was carried out, and what kinds of
punishment were used. From Anglo-Saxon times
there had been two ways of deciding difficult cases
when it was not clear if a man was innocent or
guilty. The accused man could be tested in battle
against a skilled fighter, or tested by "ordeal". A
typical "ordeal" was to put a hot iron on the man's
tongue. If the bum mark was still there three days
later he was thought to be guilty. lt was rgued that
J)

An Illustrated History of Britain

God would leave the bum mark on a guilty man's

tongue. Such a system worked only as long as
people believed in it. By the end of the twelfth
century there were seriousdoubts and in 1215 the
pope forbade the Church to have anything to do
with trial by ordeal.
In England trial by ordeal was replacedwith trial by
jury. The jury idea dated back to the Danes of
Danelaw, but had only been used in disputesover
land. Henry II had alreadyintroduced the use of
juries for some casesin the second half of the
melfth century. But it was not the kind of jury we
know today. In 1179 he allowed an accusedman in
certain casesto claim "trial by j.try". The man
could choose twelve neighbours,"twelve good men
and true'', who would help hm prove that he was
not guilty. Slowly, during the later Middle Ages,
the work of these juries gradually changed from
giving evidence tq judging the evidence of others.
Juries had no training in the law. They were
ordinary people using ordinary common sense.It
was soon obvious that they neededguidance. As a
result law schools grew up durngthe thirteenth
century, producnglawyerswho could advise juries
about the points of law.

Religious beliefs
The Church at local village level was significantly
different from the politically powerful organisation
the kng had to deal with. At the time of !7illiam I
the ordinary village priest could hardly read at all,
and he was usually one of the peasantcommunity.
His church belongedto the local lord, and was
often built next to the lord's house. Almost all
priestswere married, and many inherited their
position from their father.
However, even at village level the Church wished
to replace the lord's authority with its own, but it
was only partly successful.In many places the lord
continued to choose the local priest, and to have
more influence over him than the more distant
Church authortieswere able to have.
The Church also tried to prevent priestsfrom
marrying. In this it was more successful,and by the
end of the thirteenth century married priestswere
36

unusual. But it was still common to find a priest

who "kept a girl in his house who lit his fire but
out his virtue."
There were, however, many who promisednot to
marry and kept that promise. This was particularly
true of those men and women who wanted to be
monks or nuns and entered the local monastery or
nunnery. One reasonfor entering a religoushouse
was the increasingdifficulty during this period of
living on the land. As the population grew, more
and more people found they could not feed ther
whole family easily. If they could enter a son or
daughternto the local religioushouse there would
be fewer mouths to feed. Indeed, it may have been
the economic diffrcultiesof raising a family which
persuadedpreststo follow the Church ruling. Life
was better as a monk within the safewalls of a
monasterythan as a poor farmer outside. A monk
could leam to read and write. and be sure of food
and shelter. The monasterieswere centresof
and leaming.
In 1066 there were fifty religioushousesin Engla
home for perhaps 1,000 monks and nuns. By the
beginning of the fourteenth century there were
probably about 900 religioushouses,with 17,500
members.Even though the population in the
fourteenthcentury was three times larger than it
had been in 106, the growth of the monasteriesis
rmpresslve.
The thirteenth century brought a new movement,
the "brotherhoods" of friars. These friars were
wanderingpreachers.They were interestednot in
Church power and splendour,but in the souls of
ordinary men and women. They lived with the
and tried to bring the comfort of Christianity to
them. They lived in contrastwith the wealth and
power of the monaseries
and cathedrals,the local
centres of the Church.

Ordinary people in country and

town
There were probablybetween 1.5 and 2 million
people living in England in 1066. The Domesday
Book tells us that nine-tenths of them lived in the

 Govemment and society

countryside.It also tells us that 80 per cent of the

land used for farming at the beginning of the
rwentieth century was already being ploughed in
108. In fact it was not until the nineteenth
century that the cultivated area becamegreater
than the level recorded in the Domesday Book.
Life in the countryside was hard. Most of the
population still lived in villages in southem and
eastem parts of England. In the north and west
there were fewer people, and they often lived apart
from each other, on separatefarms. Most people
lived in the simplesthouses.The walls were made
of wooden beamsand sticks, filled with mud. The
roofs were made of thatch, with reeds or corn stalks
lald thickly and skilfully so that the rain ran off
easily. People ate cerealsand vegetablesmost of the
rime, with pork meat for special occasions.They
norked from dawn to dusk every day of the year,
every year, until they were unable to work any
longer.Until a man had land of his own he would
usuallynot marry. However, men and women often
slept togetherbeforemarriage,and once a woman
s-asexpecting a child, the couple had no choice but
to marry.
The poor were divided from their masters by the
tbudalclass system.The basisof this "manorial
rr-stem"was the exchange of land for labour. The
landlord expected the villagers to work a fixed
number of days on his own land, the "home farm".
The rest of the time they worked on their small
srripsof land, part of the village's "common land"
which they grew food for themselves and their
"ur
thmly.The DomesdayBook tells us that over
uee.quarters
of the country people were serfs.
They were not free to leave their lord's serviceor
his land without permission.Even if they wanted to
run away, there was nowhere to run to. Anyway, a
ser'slife, under his lord's protection, was better
ranthe life of an unprotected wanderer. Order
mrdprotection, no matter how hard life might be,
r-asalwaysbetter than disorder,when people would
$0arve.

The manorial systemwas not the same all over the

rr-rntry, and it did not stay the same throughout
:reMiddle Ages. There were alwaysdifferencesin

the way the system worked between one estate and

another, one region and another, and betweenone
period and another. Local customs and both local
and national economic pressuresaffected the way
things worked.
The manorial system is often thought to be
Norman, but in fact it had been growing slowly
throughoutthe Anglo.Saxon period. The Normans
inherited the systemand developedit to its fullest
extent. But the Normans were blamed for the bad
aspectsof the manorial system because they were
foreign masters.
In the early days of the Conquest Saxons and
Normans fearedand hated each other. For
example, if a dead body was found, the Saxons had
to prove that it was not the body of a murdered
Norman. If they could not prove it, the Normans
would bum the nearestvillage. The Norman ruling
class only really began to mix with and marry the
Saxons, and consider themselves"English" rather
than French, after King John lost Normandy in
L704. Even then, dislike remained between the
rulers and the ruled.
Every schoolchild knows the story of Robin Hood,
which grew out of Saxon hatred for Norman rule.
According to the legend Robin Hood lived rn
Sherwood Forestnear Nottingham as a criminal or
"outlaw", outside feudal society and the protection
of the law. He stole from the rich and gave to the
poor, and he stood up for the weak against the
poweul. His weapon was not the sword of nobles
and knights, but the longbow, the weapon of the
common man.
In fact, mosof the story is legend. The only thing
we know is that a man called Robert or "Robin"
Hood was a wanted criminal in Yorkshire in 1230.
The legend was, however, very popular with the
common people all through the fourteenth,
frfteenth and sixteenth centuries, although the
ruling class greatlydisliked it. Later the story was
changed. Robin Hood was described as a man of
noble birth, whose lands had been taken by King
John. Almost certainly this was an effort by the
authoritiesto make Robin Hood 1'respectable".

An lllustrated History of Britain

populationhued
Above: wonant mills a cou, while the cow tennly kcls its calf. Ahnost a]] tlv
gentleness
a
touching
has
scene
dtmestic
h*
too.
tullnspeople
l<ep
b1
were
cous
but
,l" ,,.',,l ,
about it.

Most landlords obtained their income directly from

the home farm, and also from letting out some of
their land in return for rent in crops or money' The
size of the home farm depended on how much land
the landlord chose to let out. In the twelfth
century, for example, many landlords found it more
profitable to let out almost all the home farm lands,
and thus be paid in money or crops rather than in
labour. [n fact it is from this period that the word
"farm" comes. Each arrangement the landlord made
to let land to a villager was a "firma": a fixed or
settledagreement.
By 1300 the population was probablyjust over four
million (up to the nineteenth century figurescan
only be guessedat), about three times what it had
been in 10. ThiS increase,of course,had an
effect on life in the country. It made it harder to
grow enough food for everyone. The situation was
*o.t" by the Normans' love of hunting. They
-"d" the English peasantsout of the forests, and
drove
punished them severely if they killed any forest
animals. "The foresthas its own laws," wrote one
man bitterly, "based not on the common law of the
kingdom, but on the personalwishes of the king'"
38

The peasantstried to farm more land. They drained

marshland, and tried to grow food on high ground
and on other poor land. But much of this newly
cleared land quickly became exhausted, because the
soil was too poor, being either too heavy or too
light and sandy. As a result, the effort to farm more
land could not match the increase in population,
and this led to a decline in individual family land
holdings. It also led to an increase in the number
landlesslabourers,to greaterpoverty and hunger.
As land became overused, so bad harvests became
more frequent. And in the years of bad harvest
people starvedto death. It is a pattern cruelly
familiar to many poor countries today. Among
richer people, the pressureon land led to an
increasein its value, and to an increasein buying
and selling. Landowning widows found themselves
courted by land-hungry single men.
Unfortunately, agricultural skills improved little
during this period. Neither peasantsnor landlords
had the necessaryknowledge or understanding to
develop them. In addition, manorial landlords,
equally interestedin good harvests,insistedthat t
animals of the peasantry grazedon their own land
to enrich it during its year of rest. Many villagers

6 Govemment and society

ried to increasetheir income by other activities

end becameblacksmiths,carpenters,tilers or
epherds, and it is from the thirteenth century
*rat many villagers became known by their trade
:rame.
Strortageof food led to a sharp rise in prices at the
end of the twelfth century. The price of wheat, for
example,doubled between 1190 and 1200. A sheep
irat cost four pence in 1199 fetched ten pence in
1310. Prices would be high in a bad season,but
could suddenly drop when the harvest was specially
@. This inflation weakenedfeudal ties, which
Jepended to a great extent on a steady economic
flnuation to be workable. The smaller landed
hnights found it increasingly dtfficult to pay for
ffieir military duties. By the end of the thirteenth
{:Enrurya knight's equipment, which had cost
treen
shillings in the early twelfth century' now
ilffmore than three times this amount. Although
m$les and knights could get more money rom
ffirlr land by paying farm labourers and receiving
omrrney
rents than by giving land rent free in return
ftr labour, many knights with smaller estates
Mlcfameincreasingly indebted.
We know about these debts from the records of the
..Exchequer
of the Jews''. The small Jewsh
onm.munityin England eamed its living by lending
ilmdney,and lived under royal protection. By the
JM thrteenth century these records show a large
of knights in debt to Jewish money lenders.
"nn'"mrher
WhEn a knight was unable to repay the money he
h'l bonowed, the Jewish money lender sold the
l@rt's land to the greater landholding nobility.
"ilfuux
did not please Edward I, who feared the
pmm in power of the greater nobility as they
pnted from the disappearanceof smaller landfuds. He had wanted the support of the knightly
dhm against the greater lords, and it was partly for
'b rearcn that he had called on them to be
,Wr''esentedin Parliament. Now he saw the danger
rhmes a class they might become seriously
. The Tewswere middlemen in an
ic processwhich was the result of social
at work in the countrysde.While the
ic function of the Jews in providing captal
heen useful they had been safe, but once this

was no longer so, the king used popular feeling

againstthem as an excuseto expel them. In 1290
the Jewish community was forced to leave the
country.
Feudalismwas slowly dying out, but the changes
often made landlords richer and peasantspoorer.
Larger landlords had to pay fewer feudal taxes,
while new taxes were demanded from everyone in
possessionof goodsand incomes. As a result many
could not afford to pay rent and so they lost their
land. Some of these landlesspeople went to the
towns, which offered a better hope for the future.

The gowthof towns as centres

of wealth
England was to a very large degree an agricultural
society. Even in towns and cities, many of those
involved in trade or industry also farmed small
holdings of land on the edge of town. In this sense
England was self-sufficient.However, throughout
the Middle Ages England needed things from
abroad,such as salt and spices. Inside England
there was a good deal of trade between different
regions.Wool-growing areas,for example, imported
food from food-producing areas. However, it is
harder to know the extent of this internal trade
because it was less formal than intemational trade.
and therefore less recorded.
We know more about intemational trade, which
was recorded because the king obtained a
considerable income from customs dues. During the
Anglo-Saxon period most European trade had been
with the Frisians in the Low Countries, around the
mouth of the River Rhine. Following the Viking
invasions most trade from the ninth century
onwards had taken place with Scandinavia. By the
eleventh century, for example, English grain was
highly valued in Norway. In rerum England
imported Scandinavian flsh and tall timber.
However, by the end of the twelfth century this
Anglo-Scandinavian trade link had weakened.
This was the result of the Norman Conquest, after
which England looked away from the norrheast,,
Scandinavia and Germany, and towards the south,
France, the Low Countries, and beyond. The royal
39

An lllustrated History of Britain

family had links with Gascony in southwest France'

tiri, led to an important trade exchange of wine
".rd
for cloth and cereal. However, easily the most
important link was once again with, the Low
Countries, and the basisof this trade was wool'

their produce and to kings who wished to benefit

from the increase in natonal wealth. As a restrlt,

England had always been famous for its wool' and

in nglo.Saxon times much of it had been
to the Low Countries' in order to improve
""po.*d
the manufacture of woollen cloth, William the
Conqueror encouragedFlemish weavers and other
skilled workers from Normandy to settle in
England. They helped to establishnew towns:
Hull, Boston, Lynn and others. These
.",,l",
were
,"ttl",, ha good connections with Europe and
wool
able to begin a lively trade' However, raw
rather than frnished cloth remained the main
As the European demand for wool stayed
"*porr.
high, a.rd since no other country could match the
hilh quality of English wool, English exporters
.o.,ld.h"tge a price high above the production
t*i." as much as the price in the
cost, and
"bo.rfThe king taxed the export of raw
home market.
wool heavily as a means of increasinghis own
income. It was easily England's most profitable
business.When Richard I was freedfrom his
As a
captivity, over half the price was paid in wool'
sack
wool
a
wealth,
of
,y-bol of E.,gland'ssource
h", ,".ui,,"i', th" House of Lords ever since this
the
time. Much of the wool industrywas built up by
monasteries,which kept large flocks of sheep on

were alreadyestablished.

their greatestates.

The wool trade illustratesthe way in which the

towns related to the countryside' "Chapmen" or
"hucksters",travelling traders,would buy wool at
particularvillage *".k",r. Then they took the wool
,o ,o*.r, where it would be graded and bundled up
in
for export or for local spinning' Larger fairs' both
where
places
important
to*n u.rd country' were
tradersand producersmst, and deals could be
made. These were not purely English affairs' For'
seeking high quality wool frequently
"igr, -"..hunts
attendedthe largerfairs'
Such trade activities could not possiblyhave taken
place under the restrictionsof feudalism' But towns
ie.e 'ual.rablecentresto nobles who wanted to sell
40

therefore gave "charters of freedom" to many

towns, f."eittg the inhabitants from feudal duties to
the local lord. These charters,however, had to be
paid for, and kings sold them for a high price' But
rvo.th the money. Towns could now raise
it
-u,
their own local taxes on goodscoming in' They
could also have their own courts' controlled by the
town merchants' on condition that they paid an
annual tax to the king. Inside the town walls'
people were able to develop social arrd economic
orga.rirutio.rsfree from feudal rule' It was the
beginningsof a middle class and a capitalist
economv.
Within the towns and cities, society and the
economy were mainly controlled by "guilds"'

were brotherhoods of different kinds of merchants'

or of skilled workers.The word "guild" came from
the Saxon word "gildan", to pay, becausememben
paid towardsthe cost of the brotherhood' The
rn"r.h^rrt guilds grew in the thirteenth century and
included all the ffadersin any particular town'
Under these guilds trade was more tghtly
controlled thn at any later period. At least one
hundred guilds existed in the thrteenthcentury'
similar in some ways to our modern trade unions'
The right to form a guild was sometimesincluded
in a town's charter of freedom' lt was from among
the membersof the guild that the town's leaders
were probably chosen. In the courseof time entry
i,,to th"s" guldsbecame increasinglydifficult as
guilds tried to control a particular ffade' In some
was only open to the sons of guild
",",
"..,y
members.in other casesentry could be obtained

6 Govemment and socierv

paying a fee to cover the cost of the training, or

apprenticeship,necessaryto maintain the high
standardof the trade.
During the fourteenth century, as larger towns
continued to grow, "craft" guilds came into being.
-{ll membersof each of theseguilds belonged to the
sametrade or craft. The earliestcraft guilds were
rlroseof the weavers n London and oxford. Each
guild tried to protect its own trade interests.
\{embersof these guilds had the right to produce,
buy or sell their particular trade without having to
pay special town taxes. But membersalso had to
nake sure that goodswere of a certain quality, and
had to keep to agreedprices so as not to undercut
guild members.
--rther
In London the development of craft guilds went
:urtherthan elsewhere,with a rich upper level of
dre craft community, the so-calledlivery
companies,controlling most of the affairsof the
ciry. Over the centuriesthe twelve main livery
c.rmpanieshave developedinto large financial
n;titutions. Today they play an important part in
dre government of the City of London, and the
'rearlychoice of its Lord Mayor.

In England two schools of higher leaming were

established, the first at Oxford and the second at
Cambridge, at the end of the twelfth century. By
the 1220sthese two universitieswere the
intellectual leadersof the country.
Few could go to the universities.Most English
people spoke neither Latin, the languageof the
Church and of education, nor French, the language
of law and of the Norman rulers. It was a long time
before English became the languageof the ruling
class. Some French words becamepart of the
English language, and often kept a more polite
meaning than the old Anglo.Saxon words. For
example, the word "chair", which came from the
French, describesa better piece o furniture than
the Anglo-Saxon word "stool". In the sameway,
the Anglo-Saxon word "belly" was replacedin
polite society by the word "stomach". Other
Anglo-Saxon words ceasedto be used altogether.
Mob Quad in Merun CoIIegeis the ollest of Oxf ad' s f amous
" quadrangbs", or courryards. h wa buik in the fir st half of thef our reenth
cenauy' Almost aLl the oxfard colbges wete built row quandrangles, with
a library on one side (in Mob Qtnd on the first floor on tlw left) , and living
areas fcr both mnstersand sailcnts on the other sides. Mernn College
chapel, in thebackgrouti' is thefilvstlate fowteenth.cenfuyexanplc in
Oicvrd.

language, literature and culture

'l[hegrowth of literacy in England was closely
ci-rnnectedwith the twelfth-century Renaissance, a
oJmral movement which had first startedin ltaly.
ilum
influence moved northwards along the trade
lmutes,reaching England at the end of the century.
l[his revolution in ideas and learning brought a new
.fl*.ireto test religiousfaith againstreason.Schools
. leaming were establishedin many towns and
. Some were "grammar"schools independent
e Church. while others were attached to a
. All of these schools taught Latin,
most books were written in this language.

it may seem strangefor education to be

on a dead language,Latin was important
use it was the educatedlanguageof almost all
, and was therefore useful in the spread of
and leaming. In spite of the dangers,the
h took a lead in the new intellectual

-ement.

41

The late N,fdleAges

The centuryof *u,,T^(ffiZnddisorder

War with Scotlandand France , The ageof chivalry. The centwy of

plagues, The poorin reuok , Heresyand orthodoxy

The fourteenth century was disastrousfor Britain as

*ell as most of Europe, becauseof the effect of wars
rurdplagues.Probably one-thrdof Europe's
gnpulation died of plague. Hardly anywhere
cscaped its effects.
hitain and France suffered, too, from the damages
war. In the 1330sEngland began a long struggle
egainst the French Crown. In France villages were
nided or destroyedby passing armies. France and
&rgland were exhausted economically by the cost of
mintaining armies. England had the additional
hnden of fighting the Scots, and maintaining
I of Ireland and Wales, both of which were
wng to throw off English rule.
h is difficult to measurethe effectso war and
on fourteenth-centuryBritain, except in
But undoubtedly one effect ofboth was an
challenge to authority. The heavy
made by the king on gentry and
nts weakened the economic strength of
and countrysidebut increasedthe political
of the merchants and gentry whenever
provided the king with money. The growth of
alliance between merchants and gentry at this
was of the greatest importance for later
itical developments,particularlyfor the strength
Parliament against the king in the sevenreenth
Twer of London has been a forness, palace and, prison. One of its
st prisontrs ua the Frcrch dul<cof Orbans, who was capaned.at the
of Agircoutt in 1415. He spnt twenty.five yens in English prsolts
lv wa ruuoned. He appears in this picune, seated in the Namwn
ite Towet, guarded b English soldiers- The V/hite Tor.uer iuelf wa buih
vilkcn 1 with stcmebrd'ght fon Nam.andy. Behint the Tower s
Bidge, with houses buik upon it.

century, and also for the strength of society against

the dangersof revolution at the end of the
eighteenthcentury. Finally, the habit of war
created a new class of armed men in the
countryside,in place of the old feudal systemof
forty days'service. These gangs,in reality local
private armies, damagedthe local economy but
increased the nobles' ability to challenge the
authority of the Crown. Already in I3Z? one king
had been murdered by powerful nobles, and another
one was murdered in 1399. These murders
weakened respect for the Crown, and encouraged
repeatedstrugglesfor it amongst the king's most
powerful relations. In the following cenrury a king,
or a king's eldesrson, was killed in 146I, I4?I,
1483 and 1485. But in the end the nobles destroved
themselvesand as a class they disappeared.

War with Scotland and France

England's wish to control Scotland had suffereda
major setbackat Bannockbum in 1314. Many of
the English had been killed, and Edward II himself
had been lucky to escape. After other unsuccessful
attempts England gave up its claim to overlordship
of Scotland in 1328. However, it was not long
before the two countries were at war again, but this
time becauseof England's war with France.
The repeated attempts of English kings to conrrol
Scotland had led the Scots to look for allies. After
Edward I's arremprto take over Scotland in 1295,
the Scots tumed to the obvious ally, the king of
France, for whom there were clear advantagesin an
alliance with Scotland. This "Auld [old]Alliance"

An lllustrated History of Brtain

lasted into the sixteenth century. France benefited

more than Scotland from it, but both countries
agreed that whenever England attacked one of
them, the other would make trouble behind
England's back. The alliance did not operatethe
whole time. There were long periodswhen it was
not neededor used.
England's troubles with France resulted from the
French king's growing authority in France, and his
determinationto control all his nobles, even the
greatestof them. France had sufferedfor centuries
from rebelliousvassals,and the two most
troublesomewere the duke of Burgundy and the
Engltsh king (who was still the king of France's
vassal as duke of Aquitaine), both of whom refused
to recognise the French king's overlordship.
To make his position stronger' the king of France
began to nterferewith England's ade. Part of
Aquitaine, an area called Gascony, traded its fine
wines for Englans com and woollen cloth. This
trde was worth a lot of money to the English
Crown. But in I3Z4 the French king seizedpart of

move to conffol these two areaswas a direct threat

to England's wealth. The king of France tried to
make the duke of Burgundy accept his authority'
To prevent this, England threatened Burgundy with
econom\c co\\apsebl stopp\ng'woo\ exports to
Flanders. This forced the duke of Burgundy to make
an alliance with England againstFrance.
England went to war because it could not afford the
destructionof its trade with Flanders. It was
difficult to persuademerchants to pay for wars
against the Scots or the !7elsh, from which there
was so little wealth to be gained. But the threat to
their trade and wealth persuadedthe rich merchant
classesof England that war against France was
absoluty necessarY. The totds, knights and
fighting men also looked forward to the possibility
of winning riches and lands.
Edward III declaredwar on France in 1337. His
excuse was a\o\d one:\e c\arme\ t\e g\t to t\e

tA

7 The century ofwar, plague and disorder

Inken prisoner. English forces raided as far as

Edinburgh, destroyingand looting. However,
EdwardIII allowed the French to ransom the Scots
king David and, satisfiedwith his successesin
France, Edward gave up trying to conffol the Scots
Crown. For a while there was peace, but the
srrugglebetween the French and English ktngs over
French territoreswas to continue into the fifteenth
.entury.

The age of chivalry

EJward III and his eldestson, the Black Prince,
a'eregreatlyadmired in England for their courage
-r the battlefieldand for their courtly manners.
lhey becamesymbolsof the "code of chivalry", the
nay in which a perfectknight should behave.
l\rring the reign of Edward interest grew in the
iegendaryKing Arthur. Arthur, if he ever existed,
*'asprobably a Celtic ruler who fought the AngloSrxons, but we know nothing more about him. The
legend createdaround Arthur
tri,urteenth-century
rncludedboth the imagined magic and mysteryof
e Celts, and also the knightly values of the court
III.
':Edward
According to the code of chivalry, the peect
b-rght fought for his good name if insulted, served
u-:,..rj
and the kng, and defended any lady in need.
llese ideaswere expressedin the legend of the
F,-undTable, around whlch King Arthur and his
fu:-rghts
sat as equalsin holy brotherhood.
E;r-ard introduced the idea of chivalry into his
,r:,urt.Once, a lady at court accidentally dropped
thcrgarterand Edward III noticed some of his
lJ|lrters
laughing at her. He picked up the garter
,,Honi
;mlJtied it to hsown leg, saying in French,
moriamed
who seeswrong in it." From this strange
pal probablytrue story, the Order of the Garter was
in 1348. Edward chose as membersof the
nr.nded
ler twenty-fourknights, the same number the
ary Arthur had chosen. They met once a
ir on St George'sDay at Windsor Castle, where
-gArthur's Round Table was supposedto have

Edwnd III receiueshis swrrrdand shieldfrom the mythical S r George Ths is

a ropagdnlt picane As patron salnt of England' and of the Gder d the
Garter which Edward III h*s fulnna St George is used in this wa1 to
ccrnfirm E dword' s po sition.

been. The custom is still followed, and Honi Soit

QuiMalY Penseis still the motto of the royal
family.
Chivalry was a usefulway of persuadingmen to
frght by creating the idea that war was a noble and
gloriousthing. War could also, of course,be
profitable.But in fact cruelty, death, destruction
and theft were hereality of war, as they are today.
The Black Prince, who was the living example of
chivalry in England, was fearedin France for his
cruelty.
45

An Illustrated History of Britain

lltr

r :!l.

!i!.

tv*

n sllr

!l !*

* E*

* r 4

iLf,

The century of plagues

The year 1348 brought an event offar greater
importancethan the creation of a new order of
chivalry. This was the terrible plague,known as the
Black Death, which reached almost every part of
Britain during 1348-9. Probably more than one'
third of the entire population of Britain died, and
fewer than one person in ten who caught the
plague managedto survive it. Whole villages
disappeared,and some towns were almost
cornpletelydeserteduntil the plague itself died out.
46

The Black Death was neither the first natural

disasterof the fourteenthcentury, nor the last.
Plagueshad killed sheep and other animals earlier
in the century. An agriculturalcrisis resultedfrom
the growth in population and the need to produce
more food. Land was no longer allowed to rest one
year in three, which meant that it was over.used,
resulting in years of famine when the harvest failed
This processhad alreadybegun to slow down
population growth by 1300.

7 The

'--.r rhe Black Death therewere other plagues

: --rngrhe rest of the century which killed mostly
:-=','cungand healthy. In 1300 the populationof
:r,:.ln had probablybeen over four million' By the
:r: .-rfthe century it was probablyhardly half that
:l.-le, and t only began to grow again in the
,:: - nd half of the frfteenthcentury. Even so, it
- , k until the seventeenthcenturybeforethe
: rulation reachedfour million again.
-:-e dramatic fall in population, however, was not
::.'irelY a bad thng. At the end of the thirteenth
:;:,:urythe sharp rise in prices had led an
number of landlords to stop paying
:--;reasing
,,. rkersfor their labour, and to go back to ser
::our in orderto avoid losses.In retum villagers
xre
given land to farm, but this tenanted land was
...,1h" poorestland of the manorial estate' After
::e Black Death there were so few people to work
l the land that the remaining workerscould ask
: r more money for their labour. We know they did
,:,rsbecausethe king and Parliament tried again
.rd again to control wage increases.\7e also know
::om theserepeatedeffortsthat they cannot have
]enSuccessful.The poor found that they could
iemand more monev and did so. This finally led to
:he end of serfdom.

-. v Bkttk Death kilkd between a

'"ilf atd one-third of the
.-,:pull'tion of Bnin.

cenrur.

:[ h

: -i::xp lu dlm ]nr-]]ll||]l|1l

Becauseof the shortageand expenseof latl'u:'

landlordsreturnedto the twelfth.centurypactlc- :r
letting out their land to energeticfleeman farmers
who bit by bit addedto their own land. ln the
twelfth century, however, the practceof letting
out farmshad been a way of increasingthe
landlord'sproits.Now it became a way of avoiding
losses.Many "firma" agreementswere for a whole
life span, and some for severallife spans' By the
mid-fifteenthcentury few landlordshad home farms
at all. These smaller farmerswho rented the
manorallands slowly became a new class, known
as the "yeomen". They became an important part
of the agriculturaleconomy' and have always
remanedso.
Overall, agriculturalland production shrank, but
those who survived the disastersof the fourteenth
century enjoyed a greatershareof the agricultural
economy. Even for peasantslife became more
comortable.For the first time they had enough
money to build more solid houses,n stone where it
was available, in place of huts made of wood, mud
and thatch.
There had been other economic changesduring the
fourteenthcentury. The most important of these
was the replacementof wool by finished cloth as

An Illustrated Historv of Britain

England's man export. This change was the natural

,er,.rltof the very high prices at which English wool
was sold in Flanders by the end of the thirteenth
century. Merchants decided they could increase
their profits further by buying wool i England at
half the price for which it was sold in Flanders, and
produce finished cloth for export. This process
iuddenly grew very rapidly after the Flemish cloth
industry itself collapsed during the years 1320 to
1360. Hundreds of skilled Flemings came to
England in search of work. They were encouraged
to do so by Edward III because there was a clear
benefit to England in exporting a finished product
rather than a raw material. The surname"Fleming"
has been a common one n England ever Since,
particularly in East Anglia, where many Flemings
settled.
At the beginning of the century England had
exported3O,OOOsacksof raw wool but only 8,000
lengths of cloth achyear. By the middle of the
century it exportedonly 8,000 sacksof wool but
5O,OOOleirgthsof cloth, and by the end of the
century this increasedto well over 100,000' The
wool export towns declined. They were replacedby
towns and villages with fast'flowingrivers usefulfor
the new processof cleaning and treatingwool'
Much of the clothmakingprocess'likq spinning,
was done in the workers'own homes. Indeed, so
many young women spun wool that "spinster"
became and has remained the word for an
unmarriedwoman.
The West Country, Wales, and Yorkshire in the
north all did well from the change in clothmaking'
But London remainedmuch larger and richer' By
the late fourteenthcentury its 50,000 inhabitants
were Supportedby trde with the outside world,
especiallythe Baltic, Mediterraneanand North Sea
ports. Its nearesttrade rival was Bristol.

The poor in revolt

It is surprisingthat the English never rebelled
againstEdward III. He was an expensiveking at a
dme when many people were miserablypoor and
sick with plagues.At the time of the Black Death
he was busy with expensivewars againstFrance
Scotland. The demandshe made on merchantsa
peasantswere enormous,but Edward III handled
thesepeople with skill.
Edward'sgrandson,Richard, was lessfortunate'
becameking on his grandfather'sdeath n 1377
becausehis father, the Black Prince, had died a
months earlier. Richard II inherited the problems
discontent but had neither the diplomatic skill of
his grandfather,nor the popularity of his father'
Added to this he became kng when he was only
eleven, and so others governedfor him. ln the
he became king, these advisersintroduceda tax
payment for every person over the age of fifteen'
Two yearslater, this tax was enforcedagain' The
people paid.
But in 1381 this tax was enforcedfor a third time
and also increasedto three times the prevous
amount. There was an immediate revolt n East
Anglia and in Kent, two of the richer partsof the
country. The poorer parts of the country, the
and northwest, did not rebel. Ths suggeststhat i
the richer areasordinary people had become more
aware and confident of their rights and their
The new tax had led to revolt, but there were
other reasonsfor discontent. The landlordshad
been trying for some time to force the peasants
into serrdom, because se labour was cheaper t

paid labour. The leader of the revolt, Wat Tyler,

*as the first to call for fair treatmentof England's
poor people:"'We are men formed in Christ's
likeness," he claimed, "and we are kept like
animals." The people sang a revolutionaryrhyme
suggestingthat when God createdman he had
made one man masterover another:
lVhen Adam delved, and Eve sPan,
'Who
was then the gentleman?
The idea that God had createdall people equal
called for an end to feudalismand respectfor

48

7 The century ofwar, plague and disorde

honest labour. But the Peasants'Revolt, as t was

called, onlyilastedfor four *""kr.t During that
period the peasantstook control of much of
London. In fact the revolt was not only by peasants
from the countryside:a number of poorer
townspeoplealso revolted, suggestingthat the
discontent went beyond the question of feudal
service.When Wat Tyler was killed, Richard II
skilfully quietened the angry crowd. He promsedto
meet all the people'sdemands,including an end to
serfdom, and the people peacefully went home.
As soon as they had gone, Richard's position
changed. Although he did not try to enforce the
tax, he refusedto keep his promise to give the
p a sants their other demands.,.Serfsyou are,'' he
said, "and serfsyou shall remaih." His officers
hunted down,other leading rebelsand hanged
Erem. But the danger of revolt by the angry poor
was a warning to the king, the nobles and to the
wealthy of the city of London.

Heresy and orthodoxy

The Peasants'Revolt was the first sign of growing
discontentwith the state. During the next century
-discontent with the Church also grew. There had
already been a few attacks on Church property in
towns controlled by the Church. In 1381 one rebel
priesthad called for the removal of all bishops and
archbishops,as well as all the nobles.
The greedof the Church was one obvious reason
tbr its unpopularity.The Church was a feudal
F\ower,and often treated its peasantsand
uownspeoplewith as much cruelty as the nobles did.
There was another reasonwhy the people of
Englanddisliked paying taxes to the pope. Edward's
nzrs in France were beginning to make the English
consciousof their "Englishness"and the pope was a
ilfureigner.To make matters worse the pope had
h'eendriven out of Rome, and was living in
vignon in France. It seemedobvious to the
English that the pope musr be on the French side,
mrdthat the axesthey paid to the Church were
asruallyhelping France againstEngland. This was a
matteron which the king and people in England
,nseed.The king reducedthe amount of tax money

the pope could raise in Britain, and made sure that

most of it found iswav into his own treasury
instead.
One might have expected the bishops and clergy to
opposethe king. They did not, becausealmost all
of them were English and came from noble fmilies,
and so sharedthe political views of the nobility.
Most of them had been appointed by the king and
some of them also acted as his officers. When the
peasantsstormedLondon in 1381 they executedthe
Archbishop of Canterbury, who was also the king's
chancellor. It was unlikely that his killers saw much
difference between the rwo offices. Archbishop or
chancellor, he was part of an oppressive
establishment.
Another threat to the Church during the
fourteenth century was the spread of religious
writings, which were popular with an increasingly
literate population. These books were for use in
private prayer and dealt with the death of Jesus
Christ, the lives of the Saints and the Virgin Mary.
The increasein private prayerwas a direct threat to
the authority of the Church over the religious life
of the population. This was becausethesewritings
allowed people to pray and think independently of
Church control. Private religiousexperienceand
the increaseof knowledge encouragedpeople to
challenge the Church's authority, and the way it
used this to advance its political influence.
Most people were happy to accept the continued
authority of the Church, but some were not. At the
end of the fourteenth century new religious ideas
appeared in England which were dangerous ro
Church authority, and were condemned as heresy.
This heresywas known as "Lollardy", a word which
probablycame from a Latin word meaning "to say
prayers".One of the leadersof Lollardy was John
!ycliffe, an oxford professor.He believed that
everyone should be able to read the Bible in English, and to be guided by it in order to save their
soul. He thereforetranslatedit from Latin, frnishing
the work in 1396. He was not allowed to publish
his new Bible in England, and was forced ro leave
Oxford. However, both he and the other Lollards
were admired by those nobles and scholarswho
49

An IllustratedHistory of Brtain

}]
'!!

! i J 1

*T*s ,.

hefeared
s^uh|"Y:^\1,haps
eneduhcn thelttdMa.1m In?"kiLbdWat T1ler
Thp,Peaants, Reuolt
nme,nLking
a secon.d
canbe seen
aLkw.,RichrndII
;;
thatTier wouldkillxinsni,h-d',,Z;,i;;,
..Sirs,tlill
";:i";;;;;;*-"Gf;.j
1oushootyw ,king?I an 1on
;J - ing themw,th thew-''
officirsto a"restandexecuethcbalprs
ienthx'
,r
;;;;',
,"]'4"'ii'riin:";
In
Ieader.f ollounrc." fact*

poor
were critical of the Church' its wealth and the
qualiry of its clergY.
king' the
If the Lollards had been supportedby the
E.rgi"h Ch"rch might have become independent
But
f';.;h" papacy in1he early ifteenthcentury.
Richard's successor'Henry IV, was not
Cturch'
sympathetic.He was deeply loyal to the
the first
for
England
into
1401 introduced
"nd'i.,the idea of executing the Lollards by burning'
time
resist' ln
i"ii"tat was not well enough organisedto
and
the next few yearsit was drvenunderground,
its spirit was not seenagainfor a century'
50

The crisis of kings and nobles

The crisisof kingship, Wales in reuok . The strugg;Ie

in France . The
Wars of theRoses. Scotland

The crisis of kingship

During the fourteenth century, towards the end of
the Middle Ages, there was a continuous srruggle
betweenthe king and his nobles. The first crisis
came in 1327 when Edward II was deposedand
cruelly murdered.His eleven-year-oldson, Edward
III, becameking, and as soon as he could, he
punished those responsible.But the principle that
kings were neither to be killed nor deposedwas
broken.
Towards the end of the fourteenthcenrury Richard
II was the second king to be killed by ambitious
lords. He had made himself exrremelyunpopular by
his choice of advisers.This was alwaysa difficult
matter, becausethe king's advisersbecame
powerful, and those not chosen lost influence and
wealth. Some of Richard's srrongesrcritics had
been the most powerful men in the kingdom.
Richard was young and proud. He quarrelledwith
thesenobles in 1388, and usedhis authority to
humble them. He imprisonedhis uncle, John of
Gaunt, the third son of Edward III, who was rhe
most powerfuland wealthy noble of his time. John
of Gaunt died in prison. Other nobles, including
John of Gaunt's son, Henry duke of Lancaster,did
not forgetor forgive. In 1399, when Rchard II was
busy trying to establishroyal authority again in
Ireland, they rebelled. Henry of Lancaser,who had
let England' returnedand raisedan armY. Richard
was deposed.

ff'rilrd II. Ths is probably the earliest pcrtrait of a souereignpailntedfrom

&.e-:c hacleswutued tn this diJ. This is a copJ of the migttnl in Westminster
it':Tf

Unlike Edward II, however, Richard II had no

children. There were two possiblesuccessors.One
was the earl of March, the seven-year-oldgrandson
of Edward III'ssecond son. The other was Henry o
Lancaster,son of John of Gaunt. It was difflcult to
5l

An Illustrated History. o Britan

say which had the better claim to the throne' But

Henry was stronger.He won the supportof other
powerful nobles and took the crown by force'
Richard died mysteriouslysoon after.
Henry IV spent the rest of his reign establishinghis
royal authority. But although he passedthe crown
to his son peacefully,he had sown the seedsof civil
war. Half a century later the nobility would be
divided between those who supportedhis family,
the "Lancastrians",and those who supportedthe
family of the earl of March, the "Yorkists"'

defeatthe English armiessent againsthim' He

continued to fight a successfulguerrillawar which
made the control of \ales an extremelyexpensive
problem for the English. But after 1410 Glyndwr
iort ul-ort all his supportas Welsh people realised
that however hard they fought they would never be
free of the English. Owain Glyndwr was never
captured.He did for Wales what Willam Wallace
had done for Scotland a century earlier' He created
a feeling of national identitY.

Wales in revolt
Edward I had conqueredWales in the 1280s,and
colonised it. He brought English people to enlarge
small towns. Pembrokeshire,in the far southwest'
even becameknown as "the little England beyond
'Wales". Edward'sofficersdrove many of the Welsh
into the hills, and gave their land to English

France, and taught the English their skill with the

longbow.
A century later the Welsh found a man who was
ready to rebel againstthe English king, and whom
they were willing to follow. Owain Glyndwr was
the first and only Welsh prince to have wide and
popular supportin every part of Wales' In fact it
rv", h" who createdthe idea of a Welsh nation' He
was descendedfrom two royalfamilies which had
ruled in differentparts of Wales beforethe
Normans came.
Owain Glyndwr's rebellion did not start as a
national revolt. At first he joined the revolt of
Norman-Welsh border lords who had alwaystried
to be free of royal control. But after ten yearsof war
Owain Glyndwr's border rebellion had developed
into a national war, and in 1400 he was proclaimed
Prince of Wales by his supporters.This was far
more popular with the Welsh people than Edward
I's trick with his newborn son at Caernarfon in
1284. However, Glyndwr was not strongenough to

Cilgenan Castle, near Cmdigan in soutiwest V/ales, was capuned b1

O.a"
Glynlu, in 1405. lrlthaugh it had been buik two Lnndred yems
earber, it wa clccrly strongand must have been dfficuh to captwe'

3 The crist okines and nobles

The strugglein France

HII1.V.l

rememberei a possiblytlw mor heroic of

English kingsbecause

ui' ii,.iz"u,,",g,,o
on u
!I;"T,!'!:::
i:.F:nc;
Englishking:"y*Lys
hopesof ruling
Fraue
"na

As with Scotland and Wales, England found

it was
the English.,The English gave her to
the Church in
Rouen which burnt her as a witch n
I43I.

inspiredby a mysreriouspeasanrgirl called

Joan of
Arc, who claimed to hear h"au..rlyvoices.
Joan of
Arc was capturedby the Burgundians,and glven
ro

England wa_snow beginning to lose an

exffemely
costly war. In 1435 Englan's best general,
John of
Bedford, died. Then England's n."o.
Burgundian allies lost confidence in the".,j
,r"tu" of th"
English alliance. With the loss of G"r.o.ry
in 1453,
the Hundred years lVar was over. ilgi;;l
had lost
everythingexcepr the port of Calais.

)J

An Illustrated History of Britain

The battle of Agircowt in 1415 was Henry V's most fanous victory against
the Frerch The English army with the rolal standard attacls (left) The
French roy| sttnddrd s to be seenon thegrounl (bottom right) as French
solliers die. Ahhough the English were outnumberedb'1 norc than tllree to
one, Henry,s mchers cstro1ed the Frerch feulal caualr1

54

8 The crisis o kings and nobles

The Wars of the Roses

Henry VI, who had become king as a baby, grew up
to be simple"mindedand book-loving. He hated the
warlike nobles, and was an unsuitableking for
such a violent society. But he was a civilised and
gentle man. He founded two places of learning that
still exist, Eton College not far from London, and
King's College in Cambridge. He could happily
have spent his life in such places of leaming. But
Henry's simple-mindednessgave way to periodsof
mental illness.
England had lost a war and was ruled by a mentally
ill king who was bad at choosing advisers.It was
perhaps natural that the nobles began to ask
questionsabout who should be ruling the country.
They rememberedthat Henry's grandfather Henry
of Lancasterhad taken the throne when Richard II
was deposed.
There were not more than sixty noble families
controlling England at this time. Most of them
were related to each other through marriage.Some
of the nobles were extremelypowerful. Many of
tem continued to keep their own private armies
after returning from the war in France, and used
them to frighten local people into obeying them.
Some of these armieswere large. For example, by
1450 the duke of Buckingham had 2,000 men in
his private army.
The discontentednobility were divided between
rlose who remained loyal to Henry VI, the
'Lancasttians", and those who supported the duke
of York, the "Yorkists". The duke of York was the
heir of the earl of March, who had lost the
competition for the throne when Richard II was
deposedin 1399. In 1460 the duke of York claiined
the throne for himself. After his death in battle, his
.on Edward took up the struggle and won the
rhrone in 146I.
Edward IV put Henry into the Tower of London,
but nine years later a new Lancastrian army rescued
Henry and chased Edward out of the country. Like
rhe Lancastrians,Edward was able to raise another
army. Edward had the advantage of his popularity
with the merchants of London and the southeastof

England. This was becausethe Yorkstshad strongly

encouragedprofitabletrade, particularlywith
Burgundy. Edward rerurnedto England in 1471 and
defeatedthe Lancastrians.At last Edward IV was
safeon the throne. Henry VI died in the Tower of
London soon after, almost certainly murdered.
The war betweenYork and Lancasterwould
probablyhave stoppdthen if Edward'sson had
been old enough to rule, and if Edward'sbrother,
Richard of Gloucester, had not been so ambitious.
But when Edward IV died in 1483, his own two
sons, the twelve-year-oldEdward V and his younger
brother, were put in the Tower by Richard of
Gloucester. Richard took the Crown and became
King Richard III. A month later the tw princes
were murdered.William Shakespeare'splay Richard
III, written a century later, accusesRichard of
murder and almost evervonebelieved it. Richard III
had a better reasonthan most to wish his two
nephewsdead, but his guilt has never been proved.
Richard III was not popular. Lancastriansand
Yorkists both disliked him. In 1485 a challenger
with a very distant claim to royal blood through
John of Gaunt landed in England with Breton
soldiersto claim the throne. Many discontented
lords, both Lancastriansand Yorkists, joined him.
His name was Henry Tudor, duke of Richmond,
and he was half Welsh. He met Richard lll at
Bosworth. Half of Richard's army changedsides,
and the battle quickly ended in his defeat and
death. Henry Tudor was crowned king
immediately, on the battlefield.
The war had finally ended, though this could not
have been clear at the time. Much later. in the
nineteenth century, the novelist Walter Scott
named these wars he..!7arsof the Roses'', because
Yrk's symbol was a white rose, and Lancaster's a
red one.
The Wars of the Roses nearly destroyed the English
idea of kingship for ever. After 1460 there had been
little respect for anything excepr the power to take
the Crown. Tudor historians made much of these
wars and made it seem as if much of England had
been destroyed.This was nor true. Fighting took
place for only a total of fifteen months out of the
))

An lllustrated History of Britain

whole twenty-fiveyear period. Only the nobles and

their armieswere involved.
It is true, however, that the wars were a disasterfor
the nobility. For the first time there had been no
purpose in taking prisoners, because no one was
interested in payment of ransom. Everyone was
interestedin destroyingthe opposingnobility.
Those capturedn battle were usually killed
immediately. By the time of the battle of Bosworth
in 1485, the old nobility had nearly destroyeditself.
Almost half the lords of the sixty noble families had
died in the wars. It was this fact which made it
possiblefor the Tudors to build new nation state.

Scotland
Scotland experiencedmany of the disastersthat
affectedEngland at this time. The Scots did not
escapethe Black Death or the other plagues,and
they also sufferedfrom repeated wars.
..Auld Alliance'' with
Sco.tlandpaid heavily for ts
France. Becauseit supportedFrance during the
Hundred Years \Var, the English repeatedlyinvaded
the Scottish Lowlands, from which most of the
Scots king's wealth came. England renewedits
claim to overlordshipof Scotland, and Edward IV's
army occupied Edinburgh in 1482.'
Like the English kings, the Scottish kings were
involved n long struggleswith their nobles.
Support for France turned attention away from
establishinga strong state at home. And, as in
England, severalktngs died early. JamesI was
murderedin 1437, JamesII died in an accident
beforehe was thirty in 1460, and JamesIII was
murderedin 1488. The early death of so many
Scots kings left government n the hands of
powerfulnobles until the dead king's son was old
enough to rule. Naturally thesenobles took the
chance to make their own position more powerful.
As in England, the nobles kept private armies,
insteadof using serfsfor military serviceas they had
done earlier. This new systemfined well with the
Celtic tribal loyalties of the Highlands. The Gaelic
word for such tribes, "clan", means "children", in
other words membersof one family. But from the
56

fourteenthcentury, a "clan" began to mean groups

of people occupying an area of land and following a
particular chief. Not all the membersof a clan were
related to each other. Some groupsjoined a clan for
protection, or becausethey were forced to choose
betweendoing so or leaving the area. The most
powerful o the Highland clans by the frfteenth
century was Clan Donald. The clan chiefs were
almost completely independent.
By the end of the Middle Ages, however, Scotland
had developedas a nation in a number of ways.
From 1399 the Scots demandedthat a parliament
should meet once a year, and kings often gathered
togetherleading citizens to discussmattersof
government.As in England, towns grew in
importance, mainly becauseof the wool trade
which grew thanks to the help of Flemish settlers.
There was a large export ffade in wool, leather and
fish, mostly to the Netherlands.
Scotland's alliance with France brought some
benefits. At a time when much of the farmland was
repeatedlydestroyedby English armies, many
Scotsmen found work as soldiersfor the French
king. Far more importantly, the connection with
France helped develop education in Scotland.
Following the example of Paris, universitieswere
founded in Scotland at St Andrews in 1412,
Glasgow inI45I and at Aberdeen in1495.
Scotland could rightly claim to be equal with
England in leaming. By the end of the fifteenth
century it was obvious that Scotland was a separate
country from England. Nobody, either in England
or in Scotland, belevedin the Engltsh king's claim
to be overlord of Scotland.

Government and society

Governmentand society' The conditionof women' I-angwgeand
culture

Government and society

The year 1485 has usually been taken to mark the
end of the Middle Ages in England. Of course,
nobody at the time would have seen it as such.
There was no reason to think that the new King
Henry VII would rule over a country any different
from the one ruled over by Richard III. Before
looking at the changes in England under the House
of Tudor it might be worth looking back at some of
the main social developmentsthat had taken place
in the late Middle Ages.

Society was still basedupon rqnk. At the top were

dukes, earls and other lords, although there were far
fewer as a result of war. Below these great lords
were knights. Most knights, even by Edward I's
time, were no longer heavily armed fighterson
horses.They were "gentlemenfarmers"or "landed
gentry" who had increasedthe size of their
landholdings,and improved their farming methods.
This class had grown in numbers. Edward I had
orderedthat all those with an income of L20 a year
must be made knights. This meant that even some

sirGeoffreyLuttrellwithhisfami\anl,reninersatdinner Foodwaseatenwithc)utforls,atasimpb
wble.Houeuer,JoungmeflinParticularhadtorcnembetheirmanners,,Don'tsitdaunuatilyou
are told to and l<eepyow hands and,feet still," thel were told. "Cut yow bread with yur knife and do
nat teait. Dul' t ban on the tabb and nwl<'ea messon the cloth or drink with a full mouth. Don,t
akc. so mrc.h in 1ow mouth thatyou cannot onswer wlvn someone speals rc you " Seueral people
,,pe
pw mouth and hands clean th a cbth, so
shnred the sane cup, so a final piece of duice wo.s
that pu do rct dirt1 the cup and na}<eyout fens unwilling to drllnk th pu ''

An IllustratedHistory of Britan

of the yeoman farmers became part of the "landed

gentry", while many "esquires", who had served
knights in earlier times, now became knights
themselves. The word "esquire" became common in
written addresses,and is only now slowly beginning
to be used less.
Next to the gentlemen were the ordinary freemen
of the towns. By the end of the Middle Ages, it was
possible for a serf from the countryside to work for
seven years in a town craft guild, and to become a
"freeman" of the town where he lived. The freemen
controlled the life of a town. Towns offered to poor
men the chance to become rich and successful
through trade. The most famous example of this
was Dick Whittington. The story tells how he
arrived in London as a poor boy from the
58

countryside, and became a successful merchant and

Lord Mayor o London three times. Whittington
was, actually, the son of a knight. He was probablt'
an example of the growing practice of the landed
families of sending younger sons to town to Joln a
merchant or craft guild. At the same time, many
successful merchant families were doing the
opposite thng, and obtaining farmland in the
countryside. These two classes, the landed gentry
and the town merchants, were beginning to
overlap.
In the beginning the guilds had been formed to
protect the production or trade of a whole town.
Later, they had come to protect those already
enjoying membership, or who could afford to buy
it, from the poorer classes in the same town. As

9 Govemment

and society

A bading ctizenof Bristol is

made mapr, 1479 The
dppointnent of the rnaycn and
aldertwn of a citl wa usually
controlled b1 seninr nlembers of a
citl's merchant ud craft pilds

r' =" Cid not have the money or family connections

:.come membersof the guilds, the poorer skilled
r rr.erstried to join togetherto protect their own
:r .:ests.These were the first effortsto form a trade
': .:.. Several times n the fourteenthcentury
li' =l workerstried unsuccessfullyto protect
:r:-=:elves
againstthe powerof the guilds.The
l
skilled
workerswere hard, but they did not
'.
luj.:]fS much as the unskilled, who lived n poor
nr'- ::rty conditions. However, even the condition
poorest workers in both town and country
.rter than it had been a century earlier.

In fact, the guilds were declinngin importance

becauseof a new force in the national economy.
During the fourteenthcentury a number of English
merchantsestablishedtrading stations,"factories",
in differentplaces in Europe. The merchant
organisationsnecessaryto operatethesefactores
became important at a national level, and began to
replacethe old town guilds as the most powerful
trading institutions. However, they copied the aims
and methods of the guilds, making sure English
merchantscould only export through their
factories,and makngsure that prcesand quality
were maintained.
59

r
An IllustratedHistory of Brtain

All women, from the highest,os

in this Pica.tre,to the loru,estin
the land uere exPected to knut
hortuto peve, spin and weave
wool. From Saxon times onwm&
English wa ntn were fanous fu
their emhodery skjlk Vmlen
were eected n spend'theit alv
in embroidery or in naking
gdmentsTEhtup ta the et.tdof
thc nineteenth centwl.

One of the most important of thesefactorieswas

the "Company of the Staple" in Calais. The
"staple" was an intemational term used by
merchantsand govemmentsmeaning that certain
goodscould only be sold in particular places' Calais
became the "staple" for all English wool at the end
of the fourteenth century when it defeatedrival
English factoriesin other foreign cities. The staple
was an arrangementwhich suited the established
merchants,as it preventedcompetition, and it also
suited the Crown, which could tax exportsmore
easily. The other important company was called the
"Merchant Adventurers". During the fourteenth
century there had been severalMerchant
0

Adventurers' factories in a number of foreign

towns. But all of them, except for the Merchant
Adventurers in Antwerp, Flanders, closed during
the fifteenth century. The Antwerp Merchant
Adventurers' factory survivedbecauseof its sole
control of cloth exports' a fact recognisedby royal
charter.
Wages for farmworkers and for skilled townspeople
rose faster than the price of goods in the flfteenth
century. There was plenty of meat and cereal
were low. But there were waming signs of proble
ahead. More and more good land was being used
sheep insteadof food crops. Rich and powerful
sheep farmers started to fence in land which had

9 Govemment and society

alwaysbeen used by other villagers. In the

sixteenth century this led to social and economic
crisis.
Meanwhile, in the towns, a new middle class was
developing. By the fifteenth century most
merchantswere well educated,and considered
themselves to be the equals of the esquires and
gentlemen of the countryside. The lawyers were
another classof city people. In London they were
consderedequal in importance to the big
merchants and cloth manufacturers. When law
schools were first established,student lawyerslived
in inns on the westem side of the Cty of London
while they studied. Slowly these inns becamepart
of the law schools, just as the student
accommodation halls of Oxford and Cambridge
eventually became the colleges of these two
universities.
By the end of the Middle Ages the more successful
of these lawyers, merchants, cloth manufacturers,
exporters, esquires, gentlemen and yeoman farmers
were increasingly forming a single class of people
with interests in both town and country. This was
also true in Wales and Scotland. A number of
Welsh landowners came to England; some studied
at Oxford, and some traded, or practised law in
[.ondon. Fewer Scots came to England, because
they had ther own universities, and their own
trade centres of Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen.
The growth of this new middle class, educated and
skilled in law, administrationand trade, createda
new atmosphere in Britain. This was patly because
of the increase in literacy. Indeed, the middle class
could be describedas the "literate class". This
lirerate class questioned the way in which the
Church and the state were organised, for both
religious and practical reasons. On the religious side
mlpportfor Wycliffe came mainly from members of
risnew middle class, who believed it was their
right to read the Bible in the English language.
They disliked serfdom partly because it was now
increasingly viewed as unchristianl but also for the
fractical reasonthat it was not economic. The
middle class also questioned the value of the feudal
because it did not create wealth.

The developmentof Parliament at this time showed

the beginningsof a new relationship betweenthe
middle class and the king. Edward I had invited
knights from the country and merchants from the
towns to his parlamentbecausehe wanted money
and they, more than any other group, could provide
it. But when Edward III asked for money from his
parliament, they asked to see the royal accounts. It
was an important development becausefor the first
time the king allowed himself to be "accountable"
to Parliament. Merchants and country gentlemen
were very anxious to influence the king's policies
both at home and abroad. They wanted to protect
their interests. When France threatened the wool
trade with Flanders, for example, they supported
Edward III in his war.
During the time of Edward III's reign Parliament
became organised in two parts: the Lords, and the
Commons, which representedthe middle class.
Only those commoners with an income of forty
shillings or more a year could qualify to be members
of Parliament. This meant that the poor had no
way of being heard except by rebellion. The poor
had no voice of their own in Parliament until the
middle of the nineteenth century.
The alliance between esquiresand merchants made
Parliament more powerful, and separatedthe
Commons more and more from the Lords. Many
European countries had the same kind of
parliamentsat this time, but in most casesthese
disappearedwhen feudalismdied out. In England,
however, the death of feudalism helped strengthen
the House of Commons in Parliament.
There was another important change that had
taken place in the country. Kings had been taking
law cases away from local lords' courts since the
twelfth century, and by the middle of the
fourteenth century the courts of local lords no
longer existe But the king's courts could not deal
with all the work. In 1363 Edward III appointed
"justicesof the peace" to deal with smaller crimes
and offences, and to hold court four times a year.
These JPs, as they became known, were usually less
important lords or members of the landed gentry.
They were, and still are, chosen for their faimess

An IllustratedHistory of Brtain

and honesty. The appointment of landed gentry as

JPs made the middle classes,that class of people
who were neither nobles nor peasants,still
stronger.Through the systemof JPs the landed
gentry took the place of the nobility as the local
authority. During the \7ars of the Roses'the nobles
used their private armies to force JPs and judgesto
do what they wanted. But this was the last time the
nobility in Britain tried to destroythe authortyof
the king. The JPs remained the only form of local
governmentin the countrysideuntil 1888. They
still exist to deal with small offences.

The condition of women

Little is known about the life of women in the
Middle Ages, but without doubt it was hard. The
Church taught that women should obey their
husbands.It also spreadtwo very different ideas
about women: that they should be pure and holy
like the Virgin Mary; and that, like Eve, they could
not be trusedand were a moral danger to men.
Such religiousteaching led men both to worship
and also to look down on women, and led women
to give in to men's authority.
Maniage was usually the single most important
event in the lives of men and women. But the
decision itself was made by the family, not the
couple themselves.This was becauseby marriagea
family could improve its wealth and social position.
Everyone, both rich and poor, marriedfor mainly
financial reasons.Once married, a woman had to
accept her husband as her master.A disobedient
wife was usuallv beaten. It is unlikelv that love
played much of a part in most marriages.
The first duty of every wife was to gveher husband
children, preferablysons. Becauseso many children
died as babies, and becausethere was litle that
could be done if a birth went wrong, producing
children was dangerousand exhausting.Yet this
was the future for every wife from rwenty or
younger until she was forty.
he wife of a noble had other responsibilities.
When her lord was away, she was in charge of the
manor and the village lands, all the servantsand
62

Vorrcn defending their castle Tfuoughout tlv Middb Ages, if a castb cn

malw wrrsattad<cduhile its ktd uas aua^1,it was the duty d hts fe, tfu
" chaulairc" (or " castlekeeper"), to defend it A lady had to know
euerythingabout adnntsterngha brd,s nanm andlands, frrr shewa
responsiblcwhen he was awal One ladl who did not completely trust her
Imd's abiLty to manoge uhile she urrs dwa), wote to him, "Keep aJI well
about 1ou till I corne honle, and treat not [dn r.r:,tenter into business
anangenentsl without me, and then all things shallbe weII "

villagers, the harvest and the animals. She also had

to defend rhe manor if it was attacked. She had to
run the household, welcome visitors, and store
enough food, including saltedmeat, for winter. She
was expectedto have enough knowledge of herbs
and plants to make suitable medicinesfor those in
the village who were ick. She probably visited the
poor and the sick in the village, showing that the

9 Govemment

and society

Bay l-eaf Fmm, a ffteenth-centttrl Kent fanthause, a timber-frune buiWing

,,uottb
and daub,,, basica)I1 stcls and mu' This was a
with walk mae of
uery effectiue tlpe of building, bat required skilled carpenters n mak a
strongfratne. One man uho did rct likc this rcw method called thesehouses
,,paper
work,, . But exampbs are stlllived in as mdhar)
Littlpmare than
hones in maLJpatsof Englanl

::lers "cared" for them. She had little time for her
-,.\'nchildren, who in any case were often sent away
i: rhe age of eight to another manor' the boys to
."re
made into men".
l"lostwomen, of course,were peasants,busy
=.akingfood, making cloth and makngclothes
:-rm the cloth. They worked in the fields, looked
i:-er the children, the geese,the pigs and the
;,l,eep,made the cheeseand grew the vegetables.
lie animals probably shared the family shelter at
:-ght. The family home was dark and smelly.

A woman's position improved if her husband died.

She could get conffol of the money her family had
given the husband at the time of marriage,usually
about one-third of his total land and wealth. But
she might have to marry again:men wanted her
land, and it was difficult to look after it without the
help of a man.

63

rAn lllustrated History of Britain

Languageand culture
With the spread of literacy, cultural life in Britain
naturally developedalso. In the cities, plays were
performedat important religiousfestivals.They
were called "mystery plays" becauseof the
mysteriousnature of events in the Bible, and they
were a popular form of culture. In the larger cities
some guilds made themselves responsible for
particular plays, which became traditional yearly
events.
The language itself was changng. French had been
used less and less by the Norman rulers during the
thirteenth century. In rhe fourteenth century
Edward III had actually forbidden the speaking of
French in his army. It was a way of making the
whole aTnyaware of its Englishness.
After the Norman Conquest English (the old
Anglo-Saxon lanpuage) continued to be spoken by
ordinary people but was no longer written. By the
end of the fourteenth century, however, English
was once again a written language,becauseit was
being used instead of French by the ruling, literate
class. But "Middle English", the languageof the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, was very
different from Anglo-Saxon. This was partly
because it had not been written for three hundred
years, and partly because it had borrowed so much
from Norman French.
Two writers, above all others, helped in the rebirth
of English literature.One was William Langland, a
mid-fourteenth century priest, whose poem Piers
Plowmangives a powerfuldescriptionof the times
in which he lived. The other, Geoffrey Chaucer,
has become much more famous. He lived at about
the same time as Langland. His most famouswork
was The Canterbury Tales, written at the end of the
fourteenth century.
The Canterbury Tales describe a group of pilgrims
travelling from London to the tomb of Thomas
Becket at Canterbury, a common religious.act in
England in the Middle Ages. During the joumey
each charactertells a story. Collections of stories
were popular at this time becausealmost all
literature,unlike today, was written to be read out
64

aloud. The storiesthemselvesare not Chaucer's

own. He used old stories,but rewrotethem in an
interestingand amusingway. The first chapter, in
which he describeshis characters, is the result of
Chaucer's own deep understanding of human
nature. It remains astonishingly fresh even after six
hundred years.It is a unique descriptionof a
nation: young and old, knight and peasant,priest
and merchant, good and bad, townsman and
countryman. Here is part of Chaucer's description
(in a modemised version) of the knight, and his
son, the squire:

There was a knight,a most distinguishedman,

Who from the day on which he first began
To ride abroadhad followed chivalry,
Truth, honour, generousnessand courtesy . . .
He had his son with him, a fine young squire,
A lover and cadet, a lad offlre
With locks as curly as if they had been pressed.
He was some twenty yearsof age, I guessed. . .
He was embroidered like a meadow bright
And full of freshestflowers,red and white.
Singing he was, or fluting all the day;
He was as fresh as is the month of May.
Short was his gown, the sleeveswere long and
wide;
He knew the way to sit a horse and rde.
He could make songsand poems and recite,
Knew how to joust and dance, to draw and writc
He loved so hotly that till dawn grew pale
He slept as little as a nightingale.

9 Govemment and society

newly educated people of the fifteenth century, and

encouragedliteracy. Caxton avoided printing any
dangerousliterature. But the children and
grandchildrenof these literate people were to use
printing as a powerful weapon to change the world
in which they lived.

The chapel of King's CoIIege, Catbridge, with its fan.uaulted rcof and large
areas of glassand drkcare stonework, nrmls the highest point of Corhic
architecune in Englanl. The uauk was compbred at the beginningof the
sixteenth centuJ, and thB wooden ogdnsceenacossthe centre of the chapel
is of Tudor design

65

The Tuors
The birth of the nation state
The new monarchy' The Reformation' The Protestant-Catholic
struggle

The centuryof Tudor rule (1485_103) is often

:houghtof as a most gloriousperiod in English
:ristory.Henry VII built the foundationsof a
o'ealthynation state and a powerfulmonarchy. His
=on,Henry VIII, kept a magnificentcourt, and
nade the Church in England truly English oy
:reaking awayfrom the Roman Catholic Church.
linally, hs daughterElizabeth brought glory to the
:]ewStateby defeatingthe poweul navy of Spain,
:he greatestEuropeanpower of the time. During
:he Tudor age England experiencedone of the
artistic periods in its history.
r-reatest
There is, however, a lessglorious view of the Tudor
-ntury.Henry VIII wastedthe wealth saved by his
:ither. Elizabeth weakenedthe quality of
.Jvernment by selling offlcial posts. She did thls to
=r'oidasking Parliament for money. And although
:.ergovernmenttried to deal with the problem of
:oor and homelesspeople at a time when prices
:.-,se
much fasterthan wages,its laws and actions
'.ere often cruel in efect.

The new monarchy

lienry VII is lesswell known than either Henry
',
III or Elizabeth I. But he was far more important
::.establishingthe new monarchy than either of
:::, The dcfeat of the Spanish Affivila in 1588 wa the most gkrriousevent
:Uzabeth I's reign k nnkcd the artiual. of England as d gredt
"
: ..opeaLset powe, Ieadingthe way to the deuelapmentof the empire ouer
|l,. next two cent|4ies,
It a]so morl<pdthe limit of Span's ability to ecapule
i':zstant cowttries fcr the Catholic Church.
'T :ht: Henry VII was cleuer uith peopb and careful wth morcy He holds
: -'-j Lancastrian rose in his hont, but he brought unity to the Houses of
, :.:<and.I'atuastgr Hs strccessorsqmbol)sedthis unity b1 use of aredrose
t :-.u,hiteouter Detek, the "Tudor" rose

them. He had the same ideasand opinonsas the

growing classesof merchantsand gentleman
farmers,and he basedroyal power on good business
sense.
Henry VII flrmly believed that war and glory were
bad for business,and that businesswas good for the
state. He thereforeavodedquarrelseither with
Scotland in the north. or France in the south.

An Illustrated History of Britain

During the fifteenth century, but particularly during

the Wars of the Roses, England's trading position
had been badly damaged.The strongGerman
Hanseatic League,a closed trading society, had
destroyedEnglish trade with the Baltic and
northem Europe. Trade with Italy and France had
also been reduced after England's defeat in France
in the mid-fifteenth century. The Low Countries
(the Netherlands and Belgium) alone offereda way
in for trade in Europe. Only a year after his victory
at Bosworth in 1485, Henry VII made an important
trade agreementwith the Netherlands which
allowed English trade to grow again.
Henry was fortunate. Many of the old noblity had
died or been defeatedin the recent wars, and ther

lands had gone to the king. Ths meant that Henry

had more power and more money than earlier
kings. In order to establishhis authority beyond
question, he forbadeanyone, except himself, to
keep armed men.
The authority of the law had been almost
completely destroyedby the lawlessbehaviour of
nobles and their armed men. Henry used the
"Court of Star Chamber", traditionally the king's
council chamber, to deal with lawlessnobles. Local
justice that had broken down during the wars slowlr
began to operateagain. Henry encouragedthe use
of heavy fines as punishment becausethis gave.the
Crown money.
Henry's aim was to make the Crown financially
independent, and the lands and the fines he took
from rhe old nobility helped him do this. Henry
also raised taxes for wars which he then did not
fight. He never spent money unlesshe had to. One
might expect Henry to have been unpopular, but
he was careful to keep the friendship of the
merchant and lessergentry classes.Lke him they
wanted peace and prosperty.He created a new
nobility from among them, d men unknown
beforenow became Henry's statesmen.But they all
knew that their rise to importancewas completely
dependenton the Crown.
When Henrv died in 1509 he left behind the huge
total of 2 million, about frfteen years' worth of
income. Tbg q"ly thing on which he was lappy to
spend money freely was the building of ships for a
merchnt fleet. Henry understood earlier than most
pept'tht England's future wealth would depend
on intemational trade. And in order to trade,
Henry realised that England must have its own fleet
of merchant ships.

Herq VIil, b1 v great co1ltpaintel Hans Hohein' Hen:ry wa hard,

cnttl, anbiaous and cabu)ating. Few swuivedhis anger. He executed two ot
his uiues, Anne Bobyn and Cahqine Howard, and seuerd of his ministers
and lealing chrnchmen. Best ktnwn omorg thesewere his Isrd Chatrcellot,
Tha nas Mryre, and his asskant in carr1ngout the Refctmation, Thorros
Crornwell

Henry VIII was quite unlike his father. He was

cruel, wastefulwith money, and interestedin
pleasinghimself. He wanted to become an
important influence in European politics. But much
had happened in Europe since England had given
up its efforts to defeat France in the Hundred Years
War. France was now more powerful than Englan
and Spain was even more poweul, becauseit was
united with the Holy Roman Empire (whlch

l0 The birth o the nation state

included much of central Europe). Henry VIII

wanted England to hold the balance of power
between these two giants. He first unsuccessfully
allied himself with Spain, and when he was not
rewardedhe changedsides. When friendshipwith
France did not bring him anything, Henry started
talking again to Charles V of Spain.
Henry's failure to gain an important position in
Europeanpolitics was a bitter disappointment.He
spent so much on maintaining a magnificent court,
and on wars from which England had little to gain,
rhat his father's carefully saved money was soon
gone. Gold and silver from newly discovered
America added to economic inflation. In this
seriousfinancial crisis, Henry needed money. One
way of doing this was by reducing the amount of
silver used in coins. But although this gave Henry
immediateprofits, it rapidly led to a rise in prices.
It was therefore a damaging policy, and the English
coinagewas reducedto a seventh of its value within
rwenty-frveyears.

The Reforrnation
Henry VIII was always looking for new sourcesof
money. His father had become poweul by taking
over the nobles' land, but the lands owned by the
Church and the monasterieshad not been touched.
The Church was a huge landowner, and the
monasterieswere no longer important to economic
and social growth in the way they had been rwo
hundred years earlier. In fact they were unpopular
becausemany monks no longer led a good religious
life but lived in wealth and comfort.
Henry disliked the power of the Church in England
because,since it was an international organisaton,
he could not completely control it. If Henry had
been poweul enough in Europe to influence the
pope it might have been different. But there were
rwo far more powerful states,France, and Spain,
with the Holy Roman Empire, lying between him
and Rome. The power of the Catholic Church in
England could therefore work against his own
authority, and the taxes paid to the Church

reduced his own income. Henry was not the only

European king with a wish to "centralise" state
authority. Many others were doing the same thing.
But Henry had another reason for standing up to
the authority of the Church.
In 1510 Henry had manied Catherine of Aragon,
the widow of his elder brother Arthur. But by 1526
she had still not had a son who survived infancy
and was now unlikely to do so. Henry tried to
persuadethe pope to allow him to divorce
Catherine. Normally, Henry need not have
expected any difficulty. His chief minister, Cardinal
Wolsey, had already been skilful in advising on
Henry's foreign and home policy. Wolsey hoped
that his skills, and hi important position in the
Church, would be successfulin persuading the
pope. But the pope was controlled by Charles V,
who was Holy Roman Emperor and king of Spain,
and also Catherine's nephew. For both political and
family reasonshe wanted Henry to stay married to
Catherine. The pope did not wish to anger either
Charles or Henry; but eventually he was forced to
do as Charles V wanted. He forbade Henry's
divorce.
Henry was extremely angry and the first person to
feel his angerwas his own minister, Cardinal
Wolsey. Wolsey only escapedexecution by dying of
natural causeson his way to the king's court, and
after Wolsey no priest ever again became an
important minister of the king. In 1531 Henry
persuadedthe bishops to make him head of the
Church in England,'and this became law after
Parliament passedthe Act of Supremacyin 1534. It
was a popular decisin. Henry was now free to
divorce Catherine and arry his new love, Anne
Boleyn. He hoped Anne would give him a son to
follow him on the throne.
Henry's break with Rome was purely political. He
had simply wanted to control the Church and to
keep its wealth in his own kingdom. He did not
approve of the new ideas of Reformation
Protestantism introduced by Martin Luther in
Germany and John Calvin in Geneva. He still
believed in the Catholic faith. Indeed, Henry had
earlier written a book criticising Luther's teaching
69

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

and the pope had rewardedhim with the title Fidel

Defensor,Defender of the Faith. The pope must
have regrettedhis action. The letters"F.D." are
still to be found on everyBrtishcoin.
Like his father, Henry VIII govemed England
through his close advisers,men who were
completely dependenton him for their position.
But when he broke with Rome, he used Parliament
to make the break legal. Through severalActs of
Parliament between 1537 and 153, England
becamepoliticallya Protestantcountry,even
though the popular religion was still Catholic.
Once England had acceptedthe separationfrom
Rome Henry took the English Reformation a step
further. Wolsey's place as the king's chief minister
was taken by one of his assistants,Thomas
Cromwell. Henry and Cromwell made a careful
surveyof Church property,the first properly
organisedtax surveysince the DomesdayBook 450
yearsearlier.Between 1536 and 1539 they closed
560 monasteriesand other religioushouses.Henry
did this in order to make monev, but he also
wanted to be popular with the rsingclassesof
landownersand merchants.He thereforegave or
sold rnuch of the monasteries'lands to them. Many
smaller landownersmade their fortunes.Most
knocked down the old monasterybuildings and

used the stone to create magnificentnew housesfor

themselves.Other buildings were just left to fall
down.
Meanwhile the monks and nuns were thrown out.
Some were given small sumsof money, but many
were unable to indwork and became wanderng
beggars.The dissolutionof the monastereswas
probably the greatestact of official destructionin
the hstoryof Britain.
Henry proved that his break with Rome was neither
a religiousnor a dplomaticdisaster.He remained
loyal to Catholic religious teaching, and executed
Protestantswho reusedto accept it. He even made
an alliance with Charles V of Spain againstFrance.
For political reasonsboth of them were willing to
forgetthe quarrel over Catherine of Aragon, and
also England's break with Rome.
Henry died in 1547, leavingbehind his sixth wife,
Catherine Parr, and his three children. Mary, the
eldest, was the daughterof Catherine of Aragon.
Elizabeth was the daughterof his second wife,
Anne Boleyn, whom he had executedbecauseshe
was unfaithful. Nine-year.old Edward was the son
of Jane Seymour, the only wife whom Henry had
really loved, but who had died giving birth to his
only son.

Eq

The rulrsof Fountains Abbey n'

Yorkshire, one of the gredtestarwe althiest English monasteies
It fuwl$ sunenered n Henry, s
refcrmationin 1539. The saine:
gkss andlzal uindow frunes
anl roofing were removed
immediate$. But it wos not unr16II that someof the slone wr.\
nken to buill Founains HalI,
nearbl Euen so, the abbe"1wa
so huge that most of the stone
was neuenken ad the abbe"1
as a ruin
surq.tived

70

10 The birth of the naton state

The Protestant-Catholic struggle

Edward VL, Henry VIII's son, was only a child
when he becameking, so the country was ruled by
a council. All the membersof this council were
from the new nobility createdby the Tudors. They
were keen Protestantreformersbecausethey had
benefitedfrom the sale of monasterylands. Indeed,
all the new landowners knew that they could only
be sure of keeping their new lands if they made
England uly Protestant.
Most English people still believed in the old
Catholic religion. Less than half the English were
Protestantby belief, but thesepeople were allowed
to take a lead in religious matters.In 1552 a new
prayer book was introduced to make sure that all
churches followed the new Prorestant religion.
Most people were not very happy with the new
religion. They had been glad to see the end of some
of the Church's bad practices like the selling of
"pardons" for the forgivenessof sins. But they did
not like the changesin belie and in some places
there was trouble.
Mary, the Catholic daughterof Catherine of
Aragon, became queen when Edward, agedsixteen,
died in 1553. A group of nobles tried to put Lady

.\ Protestant propagandapicune of EdwardVl

beingnldby his dyingfather,Henry VIII, to
qhow tfu tnle Protestm rcIigion. At
Edwmd's feet the pop. collapsesdefeated
Unlcr Edward England becamefar mtne
Protestant than bdarc, and mrvreProtestant,
probobb, thanhis fatlur intended. The pung
king was assisted fo men wla had yofired frnnt
Chwchlands and propertl a{ter tlw break with
Rrvne

Jane Grey, a Protestant,on the throne. But Mary

succeeded in entering London and took control of
the kingdom. She was supported by the ordinary
people, who were angered by the greed of the
Protestantnobles.
However, Mary was unwise and unbending in her
policy and her beliefs. She was the first queen of
England since Matilda, 400 yearsearlier. At that
time women were considered to be inferior to men.
The marriage of a queen was therefore a difficult
matter. If Mary married an Englishman she would
be under the control of a man of lesserimportance.
If she married a foreignerit might place England
under foreign control.
Mary, for political, religiousand family reasons,
chose omarry King Philip of Spain. It was an
unfortunate choice. The ordinary people disliked
the marriage, as Philip's Spanish friends in England
were quick to notice. Popular feeling was so strong
that a rebellion in Kent actually reached London
beforeending in failure. Mary dealt cruelly with the
rebel leader, \07yatt,but she took the unusualstep
of asking Parliament for its opinion about her
marriageplan. Parliament unwillingly agreedto
Mary's marriage,and it only acceptedPhilip as king
of England for Mary's lifetime.

An Illustrated History of Britain

Mary's marriage to Philip was the first mistake of

her unfortunatereign. She then beganbuming
Protestants.Three hundred people died in this way
during her five.year reign, and the bumings began
to sicken people. At the same time' the thought of
becoming a junior ally of Spain was very unpopular'
Only the knowledge that Mary herself was dying
preventeda popular rebellion.
Elizabeth, Mary's half sister,was lucky to become
queen when Mary died in 1558. Mary had
consideredkilling her, becauseshe was an obvious
leaderfor Protestantrevolt. Elizabeth had been wise
enough to say nothing, do nothing, and to express
neither Catholic nor Protestantviews while Mary
lived. And Philip persuadedMary to leave
Elizabeth unharmed.
When she became queen in 1558, Elizabeth I
wanted to flnd a peaceful answer to the problems of
the English Refomation. She wanted to bring
togetheragain those parts of English society which
*e in religiousdisagreement.And she wanted to
make England prosperous.In some ways the kind of
Protestantismfinally agreedin 1559 remanedcloser
to the Catholic religion than to other Protestant
groups. But Elizabeth made sure that the Church
was still under her authority, unlike politically
dangerousforms of Protestantism in Europe' In a
way, she made the Church part of the state
machine.
The "parish", the area servedby one church,
usuallv the same size as a village, became the unit
of state administration. People had to go to church
on Sundays by law and they were fined if they
stayed away. This meant that the parish priest, the
"parson" or "vicar", became almost as powerful as
the village squire. Elizabeth also arrangedfor a book
of semons to be used in church. Although most of
the sermonsconsistedof Bible teaching, this book
also taught the people that rebellion against the
Crown was a sin againstGod.
The strugglebetween Catholics and Protestants
continued to endanger Elizabeth's position for the
and Spain were
next thirty years. Both Fran.e
Catholic. Elizabeth and her adviserswanted to
avoid open quarrels with both of them. This was
7Z

not easy,becauseboth the French and Spanish

kings wanted to marry Elizabeth and so join
England to their own country. Elizabeth and her
advisers knew how much damage Mary had done
and that it was important that she should avoid
such a marriage.At the same time' however, there
was a dangerthat the pope would persuadeCatholic
countries to attack England. Finally, there was a
danger from those Catholic nobles still in England
who wished to remove Elizabeth and replace her
with the queen of Scotland, who was a Catholic'
Mary, the Scottish queen' usually called "Queen of
Scots", was the heir to the English throne because
she was Elzabeth'sclosestliving relative, and
becauseElizabeth had not married. Mary's mother
had been French, and Mary had spent her
childhood in France, and was a strong Catholic'
When she returned to rule Scotland as queen, Mart
soon made enemiesof some of her nobles, and to
avoid them she frnally escapedto the safety of
England. Elizabeth, however, kept Mary as a
prisonerfor almost twenty years.During that time
Elizabeth discoveredseveralsecretCatholic plots,
some of which clearly aimed at making Mary queen
of England.
It was difficult for Elizabeth to decide what to do
with Mary. She knew that France was unlikely to
attack England in support of Mary. But she was
afraid that Spain might do so. Mary's close
connection with France, however, was a
discouragementto Philip. He would not wish to
defeat Elizabeth only to put Mary on the throne' It
would be giving England to the French. So for a
long time Elizabeth just kept Mary as a prisoner'
When Elizabeth finally agreedto Mary's execution
in 1587, it was partly becauseMary had named
Philip as her heir to the throne of England, and
becausewith this claim Philip of Spain had decided
to invade England. Elizabeth no longer had a
reasonto keep Mary alive. In England Mary's
execution was popular. The Catholic plots and the
dangersof a foreign Catholic invasion had changed
people'sfeelings.By 1585 most English people
believed that to be a Catholic was to be an enemy
of England. This hatred of everything Catholic
becae an important political force.

England and her neighbours

The new-f-gig, policy, The new tradingempire, wales . lreland"

,
.
ScotlandandEngland, Ma,y Queen of .otiand thBS.ott,,h
Reformation, A Scorrshkingfor England

new foreign policy

ring the Tudor period, from 1485 until 1603.
ish foreign policy changed severaltimes. But
the end of the period England had established
basic principles. Henry VII had been careful
remain friendly with neighbouringcounrries. His
r, Henry VIII, had been
Jrr ltlufe
more arnolflous,
ambitious, noplnj
hoping
play an important parr in Europeanpolitics. He
unsuccessful.M"ry allied England to Spain by
marriage.This was not only unpopular but was
itically unwise:England had nothing to gain
n being allied to a more poweul country.
th and her advisers considered trade the
t important foreign policy mater,as Henrv VII
done. For them whichever country was
land's greatestffade rival was also its greatest
. This idea remained the basisof England's
, policy until the nineteenth century.
th's grandfather,Henry VII, had recognisei
e imporranceof trade and had built a large fleet
merchant ships. His son, Henry VIII, had spent
rey on warshipsand guns, making English guns
best in Europe.
beth's foreign policy carried Henry VII's work
r further, encouragingmerchant expansion.
correctly recognisedSpain as her main trade
and enemy. Spain at that time ruled the
ands, although many of the people were
nt and were fighting for their independence
Catholic Spanish rule. BecauseSpain and
nce were rivals, Spanshsoldierscould only
h the Netherlands from Spain by sea. This

meanr sailing up the English Channel. Elizabeth

English ships had alreadybeen attacking Spanish

ships as they retumed from America loade with
silver and gold. This had been going on since abbut
1570, and was rhe result of Spain's refusalto allow
England to trade freely with Spanish American
colonies. Although theseEnglish ships were
privately owned ..privateers'',the reasure
was
sharedwith the queen. Elizabeth apologisedto
Spain but kept her shareofwhat had been raken
from Spanish ships. Philip knew quite well that
Elizabeth was encouragingthe ,,seadogs", as they
were known. These seamen were traders as well as
pirates and adventurers. The mosfamous of them
were John Hawkins, Francis Drake and Martrn
Frobisher, but there were many others who were
also trying to build English sea rrade and to
interrupt Spain's.
Philip decided ro conquer England in 15g7 because
he believed this had to be done beforehe would be
able to defeat the Dutch rebels in the Netherlands.

73

An Illustrated History of Britain

Eliubeth triwn1lunt The

,
,,
fanous Armada portait,
showsthe SPanish Annata infuLl
sajl (let) and wec|cd upon
Ireland'sshores(right). Unlet
Ekuberh, s ght hal lies tJv
warld, a refererce ta Fancis
DtaJ<e'ssrccessful wyage around
tlv uorW, du ePeditions of
otlvt exPlorers, anl England' s
gruuing seQower Ekzabe
enjoyed,glfi), ulw great
uonty shorls in this portrait.

English Channel from the Netherlands. But in

1587 Francis Drake attackedand destroyedpart of
rhis fleet in Cadiz harbour.

having to spend more than ever on England's

defence. Peace was only made with Spain once
Elizabeth was dead.

Philip startedagain, and built the largestfleet that

had ever gone to sea. But most of the ships were
designedto carry soldiers,and the few fighting ships
were not as good as the English ones. English ships
were longer and narrower,so that they were faster,
and their guns could also shoot further than the
Spanish ones.

The new trading empire

When news of ths Armada reached England in

summer 1588, Elizabeth called her soldiers
together.She won their heartswith well'chosen
words:"l am come . . . to live or die amongstyou
all, to lay down for my God, and for my kingdom,
and for my people, my honour and my blood even
in the dust. I know I have the body of a weak and
feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of
a king, and of a king of England too,"
The Spanish Armada was defeated more by bad
weather than by English guns. Some Spanish ships
were sunk, but most were blown northwardsby the
wind, many being wrecked on the rocky coasts of
Scotland and Ireland. For England it was a
gloriousmoment, but it did not lead to an end of
the war with Spain, and England found itself
74

Both before and after the Armada, Elizabeth

followed two policies. She encouragedEnglish
sailors like John Hawkins and Francis Drake to
continue to attack and destroySpanish ships
bringing gold, silver and other treasuresback from
the newly discoveredcontinent of America. She
also encouragedEnglish traders to settle abroad and
to create colonies. This second policy led directly
to Britain's colonial empire of the seventeenthand
eighteenth centuries.
The first English colonists sailed to America
towards the end of the century. One of the best
known was Sir Walter Raleigh, who brought
tobacco back to England. The settlerstried without
successto start profitablecolonies in Virginia,
which was named after Elizabeth, the "virgin" or
unmarried queen. But these were only beginnings.
England also began selling West African slaves to
work for the Spanish in America. John Hawkins
carried his first slave cargo in 1562. By 1650 slavery
had become an important trade, bringing wealth

11 England and her neighbours

A
t],ewotld dtaum in the
",apyears of dte sixtemth
early
centu:r1 shaws geogaphical
laoutledge deaeaing wirh
disance from Europe. Ausnalia,
far exanple, is still canpletely
unkncrum. Eum so, this nap was
a great improvenwnt on
geographicalkrcwledge a centw-J
earlier. By tlv end of tlw cenwry
far mare acalate maps wee
appea.ng

particularlyto Bristol in southwestEngland. It took

until the end of the eighteenth century for this
nade to be ended.

Wales
Closer to home,.the Tudors did their best to bring
'!7ales,
Ireland and Scotland under English control.

This growth of trade abroadwas not entirely new.

The Merchant.AdventurersCompany had already
been establishedwith royal supportbefore the end
of the fifteenth century. During Elizabeth'sreign
more "chartered"companies, as they were known,
n'ereestablished.A "charter" gave a company the
right to all the businessin its particular trade or
negion.In retum for this important advantagethe
charteredcompany gave some of its profits to the
Crown. A number of these companieswere
establishedduring Elizabeth'sreign: the Eastland
Company to trade with Scandinavia and the Baltic
n 579;the Levant Company to trade with the
toman Empire in 1581;the Africa Company to
nade in slaves, in 1588;and the East India
Company ro trade with India in 1600.

Arthur, Prince of \0ales,died early and Henry's

second son became Henry VIII. But he did not
sharehis father'slove of Wales. His interestwas in
power and authority, through direct control. He
wanted the Welsh to become Englsh.

The East India Company was establishedmainly

hecausethe Dutch controlled the entire spice trade
nith the East Indies (lndonesia). Spices were
exrremely important for making the winter salted
mat tastier. The English were determined to have
n sharein this rich trade, but were unsuccessful.
Liowever,the East India Company did begin to
Lrterate
in India, Persia and even in Japan, where it
h,al a trading station from 1613-23. The quarrel
Lrn-er
spices was England's flrst difficulty with the
Lhrrch. Before the end of the seventeenth century
uaJing competition with the Dutch had led to
uhreewars.

One example of the changesHenry VIII made was

in the matter of names. At that time the Welsh did
not have family names. They used their own first
name with those of their father and grandfather,
using ap, which meant "son of". Names were long,
and the English, who had been using family names
for about three hundred years, found them difficult.
From 1535 the English put pressureon the Welsh
to use an English system of names by preventing
Welsh names being used in law courts and on
official papers.By 1750 the use of Welsh names had
almost disappeared,although not before one
Welshman had made a final and humorous protest.

Henry VII was half Welsh. At the battle of

Bosworth in 1485 Henry's flag was the red dragon
oflVales. It had been the badgeofthe legendary
last British (Welsh) king to fight againstthe
Saxons. At the time, Caxton was printing Malory's
poem More d,Arthw. Henry cleverly made the
most of popular "Arthurian" interest to suggestthat
he was somehowconnected with the ancient
British king, and named his eldest son Arthur. He
also brought many Welshmen to his court.

I)

An Illustrated History of Britain

..Sion ap William ap Son ap

He signedhis name
William ap Sion ap Dafudd ap Ithel Fychan as
Cynrig ap Robert ap lowerth ap Rhyrid ap Iowerth
ap Madoc ap Ednawain Bendew, called after the
English fashion John Jones." Many Welsh people
accepted wrong English ways of pronouncing their
names. Others took their fathers' first names and ap
Richard, ap Robert, ap Hywel, ap Hugh soon
became Pritchard, Probert, Powell and Pugh.
Others who had not used "ap" were known as
Willams, Thomas, Davies, Hughes and so on.
Between 1536 and 1543 \ales became joined to
England under one administration.English law was
now the only law for Wales. Local Welshmen were
appointed as JPs, so that the Welsh gentry became
part of the ruling English establishment. Those
parts of \Vales which had not been "shired" were
now orgnised like English counties. Welshmen
entered the English parliament. English became the
only official language, and Welsh was soon only
spoken in the hills. Although Welsh was not
allowed as an official language,Henry VIII gave
permissionfor a Welsh Bible to be printed, which
becamethe basison which the Welsh language
survived.
Although most people gave up speaking Welsh,
poets and singers continued to use it. The spoken
word had remained the most important part of
Welsh culture since the Saxon invasion. The
introductonof schools, using English, almost
destroyedthis last fortressof Welsh culture. The
gatherings of poets and singers, known as
which had been going on since 1170
eisteddfods,
suddenly stopped. But at the end of the eighteenth
century, there were still a few who could speak
Welsh. Eistedlfodsbegan again, bringing back a
tradition which still continues today.

Ireland
Henry VIII wanted to bring Ireland under his
authority, as he had done with Wales. Earlier kings
had allowed the powerulAnglo.Irish noble families
to rule, but Henry destroyedtheir power. He
persuadedthe Irish parliament to recognisehim as
king of lrelancl.
76

However, Henry also tried to make the Irish accept

his English Church Reformation. But in Ireland,
unlike England, the monasteries and the Church
were still an important part of economic and social
life. And the Irish nobility and gentry, unlike the
English, felt it was too dangerousto mke monastic
land. They refused to touch it. When an AngloIrish noble rebelled againstHenry VIII, he did so in
the name of Catholicism. Henry VIII failed to get
what he wanted n Ireland. In fact he made things
worseby bringing Irish nationalism and
Catholicism togetheragainstEnglish rule.
It is possiblethat, without the dangerof foreign
invasion, the Tudors might have given up trying to
control the lrish. But lreland temptedCatholc
Europe as a place from which to attack the English'
In 1580, during Elizabeth I's reign, many Irish
rebelled, encouraged by the arrival of a few Spanish
and French soldiers.
Queen Elizabeth'ssoldierssaw the rebelliousIrish
population as wild and primitive people and treated
them with great cruelty. Edmund Spenser, a famous
Elizabethanpoet' Wassecretaryto the Engli
commander.After the rebellion was defeatedhe
wrote, "Out of every comer of the woods . ' . they
[the Irish rebels]came creeping forth upon their
hands, for their legs would not bear them. They
looked like . . . death. They spoke like ghosts
crying out of their graves.They did eat the dead
. . . h"ppy where they could flnd them."
The Tudors fought four wars during the period to
make the Irish accept their authority and their
religion. In the end they destroyedthe old Gaelic
way of life and introduced English government.
Ireland became England's first important colony.
The effect of English rule was greatest in the north,
in Ulster, where the Irish tribes had fought longest'
Here, after the Tudor conquest' lands were taken
and sold to English and Scottish merchants. The
native Irish were forced to leave or to work for
thesesettlers.
The Protestant settlers took most of the good land
in Ulster. Even today most good land in Ulster is
owned bv Protestants, and most poor land by
Catholics. The county of Derry in Ulster was

11 England and her neighbours

over by a group of London merchants and divided

among the twelve main London guilds. The town
of Derry was renamed Londonderry, after its new
merchant owners. This colonisation did not make
England richer, but it destroyed much of lreland's
society and economy. It also laid the foundations
for war between Protestantsand Catholics in Ulster
in the second half of the twentieth centurv.

Scotland and England

The Scottish monarchs tried to introduce the same
kind of centralised monarchy that the Tudors had
so successfullydeveloped in England. But it was
much harder, because the Scottish economy was
weaker, and Scottish society more lawless.
However, JamesIV, JamesV, Mary who was
executedby her cousin Elizabeth ofEngland, and
her son JamesVI made important stepsforward.
They tried to control the lawless border country
with England, and the disobedientHighland clans
in the north. For the Scottish kings there was
alwaysa problem. The most disobedientwere often
e best fighters, and no king wanted to make
enemiesof those who might help him in battle
againstthe English.
Knowing how weak they were, the Scottish kings
usually avoided war with England. They made a
t a ce treaty with Henry VII, the first with an
English king since 1328, and JamesIV married
Henry's daughterMargaret. But Henry VIII still
ranted Scotland to accept his authority. In 1513
his army destroyed the Scottish army at Flodden. It
r'as the worst defeat the Scots ever experienced.
Jameshimself was killed, and with him over twenty
Scottish nobles.
The battle of Flodden increased the disagreement
hetweenthose Scottish nobles who felt that
ftotland should move towardsa closer friendship
u-r*rEngland and those who wanted to remain
htal to the Auld Alliance with France. The
Scottish monarch had to find a balance between
tese two, to keep both his nobles and his
meighboursh"ppy. The Protestant Reformation in
F.urope,and particularly in England, also increased
reuncertainty and danger. There was talk of a

Catholic invasion of England by France and Spain.

Many Scots wanted to sayon the side of Catholic
Europe in the hope of sharing the fruits of a
Catholic invasion of England.
But Henry VIII reminded the Scots that it was
dangerousto work against him. He sent another
army into Scotland to make the Scottish JamesV
accept his authority. James'sarnywas badly de.
feated and James himself died shortly after. Henry
hoped to marry his son Edward to the baby Queen
of Scots, Mary, and in this way join the two
countries together under an English king: An
agreementwas reached in 1543,
Ordinary Scots were most unhappy at the idea of
being ruled by England. In spite of their fear of the
powerfulEnglish armies, a new Scottish parlament,
aware of popular feeling, tumed down the marriage
agreement.For the next two yearsEnglish soldiers
punished them by buming and destroying the
housesof southem Scotland. Rather than give little
Mary to the English, the Scots sent her to France,
where she married the French king's son in 1558.

Mary Queen of Scots and the

Scottish Reformation
Mary was troubled by bad luck and wrong decisions.
She retumed to Scotland as both queen and widow
in 1561. She was Catholic, but during her time in
France Scotland had become officially and
popularly Protestant.
The Scottish nobles who supportedfriendship'with
England had welcomed Protestantism for both
political and economic reasons. The new religion
brought Scotland closer to England than France.
Financially, the Scottish monarch could take over
the great wealth of the Church in Scotland and this
would almost certainly mean awardsof land to the
nobles. The yearly income of the Church in
Scotland had been twice that of the monarch.
Unlike the English, however, the Scots were
careulnot to gve the monarch authority over the
new ProtestantScottish "Kirk", as the Church in
Scotland was called. This was possiblebecausethe
Reformation took place while the queen, Mary, was
an

An Illustrated History of Britain

not in Scotland, and unable to interfere.The new

Kirk was a far more democraticorganisationthan
the English Church, becauseit had no bishops and
was govemed by a General Assembly. The Kirk
taught the importanceof personalbelief and the
study of the Bible, and this led quickly to the idea
that education was important for everyonein
Scotland. As a result most Scots remained better
educatedthan other Europeans,including the
English, until the end of the nineteenth century.
Protestantism had spread quickly through the
Scottish universities,which were closely connected
to those in Germany and Scandinavia. The new
Kirk in Scotland disliked Mary and her French
Catholicism. Mary was careful not to give the Kirk
any reason for actually opposing her. She made it
clear she would not try to bring back Catholicism.
Mary was soon married again, to Lord Damley, a
'scottish Catholic'. But when she tired of him, she
allowed herself to agree to his murder and married
the murderer, Bothwell. Scottish society, in spite of
its lawlessness,was shocked. The English
govemment did not look forward to the possibility
of Mary succeeding Elizabeth as queen. In addition
to her Catholicism and her sffong French culture,
she had shown very poor judgement. By her
behaviour Mary probably destroyed her chance of
inheriting the English throne. She found herself at
war with her Scortish opponents, and was soon
captured and imprisoned. However, in 1568 she
escapedto England, where she was held by
Elizabeth for nineteen vears before she was finally
execu[ed.

Mary Qtum of Scos had poor julgemznt, but she was a beauty Neither rr
these qualitics helpedhn inh.a relations withher ccrusinEkzabeth I, anl rort of foohshrcssfirulb losther her head"

A Scottish king for England

JamesVI is rememberedas a weak man and a bad

decision-maker.But this was not true while he was
king only in Scotland. Early in his reign, in the las
yearsof the sixteenth century, he rebuilt the
authority of the Scottish Crown after the disasters
which had happened to his mother, grandfather
and great-grandfather.He brought the Catholic
and Protestant nobles and also the Kirk more or lesr
under royal control. These were the successesof an
extremelyclever diplomat. Like the Tudors, he was
a firm believer in the authority of the Crown, and
like them he worked with small councils of
ministers,rather than Parliament. But he did not
hav the money or military power of the Tudors.

Mary's son, JamesVI, startedto rule at the age of

twelve in 1578. He showedgreatskill from an early
age. He knew that if he behaved correctly he could
expect to inherit the English throne after
Elizabeth'sdeath, as he was her closestrelative. He
also knew that a Catholic alliance betweenSpain
and France might lead to an invasion of England so
he knew he had to remain friendly with them too.
He managedto "face both ways", while remaining
publicly the Protestant ally of England.

JamesVI's greatestsuccesswas in gaining the

English throne when Elizabeth died in 1603 at the
unusuallyold age of 70. If Elizabeth'sadvisershad
had seriousdoubts about Jamesas a suitable
Protestant ruler, they would probably have tried to
find another successorto Elizabeth. Few in England
could have liked the idea of a new king coming
from Scotland, their wild northem neighbour. The
fact that England accepted him suggeststhat its
leading statesmenhad confidence in James'sskills.

78

Government and society

Tudor parliaments, Rich and poor in town and country. Domestic

life ' Languageand cukure

During the Tudor period the changes in

government,society and the economy of England
s'ere more far-reachingthan they had been for
centuries.But most far.reachingof all were the
changesin deas,partly as a result of the rebirth of
intellectual attiudesknown as the Renaissance'
n'hich had spread slowly norrhwards from its
beginningsin Italy. In England the nature of the
Renaissancewas also affectedby the Protestant
Reformationand the economic changesthat
followed from it.

Tudor parliaments
The Tudor monarchs did not like goveming
through Parlament.Henry VII had used
Parliament only for law making. He seldom called
it together,and then only when he had a particular
job for it. Henry VIII had used it firsr ro raise
money for his military adventures,and then for his
strugglewith Rome. His aim was to make sure that
e powerful members from the shires and towns
supportedhim, becausethey had a great deal of
control over popular feeling. He also wanted to
frighten the priests and bishops into obeying him,
and to frighten the pope into gving in to his
demands.
PerhapsHenry himself did not realisethat by
inviting Parliament to make new laws for the
Reformationhe was giving it a level of authority it
never had before.Tudor monarchs were certainly
not more democratic than earlier kings, but by
using Parliament to strengthentheir policy, they
actually increasedParliament'sauthority.

Parliament strengthenedits position again durng

Edward VI's reign by ordering the new prayerbook
to be used in all churches, and forbddingthe
.!7hen
Catholc mass.
the Catholic Queen Mary
came to the throne she succeededin making
Parliament cancel all the new Reformation laws,
and agreeto her marrageto Philip of Spain. But
she could not persuadeParliament to accept him as
king of England after her death.
Only two things persuadedTudor monarchs nor ro
get rid of Parliament altogether:they neededmoney
and they neededthe supportof the merchanrsand
landowners.In 1566 Queen Elizabeth told the
French ambassadorthat the three parliamentsshe
had already held were enough for any reign and she
would have no more. Today Parliament must meet
every year and remain ..in sesson''for three.
quartersof it. This was not at all the case in the
sixteenth century.
In the early sixteenth century Parliament only met
when the monarch ordered it. Sometimes ir mer
twice in one year, but then it might not meet again
for six years. In the first forty-four years of Tudor
rule Parliament met only twenty times. Henry VIII
assembledParliament a little more often to make
the laws for Church reformation. But Elizabeth,
like her grandfather Henry VII, tried nor ro use
Parliament after her Reformation Settlement of
1559, and in forty-fouryearsshe only let
Parliament meet thirteen times.
During the century power moved from the House of
Lords to the House of Commons. The reason for
this was simple. The Members of Parliament (MPs)
in the Commons representedricher and more
79

T
An lllustrated History o Britain

influential classesthan the Lords. In fact, the idea

of getting rid of the House of Lords, still a real
question in British politics today, was first suggested
in the sixteenth century.
The old systemof representationin the Commons,
with two men from each county and two from each
"borough", or town, remained the rule. However,
during the sixteenth century the size of the
Commons nearly doubled, as a result of the
inclusion of Welsh boroughsand counties and the
inclusion of more English boroughs.
But Parliament did not really representthe people.
Few MPs followed the rule of living in the area they
represented,and the monarchy used its influence to
make sure that many MPs would support royal
policy, rather than the wishesof their electors.
In order to conffol discussionin Parliament, the
..Speaker''.Even today the
Crown apponteda
Speaker is responsiblefor good behaviour during
debatesin the House of Commons. His job in
Tudor times was to make sure that Parliament
discussedwhat the monarch wanted Parliament to
discuss,and that it made the decision which he or
she wanted.
Until the end of the Tudor period Parliament was
supposedto do three things: agreeto the taxes
needed;make the laws which the Crown suggested;
and advise the Crown, but only when asked to do
so. In order for Parliament to be able to do these
things, MPs were given important rights:freedom
of speech (that is freedomto speak their thoughts
freely without fear), freedomfrom fear of arrest,
and freedom to meet and speak to the monarch.
The Tudor monarchs realised that by asking
Parliament for money they were giving it power in
the running of the kingdom. All the Tudor
monarchs tried to get money in other ways. By
1600 Elizabeth had found wavs to raise money that
were extremelyunwise. She sold "monopolies",
which gave a particular person or company total
control over a trade. In 1601, the last parliament of
Elizabeth'sreign complained to her about the bad
effect on free trade that these monopolies had.

80

Elizabeth and her advisersused other methods. She

and her chief adviser,Lord Burghley, sold official
positions in government. Burghley was paid about
1860 a vear. but he actuallv made at least 14,000 by
selling official positions. He kept this secretfrom
Parliament. Elizabeth'smethods of rasingmoney
would today be considereddishonestas well as
foolish.
In their old age Elizabeth and Burghley noticed less,
and became more carelessand slower at making
decisions.They allowed the tax systemto become
less'effective,and failed to keep information on
how much money people should be paying. England
needed tax reform, which could only be carried out
with the agreement of Parliament. Parliament
wanted to avoid the matter of tax, and so did local
governmentbecausethe JPs who were responsible
for collecting taxes were also landlords who would
have to pay them. As JPs were not paid, they saw
no reasonfor collecting unpopular taxes. Elizabeth
left her successorsto deal with the problem.
Elizabeth avoided open discussionon money
matterswith Parliament. There was clearly an
unansweredquestion about the limits of
Parliament'spower. \7ho should decide what
Parliament could discuss:the Crown or Parliament
itself? Both the Tudor monarchs and their MPs
would have agreed that it was the Crown that
decided. However, during the sixteenth century the
Tudors asked Parliament to discuss, law'make and
advise on almost every subject.
Parliament naturally began to think it had a rightto
discussthese questions.By the end of the sixteenth
century it was beginning to show new confidence,
and in the seventeenth century, when the gentry
and merchant classeswere far more awareof their
own stength,it was obvious that Parliament would
challenge the Crown. Eventually this resultedin
war.

Rich and poor in town and

country
Even in 1485 pch of the countrysidewas still
untouched. There were still greatforestsof oak
trees. and unusedland in between. There were still

12 Govemment and societv

HaninDe1shire,

n t l580s, asmnshed
wfu bJ t)redaringuse of
gi.rss Neuer ad
*idings been so light

|fu. otncr, Ehzabethof

wasrcwly weahhy
m be rcmembered
..E.s
i[d e
',
'n't'als ln
wle stmtewark.
u'rcs fumitwe becone
Clwirs rcplacedberches
featlwr nattresses
firdlw mrrttresses.BJ
rn: cess used to stIre
tere larger, with a
m v botwtt. It wa tlv
t]v chestof drawers'

animals, wild pigs, wild cattle, and even a ew

Scatteredacrossthis countrysidewere
of human settlement,villages and towns.
rownshad more than 3,000 people, the size of
l[mgevillage today. Most towns, anyway, were no

than large villages, with their own fields and

s. Even London, a large city of over 60,000 by
had fieldsfarmedby its citizens.
Cre sixteenth century, however, this picture
to change rapidly. The population increased,
unusedland was clearedfor sheep, and large
of forestwere cut down to orovide wood for
growingshipbuilding industry. England was
ing to experience greater social and
nic problems than ever before.

he price of food and other goodsrose steeply

ffirngthe sixteenth and early seventeenth
rures.This inflation was without equal until the
tieth centurv. The price of wheat and barley,
rv for bread and beer. increasedover five
mmesbetween1510 and 1650.While most other
es increasedby five times between 1500 and
rtr.T,real wagesfell by half. The govemment tried
m Jeal with the problem of rising costs by making
,ffitnswhich contained up to 50 per cent less
gnrciousmetal. Ths only reducedthe value of
MriroYr helping to puhprices up.
W'nlplethought that inflation was caused by silver
md gold pouring into Europe from Spanish

America. But a greaterproblem was the sudden

increasein population. In England and Wales the
population almost doubled from2.2 million in1575
to four million in 1603. Twice the number of
people needed twice the amount of food. It was not
produced. Living conditions got worse as the
population rose. It is not surprisingthat fewer
people married than ever before.
In the countrysidethe people who did best in this
situation were the yeoman farmers who had at least
100 acresof land. They producedfood to sell, and
employed men to work on their land. They worked
as farmersduring the week, but were "gentlemen"
on Sundays. They were able to go on increasing
their prices becausethere was not enough food in
the markets.
Most people, however, had only twenty acresof
land or less.They had to pay rent for the land, and
often found it difficult to pay when the rent
increased.Becauseof the growing population it was
harder for a man to find work, or to produce
enough food for his family.
Many landownersfound they could make more
money from sheep farming than frorn growing
crops. They could sell the wool for a good price to
the rapidly growing cloth industry. In order to keep
sheep they fenced off land that had alwaysbelonged
to the whole village. Enclosing land in this way was
81

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

A wedding feast n the uillagel

Bermondsey, rww a Innltm
suburb. Merr'1-maL;ng * lusr
beginnng,and the uiew givesa
a good deaof uilloge lde Tk
Tower of Innlan can be seer.
across the iuer n the
background

often againstthe law, but becauseJPs were

themselveslandlords,few peasantscould prevent it.
As a result many poor people lost the land they
farmedas well as the common land where they kept
animals, and the total amount of land used for
growingfood was reduced.

put down, and its leaderswere executed.Without

work to do, many people stole food in order to eat.
It is thought that about 7,000 thieves were hanged
duringHenry VIII's regn.

There was a clear connection betweenthe damage

causedby enclosuresand the growth of the cloth
trade As one man watching the problem wrote in
1583, "these enclosuresbe the causeswhy rich men
eat up poor men as beastsdo eat grass."All through
the century the govemment tried to control
enclosuresbut without much success.Many people
becameunemployed.

Effortswere made by governmentto keep order in a

situation of rising unemployment. In 1547
Parliament gave magistratesthe po\Merto take any
person who was without work and give him for two
vearsto anv local farmerwho wanted to use him.
Any personfound homelessand unemployeda
second time could be executed. It did not solve the
crime problem. As one foregnvistorreported,
"There are incredible numbersof robbershere. thev
go about in bands of twenty . . . "

There were warning signs that the problem was

growing. In 1536 large numbersof people from the
north marched to London to show their anger at
the dissolutionof the monasteries.Their reasons
were only partly religious.As life had become
harder, the monasterieshad given employment to
many and provided food for the very poor. This
"Pilgrimageof Grace", as it was known, was cruelly

In 1563 Parliament made JPs responsiblefor

deciding on fair wagesand working hours. A worke:
was expectedto start at five o'clock in the moming
and work until seven or eight at night with two ani
a half hours allowed for meals. In order to control
the growingproblem of wanderinghomelesspeople.
workerswere not allowed to move from the parish
where they had been bom without permission.But

82

12 Govemment

and society

\ weahfu fani$ in the 1560s'

Thz gtrk in the centedetwi:.s,
ot rsn 1a,,ity lkenessof the othns
s ec)ident Chilren uue the sanp
:tylr of clnthing as their Parents.
The dinrcr nbles of thc great dnd
,.'eakhyhol.beconv a good deal
nme rnderly sirce the drrysof Sir
3eoffrey Luttrell (seePage 57)
Pmens often Pkrced their chiWen
il the age of eightar nhle in
lousehalds of hghersocial
srnndingThis offeredthe chanceof
martagelater,
JlI adud.Iilto'Eeous
nd a nisen swtus anl wealth

alreadythere were probably over 10,000 homeless

people on the roads.
Good harveststhrough most of the century
probablysaved England from disaster,but there
were bad ones between 1594 and 1597, making the
problem of the poor worse again. In 1601
Parliament passedthe first Poor Law. This made
local people responsiblefor the poor in their own
area. It gave power to JPs to raise money in the
parish to provide food, housing and work for the
poor and homelessof the same parish.
Many of the poor moved to towns, where there was
a dangerthey would join togetherto fight against
and destroytheir rulers. The governmenthad good
reasonto be afraid. In 1596, during the period of
bad harvests,peasantsin Oxfordshire rioted against
rhe enclosuresof common land. Apprentices in
London rioted againstthe city authorities.The
ElizabethanPoor Law was as much a symbol of
authority as an act o kindness. It remained in
oDerationuntil 1834.

The pattern of employmentwas changing. The

production of finished cloth, the most important of
England'sproducts, reached its greatestimportance
during the sixteenth century. Clothmakers and
merchantsbought raw wool, gave it to spinners,
who were mostly women and children in cottages,
collected it and passedit on to weaversand other
clothworkers.Then they sold it.
The successfulmen of thsnew capitalist class
showedoff their successby building magniicent
housesand churches in the villages where they
worked. England destroyedthe Flemish clothmaking industry, but took advantageof the special
skills of Flemish craftsmenwho came to England.
The lives of rich and poor were very different.The
rich ate good quality bread made from wheat, while
the poor ate rough bread made from rye and barley.
When there was not enough food the poor made
their bread from beans, peas, or oats. The rich
showedoff their wealth in silk, woollen or linen
clothing, while the poor wore simple clothes of
leather or wool.

r
An lllustrated History of Britain

By using coal instead of wood fires, Tudor England

leamt how to make greatly improved steel,
necessaryfor modem weapons.Henry VIII replaced
the longbow with the musket, an early kind of
hand-held gun. Muskets were not as effective as
longbows, but gunpowder and bullets were cheaper
than arrows, and the men cheaper to train.
Improved steel was used for making knives and
forks, clocks, watches, nails and pins. Birmingham,
by using coal fires to make steel, grew in the
sixteenth century from a village into an important
industrial city. In both Birmingham and
Manchester ambitious members of the working and
trading classescould now develop new industries,
free from the controls placed on workers by the
trade guilds in London and in many other older
owns.
Coal was unpopular, but it bumt better than wood
and became the post commonly used fuel,
especiallyin London, the rapidly growing capital.
In Henry VIII's reign London had roughly 60,000
inhabitants. By the end of the century this number
had grown to almost 200,000. In 150 London used
33,000 tons of coal from Newcastle, but by 1600 it
used five times as much, and the smoke darkened
the sky over London. A foreign ambassadorwrote
that the city stank, and was "the filthiest in the
world".

Domestic life
Foreign visitors were surprisedthat women in
England had greater freedom than anywhere else in
Europe. Although they had to obey their husbands,
they had self-confidence and were not kept hidden
in their homes as women were in Spain and other
countries. They were allowed free and easy ways
with strangers.As one foreignerdelightedly
noticed, "You are received with a kiss by all, when
you leave you are sent with a kiss. You return and
kissesare repeated."
However, there was a dark side to married [ife.
Most women bore between eight and fifteen
children, and many women died in childbtrth.
Those who did not saw half their children die at a
84

young age. No one dared hope for a long married

life becausethe dangersto ltfe were too great. For
this reason, and becausemarriagewas often an
economic arrangement,deep emotional ties often
seem to have been absent.When a wife died, a
husband looked for another.
Both rich and poor lived in small family groups.
Brothers a.ndjrsisters
usually did not live with each
other or with their parentsonce they had grown up.
The tried to find a place of their own. Over half
the population was under twenty-flve,while few
were over sixty. Queen Elizabeth reached the age of
seventy,but this was unusual. People expectedto
work hard and to die young. Poor children started
work at the age of six or seven.
An Italian visitor to England gives an interesting
view of English society in Tudor times: "The
English are great lovers of themselves, and of
everything belonging to them; they think that there
are no other men than themselves,and no other
world but England: and whenever they see a
handsomeforeigner,they say that'he looks like an
Englishman'." The English did not love their
children, he thought, for "having kept them at
home till they arrive at the age of seven or nine
yearsat the most, they put them out, boys and
girls, to hard service in the housesof other people,
holding them to seven or eight years'hard service.
They say they do it in order that their children
might leam better manners. But I believe that they
do t becausethey are better servedby strangers
than they would be by their own children."
In spite of the hard conditions of life, most people
had a larger and better home to live n than ever
before.Chimneys, which beforehad only been
found in the homes of the rich, were now built in
every house. This technical developmentmade
cooking and heating easierand more comfortable.
For the flrst time more than one room could be used
in winter.
Between 1530 and 1600 almost everyonedoubled
their living space.After 1570 the wealthy yeoman's
family had eight or more rooms and workers'
families had three rooms insteadof one, and more
fumiture was used than ever before.

12 Govemment and sociey

One group of people sufferedparticularly badly

during the Tudor period. These were the unmarried
women. Before the Reformation many of these

the work of the Dutch philosopher Erasmus. One of

them, Thomas More, wrote a study of the ideal
nation, called Utopia, which became extremely
popular throughout Europe.
The Renaissance also influenced religion,
encouraging the Protestant Reformation, as well as
a freer approach to ways of thnking within the
Catholic Church. In music England enjoyed its
most fruitful period ever. There was also
considerableinterest in the new painters in Europe,
and England developed its own special kind of
painting, the miniature portrait.
Literature, however, was England's greatestart
form. Playwrightslike Christopher Marlowe, Ben
Jonson, and William Shakespearefilled the theatres
with their exciting new plays.
Shakespearewas born in Straord-upon-Avon, and
went to the local grammarschool. His education
was typical of the Tudor age, becauseat this time
the "grammar" schools, which tried to teach
"correct" English, became the commonestform of
education. His plays were popular with both
educated and uneducated people. Many of his plays
were about English history, but he changed fact to
suit public opinion.
Nothing shows the adventurous spirit o the age
better than the "soldier poets". These were true
Renaissancemen who were both brave and cruel in
war, but also highly educated.Sir Edmund Spenser,
who fought with the army in Ireland, was one. Sir
Philip Sidney, killed fighting the Spanish in the
Netherlands, was another. A third was Sir Walter
Raleigh, adventurerand poet. !7hile mprisonedin
the Tower of London waiting to be executed,
he wrote a poem whlch describeshow time takes
away youth and gives back only old age and dust. It
was found in his Bible after his execurioni
Even such is time, that takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, our all we have,
And pays us but with earth and dust.
Who, in the dark and silent grave,
When we have wanderedall our ways,
Shuts up the story ofour days.
But from this earth, this grave, this dust,
My God shall raise me up, I trust.
85

The Stuarts
Crown and Parliament

ParliamentagainsttheCrown ' Religlousdisagreement' Ciuil war

The Stuart monarchs, from JamesI onwards,were

lesssuccessfulthan the Tudors. They quarrelled
rvith Parliament and this resultedin civil war. The
only king o England ever to be tried and executed
rvasa Stuart. The republic that followed was even
more unsuccessful,and by popular demand the dead
king's son was called back to the throne. Another
Stuart king was driven from his throne by his own
Jaughterand her Dutch husband, William of
Orange. William becameking by Parliament's
election, not by right of birth. When the last
Sruart, Queen Anne, died in 1714, the monarchy
rvasno longer absolutelypowerfulas it had been
s'hen JamesVI rode south from Scotland in 103.
It had become a "parliamentarymonarchy"
controlled by a constitution.
These important changesdid not take place simply
t'ecausethe Stuartswere bad rulers. They resulted
nom a basic change in society. During the
s V enteenth century economic power moved even
'asterinto the hands of the merchant and
landowning farmer classes.The Crown cbuld no
longerraise money or govem without their co'
.'rperation.These groups were representedby the
House of Commons. In return for money the
Commons demandedpolitical power. The victory
."'fthe Commons and the classesit representedwas
unavoidable.

Jl?/lrbs I on hrtrseback,painud in 1633 b1 the great cowt painter Anthonl

-.
m Dy ck This pican e dnnolnrces the triumph of kingship At the time
Jlwrles was at the height of his power. He hnd rc need of Pnliament and it
znned that the king couV rule abne, as the king of France was doing
Jlwb.s wu faally wang. It was Parliament that triwnphed &ning the
eteateenth century. 81 the enl of thr centurl the powers of the sovereign
*erehmited.bJ the uit of Pnl:unent. In the bottombft ccrmerare the
jalmt cnnq cunbning fm thc first time the English ,,quarters,,
tulr te Scotrish Don Ranbalnt uld the Insh Horb

It would be interestingto know how the Tudors

would have dealt with the growing power of the
House of Commons. They had been lucky not to
have this problem. But they had also been more

Jatles I uas d disappoinenent to the English As Junes VI in Scotland he

had acted skilfully to stuve the plnts of his nobbs In Englanl" he was better
known for hslu,k of skltin dealing uith Parlianent and wthhis ministers

I
An Illustrated History of Britain

willing to give up their beliefs in order that their

policies would succeed.The Stuarts, on the other
hand, held onto their beliefs however much it cost
them. even when it was foolish to do so.
The political developments of the period also
resulted from basic changes in thinking in the
seventeenth century. By 1700 a ruler like Henry
VIII or Elizabeth I would have been quite
unthinkable. By the time Queen Anne died, a new
age of reason and science had anived.

Parliament against the Crown

The first signs of trouble between Crown and
Parliament came in 101, when the Commons were
angry over Elizabeth'spolicy of selling monopolies.
But Parliament did not demand any changes.It did
not wish to upset the ageing queen whom it feared
and respected.
Like Elizabeth,JamesI tried to rule without
Parliament as much as possible. He was afraid it
would inteere, and he preferred to rule with a
small council.
Jameswas clever and well educated.As a child in
Scotland he had been kdnappedby groups of
nobles, and had been forced to give in to the Kirk.
Because of these experiences he had developed
strong beliefs and opinions. The most important of
these was his belief in the divine right of kings. He
believed that the king was chosen by God and
thereforeonly God could judge him. James'sideas
were not different from those of earlier monarchs,
or other monarchs in Europe.
He expressedtheseopinions openly, however, and
this led to trouble with Parliament. Jameshad an
unfortunate habit of saying something true or clever
at the wrong moment. The French king described
Jamesas "the wisestfool in Christendom". It was
unkind, but true. James,for all his clevemess,
seemed to have lost the commonsense which had
helped him in Scotland.

When Elizabeth died she left Jameswith a'huge

debt, larger than the total yearly income of the
Crown. Jameshad to ask Parliament to raise a tax
-- l

\88 '

to pay the debt. Parliament agreed,but in retum

insistedon the right to discussJames'shome and
foreign policy. James,however, insistedthat he
alone had the "divine right" to make these
decisions.Parliament disagreed,and it was
supported by the law.
Jameshad made the mistake of appointing
Elizabeth'sminister, Sir Edward Coke, as Chief
Justice. Coke made decisionsbasedon the law
which limited the king's power. He judgedthat the
king was not above the law, and even more
important, that the king and his council could not
make new laws. Laws could only be made by Act
Parliament. Jamesremoved Coke from the position
of Chief Justice, but as an MP Coke continued to
make trouble. He reminded Parliament of Magna
Carta, interpreting it as the great charter of English
freedom.Although this was not really true, his
claim was politically useful to Parliament. This was
the first quarrel between James and Parliament, and
it started the bad feeling which lasted during his
entire reign, and that of his son Charles.
James was successfulin ruling without Parliament
between1611 and 162I, but it was only possible
becauseBritain remained at peace.Jamescould not
afford the cost of an army. In 118, at the
beginning of the Thirty Years \il7arin Europe,
Parliament wished to go to war againstthe
Catholics. Jameswould not agree.Until his death
in 1625Jameswas alwaysquarrellingwith
Parliament over money and over its desire to play a
part in his foreign policy.
Charles I found himself quarrellingeven more
bitterly with the Commons than his father had
done, mainly over money. Finally he said,
"Parliaments are altogetherin my power . . ' As I
find the fruits of them good or evil, they are to
continue or not to be." Charles dissolved
Parliament.
Charles's need for money, however, forced him to
recall Parliament, but each time he did so, he
quarrelledwith it. !7hen he tried raising money
without Parliament, by borrowingfrom merchants,
bankersand landowning gentry, Parliament decid
to make Charles agreeto certain "parliamentary

13 Crown and Parliament

rights". It hoped Charles could not raise enough

money without its help, and in 1628 this happened.
In retum for the money he badly needed, Charles
promised that he would only raise money by Act of
Plia-ent, and that he would not imprison anyone
without lawful reason.
These rights, known as the Petition of Right,
established an important rule of government by
Parliament, because the king had now agreed that
Parliament controlled both state money, the
"national budget", and the law. Charles realised
..divine
at the Petition made nonsenseof a king's
right". He decided to prevent it being used by
dissolving Parliament the following year.
Charles surprised everyone by being able to rule
successfullywithout Parliament. He got rid of much
dishonesty that had begun in the Tudor period and
continued during his father'sreign. He was able to
balancehis budgetsand make administration
efflcient. Charles saw no reason to explain his
policy or method of government to anyone. By
1637 he was at the height of his power. His
authority seemedto be more completely accepted
than the authority of an English king had been for
centuries.It also seemedthat Parliament might
never meet again.

Religious disagreement
In 1637, however, Charles began to make serious
mistakes. These resulted from the religious situation
in Britain. His father, James, had been pleasedthat
the Anglican Church had bishops. They willingly
supportedhim as head of the English Church. And
he disliked the Presbyterian Kirk in Scotland
becauseit had no bishops. It was a more democratic
irutitution and this gave political as well as religious
power to the literate classesin Scotland. They had
given him a difficult time before he became king of
England in 1603.
There were also people in England, known as
Puritans,who, like the Scottish Presbyterians,
wanted'a democratcChurch. Queen Elizabeth had
been careful to prevent them from gaining power in
the Anglican Church. She even executed a few of
em for printing books against the bishops. In

1604, Puritans met Jamesto ask him to remove the

Anglican bishops to make the English Church
more like the Kirk, but he saw only danger for the
Crown. "A Scottish Presbytery agreesas well with
monarchy as God with the Devil," he remarked,
and sent them away with the words, "No bishop,
no king."
Charles sharedhis father'sdislike of Puritans. He
had married a French Catholic, and the marriage
was unpopular in Protestant Britain. Many MPs
were either Puritans or sympathised with them, and
many of the wealth-creating classeswere Puritan.
But Charles took no notice of popular feeling, and
he appointed an enemy of the Puritans, t07illiam
Laud, as Archbishop of Canterbury.
Archbishop Laud brought back into the Anglican
Church many Catholie practices. They were
extremely unpopulal. Anti-Catholic feeling had
been increasedby an event over thirty yearsearlier,
in 105. A small group of Catholics had been
caught trying to blow up the Houses of Parliament
with King Jamesinside. One of these men, Guy
Fawkes, was captured in the cellar under the
House. The escape of king and Parliament caught
people'simagination, and 5 November, the
anniversary,becme an occasion for celebration
with fireworks and bonfires.
Archbishop Laud tried to make the Scottish Kirk
accept the same organisation as the Church in
England. James I would have realised how
dangerousthis was, but his son, Charles, did not
because he had only lived in Scotland as an infant.
\07henLaud tried to introduce the new prayer book
in Scotland n 1637 the result was national
resistance to the introduction of bishops and what
Scots thought of as Catholicism.
In spring 1638 Charles faced a rebel Scottish army.
Without the help of Parliament he was only able to
put together an inexperienced army. It marched
north and found that the Scots had crossed the
border. Charles knew his arrny was unlikely to win
againstthe Scots. So he agreedto respectall
Scottish political and religiousfreedoms,and also
to pay a large sum of money to persuadethe Scots
to retum home.

(92 ,

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

It was impossible for Charles to find this money

except through Parliament. This gave it the chance
to end eleven yearsof absoluterule by Charles, and
to force him to rule under parliamentarycontrol. In
return for its help, Parliament made Charles accept
a new law which statedthat Parliament had to
meet at least once every three years.However' as
the months went by, it became increasinglyclear
that Charles was not wlling to keep his agreements.
..dvineright'', Charles
with Parliament. Ruling by
felt no need to accept its decisions.

Parliament, but events in Ireland resultedin civil

war. JamesI had continued Elizabeth'spolicy and
had colonised Ulster, the northem part of Ireland,

The area cantrolledby Parlianent anl, the hnghalfwa1 tlttough tv Cil

V/ar, 1642-1645.

mainly with farmersfrom the Scottish Lowlands.

The Catholic Irish were sent off the land, and even
those who had worked for Protestantsettlerswere
now repiacedby Protestantworkersfrom Scotland
and England.
In 1641, at a moment when Charles badly neededa
period of quiet, Ireland exploded in rebellion
againstthe ProtestantEnglish and Scottish settlers.
As many as 3,000 people, men, women and children, were killed, most of them in Ulster. In
London, Charles and Parliament quarrelledover
who should control an aTnyto defeat the rebels.
Many believed that Charles only wanted to raise an
army in order to dissolve Parliament by force and to
rule alone again. Charles's friendship towardsthe
Catholic Church increasedProtestantfears.
Already some of the Irish rebelsclaimed to be
rebelling againstthe English ProtestantParliament,

Parlianent met at \{lestmhtsterin 1640, detennied m limit Chnles I's

freedon ad to enslne that Parlianwnt uoull meet regthrly in futwe.
Because d rebellionsin Scotlanl anl. in I'relt'nd.,Chmles had m giuein n
Parliament's ulshto ouersee go|)efinlrnt

13 Crown and Parliament

'ad
u;

ltfiBY

o. ,On t

*iy::!!:*t'
The battle of Naebl in 1645 tnarl<edthefinal defeat of Charles I b1 Parlianvnt Charbs can be seen in front of his army Ceneral
Fairfax cornnantdrd,tlv Parlianwntnilrs, and his second.in-coflvnand, olc)erCromuell, conntanled the ght wing of the army

but not against the king. In 1642 Charles tried to

arrest five MPs in Parliament. Although he was
unsuccesful,it convinced Parliament and its
supportersall over England that they had good
reason to fear.
London locked its gates against the king, and
Charles moved to Nottingham, where he gathered
an army to defeat those MPs who opposed him.
The Civil War had started.Most people, both in
e country and in the towns, did not wish to be on
one side or the other. In fact, no more than 10 per
cent of the population became nvolved. But most
of the House of Lords and a few from the Commons
supportedCharles. The Royalists, known as
"Cavaliers", controlled most of the north and west.
But Parliament controlled East Anglia and the
southeast, including London. Its army at first
consisted of armed groups of London apprentices.
Their short hair gave the Parliamentaran soldiers
..Roundheads''.
eir popular name of

Unless the Royalists could win quickly it was

certain that Parliament would win in the end.
Parliament was supported by the navy, by most of
the merchants and by the population of London. It
therefore controlled the most important national
and intemational sources of wealth. The Royalists,
on the other hand, had no way of raising money.
By 1645 the Royalist army was unpaid, and as a
result soldierseither ran away, or stole from local
villages and farms. In the end they lost their
courage for the fight against the Parliamentarians,
and at Naseby in 1645 the Royalist arrny was finally
defeated.
Most people were happy that the war had ended.
Trade had been interrupted, and Parliament had
introduced new taxes to pay for the war. In many
places people had told both armies to stay away
from ther areas. They had had enough of
uncontrolled soldiers and of paying the cost of the
war.
/
(9t

L4 Republican and Restoration Britain

Republican Britain ' Catholicism, the Crown and the new

constitutionalmonarchy ' Scotlandand lreland ' Foreign relations

i Republican Britain
'

Se'ueralMPs had commandedthe Parliamentarian

army. Of these, the strongestwas an East Anglian
gentlemanfarmer named Oliver Cromwell. He had
created a new "model" army, the first regular force
from which the British army of today developed.
Insteadof country people or gentry, Cromwell
invited into his arfny educated men who wanted to
fight for their beliefs.
Cromwell and his advisers had captured the king n
1645, but they did not know what to do with him.
This was an entirely new.situation in English
history. Charles himself continued to encourage
rebellion againstParliament even after he had
surrenderedand had been imprisoned. He was able
to encourage the Scots to rebel against the
Parlamentarianarmy. After the Scots were
defeated some Puritan officers of the
Parliamentaranarmy demandedthe king's death
for treason.
The Parliamentarianleadersnow had a problem.
They could either bring Charles back to the throne
and allow hm to rule. or remove him and create a
new political system.By this time most people in
both Houses of Parliament aqd probably in the
country wanted the king back. They feared the
Parliamentarians and they feared the dangerous
behaviour of the army. But some aTnycommanders
were determined to get rid of the king. These men
were Puritans who belevedthey could build God's
kingdom in England.
Two-thirds of the MPs did not want to put the king
on trial. They were removed from Parliament by
92

k is said llzt Okqter Cramwell, wtth Pwitan humihtl , mld his paintcr,
Sanuel Coopo, to inchile the warts onhis face' But as well a lvnnilitl
CromwelJ also had a sobier's belief in authority. As a resuJthe wu
wtpopular as Inrd Protecw. He failed to perstnlc the English tlwt
repubhcan gouemnent wa bettsr than rnorwchl, moinly becausepeople han
lessfredon unn his autlwrtnranrulz t}wn t}vy hat uner Charles I.

the army, and the remaining fifty'three judged him

and found him guilty of making "war against his
kingdom and the Parliament''. on 31 January 149
King Charles was executed. It was a cold day and
he wore two shirts so that the crowd who came to
watch would not see him shiver and think him
frightened.

14 Republican and Restoration Britain

King Charles died bravely. As his head was cut

from his body the large crowd groaned. Perhaps the
execution was Charles's own greatestvictory,
becausemost people now realisedthat they did not
want Parliamentary rule, and were sorry that
Charles was not still kng.
From 149-160 Britain was a republic, but the
republic was not a success.Cromwell and his
friends created a govemment far more severe than
Charles's had been. They had got rid of the
monarchy, and they now got rid of the House of
Lords and the Anglican Church.
The Scots were shocked by Charles's execution.
They invited his son, whom they recognisedas
King Charles II, to join them and fight against
the English Parliamentary army. But they were
defeated, and young Charles himself was lucky to
escapeto France. Scotland was brought under
English republican rule.
Cromwell took an army to Ireland to punish the
Irish for the killing of Protestantsin 1641, and for
the continued Royalist rebellion there. He captured
two towns, Drogheda and Wexford. His soldiers
killed the inhabitants of both, about 6,000 people
in all. These killings were probably no worse than
the killings of Protestantsin 1641, but they
remained powerful symbols of English cruelty to the
Irish.
The army remained the most powerful force in the
land. Disagreementsbetween the army and
Parliament resultedin Parliament'sdissolution in
153. It was the behaviour of the army and the
dissolutionof Parliament that destroyedCromwell's
hopes. Many in the army held what were thought
to be strangebeliefs. A group called "Levellers"
waneda new equality among all men. They
wanted Parliament to meet every two years, and for
most men over the age of twenty-one to have the
right to elect MPs to it. They also wanted complete
religiousfreedom,which would have allowed the
many new Puritan groups to follow their religion in
the way they wished.

Two hundred years later, such demands were

thought of as basic citizens' rights. But in the
middle of the seventeenth century they,had little
popular support. Levellers in the army rebelled, but
their rebellion was defeated.
From 1653 Britain was govemed by Cromwell
alone. He became"Lord Protector", with far
greater powers than King Charles had had. His
efforts to govem the country through the army were
extremely unpopular, and the idea of using the
army to maintain law and order in the kingdom has
remained unpopular ever since. Cromwell's
government was unpopular for other reasons. For
example, people were forbidden to celebrate
Christmas and Easter, or to play gameson a
Sunday.
When Cromwell died in 1658, the Prorecrorare,as
his republican administrationwas called, collapsed.
Cromwell had hoped that his son, rather than
Parliament, would take over when he died. But
Richard Cromwell was not a good leader and the
aTnycommanders soon started to quarrel among
themselves.One of these decided to act. In 1660
he marched to London, arranged for free elections
and invited Charles II to return to his kingdom.
The republic was over.
ri7hen Charles II retumed to England as the
publicly acceptedking, the laws and Acts of
Cromwell's govemment were automatically
cancelled.
Charles managed his retum with skill. Although
Parliament was once more as weak as it had been in
the time of James I and Charles I, the new king was
careful to make peace with his father's enemies.
Only those who had been responsible for his
father'sexecution were punished. Many
Parliamentarianswere given positions of authority
or responsibility in the new monarchy. But
Parliament itself remained generallyweak. Charles
shared his father's belief in divine right. And he
greatlyadmired the magnificent, all-powerful,
absoluteruler of France. Louis XIV.

An illustrated History of Britain

meet freely. But Parliament was stronglyAnglican,

and would not allow this. Before the Civil War,
Puritans looked to Parliament for protection against
.the king. Now they hoped that the king would
protect them againstParliament.
Charles himself was attractedto the Catholic
Church. Parliament knew this and was always
afraid that Charles would become a Catholic. For
this reasonParliament passedthe Test Act in 173,
which preventedany Catholic from holding public
office. Fear of Charles's interestin the Catholic
Church and of the monarchy becoming too
powerulalso resultedin the first political parties in
Britain.
One of these partigyw?q a group of MPs who
rude name for cattle
became known us]:..|Whig,.]'\a
drivers. The Whigi w"uroia of an absolute
monarchy, and of the Catholic faith with which
they connected it. They also wanted to have no
regular or "standing" army. In spite of their fear of a
Catholic king, the Whigs-believedstrongly in
fleedo,q{.Because Charles and his
allowing$-l-rgrous.
wife ha io.t'iia'", the Whigs feared that the
Crown would go to Charles's Catholic brother,
James.They wanted to prevent this, but they were
undecided over who they did want as king.

,,neuer
did a wise one,,' was a
said a fnhsh thing, ruyr ec)e
Charles II, uho
welrome changefrom Crornwellian rule. Charles II klieued u snongll as
in thtediuhv ight of hngs, buthad tlv gcx:dsnse
lsfathn and,go'Iaer
to duoiddn openbretk utith Pmliarvnt. His reign.was catefree and rcIaxed,
a this prnnait sugges,quite differcnt ftan tht, morld su'gested inYan
D'1ck,s portrait of l|Lsfae (page 86).

Catholicism, the Crown and the

new constitutional monarchy
Charles hoped to make peace beweenthe different
religious groups. He wanted to allow Puritans and
Catholics who disliked the Anglican Church to
94

The Whigs were opposed by another group'

nicknamed "Tories", an Irish name for thieves. It is
dificultto give a simple defrnition of each party,
becausethey were loosely formed groups.Generally
speaking, however, the Tories upheld the authoritl
of the Crown and the Church, and were natural
..Royalist''position. The \7higs
inheritors of the
were not against the Crown, but they believed that
its authority depended upon the consent of
Parliament. As natural inheritors of the
"Parliamentarian" values of twenry years earlier,
they felt tolerant towards the new Protestant sects
which the Anglican Church so disliked. These two
parties, the Whigs and the Tories, became the basis
of Britain's two-partyparliainentarysystemof
government.
The struggle over Catholicism and the Crown
became a crisis when news was heard of a Catholic
plot to murder Charles and put his brother James

14 Republcan and Restoration Britan

on the throne. In fact the plan did not exist. The

story had been spreadas a clever trick to frighten
people and to make sure that James and the
Catholics did not come to power. The trick
worked. Parliament passedan Act forbidding any
Catholic to be a member of either the Commons or
the Lords. It was not successful,however. in
preventing James from inheriting the crown.
Charles would not allow any interference with his
brother'sdivine right to be king. Stuarts might give
in on mattersof policy, but never on mattersof
principle.
JamesII becameking after his brother'sdeath in
1685. The Tories and Anglicans were delighted,
but not for long. James had already shown his
dislike of Protestantswhile he had been Charles's
governor in Scotland. His soldiershad killed many
Presbyterian men, women and children. This
period is still rememberedin some parts of Scotland
..killing
as the
tmes''.
James then ned to remove the laws which stopped
Catholics from taking positions in govemment and
Parliament. He also tried to bring back the
Catholic Church, and allow it to exist besidethe
Anglican Church. Jamesalmost certainly believed
sincerelythat thswould result in many retuming to
the Catholic Church. But Parliament was very
anBry, particularly the Tories and Anglicans who
had supported him against the Whigs.
James tred to get rid of the Tory gentry who most
strongly opposed him. He removed three-quartersof
all JPs and replaced them with men of lower social
class. He tried to bring together the Catholics and
the Puritans, now usually called "Nonconformists"
becausethey would not agreewith or "conform" to
the Anglican Church.
In spite of their anger, Tories, tMhigs and
Anglicans did nothing because they could look
forward to the successonof James's daughter,
Mary. Mary was Protestant and married to the
Protestant ruler of Holland, William of Orange.
But this hope was destroyedwith the news in June
188 that James'sson had been bom. The Tories
and Anglicans now joined the Whigs in looking for
a Protesantrescue.

They invited William of Orange to invade Britain.

It was a dangerousthing for Willtam to do, but he
was already at war with France and he needed the
help of Britain's wealth and armed forces.At this
important moment James'sdeterminationfailed
him. It seemshe actually had some kind of mental
breakdown.
William entered London, but the crown was offered
only to Mary. William said he would leave Britain
unlesshe also became kng. Parlamenthad no
choice but to offer the crown to both William and
Mary.
However, while \Tilliam had obtained the crown,
Parliament had also won an important point. After
he had fled from England, Parliament had decided
that James II had lost his right to the crown. It
gave as its reason that he had tried to undermine
"the constitution of the kingdom by breaking the
original contract betweenKing and People." This
idea of a contract between ruler and ruled was not
entirely new. Since the restoration of Charles II in
160 there had been a number of theories about the
nature of govemment. In the 180s two of the
more important theorists, Algemon Sidney and
John Locke, had argued that govemment was based
upon the consent ofthe people, and that the
powers of the king must be strictly limited. The
logical conclusion of such ideas was that the
"consent of the people" was representedby
Parliament, and as a result Parliament, not the
king, should be the overall power in the state. In
1688 these theories were fulfilled.
Like the Civil War o 1642, the Glorious
Revolution, aS the political rsultsof the events of
188 were called, was completely unplanned and
unprepared for. It was hardly a revolution, more a
coup d,etatby the ruling class. Bu the fact that
Parliament made lTilliam king, not'by inheritance
'but
by their choice, was revolutionary. Parliament
was now beyond question more powerful than the
king, and would remain so. Its power over the
monarch was written into the Bill of Rights in
189. The king was now unable to raise taxes or
keep an army without the agreementof Parliament,
or to act against any MP for what he said or dd in
Parliament.

An lllustrated History of Britain

it
Scotland was still a separatekingdom, although

times to regain the crown. Even today, if a son or

or
daughter o th" monarch becomes a Catholic, he
she cannot inherit the throne'

now England's most dangerousEuropean enemy'

Scotland and Ireland

Neither Scotland,nor Ireland acceptedthe English
removal of Jamespeacefully.In Scotland Suppoters
of the Stuarts rebelled, but although they ,
successfullydefeated a government army' tnelr
Most
rebellion ended after the death of their leader'
still
of the rebelswere Highlanders' many of them
Catholic.

Act of Parliament. From that moment both

a
.o,rrr,ri", no longer had separateparliaments' and
,l"* p"rliu-ent of Great Britain, the new name of
howeverthe state, met for the first time' Scotland'
and
system'
kept its own separatelegal and ludicial
its own separateChurch'

,,No sunener'', the mottooi

P r o testntt s wit
Intnnterrl
siegen 1690 b1 the 9atholL
l'iit', t'as retnnjnedte mo.tn1
thz Ulster Pot2sffits to th :e
This P r oteswtt home disPla5s
crossedflagsof the Union of
Great Bitain anlNothem
Ireland and of Ukter

96

14 Republcan and Resrcration Britain

In Ireland the Catholicism of JamesII had raised

the hopes of those who had lost their lands to the
Protestant settlers. When he lost his throne in
England, James naturally thought that Ireland
would make a strong base from which to take back
his throne. In 1689 he landed in lreland, with
French support.

By the treaty of Utrecht n I? 13 France accepted

limits on its expansion, as well as a political
setement for Europe. It accepted Queen Anne
instead of James II's son as the true monarch of
Britain. In the war Britain had also won the rock of
Gibraltar, and could now control the entrance to
the Meditenanean.

In Dublin a Catholic parliament immediately

passedan Act taking away all the property of
Protestantsin lreland. But it was not so easyto
carry this out. Thirty thousand Protestants locked
themselves in the city of Londonderry (or "Derry"
as the Catholics continued to call it). James
encircled the city but the defendersrefused to
surrender. After fifteen weeks, English ships arrived
bringing fresh supplies and the strugglefor
Londonderrv was over. The battlecry of the
Protestants of Londonderry "No Surrender!" has
remained to this day the cry of Ulster
Protestantism.

The capture of foreign land was important for

Europe'seconomic development.At this stage
Britain had a smaller empire abroad than either
Spain or Holland. But it had greatervariety. On
the east coast of America, Britain controlled about
twelve colonies. Of far greaterinterestwere the
new possessionsin the lVest Indies, where sugar
was grown. Sugar became a crazefrom which
Britain has not yet recovered.

King William landed in Ireland in 1690, and

defeatedJames's army at the River Boyne. James
left Ireland for France a few days later, and never
retumed to any of his kingdoms. \Vith the battle of
the Boyne the Protestant victory was complete.

Foreign relations
During the seventeenth century Britain's main
enemieswere Spain, Holland and France. \Var with
Holland resulted from competition in trade. After
three wars in the middle of the century, when
Britain had achieved the trade position it wanted,
peacewas agreed,and Holland and Britain cooperatedagainstFrance.

The growing sugar economy of the West Indies

increasedthe demand for slaves. By 1645, fot
example, there were 40,000 white settlersand
6,000 negro slavesin Barbados.By 1685 the
balance had changed, with only 20,000 white
settlersbut 46,000 slaves.The sugarimportersused
their great influence to make sure that the
govemment did not stop slavery.
During this time Britain also established its first
trading settlements in India, on both the west and
easrcoasts.The East India Company did not
nterferein Indian politics. Its interestwas only in
trade. A hundred yearslater, however, competition
with France resulted in direct efforts to control
Indian politics, either by alliance or by the
conquest of Indian princely states.

At the end of the century Britain went to war

againstFrance. This was partly becauseWilliam of
Orange brought Britan into the Dutch Struggle
with the French. But Britain also wanted to limit
French power, which had been growing under Louis
XIV. Under the duke of Marlborough, the British
affny won several important victories over the
French at Blenheim (on the Danube), Ramillies,
Oudenarde and Malplaquet (in the Netherlands).
9?

Lie and thought

The rec)olutionin thought' Life and work in theStuart age' Family

lrf"

The political revolution during the Stuart age could

not have happened if there had not been a
revolution in thought. This influencednot only
politics, but also religionand science.By 1714
people's ideas and beliefs had changed enormously.
The real Protestantrevolution did not, in fact,
happen until the seventeenth century, when several
new religious groups appeared. But there were also
exciting new scientific ideas, quite separatefrom
these new beliefs. For the first time it was
reasonable to argue that everything in the universe
had a natural explanation, and this led to a new
self-confidence.
Another reason for this self-confldencewas the
change in Britain's intemational positon during
the century. In 103, in spite of the Armada
victory of 1588 and n spite of the union of England
and Scotland under one sovereign,Britain was still
considered less important than France, Spain and
the Holy Roman Empire. But by I7I4 the success
of its armies against France had made Britain a
leading European power. At the same time Britain
had so many new colonies that it was now in
competition with earlier colonial nations, Spain,
Portugal and the Netherlands.

The revolution in thought

The influence of Puritanism increased greatly
during the seventeenth century, particularly among
the merchant class and lessergentry. It was the
Puritans who persuadedJames I to permit a new
official (,.authorsed'')
translationof the Bible. It
was published in 1611. This beautiful translation
98

A Qual<er rneetingoldressed $ a wotr,an. Qual,crs ha a ruunber d stril<ing

ideas, far exampb, t]lat a]l rnen and wo'nenweTeequal. The Qual<a
.,peace
mo|)erantbegan ning tlw Ciqlil War, ant in 166 1 it adnpud t}le
pftVjpb,' , the idea t]ut all wa was |)nong, Since t}vn Qual<ershaue been
pacifist.

was a greatwork of English literature,and it

encouraged Bible reading among all those who
could read. Although the Bible was read most by
merchants and lessergentry, many literate labourers
began to read it too. Some of them understood the
Bible in a new and revolutionary way. As a result,
by the middle years of the seventeenth century
Puritanism had led to the formation of a large
number of small new religiousgroups,or "sects",
including the "Levellers".

15 Life and thought

Most of these Nonconformist sects lasted only a few

years, but two are important, the Baptists and the
Quakers. In spite of opposition in the seventeenth
century, both sectshave survived and have had an
important effect on the life of the nation. The
Quakers became particularly famous for their
reforming social work in the eighteenth century.
These sects brought hope to many of the poor and
the powerless. Social reform and the later growth of
trade unionism both owed much to
Nonconformism. In spite of their good work,
however, the Nonconformists continued to be
disliked by the ruling class until the end of the
nineteenth century.
The Anglican Church, unlike the Nonconformist
churches, was strongpolitically, but it became
weaker intellectually. The great religiouswritersof
the period, John Bunyan, who wrote The Pilgrim's
Progress,and John Milton, who wrote ParadiseLost,
were both Puritan.
For some Nonconformists, the oppositiop to their
beliefs was too great to bear. They left Britain to
live a free tife in the new found land of America. [n
1620, the "Pilgrim Fathers" sailed in a ship called
the Mayflnwer to Massachusetts.Catholic families
settled in Maryland for the same reasons. But most
of the 400,000 or so who left England were young
men without families, who did so for economic and
not religiouS SoflS; They wanted the chance to
start a new life. At the same time there were other
people coming in from abroad to live in Britain.
Cromwell allowedJews to settle again, the first Jews
since the earlier community had been expelled 350
yearsearlier. And after 1685 many French
Protestants, known as Huguenots, escapedfrom
Louis XIV's persecutionand settled in Britain.
The revolutonin religiousthinking was happening
at the same time as a revolution in scientific
thinking. Careful study of the natural world led to
important new discoveries.
It was not the first time that the people of Britain
had taken a lead in scientific matters. Almost a
thosandyearsearlier, the English monk and
historian, Bede, had arguedthat the earth stood
still, fixed in space, and was surrounded by seven

heavens. This, of course' was not coTect'but no

'In
one doubted him for centuries. the twelfth
century, during the reign of Henry I, another
English scientist had gained European fame. He was
Adelard of Bath, and he played a large part in the
revolution in scientific thinking at the time. He
knew that the Church considered his ideas
dangerous."I do not want to claim," he wrote,
"that God is less than all-powerful. But nature has
its own pattems and order, and we should listen to
those who have leamt somethingof it."
In the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries
English scientists,most of them at the University of
Oxford, had led Europe. Friar Roger Bacon, one of
the more famous of them, had experimented with
light, heat and magnetism.Another, William of
Ockham, had studiedfalling objects.Anorher,
William Marlee, had been one of the first to keep a
careful record of the weather. Chaucer himself
wrote a book to teach his son how to use an .
astrolabe. At the same time, the practical effects of
such curiosity were seen in new machinery, water
mills, gearedwheels and lathes.
But the seventeenth century saw the development
of scientific thinking on an entirely new scale. The
new mood had been establishedat rhe very
beginning of the century by a remarkable man,
Francis Bacon. He becameJamesI's Lord
Chancellor, but he was better known for his work
on scientific method. Every scientific idea, he
argued,must be testedby experiment.With idea
and experiment following one after the other,
eventually the whole natural world would be
understood.In the rest of the century British
scientistsput these ideas into practice. The British
have remained at the front of experiment and
researchever since.
In 128 William Harvey discoveredthe circulation
of blood and this led to great advances in
medicine and in the study of the human body. The
scientists Robert Boyle and Robert Hooke used
Harvey's methodswhen they made discoveriesin
the chemistry and mechanics of breathing.
These scientiflc studieswere encouragedby the
Stuarts. The Royal Society, founded by the Stuart
99

rAn Illustrated History of Britain

monarchy, became an important centre where

thinkers could meet, argue,enquire and share
information. Charles II, a strong supporterof its
work, gave the Royal Society firm direction "to
examine all systems,theories,principles . . .
elements,histories and experimentsof things
natural, mathematicaland mechanical".
In 1666 the Cambridge Professorof Mathematics,
Sir IsaacNewton, began to study gravity,
publishing his important discovery in 1684. In 187
he published Principia, on "the mathematical
principles of natural philosophy", perhapsthe
greatestbook in the history o science. Newton's
work remained the basisof physics until Einstein's
discoveriesin the twentieth century. Newton's
importance as a "founding father" of modem
science was recognisedin his own tme,and
Alexander Pope, a leading poet of the day, summed
it up neatly:

.e.rrt srurra*lr.'
The Royal observato) dt Greenwich was fowtlcd fu Charles II , who had a
great hrl"elestin scientific naeters' ()n the left a qdrant is bengused, larger
but similn n thaseuedfrrr twvigation an ocean.gongships. ()n tlle right an
the heaven$ bodies
extremel1long telescopeis being used'to obsecJe

100

Nature, and Nature's laws lay hid in night:

God said, LetNewtonbe! and all was light.
Newton had been encouragedand financed by his
friend, Edmund Halley, who is mostly remembered
for tracking a comet (Halley's Comet) in 1682.
There was at that time a greatdeal of interest in
astronomy.The discoveryof the geometric
movement of starsand planets destroyedold beliefs
in astrologyand magc.Everything, it seemed,had
a natural explanation.
It was no accident that the greatestBritish architect
of the time, Christopher Wren, was also Professor
of Astronomy at Oxford. In 166, following a year
o terrible plague, a fire destroyedmost of the city
of London. Eighty-sevenchurches, including the
greatmedieval cathedral of St Paul, were destroyed.
'Wren was orderedto rebuild them in the modern
style, which he did with skill.

1,5 Lrfe and thought

.,,.**_*,*_,

Wen London was rebuilt, a new low made swe that all buildings were mnle
d brckor snne, The jewel of the rlew city was the neu cathed,ral,dcsigvd
by Sir Clristopher Wren. Alrnost every clvnch in the new city was ako
Jesigledbl Wren, or bJ his able assistant, Nicholrs Hawl<smoryr Ahhough
wne buiHings were pulled dawn and othersbuih dwing the next 250 years,
e city on$ changed significmtly in the rebuihing that follawed' ttv Secmd
WcrAWar.

As a result of the rapid spreadof literacy and the

improverqentin printing techniques,the first
newspapersappearedin the seventeenthcentury.
They were a new way of spreading all kinds of
ideas,scientiflc, religiousand literary. Many of
them included advertisements.In 1660 Charles II
advertisedfor his lost dog.

Life and work in the Stuart age

The situation for the poor improved in the second
half of the seventeenthcentury. Prices fell
comparedwith wages,and fewer people askedfor
help from the parish. But it was the middle groups
rvho continued to do well. Many who startedlife as

yeoman farmers or traders became minor gentry or

merchants. Part of their successresultedfrom a
strong interest in farming improvements,which
could now be studied in the many new books on
the subject.
By the middle of the century hegovernmenthad
alreadybegun to control the traclein cerealsto
make sure that merchantsdid not export these
while Britain still needed them. However, by 1670
Britain was able to export cerealsto Europe, where
living conditions, particularlyfor the poor, were
much worse than in Britain. This was parrly the
resultof the Thirty YearsWar, 1618-48, which
had badly damagedEuropean agriculture.
101

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

rcz

15 Life and thought

Trade within Britain itself changed enormouslyin

the seventeenthcentury. The differentregions
became less economically separatefrom each other.
No place in Britain was more than sevenry-five
miles from the sea, and by 1690 few placeswere
more than twenty miles from a river or canal.
These waterwaysbecame important means of
transport,allowing each region to develop its own
special produce. Kent, for example, grew more fruit
and vegetablesto export to other regions,and
becameknown as "the gardenof England".
Improvedtransportresultedin a change in buying
and selling. Most towns did not have shops before
the seventeenthcentury. They had market days
when farmers and manufacturerssold their produce
in the town squareor marketplace.By 1690,
however, most towns also had proper shops.
Shopkeeperstravelled around the country to buy
goodsfor their shops, which were new and exciting
and drew people from the country to see them.
Towns which had shops grew larger,while smaller
towns without shops remained no more than
villages.

Ticltboe Dole,' , a late seq)enteenth.cenufi)pictl'|e,shous a

:npshife lartdnwrwr, his amilJ, senJlnts
ana fam tenants lt shows the
-he
ur n rlhich dressdiffered arcoiling a clnssanl occupation. One of the
]nl's on the left is black, while there sa Quaker woman (holding a bab1)
n,:ng t}u fanning peopb on the rght

London remained far larger than any other town,

with more than 500,000peopleby 15O.It
controlled almost all the sea rrade with other
countries.The next largestcities, Norwich,
Newcastle and Bristol, had only 25,000 each.
(London's great plague of 1665 killed 8,000 people
in only six months, almost equal to the total
population of these three cities.) After the fire of
1, the richer citizens for the first time had water
suppliedto their houses,through specially made
wooden pipes. The city streetshad trafficjams just
as bad as today's,and the noise was probably far
worse, with the sound of iron-tyredwheels and the
hammering of craftsmen.
In London there was a new class of rich
..aristocrats'',
most owhom belongedto the
nobility, but not all. Money could buy a high
position in British society more easily than in
Europe. After 1650 the rich began to meer in the
new coffeehouses,which quickly became the
meeting placesor conversationand politics.

r03

r
An Illustrated History of Britain

Coffeehouses becanw very popular at the end of the seuenteenthcena.LJ'

and remained so far murh of the eighteenthcentwl. \X4'ik coffeehowes
uere aisited only by men, their uirtes itrcreuingJl held tea partiesat hane.
Tea drinking, and t}w special utetuk necessar)fot this, became very popub
omong the weahhl. At frst tea was malz in silver teapotsand was drunk
frombowk withouthandles.In the seconl.hnlfof the centw) chhapots
rephed siluer ones, ui, tedf,upseplrced bowk These teorups sat in
salrcers,the little dshesthat were ncrrmallyused fctr howing srutes

Some of the old nobility, however, did not accept

the new rich as equals.While new Stuart yeomen
wanted to be gentry, descendantsof the older
Tudor gentry startedto call themselves"squires",
the ruling class of the countryside.They did not
wish to be confusedwith the new gentry.
The squiresand JPs governedlocally during
Cromwell's Protectorate,and continued to do so
afterwards.They had the power to tax for local
purposes,to call out soldiersand to try most
criminals. They had the same interestsas the
government,and were thereforeusuallywilling to
104

pay taxes.As one gentlemansaid in 1625, "we

must not give an example of disobedienceto those
beneath us".
While the rich of London visited the coffeehouses,
the ordinary people went to the drinking houses,
called "alehouses",in town and country. These
soon became the centre of popular culture, where
news and ideascould be passedon. By the end of
the century the govemment had secret informers
watchngthe alehousesand listening for rebellious
talk.

15 Leand thought

Family life
After the rapid increase in population in the Tudor
century, the number of births began to fall in the
Stuart age. In 1600 Britain and Ireland had a total
population of million. Although it increasedto
7.7 million by 150, the rate then startedto fall.
No one is quite sure why the population either rose
so rapidly in the Tudor age' or steadiedduring the
seventeenthcentury.
One reason for the smaller number of births was
that people married later than anywhere else tn
Europe. Most people married in their mid twenties,
and by the end of the century the average age of
first marriageswas even older, at twenty'seven'
This, of course,meant that women had fewer
babies.Some women tredto control the size of
their families by breast-feedingbabiesfor as long as
possible.It also seemsthat more men remained
unmarried than before. But the pattern of
population growth and human behaviour remains
puzzling.A study of south Wales, for example,
shows that one in three of all heads of gentry
families remained unmarried at the end of the
seventeenthcentury. A century earlier, hardly any
headsof gentry families in the area had remained
unmarried. There is uncertainty as to why this
should have been.

mind, body and soul. Absolute obediencewas

expected. Disobedience was considered an act
againstGod as well as the head of the house.
One result of this increase in the father's authority
was that from the early seventeenth century
children were frequentlybeaten to break their
"sinful" will. The child who was not beaten was
unusual. William Penn, the Quaker who founded
the colony of Pennsylvania in north America,
advisedparentsto "love them [their children] with
wisdom, correct them with affection, never strike
in passion, and suit the correctionsto their agesas
well as their fault." It is unlikely his advice was
acceptedexcept among the Quaker sect, which
rejectedall violence. Another result was the loss of
legal rights by women over whatever property they
had brought into a marriage.
However, the Protestantreligion also gave new
importanceto the individual, especiallyin
PresbyterianScotland. Many Scottish women were
not afraid to stand up to both their husbands and
the government on matters of personal belief. In
fact manv of those who chose to die for their beliefs
during Scotland's "killing times" were women. This
selconfidence was almost certainly a result of
greatereducation and religiousdemocracyin
Scotland at this time.

By the end of the sixteenth century there were

already signs that the authority of the husband was
increasing. This resulted from the weakening of
wider family ti.es.Furthermore,just as the power of
the monarch became more absolute during the
sixteenth and early seventeenthcenturies,so also
did thnt of the husband and father. But while the
power of the monarchy was brought under control,
the authority of the head of the family continued to
grow.
This power partly resulted from the increasing
authority of the Church following the Reformation.
The Protestants believed that personal faith was
important, and put extra responsibilityon the head
of the family for its spiritual welfare. The father
alwaysled daily family prayersand Bible reading. In,
some ways he had taken the place of the priest. As
a result,his wife and children belongedto him,
105

century
The eg[rteenth
The political world

Politicsand finance , Wilkes and liberty, Raicalismand the lossof

theAmerican colonies' lreland' Scotland

Well beorethe end of the eighteenth century

Britain was as powerulas France. This resulted
from the growth of its industries and from the
wealth of its largenew trading empire, part of
which had been captured from the French. Britain
now had the strongestnavy n the world; the navy
controlled Britain's own trade routes and
endangeredthose of its enemies.It was the
deliberatepolicy of the govemment to create this
trading empire, and to protect it with a strong
navy. This was made possible by the way in which
governmenthad developedduring the eighteenth
century.
For the first time, it was the king's ministerswho
were the real policy and decision-makers.Power
now belonged to the groups from which the
rninisters came, and their supportersin Parliament.
These ministers ruled over a country which had
becomewealthy through trade. This wealth, or
"capital", made possibleboth an agriculturaland an
industrial revolution which made Britain the most
advanqed economy in the world.
However, there was an enormous price to pay'
becausewhile a few people became richer, many
others lost their lancl, their homes and their way of
life. Families were driven off the land in another
period of enclosures. They became the working
Tlv pnrt of Bistol in the eighteenthcentwl. Intemational trade became the
fusis-of Bain's se to uorld greamessdwng thecenntry. Brianhad the
estsfups u ako the guns m farce its ll where trafu alone did not
sr,tcee. Bristolbecane the secondbgest city after klndan eail1 n the
centw1, based,on the uiangular troe: British.nale goodsto West Africa,
west frran shue.sto tlre Netl Wtyrl, andNew.\X/ora sugar, cotton and
mbacco toBiuin

"proletariat" of the cities that made Britain's trade

and industrial empire of the nineteenth century
possible.The invention of machinery destroyedthe
old "cottage industries"and createdfactories.The
development of industry led to the sudden growth
of cities like Birmingham, Glasgow, Manchester
and Liverpool and other centres in the north
Midlands.
None of this could have happenedwithout great
danger to the established order. In France the
misery of the poor and the power of the trading
classesled to revolution in 1789. The British
govemment was afraid of dangerousrevolutionary
ideas spreading from France to the discontented in
Britain. In fact, Britain ended the century fighting
againstthe greatFrench leader,Napoleon
Bonaparte, and eventually defeatinghim. In this
way, perhaps,many who might have been
discntented were more concemed with the defeat
of Napoleon. Revolution was still a possibility,but
Britan was savedpartly by the high level of local
control of the ruling class in the countryside and
partly by Methodism, a new religiousmovement
which offered hope and self-respectto the new
proletariat.Methodism was careful to deal only
with heavenly matters. It did not questionpolitical
or social injusticeson earth.

Politics and finance

When Queen Anne, the last of the Stuarts, died in
I714, t was not entirely certain that the Protestant
ruler of Hanover, George, would become king.
There were some Tories who wanted the deposed
107

F
An Illustrated History of Britain

JamesII's son to retum to Britain as JamesIII. If he

had given up Catholicism and acceptedthe
Anglican religion he probablywould have been
crownedJamesIII. But like other membersof his
family, Jameswas unwilling to change his mind,
and he would not give up his religion. Nor would
he give up hs claim to the throne, so he tried to
win it by force.
In 1715 he starteda rebeilion againstGeorge I,
who had by this time arrived from Hanover. But
the rebellion was a disaster,and George'sarmy had
little difficulty in defeating the English and Scottish
"Jacobites",as Stuart supporterswere known.
Becauseof the Tory connection with the Jacobites,
King George allowed the \i7higs to form his
government.
Govemment power was increasedbecausethe new
king spoke only German, and did not seem very
interestedin his new kingdom. Among the king's
ministerswas RobrtWalpole, who remained the
greatestpolitical leaderfor over twenty years.He is
consideredBritain's first Prime Minister.
Walpole came to power as a result of his financial
ability. At the end of the seventeenthcentury the
government had been forced to borrow money in
order to pay for the war with France. There was
nothing new about this, except that becauseof the
war the govemment'sborrowing increased
enormously.In 1694, a group of financierswho lent
to the govemment decided to establisha bank, and
the governmentagreedto borrow from it alone.
The new bank, called the Bank of England, had
authority to raise money by printing "bank notes".
This was not an entirely new idea. For hundreds of
years bankers and money dealers had been able to
give people "promisorynotes" signedby
themselves.These could be handed on as payment
to a third or fourth person. This way of making
trade easier had been made lawful during the reign
of Henry I, six hundred yearsearlier. The cheques
we use today developedfrom thesepromisorynotes.
At a time when many people had money to invest,
there was popular interest in financial matters.
People wanted oinvesmoney in some of the
trading companiesdoing businessin the West
108

Indies, the East Indies or in other newly developirg

areas.The possibility of high profirs,and the
excitement this possibility caused,made the cost
a share in these trading adventuresexpensive.In
1720 the South Sea Company offered to pay off re
government'snational debt if it was given
monopoly rights to trading in the South Seas. It
raisedmoney by selling shareswhich quickly rose in
value with the increasingexcitement. When
people'sconfidencein the South Sea Company
suddenlyfell, so did the price of shares,and
thousandsof people who had invested their monellost'everything.Robert Walpole was able to bring
back public confidence.He made sure that
something lke the ..South Sea Bubble'' could not
happen again. This was the first step in making
companiesresponsibleto the public for the mone)which they borrowedby the sale of shares.
In the other countries of Europe kings and queens
had absolutepower. Britain was unusual, and
l7alpole was determined to keep the Crown under
the firm control of Parliament. He knew that with
the new German monarchy this was more possible
than it had been before.
\07alpoleskilfully developed the idea that
governmentministersshould work togetherln a
small group, which was called the "Cabinet". He
introduced the idea that any minister who disagreoJ
deeply with other Cabinet ministerswas expected
to resign. From this bascidea grew another
important rule in British politics: that all members
of the Cabinet were togetherresponsiblefor policy
decisions.Walpole built on the political resultsof
the Glorious Revolution of 1688. It was he who
made sure that the power of the king would always
be limited by the constitution.
The limits to monarchy were these:the king could
not be a Catholic; the king could not remove or
change laws;the king was dependenton Parliament
for his financial income and for his army. The king
was supposedto "choose" his ministers.Even today
the governmentof Britain is "Her Majesty's
Govemment". But in fact the ministersbelongedas
much to Parliament as they did to the king.

16 The poltical world

Walpole wanted to avoid war and to increase taxes

so that the government could pay back everything
it had bonowed, and get rid of the national debt.
He put taxes on luxury goods, such as tea, coffee
and chocolate, all of which were drunk by the rich,
and were brought to Britain from its new colonies
by wealthy traders. Tea had become a national
drink by 1700, when 50,000 kg were alreadybeing
imported each year. Walpole raisedthe
govemment'sincome, but this had little effect on
the national debt, and he became very unpopular.
The most important of Walpole's political enemies
was William Pitt "the Elder", later Lord Chatham.
Chatham wanted Britain to be economically strong
in the world, and he agreedwith Daniel Defoe, the
author of RobinsonCrusoe, who had written in
1728, "Trade is the wealth of the world. Trade
makes the difference between rich and poor,
betweenone nation and another." But trade also
involved competition. Chatham had studiedFrench
trade and industry, and he was certain that Britain
must beat France in the race for an overseastrade
empire.
ln 1733 France made an alliance with Spain.
Chatham fearedthat this alliance would give
France a trade advantage over Britain through freer
tradepossibilitieswith the Spanish Empire in South
America and the Far East. England had been trying
unsuccessfullyto develop trade with the Spanish
Empire since the days of Drake. Once Chatham was
in the govemment, he decided to make the British
navy stronger than that of France or any other
nation. He also decided to take over as many as
possibleof France'strading posrcabroad.
War with France broke out n 756. Britain had
already been involved in a war against France, from
1743 to 1748, conceming control of the Austrian
Empire. However, this time Chatham left Britain's
a[y, Prussia,to do most of the fighting in Europe.
He directed British effort at destroying French
trade. The navy stoppedFrench ships reaching or
leaving French ports.
The war against France's trade went on all over the
world. In Canada, the British took Quebec n 1759
and Montreal the following year. This gave the

British control of the important fish, fur and wood

trades. Meanwhile the French navy was destroyed
in a battle near the coast of Spain. In India, the
army of the British East India Company defeated
French armies both in Bengal, and in the south
near Madras, destroying French trade interests.
Many Indian princes allied themselves with one
side or the other. In defeating France, Britain
eventually went on to conffol most o India by
conquest or treaty with the princes. Many Britons
started to go to India to make their fortune. Unlike
previous British traders, they had tittle respect for
lndian people or for their culture. So, while India
became the "jewel in the Crown" ef Britain's
foreign possessions,British- Indian relations slowly
went sour.
Meanwhile, n 1759, Britain was drunk with
victory. "One is forced to ask every morning what
victory there is for fear of missing one," an
Englishman said at the time. British pride had
alreadybeen noticed by a Swiss visitor tn 1777.
The British have a very high opinion of
themselves,he wrote, and they "think nothing is as
well done elsewhereas in their own country".
British pride was expressedin a national song
written in I747: "Rule Britannia, Britannia rule the
waves, Britons never never never shall be slaves."
But a new king, George III, came to the throne in
170. He did not wish Chatham to continue an
expensivewar. In 1763 George III made peace with
France. Britain did this without informing Prussia,
which was left to fight France alone.
For the rest of the century, Britain's international
trade increased rapidly. By the end of the century
the \07estIndies were the most profitable part of
Britan'snew empire. They formed one comer of a
profitabletrade triangle. British-madeknives,
swords and cloth were taken to !7est Africa and
exchanged for slaves. These were taken to the West
Indies, and the ships retumed to Britain carrying
sugarwhich had been grown by slaves.Britain's
colonies were an important marketplace in which
the British sold the goods they produced, from the
eighteenth century until the end of the empire in
the tweniethcentury.

r09

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

An East India ComPdn'J officL:wthhis escortof lncally recruit::

soldiers Inlndiathe dficiak o'
the East India ComPanJ nlite
public fortunes fcn Brinin, and
private fortunes for themselves
Man1, houever,didnot surui:
the effects of heat u disease
On the uhob Indian society
arcepted,,
] olm Compv,', es
thp Eost Inia CompdnJ was
bcal\ known, n both trule aru
warfare as just another elcmenr
in a complicated culatral scene
India wa used to nuaersIc
was only in the ninetpenth
centwy that Indians begon to
harc the ua1 the Btish extpnfu:
their control ouer all India anl
the uay that tfu Bitish teated
them.

Wilkes and liberty

George III was the flrst Hanoverian to be bom in
Britain. Unlike his father and grandfatherhe had
no interest in Hanover. He wanted to take a more
active part in governing Britain, and in particular
he wished to be free to choose his own ministers.
As long as he worked with the small number of
aristocratsfrom which the king's ministerswere
chosen, and who controlled Parliament, it did not
seemas if he would have much difflculty.
Parliament still representedonly a very small
number of people. In the eighteenth century only
house ownerswith a certain income had the right
to Vote. This was basedon ownershpof land worth
forty shillings a year in the counties, but the
amount varied from town to town. As a result,
while the mid-centurypopulation of Britain was
almost eight million, there were fewer than
250,000voters,160,000of them in the counties
and 85,000 in the towns or "boroughs".Only 55 of
the 200 boroughshad more than 500 voters. The
others were controlled by a small number of very
rich propertyowners, sometimesacting togetheras
a "borough corporation". Each county and each
borough sent two representativesto Parliament.
110

This meant that bargainscould be made between

the two most powerful groupsof people in each
..constituency'',allowngthe chosen representative
of each group to be returned to Parliament.
It was not difficult for rich and powerful people
either in the boroughsor in the counties to make
sure that the man they wanted was elected to
Parliament. In the countryside,most ordinary
landownersalso held land as tenantsfrom the
greaterlandowners.At that time voting was not
done in secret' and no tenant would Vote aganst
the wishesof hs landlord in case he lost his land.
Other voters were frightenedinto voting for the
"right man", or persuadedby a gift of money. In
thsway the great landowning aristocratswere able
to control those who sat in Parliament, and make
sure that MPs did what they wanted. Politics was a
matter only for a small number of the gentry who
had close connectonswith this political
aristocracy.No one could describeParliament in
thosedaysas democraric.
However, there was one MP, John !7ilkes, who
saw things differently.Wilkes was a Wirig, and did
not like the new govemment of George III. Unlike
almost every other MP, Wilkes also believed that

An Illustrated History of Britain

The Bostan T eaparty, 1773,

wa orc d thefanous euents
badngto open rebeilionb7 t|v
Americtn coloniss It was a
protest agahtstBritish axatinn
andBtishmonopokes on
impclrs. Anlecan colonists,
dressedas twtiqle Amecans,
tLrew a shiploadof tea into the
harbow rather tlvn pay tax ur

landowning gentry. Newspaperswere allowed to

send their own reportersto listen to Parliament and
write about irs discussionsin the newspapers.The
age of public opinion had arrived.

Radicalism and the loss of the

American colonies
In 1764 there was a seriousquarrel over taxation
beweenthe British govemment and its colonies in
America. It was a perfect example of the kind of
freedom for which Wilkes had been fighting. The
British government continued to think of the
colonists as British subjects.In 1700 there had been
only 200,000 colonists, but by 1770 there wereZ.5
million. Such largenumbersneeded to be dealt
with carefully.
Some American colonists decided that it was not
lawful for the British to tax them without their
agreement.Political opinion in Britain was divided.
Some felt that the tax was fair because the money
would be used to pay for the defence of the
American colonies againstFrench attack. But
severalimportant politicians, including Wilkes and
Chatham, agreedwith the colonists rhat there
should be "no taxation without representation".
IN

In I7?3 a group of colonstsat the port of Boston

threw a shipload of tea into the sea rather than pay
tax on it. The event became known as "the Boston
Teaparty". The British govemment answeredby
closing the port. But the colonists then decided to
prevent British goodsfrom entering America until
the port was opened again. This was rebellion, and
the govemment decided to defeat it by force. The
American War of Independencehad begun.
The war in America lastedfrom 1775 until 1783.
The govemment had no respectfor the politics of
the colonists, and the British army had no respect
for their fighting ability. The result was a disastrous
defeat for the British govemment. It lost everything
except for Canada.
Many British politicians openly supportedthe
colonists. They were called "radicals". For the frrst
time British politicians supportedthe rights of the
king's subjects abroad to govem themselves and to
fight for their rights against the king. The war in
America gave strength to the new ideas of
democracy and of independence.
Two of the more important radicals were Edmund
Burke and Tom Paine. Paine was the first to suggest
that the American colonists should become

16 The political world

independentof Britain. Burke,.'whohimself held a

mixture of both radical and conservative views,
argued that the king and his advisers were once
again too powerful, and that Parliament needed to
get back proper control of PolicY.

Ireland
|amesII's defeatby William of Orange in 190 had
severe and long-term effects on the Irish people.
Over the next half century the Protestant
parliament in Dublin passedlaws to prevent the
Catholics from taking any part in national life.
Catholics could not become members of the Dublin
parliament, and could not vote in parliamentary
elections.No Catholic could become a lawyer, go
to univqrsity, join the navy or accept any public
post. Catholics were not even allowed to own a
horse worth more than 15. It was impossible for
Catholics to have their children educatedaccording
to their religion, because Catholic schools were
forbidden. Although there were still far more
Catholics than Protestants, they had now become
second-classcitizens in their own land.
New laws were passedwhich divided Catholic
families. The son of Catholic parentswho became
Protestantcould take over his parents'propertyand
use it as he wanted. These actions put the Irish
Catholic population in the same position as other
colonised peopleslater on. Hatred berweenthe
ruling Protestant settlers and the ruled Catholic
Irish was unavoidable.
By the 1770s,however, life had become easierand
some of the worst laws against Catholics were
removed. But not everyone wanted to give the
Catholics more freedom,In Ulster, the northem
part of Ireland, Protestants formed the first "Orange
Lodges", societieswhich were againstany freedom
for the Catholics.
In order to increaseBritish control Ireland was
united with Britain in 1801, and the Dublin
parliament closed. The United Kingdom of Great
Britain gnd Ireland lastedfor 120 years.Politicians
had promisedIrish leadersthat when Ireland
becamepart of Britain the Catholics would get

equal voting opportunities.But George IIll

supported by most Tories and by many Protestant
Irish landlords, refrrsedto let this happen.

Scotland
Scotland also sufferedfrom the efforts of the Stuarts
to win back the throne. The first "Jacobite" revolt
to win the crown for JamesII's son, in 1715, had
been unsuccessful.The Stuarts tried again n 1745,
when James II's grandson, Prince Charles Edward
Stuart, better known as "Bonny Prince Charlie'1,
landed on the west coast of Scotland. He persuaded
some clan chiefs to join him. Many of these chiefs.
had great dificulty persuading the men in their
clans to join the revolt. Some were told their
homes would be bumt if they did not fight. Most
clans did not join the rebellion, and nor did the
men of the Scottish Lowlands.
Bonny Prince Charlie was more successfulat first
than anyone could have imagined. Hs army of
Highlanders entered Edinburgh and defeated an'
English army in a surprise atnck. Then he marched
south. Panc spread through England, because
much of the British atrny was in Europe fighting the
French. But successfor Bonny Prince Charlie
depended on Englishmen also joining his army.
When the Highland army was over halfway to
London, however, it was clear that few of the
English would join him, and the Highlanders
themselves were unhappy at being so far from
home. The rebels moved back to Scotland. Early in
1746 they were defeated by the British army
at Culloden, near Invemess. The rebellion was
finished.
The English army behaved with cruelty. Many
Highlanders were killed, even those who had not
joined the rebellion. Others were sent to work in
America. Their homes were degtroyed,and their
farm animals killed. The fear of the Highland
danger was so great that a law was passedforbidding
Highlanders to wear their traditional skirt, the kilt.
The old pattems of the kilt, called tartans' and the
Scottish musical instrument, the bagpipe,were also
forbidden. Some did not obey this law, and were
shot.

r13

T 7 Lie in town and country

Townlife' The rich' The countryside' Fomilylife

Town life
In 1700 England and Wales had a population of
about5.5 million. This had increasedvery little by
1750, but then grew quickly to about 8.8 million by
the end of the century. Including Ireland and
Scotland, the total population was about 13
million.
In 1700 England was still a land of small villages. In
the northem areasof England, in Lancashire and
!(1estYorkshire, and in the West Midlands, the
large cities of the future were only just beginning to
grow. By the middle of the century Liverpool,
Manchester, Birmingham, Shefleldand Leeds were
already large. But such new towns were still ffeated
as villages and so had no representationin
Parliament.
All the towns smelled bad. There were no drains.
Streetswere used as lavatoriesand the dirt was
seldom removed. In fact people added to it, Ieaving
in the streetsthe rubbish from the marketplace and
from houses. The streetswere muddy and narrow,
some only rwo metres wide. Around London and
other larger towns a few vegetable growers took the
dirt from the streetsto put on their frelds.
The towns were centres of disease.As a result only
one child in four in London lived to become an
adult. It was the poor who died youngest.They
were buried together in large holes dug in the
ground. These were not covered with earth until
they were full. It was hardly surprising that poor
people found comfort in drinking alcohol and in
trying to win money from card games. Quakers,
shocked by the terrible effects of gin drinking,
developed the beer industry in order to replace gin
with a less damaging drink.
LT4

During the eighteenth century, efforts were made to

make towns healthier. Streetswere built wider, so
that carriagesdrawn by horsescould passeach
other. From 1734, London had a streetlighting
system.After 170 many towns asked Parliament to
allow them to tax their citizens in order to provide
social services,such as streetcleaning and lighting.
Each house owner had to pay a local tax, the
amount or "rate" of which was decided by the local
council or corporation.
Catholics and Jews were still not allowed into
Parliament, and for Nonconformists it continued to
be difficult, but they were all able to belong to the
town councils that were now being set up. As these
..local authorites''grew, they brought togetherthe
merchantsand industrial leaders.These startedto
create a new administrativeclass to carry out the
council's will. Soon London and the other towns
were so clean and tidy that they became the
wonder of Europe. Indeed London had so much to
offer that the great literary figure of the day, Samuel
Johnson, made the now famousremark, "When a
man is tired of London, he is tired of life. For there
is in London all that life can afford."
There were four main classesof people in
eighteenth-centurytowns: the wealthy merchants;
the ordinary merchantsand traders;the skilled
craftsmen; and the large number of workers who
had no skill and who could not be sure of findine
work from one day to another.

The rich
Social conditions were probably better than in any
other country in Europe. British aristocratshad less
power over the poor than European aristocratshad.
In 170 an English lord was actually hanged for

I? LIfe in town and country

Hogarth's famous "Gin Une" was otle of a seies of powerful picunes of the
Iess pleasant aspecs of Englsh social life' This pictwe illustraus the euik of
drink' lnfatt gin drnkingbd to so mtrch death anl criminaliry that a
rutmberof Qwkersbeganheuingbeer comnwcially as an altemative, less
danwgng drink The cella:rentrurce, botnmbft, has the inscripton
" Drink fcr a Permy, deod dnnk fnr Twopence, cban suaw fu N othlng."
This is alatpr copl of Hogarth's originalblack and white print

killing his servant.There were few places n Europe

where that would have happened.To foreigners,
usedto the absolutepower of the king and his
nobles, English law seemedan example of perect
justice,even f t was not really so.

At tht other enl of the social scab, Thomas Gahsbnrough, perhaps

,'Tht
England' s finrst partaitpainter, painted f clt the rich and f unous.
MomingWoJk" has a ckun dnmesticityabout it There is also
infcrmality anl deep affection in this pictwe, qutedifferent fron the
fmnahtl of "The Tichbcrne Dob" (pages 102- 103) ctrthe Tufuir
fdmib base 83)

The workerson his lands were lucky if they were

paid more than 15 a year.

Foreignersnoticed how easy it was for the British to

move up and down the social "ladder". In London a
man who dressedas a gentlemanwould be treated
as one. It was difficult to see a clear difference
betweenthe aristocracy,the gentry and the middle
classof merchants. Most classesmixed freely
together.

The comfortablelife of the gentry must have been

dull most of the time. The men went hunting and
..improvements''to ther
riding, and carredout
estates.During the eighteenth century these
improvementsincluded rebuilding many great
housesin the classical style. It was also fashionable
to arrangenatural-lookinggardensand parks to
create a carefully made "view of nature" from the
windows of the house. Some of the gentry became
interestedin collecting treesor plants from abroad.

However, the differencebetweenrich and poor

could be very great. The duke of Newcastle, for
example, had an income of 100,00Oeach year.

\7omen's lives were more boring, although during

the winter there were frequentvisits to London,
where dancesand partieswere held. But even the
tl )

An lllustrated History of Britan

Sa nersetshireBuildings in Milson
Sneet, Barh, 1788, werc mwq
thefircst tounhouses buih it dv
.,
Getrrgian'' perio Bath has
swuiued u England's best
preseruedGeargian city becutr x
wa very fahiorubb tingtlv
eighuenth century, but sudteda
ceaed to be so at the begitning
the nineteenth cenanl. As atala
the eanonq d Bath, buedup.
tourism, nLlapsed and very fan q
the splendidG ectrgianbriWi"S
werc replaced dwing tlw nineted
ryr twentieth cmtwies.

richest women's lives were limited by the idea that

they could not take a share in more serious matters.
They were only allowed to amuse themselves. As
one lord wrote: "\0(/omenare only children of larger
growth . . . A man of sense only plays with them
. . . he neither tells them about, nor truststhem,
with seriousmatters."
During the eighteenth century, people believed
that the natural spring waters in "spa" towns such
as Bath were good for their health. These towns
becamefashionableplaceswhere most people went
to meet other membersof high society. Bath,
which is still the best example of an eighteenthcentury English city, was filled with people who
wished to be "seen". In Scotland a "New Town" on
the edge of the old city of Edinburgh was built by
Scotland's great architect, Robert Adam. Like
Bath, it representedthe height of eighteenth'
century British civilised life.

The countryside
The cultural life of Edinburgh was in total contrast
with life in the Scottish Highlands. Becausethe kilt
and tartan were forbidden, everyonebom since
1746 had grown up wearing Lowland (English)
clothes. The old way of colouring and making
tartan pattems from local plants had long been
forgotten. By the time the law forbiddng the kilt
and tartan was abolished in 1782, it was too late.
11

Highland dress and tartans became fancy dress, to

be worn by Scottish soldiers and by lovers of the
past, but not by the real Highlanders. Very few of
the tartansthat were worn after 1782 would have
..clan'' tartansby the men who
been recogniseds
had fought at Culloden.
The real disasterin the Highlands, however, was
economic. Towards the end of the eighteenth
century, the clan chiefs began to realise that mone\
could be made from sheep for the wool trade. They
began to push the people off the clan lands, and to
replace them with sheep, a process known as the
clearances.The chiefs treatedthe clan lands as
their personalproperty, and the law supported
them, just as it supportedthe enclosureof common
land in England. Between 1790 and 1850 hundreds
of thousandsof Highlanders lost their old way of
lie so that their chiefs could make a profit from the
land. Many Highlanders, men, women and
children, lived poor on the streetsof Glasgow.
Others went to begin a new life, mainly n Canada,
where many settledwith other membersof their
clan. A smaller number went to Australia in the
nineteenth century. Clan society in the Highlands
had gone for ever.
In England the countrysidechangedeven more
than the towns n the eighteenth century. Most
farming at the beginning of the century was still
done as it had been for centuries.Each villase stood

|7 Lie in town and country

in the middle of three or four large fields, and the

viHagerstogetherdecided what to grow, although
individuals continued to work on their own small
stripsof land.
During the eighteenth century most of this land was
enclosed.The enclosedland was not usedfor sheep
farming, as it had been in Tudor times, but for
mixed animal and cereal farms. People with money
and influence, such as the village squire, persuaded
their MP to passa law through Parliament allowing
them to take over common land and to enclose it.
The MP was willing to do this becausethe
landowner was often able to help him at the next
election with the votes of those who worked for
him.
One main causeof these enclosureswas that a
number of the greater landlords, including the
aristocracy,had a great deal of money to invest.
This had come partly from profits made from
increasedtrade, especiallywith the West Indies and
with India. It also came from investment in coal
mines and ironworks, both of which had a growing
part of the economy. Finally, some aristocratshad
purchaseddevelopmentsiteson the edge of
London, most notably the dukes of Bedford and
Westminster.
Most of them wanted to invest their money on the
land, and having improved therown land, and
built fine country houses,they looked to other
land. Their reasonwas that farming had become
much more profltable.From the mid-seventeenth
century there had been a number of improvements
in farming, and a growth of interest in farming
methods. Britain and Holland were better at
farming than any other country in Europe. At the
beginning of the eighteenth century a "seed drill",
a machine for sowing com seedin straight lines and
at frxedintervals, was invented by Jethro Tull. This
made flelds easierto weed, and made it possibleto
produce a greatercrop. Other farmershad startedto
understandhow to improve soil. At the same time,
root crops grown in Holland were introduced in
Britain.
Traditionally the land had been allowed to rest
every three years.But by growing root crops one

The eighuenth.centw"y etrcIasuresof uiLla'Eefamland changed'murh of

England's landscape In this aerinl vnewof Palbury, Bucl<rngharnshire,tlu
oa stpfdmingpattrn cdn still be seen, as well as the rww l1edgerows
marking che encbswes of dv gentryfamvrs

year, animal food the next, and wheat the third,

farmers could now produce more. Growing animal
food also made it possibleto keep animals through
the winter. This was an important new
development. Before the mid-eighteenthcentury
most animals were killed beforewinter because
there was never enough food to keep them until the
following spring. For the first time people could
now eat fresh meat all the year round.
These improvements,however, were a good deal
more difficult to introduce when most farmland was
still organisedby the whole village community as it
had been for centuries.No strip farmer could afford
the necessarymachinery, and it was not worth
buying machinery for such small amounts of land in
three different areasaround the village. Richer
farmers wanted to change the system of farming,
including the systemof landholding. With one
large area for each farm the new machinery and
methodswould work very well. They had the
money to do this, and could expect the help of the
village squire and their MP, who were also rich
farmerswith the same interests.They had a strong
economic argumentfor introducing change because
LI?

An Illustrated History of Britain

it was clear that the new methods would produce

more food for each acre of land than the traditional
methods. There was also another strong reason,
though at the time people may not have realisedit.
The population had started to grow at a greatly
increasedrate.
The enclosures, and the farming improvements
from which they resulted,made possiblefar greater
and more efficient food production than could be
found in almost any other country in Europe. The
recordsof Britain's largestmeat market, Smithfield
in London, show the extraordinary improvement in
animal farming. In 1710 the averageweight of an
ox was 168 kg, by 1795 it was 364 kg. During the
same period the averageweight of a sheep in
Smithfield rose from 17 kg to 36 kg.
Improved use of land made it possibleto grow
wheat almost everywhere.For the first time
everyone, including the poor, could eat white
wheat bread. White bread was less healthy than
brown, but the poor enjoyed the idea that they
could affordthe same bread as the rich. In spite of
the greatlyincreasedproduction of food, however,
Britain could no longer feed itself by the end of the
century. Imported food from abroad became
necessaryto feed the rapidly growing population.
But in social terms the enclosureswere damaging.
Villagers sometimesknew nothing about an
enclosureuntil they were sent off the land. Some
had built their homes on common land and rhese
were destroyed.Over one thousandparliamentary
Acts resultedin the enclosureof about four million
acres in the second half of the century. Many of the
poor thought this was no beter than stealing:
They hang the man and flog the woman,
That steals the goose from off the common,
But leave the greatercriminal loose
That stealsthe common from the goose.
The enclosureschanged the look of much of the
countryside.Insteadof a few large fields there were
now many smaller fields, each encircled with a
hedge, many with treesgrowing in them.
The problern o the growing landless class was made
very much worse by the rapid increase in
118

population in the second half of the century. Some

were able to work with the new farming class.
Others were not able to find work. Many of these
had to depend on the help of the Poor Laws, first
introduced by Queen Elizabeth I.
Another problem was that there were severalyears
of bad harvests which resulted in a sharp increase in
wheat prices. Local magistratescould have fixed
wages to make sure the poor could afford to eat. But
in many places, they chose instead to help those
whose wageswere particularly low out of the local
rates.The most famousexample was in a village
called Speenhamland,and the "Speenhamland
Ac'' was copied in many parts of the country. It
was a disastroussystem,becauseemployerswere
now able to employ people cheaply knowing that
the parish would have to add to the low wagesther
paid. Some employerseven lowered their wages
after the SpeenhamlandAct. It is not surprising
that as a result the national cost of helping the poor
rose from 12 million in 1790 to !4 million in 1800.
Another effect of the Speenhamland Act was to
increasethe growth of the population. Help was
given to a family according to the number of
children. Before the enclosuresfarmershad smaller
familesbecausethe land had to be divided among
the children, and becauseyoung men would not
marry until they had a farm of ther own. The
enclosuresremoved the need for these limits, and
the SpeenhamlandAct encouragedlargerfamilies
since this meant an increasein financial help.
Neighbouring parishesjoined togetherto build a
"parish workhouse" where most of the poor were
fed and housed. Some parisheshired the workhouse
and its population to a local businessmanwho
wanted cheap workers. He provided food in retum
for work. This quickly led to a systemlittle better
than slavery,with children as well as adults being
made to work long hours. These effects brought
about the collapse of the old Poor Law and led to a
new law in 1834.
Other people left their village and went to the
towns to find work. They provided the energy that
made possiblean even greaterrevolution which was
to chanse the face of Britain.

1? Lfe in town and country

Family life
In the eighteenthcentury families began to express
affection more openly than before. In addition it
seemsthat for the first time children were no longer
thought of as small adults, but as a distinct group of
people with special needs. A century after the
Quaker, Penn, there was a growing voice advising
gentlenesswith children. One popular eighteenth
century handbook on the upbringing of children,
itself a significantdevelopment,warned:"severe
and frequentwhipping is, I think, a very bad
practice." In 1798 another handbook told mothers
that "The first object in the education of a child
should be to acquire i$ affection, and the second to
obtain its confidence.The most likely thing to
expanda youthfulmind is . .' praSe.''
Girls, however, continued to be victims of the
parents'desireto make them match the popular
idea of feminine beauty of slim bodies, tight waists
and a pale appearance.To achieve this aim, and so
improve the chances of a good marriage,parents
forced their daughtersinto tightly waistedclothes,
and gave them only little food to avoid an

unfashionablyhealthy appearance.Undoubtedly
this behaviour explains the idea and reality of frail
feminine health which continued into the
nineteenth century.
Parents still often decided on a suitablemarriagefor
their children, but they increasinglysought their
children's opinion. However,'sonsand daughters
often had to marry againsttheir wishes.One man,
forced to give up the only woman he ever loved,
wrote, "l sighed as a lover, but I obeyedas a son."
But love and companionship were slowly becoming
acceptedreasonsfor marriage.As one husband
wrote to his wife after fifteenyearsof marriage,"l
have only time to say that I love you dearly, - best
of women, best of wives, and best of friends." If
such feelingsdescribeda sixteenth- or seventeenth'
century marriagethey were less openly stated, and
perhapslessopenly expected.
The increasein affection was partly becausepeople
could now expect a reasonablylong life. This
resultedmainly from improved diet and the greater
cleanlinessof cotton rather than woollen
underclothing. However, it was also the result of a

Hogarth is bestlowwrfor his

redistic picanes o/ society'sills,
but to nul,c monel he also
painted wealthy peoPle. "The
Gralam Childr en" givesa
dehchu| vicu of a warm rclaxed
anl jolly amosPhne. PIay began
mberecogedas goodfor
children, but anly for pung
ones h was feared that if older
cluWen played dvy wodd
becone laay ad.ulrs.AtB knd
wote n his son onhis ninti
birthday " Chillish toy ud
playthingsmustbe thrum ailn,
and pur mind directed m seriotts
objects "

119

An Illusnated History of Britain

growing idea of kindness. For perhapsthe first time

people startedto believe that cruelty either to
humans or animals was wrong. It did not prevent
bad factory conditions, but it did help those trying
to end slavery. At the root of this dislike of cruelty
was the idea that every human was an indivdual.

no choice but to go to the parish workhouse.Some

babieswere even killed or left to die by desperate
mothers. A poor woman expecting a baby was often
sent out of the parish, so that feeding the mother
and child became the responsibility of another
parish workhouse.

This growing individualism showed itself in a desire

for privacy. In the seventeenthcentury middle-class
and wealthier families were servedby servants,who
listened to their conversationas they ate. They
lived in rooms that led one to another, usually
through wide double doors. Not even the bedrooms
were private. But in the eighteenth century families
began to eat alone, preferringto serve themselves
than to have servants listening to everything they
had to say. They also rebuilt the insidesof their
homes, putting in corrdors,so that every person in
the family had their own private bedroom.

The use of child labour in the workhouse and in the

new factories increased towards the end of the
century. This was hardly surprising.A rapidly
growing population made a world of children.
Children of the poor had always worked as soon as
they could walk. l7orkhouse children were
expected to leam a simple task from the age of
three, and almost all would be working by the age
of six or seven. They were particularly useful to
factory owners becausethey were easy to dscipline,
unlike adults, and they were cheap.

Britain was ahead of the rest of Europe in this

individualism. Almost certainly this was the result
of the political as well as economic strengthof the
middle class, and the way in which the middle class
mixed so easily with the gentry and aristocracy.
Individualism was important to trade and industrial
success.
The most successfulin trade and industry were
often Nonconformists, who were especially
hardworking. They could be hard on their families,
as Puritan fathers had been a century earlier. But
they were also ambitiousfor their sons, sending
them away to boarding school at a young age.
Removed from family affecrion, this kind of
education increasedindividualism. Starved of
emotional life, many of these boys grew up to put
all their energy into power, either helping to build
the empire, or helping to build trade and industry.
Such individualism could not exstfor the poorer
classes. Where women and children could find work
making cloth, a worker family might double its
income, and do,quite well. But a poor family in
which only the father could find work lived on the
edge of starvation.
The SpeenhamlandAct was not prctised
everywhere. An increasing number of families had

tzo

Then, quite suddenly at the end of the century,

child labour began to be seen as shameful.Ths
resultedpartly from the growingdislike of cruelty,
and also from the fact that hard child labour
becamemore visible and more systematicnow that
So many people worked in factoresrather than in
fields and cottages.A first blow had been struck
Someyears earler. Horrified by the suffering of
children forced to sweep chimneys, two men
campaigned for almost thirty years to persuade
Parliament to passa RegrrlatingAct n 1788 to
reduce the cruelty involved. In the nineteenth
century the conditon of poor children was to
become a main area of social reform. This was a
resporrsenot only to the fact that children were
suffering more, but also that their sufferingswere
more public.

1 8 The years of revolution

' Reuolutionin France utd

Industnalreqtolution, Societyand rehigpon
the NapoleonicWars

Industrial revolution
Several influencescame togetherat the same time
to revolutioniseBritain's industry:money' labour, a
greater demand for goods, new power' and better
transport.
By the end of the eighteenth century, some families
had made huge private fortunes.Growing merchant
banks helped put this money to use.
Increasedfood production made it possible to feed
large populations in the new towns. These
populations were made up of the people who had
lost their land through enclosures and were looking
for ork. They now needed to buy things they had
never needed before. In the old days people in the
villages had grown their own food, made many of
their own clothes and generally managed without
having to buy very much. As landless workers these
people had to buy food, clothing and everything
else they needed. This created an opportunity to
make and sell more goods than ever before. The
same landless people who needed these things also
became the workers who made them.
By the early eighteenth century simple machines
had already been invented for basic jobs. They
could make large quantities of simple goods quickly
and cheaply so that "mass production" became
possible for the first time. Each machine carried out
one simple process, which introduced the idea of
..divisionolabour'' among workers.This was to
become an important part of the industrial
revolution.

industrial growth was fuel. There was less wood,

and in any case wood could not produce the heat
necessaryto make iron and steel either in large
quantities or of high quality. But at this time the
use of coal for changing iron ore into good quality
iron or steel was perfected, and this made Britain
the leading iron producer in Europe. This happened
only just in time for the many wars in which Britain
was to fight, mainly against France, for the rest of
the century. The demand for coal grew very
quickly. In 1800 Britain was producing four times as
much coal as it had done in 1700, and eight times
as much iron.
Increased iron production made it possible to
manufacture new machinery for other industries.
No one saw this more clearly than John \07ilkinson,
a man with a total belief in iron. He built the
largest ironworks in the country. He built the
world's first iron bridge, over the River Sevem, in
L?79. He saw the first iron boats made. He built an
iron chapel for the new Methodist religious sect'
and was himself buried in an iron coffin. Wilkinson
was also quick to see the value of new inventions.
When James Watt ntade a greatly improved steam
engine in L?69, Wilkinson improved it further by
making parts of the engine more accurately with his
special skills in ironworking. In this way the skills
of one craft helped the skills of another. Until then
steam engines had only been used for pumping,
usually in coal mines. But in 1781 rD7attproduced
an engine with a tuming motion, made of iron and
steel. It was a vital developmentbecausepeople
were now no longer dependent on natural power.

By the 1740sthe main problem holding back

tzl

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

Spinners at ucnk People Inokcd

back at the age of cottage industry
as ahappy time compared with the
bleak disciplire of fottnrl
emplayment The vieu ua,
perhaps, ouer.idealised Conitions
were dork and less pleasant than
thisprcture sugests Frequentll it
uos only uomen's spinning that
kept a fanLyfrom stavation But
at bast funilies wrkcd togetheras
an economic unit ALI this uu
brokr.n up by the new mrrchiner',
Button making uas one of the feu
cotwge industresto survive beyonl
I 850

An early coal mine in the Mdlanls The use of coal fcrr almost aILenerg1 led to a huge amount of
smoke which blackcned buildings and created dark " smogs", mixtwes of smoke and fog, in winter

L2Z

18 The years of revolution

One invention led to another, and increased

production in one area led to increasedproduction
in others. Other basic materialsof the industrial
revolution were cotton and woollen cloth, which
were popular abroad. In the middle of the century
other countries were buying British uniforms,
equipment and weaponsfor their armies.To meet
this increaseddemand, better methods of
production had to be found, and new machinery
was invented which replaced handwork. The
production of cotton goods had been limited by the
spinning process, which could not provide enough
cotton thread for the weavers.In 1764 a spinning
machine was invented which could do the work of
several hand spinners, and other improved
machines were made shortly after. With the far
greaterproduction of cotton thread, the slowest
part of the cotton clothmaking industry became
weaving. In 1785 a power machine for weaving
revolutionisedclothmaking. It allowed Britain to
make cloth more cheaply than elsewhere, and
Lancashire cotton cloths were sold in every
continent. But this machinery put many people out
of work. It also changed what had been a "cottage
industry" done at home into a factory industry,
where workers had to keep work hours and rules set
down by factory owners.
In the Midlands, factories using locally found clay
began to develop very quickly, and produced fine
quality plates, cups and other china goods.These
soon replaced the old metal plates and drinking
cups that had been used. Soon large quantities of
china were being exported. The most famous
factory was one started by Josiah l7edgwood. His
high quality bone china becamevery popular, as it
still is.
The cost of such goods was made cheaper than ever
by improved transport during the eighteenth
century. New waterwayswere dug between towns,
and transport by these canals was cheaper than
transport by land. Roads, still used mainly by
people rather than by goods, were also improved
during the century. York, Manchester and Exeter
werethree days' travel from London in the I?20s,
but by the 1780sthey could be reachedin little
over twenty-four hours. Along these main roads,

the coaches stopped for fresh horses in order to

keep up their speed.They became known as "stage"
coaches, a name that becamefamousin the "\07ild
'West" of America. It was rapid road travel and
cheap transport by canal that made possible the
economic successof the industrial revolution.
Soon Britain was not only exporting cloth to
Europe. It was also importing raw cotton from its
colonies and exporting finished cotton cloth to sell
to those same colonies.
The social effects of the industrial revolution were
enormous. l7orkers tried to join together to protect
themselvesagainstpoweul employers.They
wanted fair wages and reasonable conditions in
which to work. But the govemment quickly banned
these "combinations", as the workers'societieswere
known. Riots occurred, led by the unemployed who
had been replacedin factoriesby machines. In 1799
some of theserioters, known as Luddites, startedto
break up the machinery which had put them out of
work. The govemment supported the factory
owners, and made the breaking of machinery
punishable by death. The govemment was afraid of
a revolution like the one in France.

Society and religion

Britain avoided revolution partly becauseof a new
religious movement. This did not come from the
Church of England, which was slow to recognise
change. Many new industrial towns in fact had no
church or priests or any kind of organised religion.
The Church of England did not recognise the
problems of these towns, and many priests belonged
to the gentry and shared the opinions of the
govemment and ruling class.
The new movement which met the needs of the
growing industrial working class was led by a
remarkableman called John Wesley. He was an
Anglican priest who travelled around the country
preaching and teaching. In 1738 \i7esleyhad had a
mystical experience. "I felt my heart strangely
warmed." he wrote afterwards, "l felt that I did
LZ3

An Illustrated History of Britain

A Methodst me1angin 1777 ' The habit of yearhing in the openair drew poce
p!9ple yJho usually dil rct go a church. Ttle Methadist pteih",, *ent
l)ag9n village with their good,news that Coist hot died ",y,h,,e,
fcr en,yone',
*"s f,*'
They euen visited prisons, often to comfcnt thosecondemned a hang.'

trust in Christ, Christ alone for my salvation;and

an assurancewas given that he had taken m) sins,
even mine, and saved me from sin and death." For
fifty.threeyearsJohn Wesley avelled zz4,ooo
miles on horseback,preaching ar every village he
came to. Sometimeshe preachedin three different
villages in one day. Very soon others joined in his
work. John !esley visited the new villages and
industrial towns which had no parish church.
John Wesley's "Methodism" was above all a
personaland emotional form of religion. It was
organisedin small groups,or "chapels", all over the
country. At a time when the Church of England
itself showed little interest in the social and
T?4

spiritual needsof the growing population,

Methodism was able to give ordinary people a sense
of purposeand dignity. The Church was nervousof
this powerfulnew movement which it could not
control, and in the end Wesley was forced to leave
the Church of England and srart a new Methodist
Church.
By the end of the century there were over 3O
Methodist chapels, mosr of them in industrial areas.
These chapelswere more democratic than the
Church of England, parrly becauserhe membersof
each chapel had to flnd the money ro pay for them.
The Anglican Church, on the other hand, had a
good income from the land it owned.

18 The years ofrevolution

John Wesley was no friend of the ruling classesbut

he was deeply conservative, and had no time for
radicalism. He disapprovedof Vilkes and thought
the French Revolution was the work of the devil.
"The greater the share the people have in
govemment," he wrote, "the less liberty, civil or
religious,does a nation enjoy.!'He carefully
avoided politics, and taught people to be
hardworking and honest. As a result of hs
teaching, people accepted many of the injustices of
the times without complaint. Some becamewealthy
through working hard and saving their money. As
an old man, Wesley sadly noted how hard work led
to wealth, and wealth to pride and that this
threatened to destroy his work. "Although the form
of relgionremains,'' he wrote, ..thespirit is swiftly
vanishing away." However, \Tesley probably saved
Britain from revolution. He certainly brought many
people back to Christianity.
The Methodists were not alone. Other Christians
also joined what became known as "the evangelical
revival", which was a retum to a simple faith based
on the Bible. It was almosr a reawakening of
Puritanism, but this time with a social rather than a
political involvement. Some, especiallythe
Quakers, became well known for social concem.
One of the best known was Elizabeth Fry, who
made public the terrible conditions in the prisons,
and started to work for reform.
It was also a small group of Christians who were the
flrst to act againstthe evils of the slave trade, from
which Britain was making huge sums of money.
Slaves did not eipect to live long. Almost 20 per
cent died on the voyage. Most of the others died
young from cruel treatment in the West Indies. For
example, beweenI?IZ and 1768 200'000 slaves
were sent to work in Barbados, but during this
period the population cif Barbados only increased by

2'000.

The first successagainst slavery came when a judge

ruled that ..no mn could be a slave in Britain'',
and freed a slave who had landed in Bristol. This
victory gave a new and unexpected meaning to the
wordsof the national song, "Britons never shall be
slaves."In fact, just as Britain had taken a lead in

slavery and the slave trade, it also took the lead

intemationally in ending them. The slave trade was
abolishedby law in 1807. But it took until 1833 for
slavery itself to be abolished in all British colonies.
Others, also mainly Christians, tried to limit the
cruelty of employers who forced children to work
long hours. In 1802, as a result of their efforts,
Parliament passedthe first Factory Act, limiting
child labour to twelve hours each day. In 1819 a
new law forbade the employment of children under
the age of nine. Neither of these two Acts were
obeyed everywhere, but they were the early
examples of government action to protect the weak
against the powerful.
The influence of these eighteenth-century religious
movements continued. A century later, when
workers started to organise themselves more
effectively, many of those involved had been
brought up in Methodist or other Nonconformist
sects.This had a great influence on trade unionism
and the labour movement in Britain.

Revolution in France and the

Napoleonic Wars
France's neighbours only slowly realised that its
revolution in 1789 could be dangerousfor them.
Military power and the aurhoriry of kingship were
almost uselessagainstrevolutionary ideas.
In France the revolution had been made by the
"bourgeoisie'1,
or middle class, leading the peasants
and urban working classes. In England the
bourgeoisie and the gentry had acted rogerher for
centuresin the House of Commons, and had
become the most powerful class in Britain in the
seventeenth century. They had no sympathy with
the French revolutionaries, and were frightened by
the danger of "awakeningl' the working classes.
They saw the danger of revolution in the British
countryside, where the enclosures were happening,
and in the towns, to which many of the landless
were going in search of work. They also saw rhe
political dangerswhich could develop from the
great increasein population.

n5

An IllustratedHrstoryof Britain

,,Breahng
the.Iiv'' dt the battb d Trafalga' 1805 The td/;itional
t,tic
lDas to exchtlnge"broadsides" d gunfire between opposingships. Nelson
tool lus shpsin two litws across (om right to left), athe
than abngside'
the erremyfnrmation (French fleet sailing from back left to front right of
picture). His ships' gunswcre able n fire doum the bngth of eorh Frerch
ship a ic pased This had tuo advantages The bous utd srem of a warship
werc the bast defended parts, so the Englsh shpssuffered mrch less in the
exchangeof pnfire. Secondly, the gunshottrauelled the whob ltngth of the
enemy decls, causinggreat danage to the shipdn bss of life.

126

A cartoon of thc tine shaus William

Pitt and Napolron Borutparttcarving
up the warl.d Napoleon has sliced off
most of EwoPe Pitt has aken the
Atlantic uhich, Iikr. almost everS other
sed ur ocedn, uu control'ledby
Bain,s nav1

rz7

An lllustrated Historv of Britain

Several radicals sympathised with the cause of the

French revolutionaries, and called for reforms in
Britain. In other countries in Europe such sympathy
was seen as an attack on the aristocracy. But in
England both the gentry and the bourgeoisie felt
they were being attacked, and the radicals were
accused of putting Britain in danger. Tory crowds
attacked the homes of radicals n Birmingham and
severalother cities. The Whig Party was split. Most
feared 'Jacobinism", as sympathy with the
revolutionarieswas called, and joined William Pitt,
"the Younger" (the son of Lord Chatham), while
those who wanted reform stayed with the radical
Whig leader, Charles JamesFox. In spite of its
small size, Fox's party formed the link between the
Whigs of the eighteenth century and the Liberals of
the nineteenth century.

The French Revolution had created fear all over

Europe. The British govemment was so afraid that
revolution would spreadto Britain that it
imprisonedradical leaders.It was particularly
frightened that the army would be influenced by
these dangerousideas. Until then, soldiers had
always lived in inns and private homes. Now the
govemment built army camps, where soldiers could
live separatedfrom the ordinary people. The
govemment also brought together yeomen and
gentry who supported the ruling establishment and
trained them as soldiers. The govemment claimed
that these "yeomanry" forces were created in case of
a French attack. This may have been true, but they
were probably uselessagainst an enemy army, and
they were used to prevent revolution by the poor
and discontented.

Not all the radicals sympathisedwith the

revolutionaries in France. In many ways Edmund
Burke was a conservative, in spite of his support for
the American colonists in 177. He now quarrelled
with other radicals, and wrote Reflectionson the
Reuolutionin Fru'tce, which became a popular book.
He feared that the established order of kings in
Europe would fall. Tom Paine, who had also
supported the American colonists, wrote in answer
TIw Rightsof Man, in which he defended the rights
of the ordinary people against the power of the
monarchy and the aristocrats. The ideas in this
book were thought to be so dangerousthat Paine
had to escape to France. He never returned to
Britain. But the book itself has remained an
important work on the question of political
freedom.

As an island, Britain was in less danger, and as a

result was slower than other European states to
make war on the French Republic. But in 1793
Britain went to war after France had invaded the
Low Countries (today, Belgium and Holland). One
by one the European countries were defeatedby
Napoleon, and forced to ally themselveswith him.
Most of Europe fell under Napoleon's conffol.

These matters ryere discussedalmost entirely by the

middle class and the gentry. Hardly any workingclass voceswere heard. but it should be noted
that the first definitely working-classpolitical
organisation,the CorrespondingSociety, was
establishedat this time. It did not 14stlong,
becausethe governmentclosed it down in 1798,
and it only had branches in London, Norwich,
Sheffield, Nottingham and one or woother
centres.

l7R

Britain decided to flght France at sea becauseit

had a stronger navy, and because its own survival
dependedon control of its trade routes. British
policy was to damageFrench trade by preventing
French ships, including their navy, from moving
freely in and out of French seaports.The
commander of the British fleet, Admiral Horatio
Nelson, won brilliant victories over the French
navy, near the coast ofEgypt, at Copenhagen, and
finally near Spain, at Trafalgar in 1805, where he
destroyed the French-Spanish fleet. Nelson was
himself killed at Trafalgar, but became one of
Britain's greatestnational heroes. His words to the
fleet before the battle of Trafalgar, "England
expectsthat every man will do his duty," have
remained a reminder of patriotic duty n time of
national danger.
In the same year as Trafalgar, in 1805, a British
army landed in Portugal to fight the French. This
army, with its Portugueseand Spanish allies, was
eventually commandedby Wellington, a man who

18 The yearsofrevolution

had fought in India. But fighting the French on

land was an entirely different matter. Almost
everyone in Europe beleved the French army, and
its generals,to be the best in the world. Wellington
was one of the very few generals who did not. "l am
not afraid of them," he wrote on his appointment
as commander. "l suspectthat all the Continental
armeswere more than half beaten before the battle
was begun. I, at least, will not be frightened
beforehand." Like Nelson he quickly proved to be a
great commander.After severalvictories against
the French in Spain he invaded France. Napoleon,
weakenedby his disastrousinvasion of Russia,
surrenderedin 1814. But the following year he
escapedand quickly assembledan army in France.
Wellington, with the timely help of the Prussian
army, finally defeatedNapoleon at ]7aterlooin
Belgiumin June 1815.

The nneteenthcentuny
L 9 The years of power and danger

Thedangerathome, 1815-32 ' Reform' Workersreqtolt'Fanily life

Brtain in the nineteenth century was at its most

powerful and self-confident. After the industrial
revolution, nineteenth-centuryBritain was the
"workshop" of the world. Until the last quarter of
the century British factorieswere producing more
than any other country in the world.
By the end of the century, Britain's empire was
political rather than commercial. Britain used this
empire to control large areasof the world. The
empire gave the British a feeling of their own
importance which was difficult to forget when
Britain lost its power in the twentieth century. This
belief of the British in their own importancewas at
its height in the middle of the nineteenth century,
among the new middle class, which had grown with
industrialisation.The novelist Charles Dickens
nicely describedthis national pride. One of his
characters,Mr Podsnap,believed that Britain had
been specially chosen by God and "congidered
other countries a mistake".
The rapid growth of the middle class was part of the
enormousrise in the population. In 1815 the
population was 13 million, but this had doubled by
1871,and was over 40 million by 1914.This
growth and the movement of people to towns from
the countrysideforced a change in the political
balance, and by the end of the century most men
had the right to vote. Politics and government
during the nineteenth century became increasingly
the property of the middle class. The aristocracy
and the Crowir had little power left by 1914.
WiLliam BeIl Scon's "Iron and Coal" ' painted 1864-67 ' has a quiu new
atmosphne pride inlobour ard' inltntry. Strchprile was the rnnk of
energ1of
Bntai in tli i,nteenth cenulrJ. One can feel tht evJr'nous
illdustro]reuoluaon in this pointng-

However, the working class, the large number of

people who had left their villages to become factory
workers, had not yet found a proper voice.
Britain enjoyed a strong place in Europeancouncils
after the defeatof Napoleon. Its strengthwas not in
a larger population, as this was half that of Franie
and Austria, and only a little greaterthan that of
Prussia.It lay insteadin industry and trade, and the
navy which protectedthis rade.
Britain wanted two main things in Europe: a
"balance of power" which would prevent any single
nation from becoming too strong, and a free market
in which its own industrial and trade superiority
would give Britain a clear advantage.It succeeded
in the first aim by encouraging the recovery of
France, to balance the power of Austria. Further
east, it was glad that Russia'sinfluence in Europe
was limited by Prussiaand the empiresof Austria
and Turkey. These all shareda border with Russia.
Outside Europe, Britain wished its trading position
to be strongerthan anyone else's.It defendedits
interests by keeping ships of its navy in almost
every ocean of the world. This was possiblebecause
it had taken over and occupied a number of places
during the war againstNapoleon. These included
Mauritius (in the Indian Ocean), the Ionian Islands
(in the eastem Mediterranean),Sierra Leone (west
Africa), Cape Colony (south Africa), Ceylon, and
Singapore.
After 1815 the British governmentdid not only try
to develop its trading stations. Its policy now was to
control world raffic and world markets to Britain's
advantage.Britain did not, however, wish to
colonise everywhere. There were many areas in
131

An Illustrated History of Britain

which it had no interest. But there were other

areas,usually close to its own possessionsor on
important trade routes, which it wished everyone
else to leave alone. It was as a result of defending
these interests that Britain took over more and
more land. Britain's main anxiety in its foreign
policy was that Russia would try to expand
southwards,by taking over the Slavic parts of
Turkey's Balkan possessions,and might reach the
Mediterranean. For most of the century, therefore,
Britain did its best to support Turkey against
Russian expansion. In spite of its power, Britain
also felt increasingly anxious about growing
competition from France and Germany in the last
part of the century. Most of the colonies established
in the nineteenth century were more to do with
political control than with trading for profit.
The concems in Europe and the protection of trade
routes in the rest f the world guided Britain's
foreign policy for a hundred years. It was to keep
the balance in Europe in 1838 that Britain
promised to protect Belgium against stronger
neighbours.In spite of political and economic
troubles in Europe, this policy kept Britain from
war in Europe for a century from 1815. In fact it
was in defenceof Belgium in 1914 that Britain
finally went to war against Germany.

The dangerat home, 1815-32

Until about 1850, Britain was in greaterdangerat
home than abroad.The Napoleonic Wars had
turned the nation from thoughts of revolution to
the need to defeat the French. They had also
hidden the social effects of the industrial
revolution. Britain had sold clothes, guns, and
other necessarywar suppliesto its alles'armies as
well as its own. At the same time, corn had been
imported to keep the nation and its army fed.
All this changedwhen peace came in 1815.
Suddenly there was no longer such a need for
factory-madegoods, and many lost their jobs.
Unemployment was made worse by 300,000 men
from Britain's army and navy who were now
looking for work. At the same time, the
landowning farmers' own income had suffered
13z

becauseof cheaper imported corn. These farmers

persuadedthe govemment to introduce laws to
protect locally grown corn and the price at which it
was sold. The cost of bread rose quickly, and this
led to increasesin the price of almost everything.
While prices doubled, wagesremained the same.
New methods of farming also reduced the number
of workerson the land.
The generalmisery began to causetrouble. In 1830,
for example, starving farmworkersin the south of
England rioted for increasedwages.People tried to
add to their food supply by catching wild birds and
animals. But almost all the woods had been
enclosedby the local landlord and new laws were
made to stop people hunting animals for food.
Many had to choose betweenwatching their family
go hungry and risking the severepunishment of
those who were caught. A man found with nets in
his home could be transportedto the new "penal"
colony in Australia for seven years.A man caught
hunting with a gun or a knife might be hanged, and
until 1823 thieves caught entering housesand
stealingwere also hanged. These laws showedhow
much the rich feared the poor, and although they
were slowly softened,the fear remained.
There were good reasonsfor this fear. A new poor
law in 1834 was intended to improve the help given
to the needy. But central government did not
provide the necessarymoney and many people
received even lesshelp than before.Now, only
those who actually lived in the workhouse were
given any help at all. The workhouseswere feared
and hated. They were crowded and dirty, with
barely enough food to keep people alive. The
inhabitants had to work from early moming till late
at night. The sexeswere separated,so families were
divided. Charles Dickens wrote about the
workhousein his novels. His descriptionsof the life
of crime and misery into which poor people were
forced shocked the richer classes,and conditions
slowly improved.
In order to avoid the workhouse,many looked for a
better life in the towns. Between 1815 and 1835
Britain changed from being a nation of country
people to a nation mainly of townspeople.In the
flrst thirtv vearsof the nineteenth centurv, cities

19 The years ofpower and danger

Above: She/'feld was kttle mrlte than a large llillage n the earl1 eighteenth
century 81 1858 it was one of le fastestgrowng toums of the industrial
a new sk.Jlinp
revoluton, wnthlwndreds f*u,y chimneys cedtng

DISTRIB UTION OF POPU L ATION

Below: England's populntion distrbutionEuenbJ 1801' t}wdrift to dle

tollrnr
in the Midlon/s md ncrthwest of Englar' wa ccnsiderable, and this
mouement increased dwing the first half of the nirleteenth centw).

ffivv

086

oygrl2persquare
ffi
-

ffi ove r40pe rsq uare

*
mile
ffi 3o-4ope rsq uare

mtle

8- 11persqu a re
ffi
* m ile
fl lessthanI per
squ a rem ile
-

x70

ffi

I-

le ssthan30pe r
squaremile

80

overtsoper
ffi
square mile

ffi ove r200p e r

ffi squaremile

too-tsoper
ffi
t@

Fm
*
squaremile

squaremile
l-l lessthan 100per
.....'
square mile

mile

per
1so-2oo

fl
"

lessthan150 per
squaremile

131

An Illustrated History of Britain

like Birmingham and Sheffield doubled in stze,

while Manchester, Glasgow and Leeds more than
doubled. Several towns close togethergrew into
huge cities with no countrysideleft in between.
The main city areaswere northwestEngland, where
the new cotton industrywas based, the north
Midlands, the area around Glasgow, and south
Wales. But although these cities grew fast, London
remained the largest.In 1820 London was home for
1.25 million, out of a total British population of
about 15 million.
If the rich fearedthe poor in the countryside,they
fearedeven more those in the fast-growingtowns.
These were harder to control. If they had been
organised,a revolution like that in France might
have happened. But they were not organsed,and
had no leaders.Only a few radical politicians spoke
for the poor, but they failed to work in close cooperationwith the workerswho could have
supportedthem.
Several riots did, however, take place, and the
governmentreactednervously. In 1819, for
example, a large crowd of working people and their
families gatheredin Manchester to protestagainst
their conditions and to listen to a radical speech in
favour of change. Suddenly they were attackedby
soldierson horses.Eleven people were killed and
more than one hundred wounded. The struggle
between the government,frightenedof revolution,
and those who wanted change became greater.

Reform
The Whigs understoodbetter than the Tories the
need to reform the law in order to improve social
conditions. Like the Tories they fearedrevolution,
but unlike the Tories they believed it could only be
avoided by reform. Indeed, the idea of reform to
make the parliamentarysystemfairer had begun in
the eighteenthcentury. It had been startedby early
radicals, and encouragedby the American War of
lndependence,and by the French Revolution.
The Tories believed that Parliament should
represent"property" and the propertyowners, an
idea that is still associatedbv some with todav's
134

Tory Party. The radicalsbelieved that Parliament

should representthe people. The Whigs, or Liberals
as they later becameknown,'were in the middle,
wanting enough change to avoid revolution but
little more.
The Tories hoped that the House of Lords would
protect the interestsof the property owners.When
the Commons agreedon reform in 1830 it was
turned down by the House of Lords. But the Tories
fell from power the same year, and Lord Grey
formed a Whig government. Grey himself had
supportedthe call for reform as a radical n 1797. In
1832 the Lords acceptedthe Reform Bill, but more
becausethey were frghtenedby the riots in the
streetsoutside than becausethey now acceptedthe
idea o reform. They feared that the collapse of
political and civil order might lead to revolution.
At flrst sight the Reform Bill itself seemedalmost a
political revolution. Scotland's voters increased
from 5,000 to 65,000. Forty-oneEnglish towns,
including the large cities of Manchester,
Birmingham and Bradford,were representedin
Parliament for the very first time. But there were
limits to the progressmade. The total number of
voters increasedby only 50 per cent. The 349
electorsof the small town of Buckingham still had
as many MPs to representthem as the 4,I92
electorsof the city of Leeds. And England, with
only 54 per cent of the British population,
continued to have over 70 per cent of MPs as it had
done before. However, in spite of its shortcomings,
the 1832 Reform Bill was a political recognition
that Britain had become an urban society.

Workers revolt
Since 1824 workershad been allowed to join
togetherin unions. Most of these unions were small
and weak. Although one of their aims was to make
sure employerspaid reasonablewages,they also
tried to prevent other people from working in their
particular trade. As a result the working classesstill
found it difficult to act together. Determined
employerscould still quite easily defeatstrikerswho
refusedto work until their pay was improved, and
often did so with cruelty and violence. Soldiers

19 The yearsofpower and danger

The Penny Black sratnpinto&rced

cheap posnge in 1M0, enswing
cheap communicatonsf or
euerJone The RolatMail prided
itself on efficient service Oq,)erthe
years it has remained one of tlv
bestpostal servicesin the wcyrW

were sometimesused to force people back to work

or break up meetings.
In 1834, there was an event of great importance in
trade union history. Six farmworkersin the Dorset
village of Tolpuddle joined together,promising to
be loyal to their "union". Their employermanaged
to flnd a law by which they could be punished. A
judge had been specially appointedby the
governmentfo find the six men guilty, and this he
did. In London 30,000 workersand radicals
gatheredto ask the govemment to pardon the
"Tolpuddle Martyrs". The govemment, afraid of
seemingweak, did not do so until the "martyrs"
had completedpart of their punishment. It was a
bad mistake. Tolpuddle became a symbol of
employers'cruelty, and of the working classes'need
to defend themselvesthrough ffade union strength.
The radicals and workerswere greatlyhelped in
their effortsby the introduction of a cheap postage
systemin 1840. This enabled them to organise
themselvesacrossthe country far better than
before.For one penny a letter could be sent to
anyone, anywherein Britain.

The Chanist rally on Kennington Contnton, southl-onlan, markrd the enl.

of tlv movement k failed to change murh by constituaorwl means, and ics
baders feared the results of trying to chonge society b1 uncoltstitutotvll
methods, This ral\, hl<cpreuousones' was attenled mostfu b1 nlen Very
few women canbe seen.

l7orking together for the first time, unions, workers

and radicalsput forward a People'sCharter in 1838.
The Charter demandedrights that are now
acceptedby everyone:the vote for all adults;the
right for a man without properry of his own to be
an MP; voting in secret (so that people could not
be forced to vote for their landlord or his party);
payment for MPs, and an election every year
(which everyonetoday recognisesas impractical).
All of these demandswere refusedby the House of
Commons.
The "Chartists" were not united for long. They
were divided between those ready to use violence
and those who believed in change by lawful means
only. Many did not like the idea of women also
getting the vote, parrly becausethey believed it
would make it harder to obtain voring rights for all
men, and this demand, which had been included in
the wording to the very first Charter, was quietly
forgotten.But rotsand political meetings
continued. In 1839 fourteenmen were killed by
soldiersin a riot in Newport, Wales, and many
others sent to one of Britain's colonies as prisoners.
135

An Illustrated History of Britain

way, Peel's decision to repeal the Com Law was a

sign of the way power was passing out of the hands
of the eighteenth-centurygentry class. These had
kept their power in the early years of the
nineteenth century. But now power decisively
passedinto the hands of the growing number of
industrialistsand traders.
Besideshunger, crime was the mark of poverty.
Peel had tumed his attention to this problem
already,by establishinga regularpolice force for
Lortdon in 1829. At first people had laughedat his
blue-uniformedmen in their top hats. But during
the next thirty yearsalmost every ohertown and
county startedits own police force. The new police
forces soon proved themselves successful,as much
crime was pushedout of the largercities, then out
of towns and then out of the countryside.Peel was
able to show that certainty of punishrnentwas far
more effectivethan cruelty of punishment.

dangerolts,
Mmy parts d Inndm ant, other large ctiesweeqJe.
paticu]abafter dark. It uas fctr this elson that the first repllar police frrrct
wu establishedby Sir Robert "Bob" PeeI, after whom tlv new police were
nicknancd "bobbies"

The govemment'ssevereactions showedhow much

it fearedthat the poor might take power, and
establisha republic.
The govemment was savedpartly by the skill of
Robert Peel, the Prime Mnister of the time. Peel
believed that changesshould be made slowly but
steadily. He was able to use the improved economic
conditions in the 1840sto weaken the Chartrst
movemenr, which slowly died. In 1846 he
abolishedthe unpopular Com Law of 1815, whlch
had kept the price of corn higher than necessary.
Not only had this made life hard for those with
little money, but it had brought their employers,
the growing classof industrialists,into conflict with
the landlord class.
These industrialstsneither wished to pay higher
wages,nor employ an underfedworkforce. In this
tJo

Britain's successin avoiding the storm of revolution

in Europe in 1848 was admired almost everywhere.
European monarchs wshedthey were as safe on
their thrones as the British queen seemedto be.
And liberals and revolutionaries wished they could
act as freely as radicals in Britain were able to do.
Britain had been a political model in the eighteenth century, but with the War of Independence
in America and revolution in France interest in
liberalism and democracyturned to these two
countries.Now it moved back to Britain, as a
model both of industrial successand of free
constitutional govemment. For much of the nineteenth cenuryBritain was the enlry of the world.

Family life
In spite of the greateremphasison the individual
and the growth of openly shown affection, the end
of the eighteenth century also saw a swing back to
stricter ideas of family life. In part, the close family
resulted from the growth of new attitudes to
privacy, perhapsa necessarypart of individualism.
It was also the result of the removal, over a period
beginning in the sixteenth century, of the social
and economic support of the wider famly and
village community, which had made family life so-

19 The yearsofpowe and danger

"Dimttr How arWigur" by

Eyre Crowe ( 1844 - 19 10) slues
a fine but rotwntc tlewof life in
one of B'irain's industal tov;tts
Factcry uonlen cannot often
have lool<cdso clean or heahhy
Sone wear woodem sobdcbgs on
theifeet, othersae bnt'oot' It
is a pictwe fuil of inreresr, and
perhaps the fl|ast imptan point
d the pictweis the canrpm)anshipof wornen. Wa.nen's cbsest
friendships were probobly mare
oftcn nude with other women
than with their husbands. In the
mldlegroundsands a
pohceman, a reminder of
and that utlority was
*!-iry
mae

much more public. Except for the very rich, people

no longer married for economcreasons'but did so
for personalhappiness.However, while wives might
be companions, they were certainly not equals.As
someonewrote in 1800, "the husband and wife are
one, and the husband is that one". As the idea of
the close family under the "master" of the
householdbecame stronger,so the possibility for a
wife to frnd emotional supportor practical advice
outside the immediatefamily became more limited.
In addition, as the idea of the close family slowly
spreaddown the social order, an increasingnumber
of women found their sole economic and social
usefulnessended when their children grew up, a
problem that continued into the twentieth century.
They were discouragedfrom going out to work if
not economically necessary,and also encouragedto
make use of the growing number of people available
for domestcservice.
This return to authority exercisedby the head of
the family was largely the result of three things.
These were fear of politcal revolution spreading
from France, ofsocial change causedby industrial
revolution in Britain, and the influence of the new
religiousmovementsof Methodism and
Evangelicalism.

One must wonder how much these things reduced

the chance of happy family life. Individualism,
strict parental behaviour, the regularbeating of
children (whtch was still widespread),and the cruel
conditions for those boys at boarding school, all
worked against it. One should not be surprised that
family life often ended when children grew up. As
one foreignernoted in 1828, "grown up children
and their parentssoon become almost strangers".It
is impossible to be sure what effect this kind of
family life had on chldren. But no doubt it made
young men unfeeling towards their own wives who,
with unmarriedsisters,were the responsibilityof
the man of the house. A wife was legally a man's
property, until nearly the end of the century.
In spite of a stricter moral atmospherein Scotland
which resulted from the strong influence of the
Kirk, Scottish women seem to have continued a
stronger tradition of independent attitudes and
plain speaking.In 1830 a Scotswomancalled for
..thepeect
equaltyof her sex to that of man''.
Another in 1838 wrote, "lt is the right of every
woman to have a vote . . . in her county, and more
so now that we have got a woman [Queen Victoria]
at the head of govemment." She had a long time to
wart.
13?

zo

The years of self-coofidence

The railway ' The riseof themidlle classes' The growthof townsand
cities. Populationand politics' Queen and monarchy' Queen and
empire' Wales, Scotlandand Ireland

In 1851 Queen Victoria opened the Great

Exhibition of the Industriesof All Natons inside
the Crystal Palace, in London. The exhibition
aimed to show the world the greatnessof Britain's
industry. No ohernation could produce as much at
that time. At the end of the eighteenthcentury,
France had produced more iron than Britain. By
1850 Britain was producing more iron than the rest
of the world together.
Britain had become powerful because it had enough
coal, iron and steel for its own enormous industry,
and could even export them in large quantities to
Europe. With these materialsit could produce new
heavy industrial goodslike iron ships and steam
engines. It could also make machinery which
producedtraditional goodslike woollen and cotton
cloth in the factoriesof Lancashire. Britain's cloth
was cheap and was exportedto India, to other
colonies and throughout the Middle East, where it
quickly destroyed the local cloth industry, causing
great misery. Britain made and owned more than
half the worls total shipping. This great industrial
empire was supportedby a strong banking system
developed during the eighteenth century.

The railway
The greatestexample of Britain's industrial power
in the mid-nineteenth century was its railway
system.Indeed, it was mainly becauseof this new
form of ffansport that six million people were able
to visit the Great Exhibition, 109,000 of them on
one day. Many of them had never visited London
138

before.As one newspaperwrote, "How few among

the last generationever stirredbeyond their own
villages. How few of the presentwill die without
visiting London." It was impossiblefor political
reform not to continue once everyone could escape
localism and travel all over the country with such
ease.
In fact industrialistshad built the railwaysto
transportgoods, not people, in order to bring down
the cost of transport.By 1840 2,400 miles of track
had been laid, connecting not only the industrial
ownsof the north, but also London, Birmingham
and even an economically unimportant town like
Brighton. By 1870 the railway systemof Britain was
almost complete. The canals weie soon empty as
everythingwent by rail. The speedof the railway
even made possiblethe delivery of fresh fish and
raspberriesfrom Scotland to London in one night.
In 1851 the govemment made the railway
companiesprovide passengertrains which stopped
at all stationsfor a fare of one penny per mile. Now
people could move about much more quickly and
easily.
The middle classessoon took advantage of the new
opportunity to live in suburbs, from which they
travelled nto the city every day by train. The
suburb was a copy of the country village with all the
advantagesof the town. Most of the London area
was built very rapidly between 1850 and 1880 in
response to the enormous demand for a home in the
suburbs.

20 The years of self-confidence

"Home Sweet Home" by Waher

Sadler showsd prosperous home
in about 1850 Tfu brarulvs of
hol\ decoruting the minm,
nantelpiece and picune tell w
that it is Clvistmos, but it is
before the age of greetingscards.
Sittngeit}vr sideof the firepkrce
dethe grdnapaTents, enjoying
the fani$ scerc. Mother plays
the piaI.Lo,uhle the fat}vr and
children sing The eldcst dnughter
h.ts been reading, possb\ abud
to gueher grandpaentspbasue
Besdethe grandmother smnls a
rowtd frame on which sofiteol1e
has been daing embroiderywork.
On the flonr is a "Twkey
carpet", ptobably a Birish
machine.made copy of the more
expensive handwolten carpetsf rom
Twkcy

Poor people'slives also benefitedby the railway.

Many moved wth the middle classesto the
suburbs,into smaller houses.The men travelled by
train to work in the town. Many of the women
became servantsin the housesof the middle classes.
By 1850 16 per cent of the populationwere "in
service" in private homes, more than were in
farming or in the cloth industry.

The rise of the middle classes

There had been a "middle class" in Britain for
hundredsof years.It was a small class of merchants,
tradersand small farmers.In the second half of the
eighteenth century it had ncreasedwith the rise of
industrialistsand factory owners.
In the nineteenth century, however, the middle
classgrew more quckly than ever beforeand
included greaterdifferencesof wealth, social
postionand kinds of work. It included those who
worked in the professions,such as the Church, the
Iaw, medicine, the cvil service, the diplomatic
service, merchant banking and the armv and the
navy.

IsambardKingdam Brmel (1806- 1859) wa a midlh-ckus man who

representedt}v hei'ghtof Briash enneeng slltcess an'd'the leadershtpof the
mildle classesin rwtional LeIn 183j he oversaw the constrlrction of the
Great westem Railway In 18j8 he desgnedthe first steanship to cross the
Atkntc regtllarl1. In 1U5 he built the Great Britain, the first lttrge ship to
be mole of ron wtha screu propelbr

139

An lllustrated History of Britain

,,Capital

andl-abow,', d camon

fromPunchnagaTirw. A
gentlenwnrelaxes comfcnted in
the knowledge that the suffengs
of the poor haue at least given hts
f onib atd himself such lunn'y.
Belaw, in tl backgro|and,child
labourers can be seen miling
alnng the gaWies of a coal mhw.

It also included the commercial classes,however,

who were the real creators of wealth in the country.
Industrialistswere often "self-made"men who came
from poor beginnings.They believed in hard work,
a regularstyle of life and being careful with money.
This class included both the very successfuland
rich industrialistsand the small shopkeepersand
offrce workers of the growing towns and suburbs.
In spite of the idea of "class", the Victorian age was
a time of great social movement. The children of
the first generation of factory owners often preferred
commerce and banking to industry. While their
fathersremainedNonconformist and Liberal, some
children became Anglican and Tory. Some went
into the professions.The very successfulreceived
knighthoods or became lords and joined the ranks
of the upper classes.
Those of the mddle class who could afford it sent
their sons to feepaying"public" schools. These
schools aimed not only to give boys a good
education, but to train them in leadershipby taking
them away from home and making.their living
conditions hard. These public schoolsprovided
many of the officers for the armed forces, the
colonial administrationand the civil service.
1,+0

The gowthof towns and cities

The escapeof the middle classesto the suburbswas
understandable.The cities and towns were
overcrowdedand unhealthy. One baby in four died
within a year of its birth. In 1832 an outbreakof
cholera, a diseasespreadby dirty water, killed
31,000 people. Proper drains and water supplies
were still limited to those who could afford them.
In the middle of the century towns began to
appoint health officersand to provide proper drains
and clean water, which quickly reducedthe level of
disease,particularly cholera. These health officers
also tried to make sure that new housing was less
crowded. Even so, there were many "slum" areasfor
factory workers,where tiny homes were built very
close together.The better town councils provided
parks in newly built areas,as well as libraries,
public baths where people could wash, and even
concert halls.
Some towns grew very fast. In the north, for
example, Middlesbroughgrew from nothing to an
iron and steel town of 150,000 people in only fifty
years.Most people did not own their homes, but
rented them. The homes of the workers usuallv had

20 The yearsofself.confidence

Mr CLdl'tane speal,ingin the

House of Commons, 1882. Earh
pdrty sat on eitlur sideof tlv
Speaker(seated back right) and
the central table The Speaker's
responsibility was to erswe the
crderly condutt of pnlianwntary
htsirless.To fulp him, a line
along t]w Ioo(rwning wier
thefeet of ale d Gladstone's
colleagues) mmls the bountms
eochMP had m stny behind on
eath sideof tfu House. This tras
m auoid ongry dgunents
becomingfights 'The two lines
are two swtndlengtls' distarce
aparc The silver nace on the
rable is a slmbol of royJ
MtIWit.J

only four small rooms, woupstairsand two

downstairs,with a small back yard. Most of the
middle classeslived in houseswith a small sarden
in front, and a largerone at the back.

Population and politics

In 1851, an official population surveywas carried
out for the flrst time. It showed that the nation was
not as religious as its people had believed. Only 60
per cent of the population went to church. The
surveyalso showed that of these only 5.2 million
called themselvesAnglicans, comparedwith 4.5
million Nonconformists and almost half a mllion
Catholics. Changes in the law, in 1828 and 1829,
made it possible,for the flrst time since the
seventeenthcentury, for Catholics and
Nonconformists to enter govemment service and to
enter Parliament. In practice, however, it remained
difficult for them to do so. The Tory-Anglican
alliance could hardly keep them out any longer. But
the Nonconformists naturally supported the
Liberals, the more reformistparty. In fact the
Tories held office for less than five vears between
184 and 1874.

In 1846, when Sir Robert Peel had fallen from

power, the shapeof British politics was still
unclear. Peel was a Tory, and many Tories felt that
his repeal of the Com Laws that year was a betrayal
of Tory beliefs. Peel had alreadymade himself very
unpopular by supporting the right of Catholics to
enter Parliament in 1829. But Peel was a true
representativeof the style of politics at the rime.
Like other politicians he acted independently,in
spite of his party membership.One reasonfor this
was the number of crises in British politics for a
whole generationafter 1815. Those in power found
they otenhad to avoid dangerouspolitical,
economic or social situationsby taking stepsthey
themselveswould have preferrednot to take. This
was the case with Peel. He did not wish to see
Catholics in Parliament, but he was forced to let
them in. He did not wish to repeal the Corn Laws
becausethese servedthe farming interestsof the
Tory landowning class, but he had to accept that
the power of the manufacturingmiddle classwas
growing greater than that of the landed Tory
gentry.
Peel's actions were also evidence of a growing
acceptanceby both Tories and Whigs of the
I4I

An lllustrated History of Brtain

Much of London still look as it

did in the closing yars of the
nineteenth centurl " St Pancras
Hotel and Stationfrom
P entont ilb Road; Sunset" b1
JohnO'Connor (1884,)shous Sr
Pancras as it was meant to be
seen, a tempb to Victorian
uahtestoweringabove the
swtounling houses St Pancras,
buik b1 George Gilberr Scoct,is
one of Inndon's finest "Gothic
revival" buillings

economic need for free trade, as well as the need for

social and political reform to allow the middle class
to grow richer and to expand. This meant'allowing
a freer and more open society, with all the dangers
that might mean. It also meant encouraginga freer
and more open society in the countries with which
Britain hoped to trade. This was "Liberalism", and
the Whigs, who were generallymore willing to
advance these ideas, became known as Liberals.
Some Tories also pursuedessentially"Liberal"
policy. In 1823,for example,the Tory Foreign
Secretary,Lord Canning, used the navy to prevent
Spain sending troops to her rebelliouscolonies in
South America. The British were glad to see the
liberation movement led bv Simon Bolivar succeed.
However, this was partly for an economic reason.
Spain had preventedBritain's free trade with
Spanish colonies since the days of Drake.
Canning had also been responsiblefor helping the
Greeks achevetheir freedomfrom the Turkish
empire. He did this partly in order to satisfu
romantic liberalism in Britain, which supported
Greek freedommainly as a result of the influence of
the greatpoet of the time, Lord Byron, who had
visited Greece. But Canning also knew that Russia,
like Greece an orthodox Christian country, might
r42

use the excuseof Turkish isrule to take control of

Greece itself. Canning judgedcorrectly that an
independentGreece would be a more effective
check to Russianexpansion.
From 1846 until 1865 the most important political
figurewas Lord Palmerston,describedby one
historian as "the most characteristicallymidVictorian statesmanof all. " He was a Liberal, but
like Peel he often went againsthis own party's ideas
and values. Palmerstonwas known for liberalism in
his foreign policy. He stronglybelieved that
despoticstatesdiscouragedfree trade, and he
openly supportedEuropean liberal and
independencemovements.In 1859-60, for
example, Palmerstonsuccessfullysupportedthe
Italian independencemovement againstboth
Austrian and French interests.Within Britain,
however, Palmerstonwas a good deal less liberal,
and did not want to allow further political reform to
take place. This was not totally surprising,since he
had been a Tory as a young man under Canning
and had joined the Whigs at the time of the 1832
Reform Bill. It was also typical of the confusing
individualism of politics that the Liberal Lord
Pahrrerstonwas invited to join a Tory govemment
in 1852.

20 The years ofself-conficience

After Palmerston'sdeath in 1865 a much stricrer

"two party" systemdeveloped,demandinggreater
loyalty from its membership.The two parties,Tory
(or Conservative as it becameofficially known) and
Liberal, developedgreaterparty organisationand
order. There was also a change in the kind of men
who became political leaders.This was a result of
the Reform of 1832, after which a much larger
number of people could vote. These new voters
chose a different kind of MP, men from the
commercial rather than the landowning class.
Gladstone, the new Liberal leader,had been a
factory owner. He had also startedhis political life
as a Tory. Even more surprisinglyBenjamin
Disraeli, the new Conservative leader, was of
Jewish origin. In 1860 Jews were for the first time
given equal rights with other citizens. Disraeli had
led the Tory attack on Peel in 1846, and brought
down his government.At that time Disraeli had
strongly supported the nterestsof the landed
gentry. Twenty years later Disraeli himself changed
the outlook of the Conservative Party, deliberately
increasing the party's support among the middle
class. Since 1881 the Conservative Party has
generallyremained the strongest.
Much of what we know today as the modem state
was built in the 180s and 1870s.Between 187
and 1884 the number of voters increased from 20
per cent to 0 per cent of men in towns and to 70
per cent in the country, including some of the
working class. One immediate effect was the rapid
growth in party organisation, with branches in
every town, able to organisethings locally. In I87Z
voting was carried out in secretfor the first time,
allowing ordinary people to vote freely and without
fear. This, and the growth of the newpaper
industry, in particular "popular" newspapersfor the
new half-educated population, strengthened the
importance of popular opinion. Democracy grew
quickly. A national political pattem appeared.
England, particularly the south, was more
conservative,while Scotland, Ireland, Wales and
the north of England appeared more radical. This
pattem has generally continued since then. The
House of Commons grew in size to over 50
members, and the House of Lords lost the powerful

position it had held in the eighteenth and early

nneteenth centuries. Now it no longer formed
policy but tried to prevent reform taking place
through the House of Commons.
Democracy also grew rapidly outside Parliament. In
1844 a "Co-operative Movement" was started by a
few Chartists and trade unonists. Its purpose was
self.help, through a neworkof shops which sold
goods at a fair and low price, and which shared all
its profits among its members. It was very
successful,with 150 Co-operative storesby 1851 in
the north of England and Scotland. By 1889 it had
over 800,000 members.Co.operative selhelp was
a powerful way in which the working class gained
self-confidence in spite of its weak position.
After 1850 a number of trade unions grew up, based
on particular kinds of skilled labour. However,
unlike many European worker struggles,the English
trade unions sought to achieve their goals through
parliamentary democracy. In 1868 the first congress
of trade unions met in Manchester, representing
118,000 members.The following year the new
Trades Union Congress established a parliamentary
committee with the purpose of achieving worker
representation in Parliament. Ths wish to work
within Parliament rather than outside it had already
brought trade unionists into close co-operation with
radicals and reformist Liberals. Even the
Conservative Party tried to attract worker support.
However, there were limits to Conservative and
Liberal co-operation. It was one thing to encourage
"friendly" societies for the peaceful benefit of
workers. It was quite another to encourage union
campaigns using strike action. During the 1870s
wageswere lowered n many factories and this led
to more strikes than had been seen in Britain
before. The trade unions' mixture of worker struggle
and desire to work democratically within
Parliament led eventually to the foundation of the
Labour Party.
During the same period the machinery of modem
govemment was set up. During the 1850s a regular
civil service was established to carry out the work of
govemment, and "civil servants" were carefully
chosen after taking an examination. The system

r43

An Illustrated History of Britain

still exists today. The army, too, was reorganised,

and from 1870 officers were no longer able to buy
their commissions.The administrationof the law
was reorganised.Local govemment in towns and
counties was reorganisedto make sure of good
governmentand proper servicesor the people. In
1867 the first move was made to introduce free and
compulsoryeducation for children. In fact social
improvementand political reform acted on each
other throughout the c-enturyto change the face of
the nation almost bevond recognition.

Queen and monarchy

Queen Victoria came to the throne as a young
woman in 1837 and reigned until her death rn
1901. She did not like the way in which power
seemed to be slipping so quickly away from the
monarchy and aristocracy, but like her advisers she
was unable to prevent it. Victoria married a
German, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg, but he
died at the age oforty.two in 1861. She could not
get over her sorrow at his death, and for a long time
refusedto be seen in public.
This was a dangerousthing to do. Newspapers
began to criticise her, and some even questioned
the value of the monarchy. Many radicals actually
believed the end of monarchy was bound to happen
as a result of democracy. Most had no wish to hurry
this process, and were h"ppy to let the monarchy
die naturally. However, the queen'sadvisers
persuadedher to take a more public interest in the
businesso the kingdom. She did so, and she soon
became extraordinarilypopular. By the time
Victoria died the monarchy was better loved among
the British than it had ever been before.
One important step back to popularity was the
publication in 188 of the queen'sbookow life in
the Highlms..The book was the queen's own diary,
with drawings,of her life with Prince Albert at
Balmoral, her castle in the Scottish Highlands. It
delighted the public, in particular the growing
middle class. They had never beforeknown
anything of the private life of the monarch, and
they enjoyedbeing able to share it. She referredto
the Prince Consort simply as "Albert", to the
144

.ll:"'

'"

QueenYictoria in hn sixty-eighthyear, 1887 Because of tlw growth d

parliamentary gouelinent she was less powut'ul than pteviotts sotleteigv.
Howellet' as queen and' empress, sheru]ed ouer mme lans md peoplesthon
alq preuious souereigns Fwthennore, sheenioyed the respectand affectitrn
of her Brtish subjects

Prince of Wales as "Bertie", and to the Princess

Royal as "Vicky". The queen also wrote about her
servantsas if they were membersof her family.
The increasinglydemocratic British respectedthe
example of family life which the queen had given
them, and shared its moral and religiousvalues. But
she also touched people'shearts. She succeededin
showing a newly industrialisednation that the
monarchy was a connection with a glorioushistory.
In spite of the effortsof earlier monarchs to stop the
spreadof democracy,the monarchy was now, quite

20 The vears of self-corrlderrce

suddenly, out of danger. It was never safer than

when it had lost most of its political power.
"We have come to believe that it is natural to have
a virtuous sovereign,"wrote one Victorian. Pure
family morality was an idea of royalty that would
have been of little interestto the subjectsof earlier
monarchs.

Queen and empire

Britain's empire had first been built on trade and
the need to defend this against rival European
countries. After the loss of the American colonies
in 1783, the idea of creating new colonies remained
unpopular until the 1830s.Instead,Britain watched
the oceans carefully to make sure its trade routes
were safe, and fought wars in order to protect its
"areasof interest". In 1839 it attackedChina and
forced it to allow the profitableBritish trade in
opium from India to China. The "Opium'!Vars"
were one of the more shameful events in British
colonial history.
After about 1850 Britain was driven more by fear of
growing European compettion than by commercial
need. This led to the taking of land, the creation of
colonies, and to colonial wars that were extremely
expensive.Fear that Russia would advance
southwardstowards India resulted in a disastrous
war in Afghanistan (1839-42), in which one army
was completely destroyed by Afghan forces in the
mountains. Soon after, Britain was fighting a war in
Sindh, a part of modem Pakistan, then another
againstSikhs in the Punjab, in northwest India.
The Russian danger also affected south Europe and
the Middle East. Britain fearedthat Russia would
destroythe weak Ottoman Empire, which
controlled Turkey and the Arab countries. This
would change the balance of power in Europe, and
be a dangerto Britain's sea and land routes to
India. When Russia and Ottoman Turkey went to
war Britain joined the Turks againstRussia in
Crimea in 1854, in order to stop Russian expansion
into Asiatic Turkey in the Black Sea area.
It was the first, and last, time that newspaperswere
able to report freely on a British war without army

control. They told some unwelcome truths; for

example, they wrote about the courage of the
ordinary soldiers, and the poor quality of their
officers. They also reported the shocking conditions
in army hospitals, and the remarkable work of the
nurse Florence Nightingale.
In India, the unwise treatmentof Indian soldiersin
British pay resultedin revolt in 1857. Known in
Britain as the "Indian Mutiny", this revolt quickly
became a national movement against foreign rule,
led by a number of Hindu and Muslim princes.
Many of these had recently lost power and land to
the British rulers. If they had been better organised,
they would have been able to throw the British out
of India. Both British and Indians behavedwith
great violence, and the British cruelly punished the
defeated rebels. The friendship between the British
and the Indians never fully recovered. A feeling of
distrust and distance between ruler an ruled grew
into the Indian independence movement of the
twentieth century.
In Africa, Britain's first interest had been the slave
ffade on the west coast. lt then took over the Cape
of Good Hope at the southem point, becauseit
needed a port there to service the sea route to
India.
Britain's interest in Africa was increasedby reports
sent back by European travellers and explorers. The
most famous of these was David Livingstone, who
was a Scottish doctor, a Christian missionaryand
an explorer. In many ways, Livingstone was a "man
of his age". No one could doubt his courage,or his
honesty. His journeysfrom the east coast into
"darkest" Africa excited the British. They greatly
admiredhim. Livingstone discoveredareasof Africa
unknown to Europeans, and "opened" these areas
to Christianity, to European ideas and to European
trade.
Christianity too easily became a tool for building a
commercial and political empire in Africa. The
gvernments of Europe rushed in to take what they
could, using the excuseof bringing "civilisation" to
the people. The rush for land became so great that
European countries agreedby treaty in 1890 to
divide Africa into "areasof interest". By the end of
145

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

s'ourn'
l

L6

Ij

|4o

t
l-,

Our Empire Atlas, 1897, clecr\ showsBria)n's strategiccontrolof mrch

of the wcrld, Although not marked as sr,rch,Egypt and the Sulan uee dlso
cobnies in practice The extentof Bnn's cobniaL possessons
doubled
during the nitleteenthcenany Biain' s dppetiteft new possessionsrowdTds
the end of the centtlJwas a signof ics neTuousnesscotrceming the growth of
otheEuopedrlwa powes,pa'rticulaIJFrcnce ,:ntdcemuny
Although
Biuin becane ch ptlrt\ tlvough her colonial possessions,defending them
eventuall1 proved too great a strain on Btan's economy

the cenury,severalEuropean countries had taken

over large areasof Africa. Britain succeededin
taking most.
In South Africa Britain found that dealing with
other European settlerspresentednew problems.
The Dutch settlers,the Boers, fought two wars
againstthe British at the end of the century,
proving again, as the Crimean'War had done, the
weaknessesof the British army. The Boers were
defeatedonly with greardifficulry.
The real problemsof British mperialambition,
however' were most obvious in Egypt. Britan,
anxious about the safeff of the route to Indra

r46

20 The years of self-confidence

through the newly dug Suez Canal, bought a large

number of sharesin the Suez Canal company.
When Egyptian natonalistsbrought down the ruler
in 1882, Britain invaded"to protectinternational
shipping". In fact, it acted to protect its imperial
interest, its route to India. Britain told the world its
occupation o Egypt was only for a short time, but it
did not leave until forcedto do so n 1954.
Involvement in Egypt led to invasion and takeover
of the Sudan in 1884, a country wo-thirdsthe size
o India. Like other powers' Britain found that
every area conqueredcreatednew dangerswhich in
turn had to be controlled. In all these countries. in

Bain hol to use drl increasing ulmber of soldiersto drfenl, its growing
empire The battle of Isandhlwana in southAfrica in 1879 ua a htuniliating
defeat Brinin did not expect its sol.diersto be defeatedb.1bkrck Afncan
Zulus.

An illustrated History of Britain

population of Britain. A number of people called

for the developmentof colonies for British settlers
as an obvious solution to the problem. As a result,
there was marked increasein settlementin Canada,
Australia and New Zealand from the 1840s
onwards.The settlersarrived to mke over the land
and to farm it. In all three countries there had been
earlier populations. In Canada most of thesewere
pushedwestwards,and those not killed becamepart
of the "white" culture. In Australia British settlers
killed most of the aboriginal inhabitants, leaving
only a few in the central desertareas.In New
Zealand the Maori inhabitants sufferedless than in
either Canada or Australia, although they still lost
most of the land.

" 1l . l i l )!

.!!!

l tl o t r c r .

i, lri

l!

l ( i i l i r l bl f

!' .

L'Ji

: :' l i l l

lrri (.rfllll

Sixt1 1ears a queen, Victrrria celebrateshg DamondJuhbe. Imnedtatety

behind her standslter son and sutcessor, Edward VII , anl' his ocl)n son and
stlccessar, GeoTge V , stanls on his bft Vicuna is arclatnvd queen and
emptessb1 the many different colmtial peopleswter her rule

India, Africa and elsewhere, Britain found itself

involved in a contradiction between its imperial
ambition and the liberal ideas it wshed to advance
elsewhere. Gladstone's view that "the foreign policy
of England should always be inspired by a love of
freedom" seemed to have little place in the
colonies. In the twentieth century this
contradiction was a major reason for the collapse of
the empire.
There was another reason for the interest in
creating colonies. From the 1830s there had been
growing concern at the rapidly increasing
148

The white colonies, unlike the others, were soon

allowed to govem themselves,and no longer
dependedon Britain. They still, however, accepted
the British monarch as their head of state. The
move towardsself-govemmentwas the result of
trouble in Canada in 1837. A new governor, Lord
Durham, quickly understood the danger that
Canada might follow the other American colonies
into independence.His report establishedthe
principle o self-government'first for the white
colonies, but eventually for all British possessions.
It preparedthe way from empire to a British
"Commonwealth of Nations" in the twentieth
century.
By the end of the nineteenth century Britain
controlled the oceans and much of the land areasof
the world. Most Brtishstronglybelieved in their
right to an empire, and were willing to defend it
againstthe least threat. This state of mind became
known as Jingosm,after a famousMusic Hall song
of 1878:
We don't want to fight, but, by jingo if we do,
'We've got the ships, we've got the men, we've
got the money too.
But even at this moment of greatestpower, Britain
had begun to spend more on its empire than it took
from it. The empire had startedto be a heavy load.
It would become impossiblyheavy in the twentieth
century, when the colonies flnally began to demand
their freedom.

20 The vears ofselconfidence

Wales, Scotland and Ireland

As industrialisationcontinued, the areasat the
edge of British economic power became weaker.
Areas in \07ales.Scotland and Ireland were
particularly affected.
l7aleshad fewer problems than either Scotland or
Ireland. Its population grew from half a million in
1800 to over two million by 1900, partly because
the averageexpectation of life doubled from thirry
to sixty. In south Wales there were rich coal mines
which quickly became the centre of a rapidly
growing coal and steel industry. In their search for
work, a huge number of people, between two-thirds
and three-quartersof the total Welsh population,
moved into the southeast comer of the country. By
1870 Wales was mainly an industrial society.
This new working-class community, bom in
southeast\il7ales,became increasingly interested in
Nonconformist Christianjty and radicalism. It
created its own cultural life. In many mining
villages brass bands were created, and these quickly
becamesymbolsof working-classunity. Other
people joined the local Nonconformist chapel
choir, and helped to create the Welsh tradition of
fine choral singing. Wales was soon a nation
divided between the industrialiseareasand the
unchangedareasof old Wales, in the centre and
north.
The parliamentary reforms of the nineteenth
century gave.!alesa new voice. As soon as they
were allowed to vote, the Welsh workersgot rid of
the Tories and the landowning families who had
representedthem for 300 years.
Scotland was also divided between a new
industrialisedarea, around Glasgow and Edinburgh,
and the Highland and Lowland areas. Around the
rwo great cities there were coal mines and factories
producngsteel and iron, as well as the centre of
the British shipbuilding industry on the River
Clyde. Like Wales, Scotland becamestrongly
Liberal once its workforcegained voting rights.
The clearancesin the Highlands continued. In the
second half of the century it became more profitable
to replace the sheepwith wild deer, which were

hunted for sport. Many old clan lands were sold to

new landowners who had no previous connection
with the Highlands, and who only occasionally
visited their estates.The Highlands have never
recovered from the collapse of the clan system,
either socially or economically. It is probablethat
the Highland areas would have become depopulated
anyway, as people moved away to find work in the
cities. But the way in which it happened was not
gentle, and left a bitter memory.
The Irish experience was worse than that of
Scotland. ln the nineteenth century, an increasing
number of Protestant Irish tumed to England as a
protection against the Catholic inhabitants. To he
Catholics, however, most Irish Protestantswere a
reminder that England, a foreign country, was still
as powerful in Ireland as it had been in 1690. The
strugglefor Irish freedom from English rule became
a struggle beweenCatholic and Protestant. The
first great victory for Irish freedornwas when
Catholics were allowed to become MPs in 1829. In
fact in Ireland this decision was accompanied by a
repressionof civil and political liberties.Even so,
the fact that a Catholic could enter Parliament
increasedIrish national feeling.
But while this feeling was growing, Ireland suffered
the worst disaster in its entire history. For three
years, 1845, 1846 and 1847, the potato crop, which
was the main food of the poor, failed. Since the
beginning of the century, the population had risen
quickly from five to eight million. In these three
years 1.5 million (about 20 per cent) died from
hunger. At the same time Ireland had enough
wheat to feed the entire population, but it was
grown for export to England by the mainly
Protestant landowners. The govemment in London
failed to realise the seriousnessof the problem.
Many Irish people had little choice but to leave. At
least a million left during theseyears,but many
more followed during the rest of the cenrury
becauseof the great poverty in lreland. Most settled
in the United States. Between 1841 and 1920
almost five million settledthere. Some went
eastwardsto the towns and ctiesof Britain. Many
helped to build Britain's railways.
149

An IllustratedHistory o Britain

Man1 Scottislr Highlanders and lsh were driuen off their land in the
nineteenth cenwry The Irish suffered worst of all,. After tlu terribk poato
famine of 1845, there were other years of poor hrnuest, nombly in the yeo:rs
1877 _79, but many lk]s refused m bwer rens during this time' Many
funiheq tikc the onr shoun in this photograph,were Incl<edout of their
homes as they coua no bnger pay ent Most of them made their way n t}w
where Irish Anwncans stitl remembet hou thzr
n:#,T;:#;ca,

The Irish population has still not yet grown to the

same level. Today it is less than flve million (three
million in the Republic of Ireland, 1.5 million in
Northem Ireland), only a little more than half
what it was in 1840. Emisration from Ireland
contnues.
The Irish who went to the United States did not
forget the old country. Nor did they forgive Britain.
By 1880 many Irish Americans were rich and
poweul and were able to supportthe Irish freedom
movement. They have had an influence on British
policy in Ireland ever since.
150

Meanwhile, Charles Parnell, a ProtestantIrish MP,

demandedfuller rights for the Irish people, in
.when
most
partcularthe right to self.govemment.
Irish were able to vote for the frrsttime in 1885,
eighry-sixmembersof Pamell's Irish party were
elected to Parliament. Most Liberals supported
Parnell, but the Tories did not and Ireland did not
gain the right to self-govemment,or "home rule",
until thirty years later. But then Britain's war with
Germany delayed it taking place, and by the time
the war ended Irish nationalistshad decided they
could only win their freedom by fighting for it.

ZT

The end of an age

Socialand economicirruprouements
' The importdnceof sport'
,,Englnnd,s summe,,. The storm
.
Changesin thinking The end of

clouls of war

Social and economic

improvements
Between 1875 and 1914 the condition of the poor
in most cf Britain greatly improved as prices fell by
40 per cent and real wagesdoubled. Life at home
was made more comfortable.Most homes now had
gas both for heating and lighting. As a result of
falling prices and increasedwages,poor families
could eat better food, including meat, fresh milk
(broughtfrom the countrysideby train) and
vegetables.This greatlyimproved the old diet of
white bread and beer.
In 1870 and 1891 two Education Acm were passed.
As a result of these, all children had to go to school

Naulre scu1in an ebmenaD school,

1908 In !870 itbecane the duty of
Iacal authrntiesto establish schaok at t|w
expenseof Incal ratcpayas Thel were
aurlunised m compel attendance Dwing
thr. next twentJ years schoob uere buile
and the attenlance of most, if rct all,
children ac.hieuedat ebmentaD leuel

up to the age of thirteen, where they were taught

reading, writing and arithmetic. In Scotland there
had been a state education systemsince the time
of the Reformation. There were four Scottish
universties,three dating from the Middle Ages. In
Wales schools had begun to grow rapidly in the
middle of the century, partly for nationalist reasons.
By the middle of the century Wales had a university
and a smaller university college. England now
sartedto build ..redbrick''universitiesin the new
industrial cities. The term "redbrick" distinguished
the new universities,often brick-built, from the
older, mainly stone-builtuniversitiesof Oxford and
Cambridge. These new universitieswere unlike
Oxford and Cambridge, and taught more science
and technology to feed Britain's industries.

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

The face of the towns had greatly changed in the

middle yearsof the century. The organised
improvementof workers'homes, of factory
conditions, public health and education had all
come fast, once the Victorians had developedthe
administrativeand scientifrcmeans. Sidney Webb,
an early socialist, amusinglydescribedthe pride of
the new town authorities,or municipalities, which
carried out these changes:
The town councillor will walk along the munici'
pal pavement, lit by municipal gas and cleansed
by municipal broomswith municipal water and,
seeingby the municipal clock in the municipal
market, that he is too early to meet his children
coming from the municipal school . . . will use
the national telegraphsystemto tell them not to
walk through the municipal park, but . . . to
meet him in the municipal reading room.
It was easy to see the physical changessuch as the
growth of towns and cities and villages. It was less
easyto see the social changes.But in fact, power
had moved from the shires to the towns. At the
beginning of the nineteenth century the country
squirecould use his power to rule the village, send
children to work in the workhouse,and enclose
common land for his own use. By 1900 he was a
harmlessreminder of an earlier age. JPs lost all their
local govemment and administrativepowersin
1888, and could now only make judgementsin very

small cases.New county councils took their place,

which were made up of elected men and women,
with a staff of administratorsto carry out ther
decisions,a systemwhich still operatestoday.
The authority of the Church was also weakened.In
the country, the village priest no longer had the
power he ha had a century earlier. Churches were
now half empty, becauseso many people had gone
to live in the towns, where they stoppedgoing to
church. By 1900 only 19 per cent ofLondoners
went regularlyto church. Those who did usually
lived in richer areas.This remains true todav, when
under 10 per cent are regularchurchgoers.
Why did the poor no longer go to church? One
reason was that the Church of England offered
them no help with the problemsof their daily lives.
Staying away from church was also a kind of
rebellion againstthe ruling establishmentwith
which the Church was still closely connected. In
the village, many people had gone to church
becausethey were orcedto do so by the squlre'
who probably employed them. In the greatcities of
industrial Britain they were free, and they chose to
stay away.
They were also attractedby other ways of spending
their Sundays. By the 1880s,for the first time,
workngpeople could think about enjoying some
free time. Apart from museums,parks, swimming

The seasidebecame tlv Place

wllere euerlone wished a go on
holiday. Different seaide touns
arowtd v countr1 attracted
differant classes. Scarbnroughin
Y arlshir e, illustrated here,
aetracredtlv nnddle clzrsses.On
the west coat Blul<pool,
Larcashire, attracted lower
irrcone families.
I)L

21 The end ofan ase

Cc|<t was a gentleman'sEame

in which orher could also joinin
as "players". The divisian
between "gentlenen" (the rulin7
estabhshrrtent)and,, players,, (
lnwer social slo;tus)wu a clear
satement of tlte divide between
clzrssesin Fiininatthe'endof rlw
cenan), Howeuer, cricl<etwa
an mpat4ntbridge between
classes,wlvte eswct uas given
n l:r.:rsewho ployed weL,
regard)essof class. h wa pntly
far this reann, and oko because
it was a gane which mixed team
wvrk with individual excelbnce,
tlvt tlv gane becanle a synbol of
f air play in rutbnal life.
shurnefu]behavow in politics ar
in ytblic kfe was frequently
desoibedin the pess as "rwt
cticl<ct".

pools and librariesrecently opened in towns, the

real popular social centre remained the alehouseor
pub. Thousands of these were built in the new
suburbs.
From the middle of the century many people had
smrted to use the railway to get to work. Now they
began to travel for pleasure.The working class went
to the new seasideholiday towns. The middle class
enjoyed the countryside,or smaller seasideresorts
of a more expensivekind. But for both, the seaside
was a plaie where families could take holidays
together.
The invention of the bicycle was also important.
For the first time people could cycle into the
countryside,up to fifty miles from home. It gave a
new freedomto working.classand middle'class
people, who met each other for the first time away
from work. More importantly, it gave young women
their first taste of freedom. Up till then they had
alwayshad an older woman as a companion to
make sure that nothing "happened"when they met
men. Now these young women had a means of
escape,and escapethey did.

The importance of sport

By the end of the nineteenth century, two sports,
cricket and football, had become of great interest to

the British public. Cricket, which had startedas a

"gentleman's"sport, had become an extremely
popular village game. Although it had first
developedin the eighteenth century, it was not
until a century later that its rules were organised.
From 1873 a county championship took place each
year. Cricket was a gamewhich encouragedboth
individual and team excellence and taught respect
for fair play. As one Englishman said at the time,
"We have a much greaterlove of cricket than of
politics." Cricket was successfullyexported to the
empire: to the West Indies, India, Pakistan,
Ceylon, Australia and New Zealand. But while it
was popular in Wales, it never had the same
popularity in Scotland.
Brtain'sother main game, football, was also
organisedwith proper rules in the nineteenth
century. As an organisedgame it was at first a
middle-classor gentleman'ssport, but it quickly
became popular among all classes.Football soon
drew huge crowds who came to watch the full'time
professionalfootballersplay the game. By the end
of the nineteenth century almost every town
betweenPortsmouth on the south coast of England
and Aberdeen in northeastScotland had its own
football, or "soccer" team. These often encouraged
local loyalties. Sometimes they symbolised
somethingrqore. In Glasgow Celtic was supported
by the thousandsof Irish immigrantsand other
153

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

Catholics, while Rangerswas supportedby

Protestants.But at this time there was no violence.
Crowds were well behaved. Britain also exported
football abroad, as young commercial travellers
took the gamewith them, particularly to Europe
and to South America.

Changes in thinking
The most important idea of the nineteenth century
was that everyonehad the right to personal
freedom,which was the basisof capitalism. This
idea had spreadwidely through the book Enquiry
into the \Yeahh of Nations, written by the Scotsman
Adam Smith in the eighteenth century. After
Adam Smith, severalcapitalist economistsargued
that govemment should not interferein trade and
industry at all. Fewer laws, they claimed, meant
more freedom,and freedomfor indvidualswould
lead to happinessfor the greatestnumber of people.
These ideaswere eagerlyacceptedby the growing
middle class.

As so often happens, govemment policy was

influencedby individual people. At the begnning
of the century Robert Owen, a factory owner in
Scotland, gave his workers shorterworking hours.
He built his factory in the countryside,away from
the fog and dirt of the cities, and provided good
housing nearby, and education for the workers'
children. Owen was able to prove that his workers
producedmore in less time than those forced to
work long hours. Owen also encouragedtrade
unions, and supportedthe Tolpuddle Martyrs.
Owen's ideas and example began to spread.Other
reformers,like the Quaker, Arthur Cadbury,
famousfor his Birmingham chocolate factory, built
first-classhousing for their workers.
In spite of men like Owen, improvementswere
slow. By the end of the century, 30 per cent of the

However, it soon became very clear that the

freedomof factory owners to do as they pleasedhad
led to slaveryand misery for the poor, not to
happinessor freedom. By 1820 more and more
people had begun to accept the idea that
governmentmust interfereto protect the poor and
the weak. The result was a number of laws to
improve working conditions. One of these, in
1833, limited the number of hours that women and
children were allowed to work. Another law the
same year abolishedslavery throughout the British
Empire. While this set a new example
intemationally, factory ownerswere quick to point
out that while slave ownerswere compensatedfor
the loss of slave labour, they were not compensated
for the new limits on labour in Britain.
Such laws did irot make British factoriesperfect
places in which to work, and many factory owners
did their best to avoid obeying them. But by the
end of the century, few people thought it was
wrong for the government to interfere in factory
conditions, health in towns, and education for
children. People now saw these as government
duties.
154

Most of tl:epoorer classeshved in urlualth1 conl'iticrts in small, dat

.,back.to.back,,
housesl withfew oen spores.As the millLe classesmoued
out to ktter suburbs, pars d the ctJ centesbecame area d pouerty, akc
this streetinNewcatle in 1880.

\
21 The end ofan ase

nation was still exffemely poor. It was an

uncomfortable fact for the most powerful nation on
earth. Again, it was individual people who led the
fight againstthis problem. William Booth smrreda
new religiousmovement, the Salvation Army, to
"make war" on poverty. His book ln Darkest
England and the'Way Out was a reminder that while
the British called Africa ..thedark coninent'',
areasof possiblygreater"darkness"were just down
the road in their own rowns.
Literaturewas influencedby the new mood of
change. In the middle of the century Charles
Dickens attacked the rich and powerfulfor their
cruelty towards the weak and unfortunate in
society. Painting too was affected.A century earlier
it had been the great landowning aristocracy who
had bought paintings and paid artisrs.In the
nineteenth century it was the mainly urban middle
class, and to pleasethem, artistspainted different
subjects,such as sentimental scenesof the
countryside,and paintings which told a moral
story. But some painted industrial sceneswhich
raisedquestionsabout the new society Britain had
created."Pre-Raphaelite"painters looked back to
the pre-industrialmedieval and classicalworlds
with fresh and romantic eyes. Later on in the
century' many of the first socialistsn Britain were
writersor artists.Some of these belongedto the
"Arts and Crafts Movement", whose members
turned away from the new middle-class values, and
looked to pre.ndustrialhandcraft and to nature for
inspiration.
Above .all, Victorian sociery was self-confident.
This had been shown in the Great Exhibition in
1851. British self.confidencewas built not only
upon power but also upon the rapid scientific
advancesbeing made ar rhe time. In 1857 Charles
Darwin published The Origin of Species.His theory
of evolution, basedupon scienificobservation,was
welcomed by many as proof of mankind's ability to
find a scientiflc explanation for everything. But for
churchgoing people, who were mostly to be found
among the middle classes,the idea that all animals,
including human beings, had developedfrom more
simple creaturesshook this self-confidenceand led
to a crisis in the Church. Most of the churchgoing

population believed every word of the Bible. They

found it difficult ro accept Darwin's theory that the
world had developedover millions of years,and had
not been created in six days in the year 4004 nc.
Even less acceptablewas the idea that over a perod
of thousands of years man had developed from the
ape. The battle between "faith" and "reason" lasted
for the rest of the century.
There was one dangerousresult of Darwin's book.
Some of those who acceptedhis ideasbegan to talk
of "advanced" and "inferior" races.These ideas
soon influencedBritain's imperial policy. Several
European countries alreadyshared the view that for
reasonsof religion and "higher" civilisation, they
could justify their colonial policy. But the idea of
racial or genetic superioritywas a new one, from
lwhich the colonised peoplescould not hope to
escape.They could accept Christianity and could
become "more civilised", but they could not change
their race.
Today it is dificult to understand how these ideas
could have been accepted. But at the time there
was little doubt among most of the British that
Britain was hemost advancedof the ..advanced''
races,with a duty to govem the "inferior" races.

The end of t'England's summer"

At the beginning of the wentiethcentury peqple
did not, of course,realise that they were living at
the end of an age. There was srill a generalbelief in
the "liberal idea", that the nation could achieve
steadyeconomic and social improvementas well as
democracywithout revolution. Things for Britain
could only get berrer and better.
A growing demand for reormled .,New Liberal''
governments to try to improve social conditions. ln
1907 they provided free school meals, to improve
the health of Britain's children. The following year
they startedan old age pensionsscheme. It was an
astonishingnew idea that govemment should
preventhe old from starving or becoming home.
less. In 1909 Labour Exchangeswere opened, where
those without work could look for jobs. Two years
later all working people were made to pay for
"national insurance". It was another new idea that
t55

An Illustrated History of Britain

those unable to earn money through sickness or

unemploymentwould be helped by the state.
The New Liberals had begun to establishwhat
became the "welfarestate". By doing so, they made
important changesto the free capitalism of the
nineteenth century. Govemment, said the Liberals,
had a duty to protect the weak againstthe strong.
As in the gerltlemanlysport of cricket, the Liberals
believed that even within capitalism there had to
be "fair play".
In 1911 another important political event occurred.
The Liberal drive for reform, both in Irish politics
and in social affairsat home, was extremely
unpopular with most Conservatives,who had a
majority in the House of Lords. They used this
majority to stop many of the bills introduced by the
Liberal govemrnent in the Commons in the years
1906- 10. The battle of wills berween the two
Housesproduceda crisis when the Liberals tried to
introduce a new budget in 1909 which was intended to ncreasethe taxes paid by the rich,
particularly the large landowners. The Lords tumed
down the new budget. The new king, George V,
put an end to the crissby waming that he would
create enough new Liberal lords to give the Liberals
a majority. The Lords gave in. One result of the
disputewas that taxation was increasinglyseen as a
social matteras well as an economicone.
The crisis, howeverrwas not only about money'
or about reform. There was a constitutional
disagreement.The Conservativesstill favoureda
two-houseparliamentarysystem,but they now
recognised that the Lords would have to be
changed. The Liberals wanted one strong house,
with the powers of the Lords so weakened that it
could not prevent the will of the Commons from
being carried out. The result of this constitutional
debatewas the Parliament Act of 1911. Like much
of British political developmentit resultedfrom a
compromise,but one in which the Liberals won
most of what they wanted. The House of Lords lost
its right to question financial legislationpassedin
the Commons. Its powers in all other matterswere
limited. It could no longer prevent legislation but
only delay it, and for not more than two years. The
systemstill operates.
156

In the same year, for the first time, the Commons

agreedthat MPs should be paid. This was a far
more important step than it might seem, for it
meant that men of low income could now become
MPs. In 1906 a new "Labour" party had managed
to get twenty-nine representativeselected to Parliament. It was clear to even the most conservativeminded that socialistsshould work inside the
parliamentarysystemrather than outside it. The
dangersof political evolution were far less than
those of revolution.

The storm clouds of war

By the end of the century it had become clear that
Britain was no longer as powerful as it had been. In
1885 a book entitled England.noted "we have come
to occupy a position in which we are no longer
progressing,but even falling back . . . We find
other nations able to compete with us to an extent
such as we have never beforeexperienced."In
Europe Germany was now united and had become
very strong. Its economic prospectswere clearly
greaterthan Britain's. Like the USA it was
producing more steel than Britain, and it used this
to build strong industriesand a strong navy.
Why did Britain lose the advantagesit had over
other countries at the time of the Great Exhibition
of 1851?There seem to be a number of reasons.
Other countries,Germany particularly, had greater
natural wealth, including coal and iron, and wheatproducing lands. Most British people invested their
money abroad rather than in building up home
industry. British workers produced less than those
in other countries, and Britain was behind other
countries in science and technology, as well as in
managementskills, and did little to change this.
Public schools, the private systemof education for
the richer middle class, did not encouragebusiness
or scientific studies.Britain had nothing to compare
with the scientific'andtechnical education of
Germany. Finally, the working class, used to low
pay for long hours, did not feel they were partners
in manufacture.
The balance of power in Europe that had worked s
well since Waterloo was beginning to collapse. The

21 The end ofan age

i

British believed that the long period of peace had

been the result of Britain's authority in world
affairs. This authority came from Britain's imperial
and economic power. By 1880 the British merchant
fleet was four times larger than it had been in 1847,
when it was already the world leader.'More than
two out of every three tons of shipping passing
through the Suez Canal was British. By 1880, too,
Britain led the world in telegraphic
communications,with lines to almost every part of
the world. London was beyond doubt the centre of
the growing international financial system. But in
spite of such things, Britain found that Germany,
France and the USA were increasingly competing
with her. Britain was not used to being so strongly
challenged.
Suddenly Britain realised that it no longer ruled the
seas quite so assuredly,and that others had more
powerful armies and more powerful industries. As a
result of the growth of intemational trade Britain
was less self-sufficient, and as a result of growing US
and German competition startedto trade more with
the less developed and less.competitive world. This
experienceincreasedits senseofpolitical
uncertainty. Britain had been surprised and shocked
by the way in which almost the whole of Europe
had taken the part of the Boers against Britain
during the South African war, 1899- 1902. It was a
sharp reminder that friendship in Europe did
matter, and that Britain was no longer able'to
persuadeother countries how to behave in quite the
same way that it had fifty years earlier. It had to
reach agreementwith them. Between 1902 and
1907 Britain made treaties or understandingsof
friendship with France, Japan and Russia. It failed
to reach agreementwith the Ottoman Empire, and
with the country it feared most, Germany.
The danger of war with Germany had been clear
from the beginning of the century' and it was this
which had brought France and Britain together.
Britain was particularly frightened of Germany's
modem navy, which seemeda good deal stronger
than its own. The govemment starteda programme
of building battleships to make sure of its strength
at sea. The reasonwas simple. Britain could not
possibly survive for long without food and other

essentialgoodsreaching it by sea. From 1908

onwards Britain spent large sums of money to make
sure that it possesseda stronger fleet than Germany.
Britain's aTnywas small, but its size seemed less
important than its quality. In any case' no one
believed that war in Europe, if it happened,would
last more than six months.
By 1914 an extremelydangeroussituation had
developed. Germany and Austria-Hungary had
made a military alliance. Russia and France,
frightened of German ambitions, had made one
also. Although Britain had no treaty with France,
in practice it had no choice but to stand by France
if it was attacked by Germany.
A dreadfulchain of events took place. In July 1914
Austria-Hungary declared war on its neighbour
Serbia following the murder of a senior Austrian
Archduke in Sarajevo. Because Russia had
promised to defend Serbia, it declared war on
Austria-Hungary. Because of Germany's promise to
stand by Austria.Hungary, Russia also found itself
at war with Germany. France, Russia'sally,
immediately made its troops ready, recognising that
the events in Serbia would lead inevitably to war
with Germany. Britain still hoped that it would not
be draggedinto war, but realised only a miracle
could prevent it. No miracle occurred.
In August 1914 Germany's attack on France took
its army through Belgium. Britain immediately
declared war because it had promised to guarantee
Belgium'sneutrality by the treaty of 1838. But
Britain went to war also because it feared that
Germany's ambitions, like Napoleon's over a
century earlier, would completely change the map
of Europe. In particular Britain could not allow a
major enemy power to control the Low Countries.
Gazing sadly across St James'sPark from his room
in the Foreign Office, Sir Edward Grey, the Foreign
Secretary, remarked, "The lamps are going out all
over Europe. We shall not see them lit aganin our
..lamps''went out for ever.
lifetime.'' In a senseth
For what neither Britain, nor Germany' nor anyone
else realised was that after the war no one' not even
the winners, would be able to return to life as it had
been before.
157

The twentf,eth
century
22 Britain at war

The FirstWorldWar . The riseof thel-abow Party , Tlv rightsof

women' Irelnnd' Disappointmentand depression, The SecondWorld

War

At the start of the twentieth century Britain was

still the greatestworld power. By the middle of the
century, although still one of the "Big Three",
Britain was clearly weaker than either the United
States or the Soviet Union. By the end of the
seventiesBritain was no longer a world power at
all, and was not even among the richest European
powers. Its power had ended as quickly as Spain's
had done in the seventeenth century.
One reason for this sudden decline was the cost and
efortof two world wars. Another reason was the
cost of keeping up the empire, followed by the
economic problemsinvolved in losing it. But the
most important reason was the basic weaknessesin
Britain's industrial power, and particularly its failure
to spend as much as other industrial nations in
developing its industry.
Now, near the end of the century, Britain has lost
much of its earlier self-confldence; but no one is
sure what the reasonsfor this are. Some argue that
the workforce is lazy, or that the trade unions,are

An aduertisementfor the Londnn Unlerground. in 1908 offers the twentiethcenuny drean for many British people. As the "tube" reaclwd,out into the
countryside, rcw subwbs wcre bul.t Here, so the aduerasement sugested.,a
fami\ couWhve in a suburbanhousein the "mack" Tulm style, sugesn,te
of a past age of rutional glor7, th their oum garden The husband waters
tlv flowerc, while his wife and chiW prepare wool fm knining. k is a scene
ut sugesrs both damestic happinessand ako a midlle.ckss property.owning
democtacy k is an extremelycleuer aduertisement,fcr it has lost norc of its
appeal eighty year later.

too powerul, or that there are not enough good

managers.Others blame the immigrants who have
settled in Britain from the old colonies since rhe
Second World War. No one doubts that Britain is
living in an age of uncertainry.
Britain still has some valuable advantages.The
discoveryof oil in the North Sea has rescuedthe
nation from a situation that might have been far
worse. And in electronics and technology Britain is
still a world comperitor.
A nation's story is not, or should not be, solely
about wealth or power, but about the quality of the
community's existence. Britan'sloss of power need
not damagethat quality, unlessthis is measured
onlv in material terms.

The First World War

Germany nearly defeatedthe Allies, Britain and
France, in the first few weeks of war in I9I4. It had
better trained soldiers,better equipment and a clear
plan of attack. The French army and the small
British force were fortunate to hold back the
German aTnyat the River Mame, deep inside
France. Four years of bitter fighting followed, both
armies living and fighting in the trenches, which
they had dug to prorect their men.
Apart from the Crimean \Var, this was Brirain's
frrst European war for a century, and the country

r59

An lllustrated History of Brtain

would have led to fewer casualtiesif its militarv

value had been properly understood at the time.
In the Middle East the British fought against
Turkish troops in Iraq and in Palestine, and at
Gallipoli, on the Dardanelles.There, roo, there
were many casualties, but many of them were
causedby sicknessand heat. It was not until 1917
that the British were really able to drive back the
Turks.
Somehow the govemmenr had to persuadethe
people that in spite of such disastrousresults the
war was stll worth fighting. The nation was told
that it was defendingthe weak (Belgium) against
the sffong (Germany), and that it was fighting for
democracy and freedom.

Tlw aq*,fullss of war : otu of Briuin' s 75 O,OOOdBaA in the F irst W arld

\?'ar.

was quite unprepared for the terrible destructive

power of modern weapons. At first all those who
joined the army were volunreers.Bur in 1916 the
govemment forced men to join the army whether
they wanted to or not. A few men, mainly
Quakers, refusedto fight. For rhe first time, a
government accepted the idea that men had the
right to refuseto fight if they believed flghting to be
wrong. But the war went on, and the number of
deaths increased.On l July 1916 Britain attacked
German positions on the River Somme. By the
evening it had lost 20,000 dead and 40,000
wounded. In fact, five months of fighting from 1
July 1916 cost Britain 400,000, France 200,OOOand
Germany 500,000 dead and wounded. At
Passchendaele,the following year, the British army
advancedfive miles at the cost of anorher 400,000
dead and wounded. Modern artillery and machine
guns had completely changed rhe nature of war.
The invention of the tank and irs use on rhe
battlefieldto break through the enemy rrenchesin
1917 could have changed the courseof the war. It
160

At the same time popular newspapers,using large

print, memorableshort sentencesand emotional
language, encouraged the nation to hate Germany,
and to want Germany's destruction.National
feelings were even stronger in France, which had
alreadybeen badly defeatedby Germany in 1871.
As a resul,when Germany offered to make peace
at the end of 1916, neither the British nor he
French govemment welcomed the idea. Both were
prisonersof the public feelingsthey had helped to
create.
The war at sea was more important than the war on
land, becausedefeatat sea would have inevitably
resultedin British surrender.From 1915 German
submarines started to sink merchant ships bringing
suppliesto Britain. At the battle of Jutland, in
1916, Admiral Jellicoe successfullydrove the
German fleet back into harbour. At the time it was
said, with some truth, that Admiral Jellicoe was rhe
only man on either side who could have lost the
war in a single aftemoon. If Germany's navy had
destroyed the British fleer at Jutland, Germany
would have gained control of the seas around
Britain, forcing Britain ro surrender.In spite of this
partial victory German submarinesmanagedto sink
40 per cent of Britain's merchant fleet and ar one
point brought Britain to within six weeks of
starvation.When Russia, following the Bolshevik
revolution of I9I7, made peace with Germany, rhe
German generals hoped for victory against the

I
22 Britan at war

Allies. But German subrnarine attacks on neutral

shipping drew America into the war against
Germany. The arrival of American troops in France
ended Germany's hopes, and it surrenderedin
November 1918.
By this time Britain had an army of over five
million men, but by this time over 750,000 had
died, and another two million had been seriously
wounded. About fifty times more people had died
than in the twenty-year war against Napoleon.
Public opinion demanded no mercy for Germany.
In this atmosphere, France and Britain met to
discusspeace at Versailles in 1919. Germany was
not invited to the conference, but was forced to
accept its punishment, which was extremely severe.
The most famousBritish economist of the time.
John Maynard Keynes, arguedthat it was foolish to
punish the Germans, for Europe's economic and
political recoverycould not take place without
them. But his advice was not accepted.
Apart rom hatred of Germany, there was great
sorrow for the dead. The destruction had been
tenible. As one young soldier wrote shortly before
he himself died, "Everywhere the work of God is
spoiled by the hand of man." \U7iveshad lost their
husbands, children had lost their fathers, parents
had lost their sons. It was natural for a nation in
these circumstances to persuade itself that the war
had somehow been worth it. Those who died in
battle have been rememberedever since in these
words:
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow
old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years
condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the moming
\7ewill remember them.
"For the Fallen", Laurence Binyon 1869-1943

There was also anger about the stupidity of war,

best expressedby Britain's "war poets". As the most
famous of them, Wilfred Owen, wrote, shortly
beforehe himself died on the battlefield,"My
subject is !7ar, and the pity of ]7ar.''The poems
written by young poet-soldiersinfluencedpublic

opinion, persuading many that the war had been an

act against God and man. "Never again" was the
feeling of the nation when it was all over.
When peace came there were great hopes for a
better future. These hopes had been created by the
government itself, which had made too many
promises about improved conditions of life for
soldiers retuming from the war. As soon as the war
had ended, the government started a big
programmeof building homes and improving health
and education. But there was far less progressthan
people had been led to hope for.

The rise of the Labour Partv

An important political developmentduring the war
was the rapid growth of the Labour Party. Although
it was formally establishedin 1900, its beginnings
dated from 1874, as part of the trade union
movement. The trade unions themselves had grown
enormously, from rwo million members to five
million by I9I4, and eight million by 1918. In that
year, for the first time, all men aged twenty-one
and some women over thirry were allowed to vote.
The number of voters doubled from eight to sixteen
million people, most of whom belongedto the
working class.
As a result of these changes, the Labour Party,
which had won wenty.nine seats in the 1906
election, won fifty-sevenseatsin 1918, 142 seatsin
1922, and 191 seats inI9Z3. The following year
the first Labour govemment was created. The
Labour Party, however, was not "socialist". Its
leaderswere, or had become, membersof the
middle classes.Insteadof a social revolution, they
wanted to develop a kind of socialism that would fit
the situation in Britain. This was partly because
Labour's leaders did not wish to frighten the voters.
It was also becausemiddle.classthinkers beforethe
war had almost completely failed to interest the
working class in socialitideas. ln fact Karl Marx,
who spent most of his life in Brtain studying and
writing, was almost unknown except to a few
friends. Both he and his close friend Friedrich
Engels, who owned a factory in Manchester, had
L6L

An Illustrared Historv of Britain

little hope of the British working classesbecoming

truly socialist. In 1885 Engels had written of the
trade unionists: "The fools want to reform society
to suit themselves, but not reform themselves to
suit the developmentof society." Most workingclasspeople wished to improve their financial
situation and to enjoy the advantagesof the middle
classwithout becoming involved in socialistbeliefs.
The trade unions and the Labour movement had
been shaped by the experiences of the nineteenth
century. They did not believe they could bring
down the existing form of govemment, and in any
case they wanted to change things by accepted
constitutional means, in Parliament. This was
partly because they were supported not only by the
working class but also by radicals already in
Parliament.
By I9I4 the socialist Beatrice Webb could write:
"The landslide in England towards social democracy
proceedssteadily,but it is the whole nation that is
sliding, not one class of manual workers." That
slide has continued for most of this century. As a
result. the effecton Britain of the 1917 Bolshevik
revolution in Russia was not as great as many feared
it would be. Enough people were interested in
Marxism to establisha Communist Party, but the
Labour Party firmly refused to be connected with it.
However, Marxism stirred a deep-seatedfear in the
Conservative Party, which has continued to see
evidence of Marxist Socialism behind the l-abour
Parry, the trade unions and strike action.
As a result of Labour's successin 1924, the Liberal
Party almost completely disappeared.Liberals with
traditional capitalist ideason the economy joined
the Conservative Party, while most Liberal
"reformers"ioined the Labour Parw.

The rights of women

In 1918, some women over the age of thirty gained
the right to vote after a long, hard struggle.John
Stuart Mill, a radical thinker, had tried
unsuccessfullyto include votes for women in the
1867 Reform Bill. The industrial revolution had
increasedthe power of men, and their feelings
about property. Karl Marx noticed that the factoryr62

owning Englishman'sattitude of "chivalry" to

women had not preyented them from forcing
women to work like slaves in their factories and
workhouses.
A man thought of his wife and daughters as his
property,and so did the law. It was almost
impossiblefor women to get a divorce, even for
those rich enough to pay the legal costs. Until
1882, a woman had to give up all her property to
her husbandwhen she married him. And until
1891, husbandswere still allowed by law to beat
their wives with a stick "no thicker than a man's
thumb", and to lock them up in a room if they
wished. By 1850, wife beating had become a serious
social problem in Britain. Men of all classeswere
able to take sexual advantageof working women.
!7omen were probably treatedworse in Britain than
in any other industrialising European country at
this time.
After 1870 the situation, particularlyfor middleclass women, began to improve. \7omen were
allowed to vote and to be elected to borough or
county councils. A very small number started to
study at Oxford and Cambridge in separatewomen's
colleges.But while they were allowed to follow the
same course of study as men, they could not receive
a degreeat the end. Middle-class women became
increasinglydeterminedto have equal rights.
Working-classwomen were more interestedin their
legal rights conceming working conditions, and
they found support in the trade union movement.
In 1888 the policy of the unions was that "where
women do the same work as men, they should
receive equal pay". It was nearly another century
before this principle became law. Female
membershipof the unions increased,but it was not
always easy to persuadeworking men to respect the
equal rights of t\eir wives, particularly in times of
unemployment.
In 1897 women startedto demand the right to vote
in national elections. Within ten yearsthese
women, the "suffragettes",had become famousfor
the extreme methods they were willing to use.
Many politicians who agreedwith their aims were
shocked by their violent methods and stopped

22 Britain at war

'l

r.

't I

^" !

lreland

Suffragettesa.restedatg,, attackin{ Brchnglwn P alue, May 19 14.

Sffiogetres caused geat feelingsof hosality b1 ilvir lawless acts, but tlwy
belieued tlut it wa only by artingin surh a way that they couW gatn the
inteuptedtJvi campaip.
attzntian of the natan. The FirstWorll\Yar

Before the beginning of the First World War the

British government had agreed to home rule for
Ireland. It was afraid, however, that the Protestants
in the north would start a civil war in Ulster if
home rule was introduced. For this reason, when
war began in I9I4, the govemment delayed the
introduction of home rule, and called on Irishmen
to join the army. Many thousands did, encouraged
by their MPs, who hoped that this show of loyalty
would help Ireland win self-govemment when the
war ended.

The war in I9I4 changed everything. Britain would

have been unable to continue the war without the
women who took men's places in the factories.By
I9I8 29 per cent of the total workforceof Britain
was female. Women had to be given the vote. But
it was not until ten yearslater that the voting age
of women came down to twenty-one,equal with
men.

There was another group of Irishmen, however,

who did not see why they should die for the British,
who had treated Ireland so badly. They did not
only want home rule, but full independence. At
Easrer 1916, these republicansrebelled in Dublin.
They knew they could not win, but they hoped
their rising would persuadeother Irishmen to join
the republican movement. The "Easter Rising" was
quickly put down, and most Irish disapproved of it.
But the British executedall the leaders,which was
a seriousmistake. The public was shocked, not only
in lreland, but also in London. Irish Americans
were also angry, just at the moment when America
had joined Britan in the war againstGermany.

The liberation of women took other forms. They

startedto wear lighter clothing, shorterhair and
skirts, began to smoke and drink openly, and to
wear cosmetics.Married women wanted smaller
families, and divorce became easier,rising from a
yearlyaverageof800 in 1910 to 8,000 in 1939.
Undoubtedly many men also moved away from
Victorian values. Leading writers like D.H.
Lawrence, Aldous Huxley, JamesJoyce and
Virginia Woolf freely discussedsexual and other
sensitivematters,which would have been
impossiblefor earlier generations.

In the 1918 elections the republicanswon in almost

every area except ulster. Insteadof loining the
British parliament, however, they met in their own
new parliament, the Dail in Dublin, and
announced that Ireland was now a republic.
Irishmenjoined the republic'sarmy, and guerrilla
fighting against the British began. As a result the
British govemment decided to make peace. In I92I
it agreed to the independence of southem lreland.
But it also insistedthat Ulster, or Northem Ireland
as it becameknown, should remain united with
Britain.

Once women could vote, many people felt that

they had gained full and equal rights. But there was
still a long battle ahead for equal treatment and
respect both at work and at home. The strugglefor
full women's rights is one of the most important
events in recent British social history, and its
effects continue to be felt.

The Anglo-lrish Treaty of I92I led to civil war

between the Irish themselves. By this treaty the
new "lrish Free State" acceptedcontinued British
use of certain ports, the sovereignty of the British
Crown, and most important of all, the loss of
Northem Ireland, which remained under British
control. The pro-Treayforces won, and the

supportingthem. However, if they had not been

willing to shock the public, the suffragettesmight
not have succeeded.

163

An Illustrated Historv of Britain

republicans, who insisted that all lreland, including

Northem Ireland, should be an independent
republic, were defeated. But a group of republicans
formed a new pary,Fianna Fail, which won the
election of 1932 and the new Prime Minister,
Eamon de Valera, began to undo the Treaty and in
1937 declaredsouthem Ireland a republic. The
British Crown was now no longer sovereign in
Ireland.
Ireland and Britain today find themselves in the
strange position ofbeing entirely separatestates'
but by agreement their citizens are not considered
foreigners in one anotherls country. Within the
Republic of lreland the majority have continued to
believe that all Ireland should one day be united,
but without the use of force. A minority, however,
has remained since I9?I ready and willing to use
violent means to achieve a united lreland.

another miners' strike seemed inevitable. Fearing

that this would seriously damage the economy, the
govemment made plans to make sure of continued
coal supplies.Both sides, the govemment and the
Trades Union Congress (representing the miners in
this case), found themselves unwillingly driven into
opposing positions, which made a general strike
inevitable. It was not what the TUC had wanted,
and it proved deeply damaging to everyone
involved.

The men who had fought in such terrible

conditions during the war had been promised a land
"fltf.or heroes". But this promise could not easily be
kept, even by the popular new Labour Party.

The general strike ended after nine days, partly

becausemembers of the middle classesworked to
keep services like transport, gas and electricity
going. But it also ended becauseof uncertainty
among the trade union leaders. Most feared the
dangersboth to their workers and the country of
"going too far". The miners struggledon alone and
then gave up the strike. Many workers, especially
the miners, believed that the police, whose job was
to keep the law, were actually fighting against
them. Whether or not this was true, many people
remembered the general strike with great bitterness.
These memories influenced their opinion of
employers, govemment and the police for half a
century.

Alongside the social effects of the war were far'

reaching economic ones. The cost of the war had
led to an enorrnous increase in taxation, from 6 per
cent of income in 1914 to 25 per cent in 1918. The
demands of the war had also led to a doubling in
the size of the civil service, and greater govemment
control of national life. It was inevitable that there
should be increasing disagreementbetween workers
and the govemment. Just before the war in 1914
there had been an outbreak of strikes. Immediately
after the war there were further serious strikes, and
in 1919 and 1921 soldierswere used to break these
strikes, and force men back to work.

It is possible to argue that Britain missed an

opportunity to reform the economic structure of the
country after the war. But instead of careful
planning, businessmenwere allowed to make quick
profits, particularly in the cotton mills, the
shipyards and engineering industries. But perhaps
there was little the govemment could do to control
the situation, as it was not in control of economic
forces. All over Europe and America a serious
economic crisis, known as "the depression",was
taking place. It affected Britain most severely from
1930 to 1933, when over three million workers
were unemployed.

ln 19?6 discontent led to a general strike by all

workers. The reasonsfor the strike were
complicated, but the imrnediate cause was a
coalminers'strike. An earlerminers'strike in 1921
had been defeated and the men had retumed to
work bitterly disappointed with the mine owners'
terms. In 1975 mine owners cut miners' wages and

In Germany the depressionwas even more severe,

and it destroyed Britain's second most important
market from before the war. John Maynard Keynes's
waming - that if Germany did not recover then
neither would its European trading partners became honibly true. Far worse, the economic
collapseof Germany led to the rise of Adolf Hitler.

Disappointment and depression

r64

22 Britain at war

Because the worst effects of the depression in

Britain were limited to certain areas' the
govemment did not take the situation seriously
enough. The areas most affected by the depression
were those which had createdBritain's industrial
revolution, including Clydeside, Belfast, the
industrial north of England and southeastWales.
The working class in these areasstill lived in poor
conditions. Men and women could not expect to
live as long as people in richer areas,and more
babies died in the first year of life. There was little
hope for these people because almost no one was
willing to invest the large amounts of money
needed to get industry working again. The Labour
Party was no better at dealing with the situation
than the Conservatives.
It is surprisingthat Britain avoided a serious
political crisis in the 1920s.The unfairnessof the
situation was so obvious to working'classpeople,
who had neither politcal nor economic power.
Two-thirds of the wealth of the nation was in the
hands of only 400,000 people, less than 1 per cent
of the population. In other European countries
economic crisis and social unrest had led to great
changes.In Russia there had been the Bolshevik
revolution. Powerful new Nazi and Fascist
governmentswere taking over in Germany, Italy,
Austria and Spain, while France also faced political
crisis. Britain's reasonablycalm political life was
proof of an astonishinglevel of popular agreement
about the basisof governmentwhich did not seem
to exist in many parts of EuroPe.
In the 1930sthe Brtish economy startedto
recover, especiallyin the Midlands and the south.
This could be seen in the enoTnousnumber of
small houseswhich were being built along main
roads far into the countryside.
This new kind of development depended on
Britain's growing motor industry, which was based
in the Midlands. In the nineteenth century, towns
had been changedby the building of new homes
near the railway. Now the country around the
towns changed as many new houseswere built
along main roadssuitablefor motoring. Middle'
classpeople moved out even further to quieter new

,,Sueet
The despdiof wwnplo1ment. This firc pbngraph Ls simpfu entitlcd
thz
usualfootweat
InLanca,hire clogswe'e sall
fu the
scerc iiWigan".
working class llmril after the SecondVorldWar.

suburbs, each of which was likely to have its own

shops and a cinema. Unplanned suburbsgrew
especiallyquickly around London, where the
undergroundrailway system,the "tube", had spread
out into the country. It seemedas if everyone's
dream was to live in suburbia.
Economic recovery resulted partly from the danger
of another war. By 1935 twas clear that Germany,
under its new leader Adolf Hitler, was preparingto
regain its position in Europe, by force if necessary.
Britain had done nothing to increase its fighting
strengthsince 1918 becausepublic opinion in
Britain had been againstwar. The govemment
suddenlyhad to rebuild its armed forces, and this
meant investing a large amount of money in heavy
industry. By 1937 British industry was producing
weapons,aircraft and equipment for war, with the
help of money frorn the United States.

r65

An IllustratedHistory of Britain

The Second World War

The people of Britain watched anxiously as German
control spreadover Europe in the 1930s.But some
had foreseenthis dangeroussituation. They
believed that the reasonsfor German expansion
could be found in the harsh peace terms forced on
Germany by the Allies in 1919, and the failure to
involve it in the post-warpolitical settlement.In
1920 the Allies had createdthe Leagueof Nations
which, it was hoped, would enable nations to cooperatewith each other. Although the League did
not forbid war, its members agreed to respect and
preserve the borders and territory of all other
members.But in 1935 Italy invaded Abyssinra
(Ethiopia), a fellow member of the League. Britain
and France were anxious to win ltaly's co-operation
againstHitler, who was illegally rearming
Germany, and therefore decided against taking
action against Italy as the rules of the League
required them to do. This failure to use the
League'sauthority had seriousresults.ltaly's Fascist
leader, Benito Mussolini, and Hitler realisedthat
Britain and France lacked the will to make sure the
standardsthe League demanded of its members were
followed.
For the next four years Germany, Italy and their
ally in the Far East, Japan, took advantageof this
weaknessto seizeterritory of interestto them.
There was good evidence that the demands of
Germany could not be satisfied.But in order to
avoid war in 1938, the British Prime Minister,
Neville Chamberlain, acceptedand co'operatedin
the takeover of German-speaking par$ of
Czechoslovakiaby Germany. Chamberlain retumed
from meeting Hitler in Munich. He reassured
Britain that he had Hitler's written promise that
Germany had no more territorial ambitions, in the
memorablewords, "peace for our time". Six months
later Germany occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia.
Britain, realising that war was inevitable, gave a
guaranteeof supportto Poland if Germany invaded.
Chamberlain was widely blamed for his
"appeasement"of Germany. But he expressedthe
feelingsof many people in Britain, to avoid war at
all costs. As one of his opponents,Er-nestBevin,
16

generouslysaid n I94I , ,,If anyone asks me who

was responsiblefor the British policy leading up to
the war, I will, as a Labour man myself, make the
confessionand sav. 'All of us.'!(/e refused
absolutelyto face the facts."
In September 1939 Germany invaded Poland, and
Britain entered the war. The British felt again that
they were fighting for the weaker nations of Europe,
and for democracv.Thev had also heard about the
cruelty of the Nazis from Jews who had escapedto
Britain.
Few people realisedhow strong the German army
was. In May 1940 it attacked, defeatingthe French
in a few days, and driving the British army into the
sea. At Dunkirk, a small French port, the British
army was saved by thousands of private boats which
crossedthe English channel. Dunkirk was a
miraculousrescuefrom military disaster,and
Britain's new Prime Minister, l7inston Churchill,
persuadedthe nation that it was a victory of
courageand determination at Britain's darkest
hour. Although the army had lost almost all its
weaponsin France, Churchill told the nation there
could be no thought of surrender or peace
negotiation:"we shall defend our island, whatever
the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches,we
shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall flght in
the fields and in the streets, we shall fight on the
hills; we shall never surrender.. . . until in God's
good time the New World, with all its power and
might, setsforth to the liberation and rescueof the
Old." And he offeredhis countrymen nothing but
"blood, toil, tearsand sweat."
Everyone in Britain expectedGermany to invade,
but the British air force won an important battle
againstGerman planes in the air over Britain. This,
however, did not prevent the German air force
from bombing the towns of Britain. Almost one
and a half million people in London were made
homelessby German bombing during the next few
months. Once again Churchill brilliantly managed
to persuadea nation "on its knees" that it would
still win.
The war had begun as a traditional European
struggle,with Britain flghting to save the "balance

--t
22 Britain at war

'V/instan Churchill at his desk,

March 1944.

of power" in Europe, and to conffol the Atlantic

Ocean and the sea surroundingBritain. But the war
quickly becameworldwide. Both sideswanted to
control the oil in the Middle East, and the Suez
Canal, Britain's route to lndia. In 1941 Japan,
Germany's ally, attacked British colonial
possessions,including Malaya (Malaysia), Burma
and India. As a result, Britain used soldiersfrom all
parts of its empire to help fight againstGermany,
Italy and Japan. But the weaknessof Britain was
obvious to the whole world when its army
surrenderedSingapore to Japan, describedby
Churchill as the worst surrender in British history.
|n 94I Germany and Japan had made two mistakes
which undoubtedly cost them the war. Germany
attackedthe Soviet Union, and Japan attacked the
United States, both quite unexpectedly.Whatever
the advantagesof surprise attack, the Axis of
Germany, Italy and Japan had now forced onto the
battlefield two of the most powerful nations in the
world.
Britain could not possibly have defeatedGermany
without the help of its strongerallies, the Soviet
Union and the United States. By 1943 the Soviet
army was pushing the Germans out of the USSR,
and Britain had driven German and Italian troops
out of North Africa. Italy sunendered quickly
following Allied landings in July 1943. In 944

Britain and the United States invaded Germanoccupied France. They had alreadystartedto bomb
German towns, causinggreaterdestructionthan
any war had ever caused before. Such bombing had
very doubtful miltaryresults.Dresden, a
particularly beautifuleighteenth-centurycity, and
most of its 130,000 inhabitants,were destroyedin
one night early in 1945. InMay 1945, Germany
finally surrendered. In order to save further
casualtiesamong their own troops, Britain and the
United States then used their bombing power to
defeatJapan. This time they used the new atomic
bombs to destroymost of Nagasaki and Hiroshima,
two largeJapanesecities. Over 110,000people died
immediatelyand many thousandsmore died later
from the after.effects.
It was a tenible end to the war, and an equally
terrible beginning to the post-war world. But at the
time there was great relief in Britain that the war
had finally ended. It had lasted longer than the
First World \iVar, and although less than half as
many British troops had died this time, the figures
of over 303,000 soldiersand 60,000 civilians in air
raids was a very heavy price to pay for the mistakes
of the inter-war years. The Soviet Union, Germany
and Japan paid a fair more tenible price, as did
ethnic groupslike the Jewish and gypsypeoples,
severalmillion of whom were deliberatelykilled.
167

23 The age of uncertainty

The new internationalorder The welfarestate' Youthful Brinin' A

populnrmonarchy' The losso/ empire' Britain, Europeand the United
States' Northernlreland' ScotlandandWales' The yearsof
discontent.The new politics' Britain: past, presentand fuane

The new international order

During the war the Allies had started to think of
ways in which a new world order could replace the
failed League of ations. Even before it joined the
war against the Axis powers, the United States had
agreed an "Atlantic Charter" with Britain. The
basis of this new charter was US President
Rooseveltls.FourFreedoms'':freedomof speech
and expression;freedom of worship; freedom from
fear; and freedom from want.
At the end of the war the victorious Allies created
the United Nations, which expressedthe ideas of
the Atlantic Charter. The Allies formed themselves
into a "Security Council", into which they invited
some less powerul nations. They hoped that the
successof wartime alliance could be carried into
peacetime. But this dependedon a continuing
feeling of common purpose, which no longer'
existed. The idea of the four allies (Soviet Union,
United States, France and Britain) working
together for the recovery of central Europe
collapsed. Europe became divided into two, the
eastem part under communist Soviet control, the
westem part under a capitalist system protected by
US power.
In 1948-9 the Soviet Union tried to captureWest
Berlin by stopping all road and rail traffic to it, and
it was only savedby a huge airlift of essential
supplies from the West, which lasted almost one
year. As a result of the strugglefor West Berlin,
opposing alliances were formed: the North Atlantic
168

Treaty Organization of the l07estemnations, and

the Warsaw Pact of the Eastern bloc.
ln 1950 the United Nations faced new difficulties
in the Far East. Troops of North Korea, which was
under Soviet control invaded South Korea, which
was under US control. British ffoops formed part of
the United Nations force which defended South
Korea. Only fear on both sideslimited the level and
extent of the war. But while Britain became more
fearful of Soviet intentions, it also became more
unhappy with the forceful attitude of its ally, the
United States.
British foreig policy was not only concemed with
the dangerfrom the Soviet Union. It was also
concemed with finding a new part to play in a
fast-changingworld, and getting used to changing
relations with its friends, particularly with the
United States,with the European countries, and
with members of the Commonwealth. a new
associationof former British possessions.
Britain still considereditself to be a world power,
and this confidence was strengthened by three
important technical developments in the 1950s
which increasedits military strength.These
developments were in research into space, in the
design of nuclear weapons, and in the design of
intercontinental ballistic missiles.Britain's
leadershipin nuclear power resultedin the
development of nuclear weapons. But it also led to
the building of the first nuclear energy power
station in the world in 195. A1l these militarv and

23 The age ouncertainty

scentific developments drew Britain more closely to

the United States, both for political and financial
reasons.
However, by the early 190s Britain was
increasingly interested in joining the new European
Community (EC). Britain wanted to join the
Community becauseof the realisation that it had
lost political power intemationally, and becauseof
a growing desire to play a greater part in European
politics.
It was in Egypt that Britain's weakening
intemational position was most obvious. Until
195 Britain had controlled the Suez Canal, but in
that year Egypt decided to take it over. Britain,
together with France and Israel, attacked Egypt.
But the rest of the world, in particular the United
States loudly disapproved of Britain's action, and
forced Britain to remove its troops from Egypt.
Until Suez, Britain had been able to deal with the
United States and the Soviet Union as an equal,
but after Suez this was no longer possible. From
now on, Britain was viewed in a new light, not
only by the two Great Powers, but also by many
weaker countries in Asia and Africa, particularly by
the Arab countries. They began to challenge
Britain's authoriymore openly. Even more
importantly, Suez opened a painful debate inside
Britain, in which politicians tried to define Britain's
new intemational role after such a humiliatng
political defeat.

The welfare state

In 1918 there had been a wish to retum to the
"good old days". There was no such feeling during
the Second World War, when Winston Churchill
had told the nation, "We are not fighting to restore
the past. \07emust plan and create a noble future."
At the end of the war many reforms were
introduced, both by Conservative and Labour Party
ministers. Most of them agreed that there were
social wrongs in British life which had to be put
right. The reforms introduced were based on the
"New Liberal" reforms which had been carried out
just beforethe First World !7ar. But they went
much further, and it could be said that the whole

nation, Conservative and Labour, had moved

politically to the left. This move was one of the
greatestachevementsof the British labour
movement, and its effect was felt for the next thirty
years.
|n 944, for the first time, the govemment
promised free secondary education for all, and
promised to provide more further and higher
education. In 1946 a Labour govemment brought
in a new National Health Service, which gave
everyone the right to free medical treatment. Two
yearslater, in 1948, the National Assistance Act
provided financial help for the old, the unemployed
and those unable to work through sickness.
Mothers and children also received help.
Progressin these areaswas the result of new ideas
about basic human rights. Importantcitizens'
rights, particularly freedom of speech, had been
firmly established in the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. Political rights, particularly
the right to vote, and to vote secretly, developed
during the nineteenth century. In the twentieth
century people began to demand basic social rights,
such as the right to work, the right to proper health
care, and the right to care in old age. Tfu Times
newspaperwrote in 1940: "If we speak of
democracy we do not mean democracy which
maintains the right to vote but forgets the right to
work and the right to live."
The Labour govemment went further, taking over
control of credit (the Bank of England), power
(coal, .iron and steel), and transport(railwaysand
airlines). These acts were meant to give direction
tc the economy. But only 20 per cent of British
industry was actually nationalised, and these
nationalised industries served private industry
rather than directed it. Nationalisation was a
disappointment. Even the workers in the
nationalisedindustriesdid not feel involved in
making them succeed, as the planners had hoped.
Strikes in the nationalised industrieswere as big a
problem as they were in privately owned industries.
As a result of the changes which gave importance
to people'shappinessand wellbeing, the
govemment became known as "the welfare state".

r69

An Illustrated History of Brirain

The Royal Festival Hall was

unong tLe bestof 1950s
architecure. k wa built u part
d the Festiual of Briain
celehation in 1951, me lunlred
years afrer the Grcat Exhibition.
But is real impotancewas ta
nark t]w n,d o t]" hardships
causedby thewar k wa a
populm celehariut of rwtional
ecouer)' with a new corcertluJl
an Londan's South Bank and a
funfait futvr upstean at
Batterea.

For the next quartercentury both the Conservative

and Labour partieswere agreedon the need to keep
up the "welfarestate", in particular to avoid
unemployment.Britain became in fact a social
democracy,in which both main partiesagreedon
most of the basic values, and disagreedmainly
about method. The main area of disagreementwas
the level of nationalisation desirablefor the British
economy to operateat its best.
However, although the welfarestate improved
many people'slives, it also introduced new
problems.Govemment administrationgrew very
fast in order to provide the new welfareservices.
Some people objected to the cost, and claimed that
statewelfaremade people lazy and irresponsible
about their own lives.

Youthful Britain
Like much of post-warEurope, Britain had become
economically dependenton the United States.
Thanks to the US Marshall Aid Programme,
Britain was able to recover quickly from the war.
170

Working people now had a better standardof living

than ever before.There was enough work for
everyone.Wages were about 30 per cent higher
than in 1939 and prices had hardly risen at all.
People had free time to enjoy themselves.At
weekendsmany watched football matches in large
new stadiums.In the evenings they could go to the
cinema. They began to go away for holidays to
Iow-cost"holiday camps". In 1950, car production
was twice what it had been in 1939, and by 1960
cars were owned not only by richer people but by
many on a lower income. It seemedas if the sun
shone on Britain. As one Prime Minister said,
"You've never had it so good," a remark that
becamefamous.
It was also the age of youth. Young people had
more money in their pockets than ever before, now
that wagesfor those just startingwork had
improved. The result was that the young began to
influencefashion, particularly in clothing and
music. Nothing expressedthe youthful "pop"
culture of the sixties better than the Beatles, whose
music quickly became internationally known. It was

23 The age ouncertainty

no accident that the Beatleswere working-class

boys from Liverpool. They were real representatives
of a popular culture.
Young people began to expressthemselvesin other
ways. They questionedauthority, and the culture in
which they had been brought up. ln parricular rhey
rebelled againstthe sexual rules of Christian
society. Some young people startedliving together
without getting married. In the early 1960sthe
number was small, perhapsonly 6 per cent, but it
grew to 20 per cent within twenty years.
Improvementsin birth conrolmade this more open
sexual behaviour possible.Divorce became much
easier,and by 1975 one marriagein three ended in
dvorce,the highest rate in Europe. Older people
were frghtenedby this development' and called the
new youth culture he..permissivesociety''. Perhaps
the clearestsymbol of the permissiveage was the
mini skirt, a far shorterskirt than had ever been
wom before.
But there was a limit to what the permissivesociety
was preparedto accept. Two cabinet ministers, one
n 963, the other in 1983, had to leave the
govemment when their sexual relationshipsoutside
marriagebecamewidely known. Public disapproval
could still be unexpectedlysffong.

A popular monarchy
During the twentieth century the monarchy became
more popular than ever before. George V, rhe
grandsonof Victoria, had attendedthe first football
Cup Final match at l7embley Stadium, and royal
attendancebecame an annual event. On Christmas
Day, 1932, he used the new BBC radio service ro
speak to all peoplesof the Commonwealth and the
empire. His broadcastwas enormouslypopular, and
began a tradition. In 1935 George V celebratedhis
Silver Jubilee, and drove through crowdedsrreetsof
cheering people in the poorestparts of London. "l'd
no idea they felt like that about me," he said, "l'm
beginning to rhink they must really like me for
myself." To his own great surprise,George V had
become a "people'sking".
However, in 1936 the monarchy experienceda
seriouscrisis when George V's son, Edward VIII,
gave up the throne in order to marry a divorced
woman. Dvorcewas still stronglydisapprovedof at
that time, and the evenr showedhow public
opinion now limited the way the royal family could
act in private life. At the time it causedmuch
discussion,and has remained a matter for heated
argument.

The Beatbs were an exomple of

the rcw popiar culure. They
cone fram a:nailirury suburb of
I)verpool, md quicHy became
wtnld farcus f or theh rrusic
from 1964 onwards.
1-1

lr

An Illustrated Historv of Britain

During the Second World lVar George VI,

Edward's brother, became greatly loved for his visits
to the bombed areas of Britain. He and his wife
were admired for refusing ro leave Buckingham
Palace even after it also had been bombed. Since
1952, when Elizabeth II becamequeen, the
monarchy has steadily increased in popularity.

The loss of empire

At the end of the First World War, the German
colonies of Africa, as well as Iraq and Palestine in
the Middle East, were added to Britain's area of
conrol. Its empire was now bigger than ever
before, and covered a quarter of the entire land
surface of the world.
There were already signs, however, that the empire
was coming to an end. At the 1919 peace
conference US President !(/oodrow V7ilson's
disapproval of colonialism resulted in Britain's latest
territorial gains being described as "mandated" from
the League of Nations. Britain had to agree to help
these territories towards self-govemment. The real
questions were how long this would take, and how
much Britain would try to control the foreign
policies of these territories even after selfgovemment had been achieved. In fact it took
longer than the populations of some of these areas
had been led to hope, and by 1945 only Iraq was
independent, and even here Britain had a strong
influence on its foreign policy.
The United Nations Charter in 1945 also called for
progresstowards self-govemment. It seemedhardly
likely in this new mood that the British Empire
could last very long. This feeling was strengthened
by the speed with which Britain had lost control of
colonial possessionsto Japan during the war.
In India there had been a growing demand for
freedom during the 1920s and 1930s. This was
partly becauseof the continued mistrust and
misunderstandingbetween the British rulers and
the Indian people, well described in E.M. Forster's
novel A Passageto Inlia, published in 1924. But it
was also the result of a growing nationalist
movement, skilfully led by Mahatma Gandhi,
which successfuliydisturbed British rule. By 1945 r

was clear that British rule in India could no longer

continue. It was impossibleand extremely
expensiveto try to rule 300 million people without
their c-operation. In 1947 the British finally left
India, which then divided into a Hindu state and a
smaller Muslim state called Pakistan. Britain also
left Palestine, where it was unable to keep its
promises to both the Arab inhabitants and the new
Jewish settlers.Ceylon became independentthe
following year.
For most of the 1950sBritain managedto keep its
other possessions,but after Suez it began to give
them up. On a visit to Africa in 1960 Prime
Minister Macmillan wamed of a "wind of change
blowing through the Continent." On his retum to
London he began to speed up plans to hand over
power. This was partly because of the rapid growth
of local independence movements, but also because
of a change in thinking in Britain itself. Most
people no longer believed in Britain's right to rule.
Between 1945 arrd1965 500 million people in
former colonies became completely self-governing.
In some countries, like Kenya, Cyprus and Aden,
British soldiers fought against local people. Other
countries became independent more peacefully.
On the whole, however, the ending of Britain's
empire was a highly successfulprocess,carried out
in spite of some who opposed surrendering power,
however costly this might be. It compared well with
the bloody events which occurred when both
France and Belgium pulled out of their colonies.
This successfulretreat resulted partly from the great
skill of Prime Ministers and those they chose for the
difficult job of handing over power in each colony.
But it was also the result of the quality of its
colonial administrators,particularly those in junior
positions. In spite of the great wrongs of colonial
rule, many of these administrators had the highest
ideals of duty and service. It was largely due to their
work that the newly independent countries felt they
wanted to remain on friendly terms with Britain.
Britain tried to hold onto its intemational position
through irs Commonwealth, which all the old
colonies were invited to join as free and equal
membep. This has been successful,because it is
badedon the kind of friendship that allows all

r7z
b-:--

---

=---4.

23 The age of uncertainty

membersto follow their own policies without

interference.At the same time, it allows discussion
of intemational problemsin a more relaxed
atmospherethan is possiblethrough the United
Nations. It was with the help of the
Commonwealth that Zimbabwe finally moved
peacefullyfrom rebellion by the whites to
independenceand black majority rule.
Britain also tried to keep its influence by a number
of treatieswith friendly govemments in the Middle
East and in southeastAsia. But most ex-colonies
did not wish to be brought into such arrangements,
either with Britain or with any other powerful
country.
By 1985 Britain had few of irc old colonial
possessionsleft, and those it still had were being
claimed by other countries:Hong Kong by China,
the Falklands/Malvinasby Argentina, and Gibraltar
by Spain. In 1982 Britain went to war to take back
the Falklands after an Argentinian invasion. In
spite of the greatdistance involved, British forces
were able to carry out a rapid recapture of the
islands.The operation was very popular in Britain,
perhapsbecauseit suggestedthat Britain was still a
world power. But Britain's victory made an
eventual solution to the problem more dificult, and
possessionof the islandsextremelyexpensive.The
war itself had cost 900 million, but the total cost
of defendingthe island since 1982 had risen to 3
billion by 1987.

Britain, Europe and the

United States
It was, perhaps,natural that Britain was unable to
give proper attention to its relations with Europe
until it was no longer an imperial power. Ever since
the growth of its trade beyond Europe during the
seventeenthcentury, Britain had ceasedto be fully
active in Europe except at moments of crisis. As
long as Europe did not intererewith Britain's
trade, and as long as the balance of power in
Europe was not seriously disturbed, Britain could
happily neglect European affairs.
At the end of the eighteenth century Napoleonic
France drew Britain further into European politics

than it had been, perhaps,since the Hundred Years

war. In 1815 Britain co-operatedwith the other
European powers to ensure peace, and it withdrew
this support because it did not wish to work with
the despotic powers then governing most of Europe.
For the rest of the century, European affairs took
second place to empire and imperial trade.
After the First World War it was natural that some
Europeans should try to create a European union
that would prevent a repetition of war. A few
British people welcomed the idea. But when France
proposedsuch an aTangement
in 1930, one British
politician spoke for the majority of the narion:
"Our hearts are not in Europe; we could never share
the truly European point of view nor become real
patriotsof Europe. Besides,we could never give up
our own patriotism for an Empire which extends to
all parts of the world . . . The character of the
British people makes it impossible for us to take
part seriouslyin any Pan-Europeansystem."
Since then Britain has found it difficult ro move
away from this point of view. After the Second
!7orld lVar the value of European unity was a good
deal clearer. In 1946 Churchill called for a ..Unitd
States of Europe", but it was alreadytoo late to
prevent the division of Europe int mo blocs. In
1949 Britain joined with other Westem European
countries to form the Council of Europe, "to
achieve greaterunity betweenmembers",but it is
doubtful how far this aim has been achieved.
Indeed, eight yearslater in 1957, Britain refusedto
join the six other European countries in the
creation of a European Common Market. Britain
was unwilling to surrender any sovereignty or
control over its own affairs,and said it still felt
responsibilitytowardsits empire.
It quickly became clear that Britain's attitude,
particularly in view of the rapid loss of empire, was
mistaken. As its financial and economic difficulties
increased, Britain could not afford to stay out of
Europe. But it was too late: when Britain tried to
join the European Community in 1963 and again in
1967, the French PresidentGeneral de Gaulle
refused to allow it. Britain only became a member
in 973, after de Gaulle's retirement.

r73

An Illustrated History of Britain

After becoming a member in 1973, Britain's

attitude towards the European Community
continued to be unenthusiastic. Although trade
with Europe greatly increased, most British
continued to feel that they had not had any
economic benefit frorn Europe. This feeling was
strengthened by the way in which Prime Minister
Margaret Thatcher arguedfor a better financial deal
for Britain in the Community's affairs. The way in
which she fought won her some admiration rn
Britain, but also anger in many parts of Europe. She
welcomed closer co-operation in the European
Community but only if this did not mean any
lessening of sovereignty. Many Europeans saw this
as a conadiction. Unless member Stateswere
willing to surrender some control over their own
affairs, they argued, there could be little chance of
achieving greater European unity. It is not
surprising therefore that Britain's European partners
wondered whether Britain was still unable "to take
part seriouslyin any Pan.Europeansystem."
De Gaulle's attitude to Britain was not only the
result of his dislike of "les Angb-Saxons". He also
believed that Britain could not make up its mind
whether its first loyalty, now that its empire was
rapidly disappearing, was to Europe or to the
United States.
Britain felt its "special relationship" with the
United Stateswas particularly important. It was
vaguely believed that this relationship came from a
common democratic tradition, and from the fact
that the United States was basically Anglo'Saxon.
Neither belief was wholly true, for the United
States since 1783 had been a good deal more
democratic than Britain, and most US citizens were
not Anglo-Saxons. Even Britain's alliance with the
United Stateswas very recent. In 1814 British
troops had burnt down the US capital,
l7ashington. In the middle of the nineteenth
century most British took the part of the South in
the American Civil \Var. By the end of the century
the United Stateswas openly critical of Britain's
empire.
Britain's special relationship rested almost entirely
on a common language, on its wartime alliance
with the United States and the Cold War which

followed it. In particular t resultedfrom the close

relationship !T inston Churchill personallyenjoyed
with the American people.
After the war, Britain found itself unable to keep
up with the military arms race between the United
States and the Soviet Union. It soon gave up the
idea of an independentnuclear deterrent,and in
1962 took American "Polaris" nuclear missilesfor
British submarines.The possessionof these
weaponsgave Britain, in the words of one Prime
Minister, the right "to sit at the top of the table"
with the Superpowers.However, Britain could only
use these missilesby agreementwith the United
States and as a result Brtain was tied more closelv
to the United States.
Other European countries would not have felt so
uneasyabout the close ties between the United
States and Britain if they themselves had not
disagreedwith the United States concerning the
Soviet Union and other foreign policy matters.
Ever since 1945 the United States and the political
right in Britain were more openly hostile to the
Soviet Union. The Europeans and the British
political left were, on the whole, just as suspicious
of Soviet intentions, but were more anxious to
improve relations. However, even under Labour
govemments, Britain remained between the
European and American positions. It was natural,
therefore. that under Thatcher, who was more
firmly to the right than any Conservative Prime
Minister since the war, British foreign policy was
more closely linked to that of the United States,
particularly with regardto the Soviet Union. This
was most clearly shown when, after the Russians,
invaded Afghanistan, Britain joined the United
States in boycotting the Moscow Olympics in 1980.
Britain sided with the United States in other
foreign policy matterstoo, which alarmed its
Europeanpartners.In 1986, for example, it allowed
US aircraft to use British airfields from which to
attack the Libyan capital, Tripoli. One thing was
clear from these events. Britain still had not made
up its mind whether its first political loyalty lay
across the Atlantic, or in Europe.

L?4

,4

23 The age ofuncertaintv

Troops on t)wfrontlirc in
Belfat, Ulsur Wlvntlv
conflictbrol,c out in 1969 Polke
faced civil rights yotesters. Aftrr
t]vIP.A stntedits camPaien
shootngsand botlbings, the
Ukw pokce was unable n
mainuin aut)writy mossisted and
dvBritish army wu drawtnm
t)u fght Civilian Prorcstus and
owsbecane youngu and
yanger, nakingitlvrde fat v
anny anl polke m leeP conrtoL
Tlv use of force against twelue.
year-old dan.rr:sttators Iml<cd
bad on tebusian. Those who
bekevd Briain shatM cantitue
m gouernNcrtlen Ireland saw
ilu conflict as a secwitl strugg;le,
while those wlo belieued Uktcr
shouldbecone part of dw
Regblic d lreland saw it as a
Iibtration smtgp;Ie.

Northern Ireland
\7hen Ireland was divided in I92I, the population
of the new republic was only 5 per cent Protestant.
But in Ulster, the new province of Northem
Ireland, 6? per cent of the people were Protestant.
For many years it seemed that almost everyone
accepted the arrangement, even if some did not like
rt.
However, many people in Northem Ireland
considered that their system of govemment was
unfair. It was a seligoveming province, but its
govemment was controlled by the Protestants, who
feared the Catholics and kept them out of
responsible positions. Many Catholics were even
unable to vote.
Suddenly, n 1969, Ulster people, both Catholics
and Protestants, began to gather on the streets and
demand a fairer system. The police could not keep
control, and republicans who wanted to unite
Ireland tumed this civil rights movement ihto a
nationalist rebellion against British rule.
In order to keep law and order, British soldiers were
sent to help the police, but many Catholics saw
them as a foreign army with no rght to be there.

Violence has continued, with bomb attacks and

shootings by republicans, which the British army
tried to prevent. In 1972 the Northem Ireland
govemment was removed and was replaced with
direct rule from London. Since then, Britain has
been anxious to find a solution which will please
most of the people there, and offer peace to
everyone.
In 1985 Britain and Ireland made a formal
agreement at Hillsborough that they would
exchange views on Northem Ireland regularly. This
agreementwas bitterly opposed by Protestant
political leaders in the province. But their failure to
put a stop to the Hillsborough Agreement resulte
in a growing challenge from those Protestants who
wanted to continue the struggle outside Parliament
and possiblyin a military form.
The future of Northem Ireland remains uncertain.
The Catholic population is increasngslightly faster
than the Protestant one, but there are unlikely to
be more Catholics than Protestants for a very long
time. Meanwhile young people in Northem Ireland
cannot remember a time when there was peace in
the province.

An Illustrated History of Britain

Scotland and Wales

In Scotland and \0a1es,
too, there was a growing
feeling by the 1970sthat the govemment in
London had too much power. In Wales, a
nationalist party, Plaid Cymru, the party of "fellow
countrymen", became a strong political force in the
1970s.But Welsh nationalism lost supportin 1979
when the people of Wales turned down the
govemment's offer of limited self-govemment.
Almost certainly this was becausemany of them did
not welomewider oficial use of the Welsh
language.In spite of the rise of Plaid Cymru, the
u7elsh languagewas actually spoken less and less.
In 1951 29 per cent of the \i7elshpopulation spoke
Welsh. By 1981 this figurehad fallen to 19 per
celrt-{even though \7elsh was used for many radio
and television programmes,and in schools.
In Scotland, the Scottish Nationalist Party
(SNP) showed its growing popularity by increasing
its percentageof the national vote from 20 per cent
to 30 per cent during I974. The SNP became the
second party in Scotland, pushing the
Conservativesinto third place. When Scotland was
offered the same limited form of self-government as
Wales, just over half of those who voted supported
it. But the govemment decided that 54 per cent of
those who voted was not a big enough majority,
and to the anger of the SNP it abandoned the self'
govemment offer. As a result the SNP itself
collapsedat the next election, losing nine of its
eleven seats.But like Plaid Cymru in Wales, the
SNP remained active in Scottish poltics.In both
countriesmost people continued to supportthe
Labour Party, partly in protestagainstmainly
Conservative England. Although in \7a1esWelsh
was declining, and although in Scotland only a
very few people still spoke Gaelic, the different
political and cultural life of Celtic Wales and
Scotland seemedunlikely to disappear.

The years of discontent

During the 1950sand 1960sBritain remained a
European leader economically as well as politically.
But Britain suddenlybegan to slip rapidly behind its
Europeanneighbourseconomically. This was partly
t76

The discouu1 of oil in commercial quanttiesin the N arth Sea proded

webome help to Binin when ix traditiotwl sowces of income were n decline
in the 1970s The construction of oil gs proudedwuk fcn thousulds of
shipbuildersfor whun tlere eeno mote ships to build B1 the enly 1980s,
houever, no more ol gs were required and unemployment followed ln
aditon, mrch of Briain's ircome from oil was bst on wwmployment
beneft far rhe three million or so peopb out of work
Conctyrde, the result d Angb.French co'opedtion, was ehemost advanted
cil jet arlinerin the worh But it was too expensiue,no one wished to bu1
t, and it was a commercial failwe It was only used by the French and
British rutorwl ajrlines.

23 The age ouncertainty

the result of a new and unpleasant experience, a

combination of rising prices and growing
unemployment. Govemments were uncertain about
how to solve the problem, and no lnger agreed
that the state had a responsibilityto prevent
unemployment.
How real were Britain's economic problems?Most
people'swealth had continued to grow. By the end
of the 1970s four-fifths of homes had their own
telephones and refrigerators,and two-thirds owned
their own homes and cars.
Compared with its European neighbours, however,
Britain was certainly doing less well. In 194 only
West Germany of the six European Community
countriesproducedmore per head of population
than Britain. Thirteen yearslater, however, in
97?, on|y Italy produced less. Britain eventually
joined the EuropeanCommunity in 1973, hoping
that it would be able to share the new European
wealth. By 1987 this had not yet happened, and
Britain has continued to slip behind most other
European countries. The British Ambassador in
Paris wrote in 1979, "today we are not only no
longer a world power, but we are not in the first
rank as a European one . . . We mlk of ourselves
without shame as being one of the least prosperous
countries in Europe . . . If presenttrndscontinue,
we shall be overtaken . . . by ltaly and Spain well
before the end of the century." And he pointed out
that for the first time in three hundred years the
averageindividual income in Britain was well below
that in France. France itself, however, made a great
economic recovery in the seventies.Some believed
that Britain could do the same.
Britain also experiencednew social problems,
particularly after the arrival of immigrants in
Britain. All through British history there have been
times when large numbers of immigrants have come
to settle in the country. But until recently these
people, being Europeans,were not noticeably
different from the British themselves. In the fifties,
however, the first black immigrantsstartedto arrive
from the West Indies, looking for work. By 1960
there were 250,000 "coloured" immigrantsin
Britain and also the first signs of trouble with young
whites.

Later, Asian immigrants started to arrive from India

and Pakistan and from East Africa. Most
immigrants lived together in poor areas of large
cities. Leicester'spopulation became 16 per cent
immigrant, Wolverhampton and Bradford about
8 per cent each. By 1985 there were about five
million recent immigrants and their children out of
a total population of about fifty.six million. By
1985, too, almost half this black population had
been bom in Britain. Even so, there were still
white people who, in the words of one newspaper,
"go on pretending . . . that one day the blacks can
somehowbe sent'home', as though home for most
of them was anywhereelse but Britain."
As unemployment grew, the new immigrants were
sometimes wrongly blamed. In fact, it was often the
immigrants who were willing to do dirty or
unpopular work, in factories, hospitals and other
workplaces. The relationship between black
immigrants and the white population of Britain was
not easy. Black people found it harder to obtain
employment, and were often only able to live in
the worst housing. The govemment passedlaws to
prevent unequal treatment of black people, but also
to control the number of immigrants comng to
Britain.
The old nneteenth.century city centres in which
black immigrants had settled were areaswith serious
physical and economic problems. In the 1980sbad
housing and unemployment led to riots in
Liverpool, Bristol and London, worse than any seen
in Britain since the nineteenth century. Black
people were blamed for.causingthese riots, but they
were in fact mainly the result of serious and
longstanding economic difficulties, which affected
the black population living in the old city centres
more rhan the white.
There were other signs that British society was
going through a dfficult period. The Saturday
afternoon football match, the favourite
entertainmentof many British families, gradually
became the scene of frightening and often
meaninglessviolence. British football crowds
becamefearedaround the world. In 1984 an
English crowd was mainly responsiblefor a disaster
Lt

An IllustratedHistory of Brrtarn

:lT*:r:

I mmigranrsf r on diff er ent

C onrmonu eahh countries tznded.
m Livetogetherin particular
districrs In Southall, uest
Inndan, many Punjabis,
Gujaratis and Sil<)sfron India
settbd daum, opening shopsand
beconing successfulin trade

at a match in Brusselsin which almost forty people

were killed. People were shocked and ashamed,but
still dd not understandthe reasonfor the violence.
The permissivesociety and unemploymentwere
blamed, but the strangefact was that those who
startedthe violence were often well-off membersof
societywirh good jobs.
!7omen, too, had reasonsfor discontent. They
spoke out increasnglyagainstsexism, in
advertising,in employmentand in joumalism.
They protestedabout volenceagainstwomen and
demandedmore severepunishment for sexual
crimes. They also tried to win the same pay and
work opportunitiesas men. This new movement
resultedfrom the growth in the number of working
women. Between 195 and 1985 the number of
wives with jobs increasedfrom 37 per cent to 58 per
cent. In I975 it became unlawful to treat women
differentlyfrom men in mattersof employmentand
pay. But this law was not fully enforced, and it
continued to be harder for women to take a full part
in national life.
178
b*-

Unemployment ncreasedrapidly at the end of the

1970s,reaching3.5 million by 1985. In many
towns, 15 per cent or more of the working
population was out of work. Unemployment was
highest in the industrial north of England, and in
Belast,Clydeside and southeastWales, as it had
been in the 1930sdepression.Things became worse
as steelmills and coal mines were closed.In 1984
the miners refusedto accept the closing of mines,
and went on srike. After a year of violence during
which miners fought with the police the strike
failed.
The defeatof the miners showedhow much power
and confidencethe trade unions had lost. This was
partly becausethey faced a governmentdetermined
to reducethe power of the unions. But it was also
becausethey seemedunable to change themselves
to meet changed circumstances,and they seemed
afraid of losing their power.
Inflation had made the situation more difficult.
Between I754 an 1954,priceshad multipliedby

23 The age of uncertaincy

six. Then, they multiplied by six again in the space

of only thirty years,between 1954 and 1984. In
such circumstancesit proved almost impossibleto
make sure that all workersfelt that they were fairly
paid.
Industrialproblemsalso increasedthe differences
,,comfortab1e''
south and the poorer
beweenthe
north. It is easy to forget that this divsion already
existedbeforethe industrial revolution, when the
north was poorer and had a smaller population.
The large cities and towns built during the
industrial revolutonhave had great difficulty in
creating new industriesto replace the old.

The new politics

Few of the problemsof the 1980swere entirely
new. However, many people blamed them on the
new Conservative govemment, and in particular,
Britain's first woman Prime Minister, Margaret
Thatcher. Thatcher had been elected n 1979
becauseshe promiseda new beginning for Britain.
The need for such a break with the past had been
u'idely recognisedfor some years.As a result the old
Conservatve-Labour agreementon the guiding
principles of the welfarestate had alreadybroken
Jown. In the Conservative Party there had been a
srrongmovement to the right, and in the Labour
Farry there had been a similarly strong move to the
Xett.Both moved further awayfrom the "centre" of
Britshpolitics than they had done in living
:nemory.
lb's basic change in British politics causeda major
:nsis for the Labour Party. Labour was no stranger
:- inremal conflict, nor to these conflicrc being
;.magingly conducted in public. In the 1930sthe
:
had turned against its own first Prime
-nrl
l-trnister,Ramsay MacDonald, when he formed a
:,=:ronalgovernmentwith the Conservativesto
.-,.:iJlethe flnancial crisis of 1931. Four years later
: ial again been split between its traditional antio"'.::nembersand those who recognisedthe Nazi
::l:et. In 1959 Labour had again publicly
:ll."=:leed
about two issues,nationalSationand
- -r:-ear\\-eapons,
which a large section of the party

Margaret Thatrller, tlv kmgest serving Pitne Ministet of v twentieth

century. Her styb andher views appea)ed.m nany British peoqle wha had
lost canfence in the welfare sate and in t]le direction tfu natiorthad t41en.
In some ways shewa the first genuhwleacr tlv nationhadhad sirtce
Churchill, the pohtician on wlum slv corucioruly modelledherself. ln spiu oJ
the fort tha ouer half t)v naaon disagreed withhn policies, they were unabb
to uote her out of ffice.

wished to give up, whether other nuclear armed

nations did so or not. This time, however, the
disagreementsbetweenthe party'sleft and right
were far more damaging.The 1979 election result
was the worst defeatsince 1931. !7orse, however,
was to follow, and as the bitter conflict continued,
many people ceasedto believe in the party'sability
to govem itself, let alone the country.
Labour suffereda further blow when four senior
right-wing members left the party to form their own
..Social
Democratic Pary''in 1981, in alliance with
the small but surviving Liberal Party. For some
yearsthe Liberal Party had been calling for a
change in the electoral system.It had good reason
to do so. In I974 the Liberals had received 20 per
cent of the national vote but only 2 per cent of the
seatsin Parliament. By March 1982 the new
"Alliance" was gaining ground both from the
Conservative and Labour parties.

An Illustrated Historv of Britain

Margaret Thatcher had come to power calling on

the nation for hard work, patriotism and self-help.
She was not, however, a typical Conservative. As
one of her ministerssaid, "I am a nineteenthcentury Liberal, and so is Mrs Thatcher. That's
what this govemment is about." There was much
truth in the remark. for she wanted free trade at
home and abroad, individual enterprise and less
government econornic protection or interference.
However, she was more of a Palmerston than a
Gladstone. She wanted more "law and order" but
was a good deal less willing to undertake the social
reform for which later nineteenth-century Liberals
were noted.
Not everyone in the Conservative Party was happy
about the change n policy. The discontented
members'becarneknown as "wets", one of whom
argued that "people . . . must at least feel loyalty to
the state. This loyalty will not be deep unlessthey
gain from the state protection and other beneflts",
and he wamed against the state's "failure to
create a sense of community". Thatcher, however,
ignored these views, saying that she "could not
wastetime having any intemal arguments."
By the beginning of 1982 the Conservative
government had become deeply unpopular in the
country" However, by her firm leadership during
the Falklands War Thatcher captured the
imagination of the nation, and was confidently able
to call an election in 1983.
As expected,Thatcher was retumed to power with
a cleamajorityof 144 seatsin the 650-seat
Parliament. It was the greatestConservative victory
for forty years. In part Thatcher's victory was a
result of the "Falklands factor". Far more, however,
it was the result of a split opposition vote, between
Labour and the Alliance, and the continued
weaknessof the Labour Party, which sufferedits
worst result since the early 1920s.Once again the
Alliance had the disappointment of gaining 26 per
cent of the national vot , but only 3.5 per cent of
the seatsin Parliament. A clear majority had voted
against the retum of a Conservative govemment,
showing dissatisfactionwith Thatcher's policies. It
was not difficult to see whv this was so.
180

Thatcher had promisedto stop Britain's decline,

but by 1983 she had not succeeded.Industrial
production since 1979 had fallen by 10 per cent,
and manufacturing production by 17 per cent. By
1983, for the first time since the industrial
revolution, Britain had become a net importer of
manufactured goods. There was a clear economic
shift towards service industries. Unemployment had
risen from 1.25 million n 1979 to over 3 million.
However, Thatcher could claim she had begun to
retum nationalised industries to the private sector,
that she had gone even further than she had
promised. By 1987 telecommunications,gas, British
Airways, British Aerospace and British Shipbuilders
had all been put into private ownership. She could
also claim that she had broken the power of the
trade unions, something else she had promised to
do. In fact, the trade unions had been damaged
more by growing unemployment than by
govemment legislation. She could be less confident
about increased law and order. In spite of increasing
the size of the police force, there was a falling rate
of crime prevention and detection. In addition, the
rough behaviour of the police in dealing with
industrial disputes and city riots had seriously
damagedtheir reputation.
The most serious accusation against the Thatcher
governmentby the middle of the 1980swas that it
had createda more unequal society, a society of
"two nations", one wealttry,and the other poor.
According to these critics, the divide cut across the
nation in a number of ways. The number of very
poor, who received only a very small amount of
governmenthelp, increasedfrom twelve million in
1979 to over sixteen million bv 1983. In the
meantime, reductionsin income tax favouredthe
higher income eamers.
The division was also geographical,between
prosperoussuburbanareas,and neglectedinner city
areas of decay. Although the govemment sold
many state-ownedhousesand flats to the people
who lived in them, it also halved the number of
new housesit built between 1981 and 1985, a
period in which the number of homeless people
increased.

23 The age ofuncertainty

r

s
I

rt

ry
Londan's docLlonds. Fron tlv eightzenthcentu:ry until the 1950s the
inhabiants d these areaswarkcd in Inndon,s hlsy docls Then the dc|s
died, and remained empty u.ntil tlv 1980s when the whole nea wu
redeuelaped.Young yofessionak from outsidethe area moued inn tlw rcw
homing (foreground) becat+seit wa cbse to dte banls atn finandal
instiwtims (background) in which they warl<cd. Ahhaugh redevelopment
hought new weakh to tlu area, somt of dv oAbw-ircomed. dackland.
connnuniq wha saw no benefitfor thernseluesmaued.out

More importantly, people saw a divide between the

north and south of the country. Ninety'four per
cent of the jobs lost since 1979 had been north of a
line running from the Wash, on the east coast, to
the Bristol channel in the west. People were aware
of growing unemploymentin the "depressed"areas,
and fewer hopes offinding a job. Indeed, by 1986
41 per cent of those unemployedhad been out of
work for over a year, comparedwith only 25 per
cent in 1979. As a result, it was not surprisingthat
Labour continued to be the strongerparty in the
north, and in other depressedareas.In the more
heavily populatedsouth, the Alliance replaced
Labour as the main opposition party.
The black community also felt separatedfrom
richer Britain. Most blacks lived in the poor inner
citv areas.not the richer suburbs,and

unemploymentamong blacks by 1986 was twice as

high as among the white population.
In spite of these problems,Thatcher's Conservative
Party was still more popular than any other single
party in 1987. In the national elections that year,
the Conservative Party was returned to power with
a majority of I02 seats.This was partly because
since 1979 personalitieshad become politically
more important. Thatcher was seen as more
determinedand more convincing than the Labour
or Alliance leaders.It was also becausethe
opposition to Conservative policy remanedsplit
betweenLabour and the Alliance, and it appeared
permanentlyso.
There were other reasonswhy the Conservative
Party, wth only 43 per cent of the national vote'

]'i

ln<

aEe :f .rN'*rL

The royal fami\ celeha.ws the.

weddingof Prce Andrew artd
Sarah Fergttscn. In tlv 1980s the
,,warld
oyalafllilbbecanv
vopetJ,, in a wa| it hol not
beenberyte.Member of tht
royat family became the stbject.
of jownakstic nuesngation,both
in theipublic md pivate liues'
ubegan m mincr teleuisivn
"soaP oPera" in their
entertatnnvnt qtalue.

simple. The Spanish Armada was defeatedmore by

the weather than by the English navy' the Spanish
navy became strongerrather than weaker after
158b, and the war with Spain seriouslydamaged
the economy of England. Nevertheless,the defeat
of the Armada has remained a symbol of Britain's
seafarngsuccess.It was given particular importance
in the lJte nineteenth century, when British world'
wide command of the seaswas at its height' By
1988 it was harder to think in the same way'
becauseBritish foreign policy had shrunk in recent
years,with a decline in its interesrcbeyond Europe
and the United States.
There was also somethingslightly uncomfortable
about celebrationof the Glorious Revolution' The
Glorious Revolution was about the sovereigntyof
Parliament in the nation's affairs' But not everyone
was happy with parliamentarylife by 1988' Was its
constituencysystemtruly democratic?Was
Parliament itself too powerful?There was another

reasonfor discomfort.The Glorious Revolution had

been a disasterfor lreland. In 1988 there was a
reminder of this side of Britain's history in the
conflict in Northern Ireland, where even the
Protestant"Loyalists" were unhappy with rule by
the Westminster Parliament. In Scotland, Wales'
and parts of England, too, there were people who
\Westminster,
disliked the centralisedpower of
which had increasedin the Thatcher years'
Britain has more living symbolsof its past than
many countries. It still has a royal family and a
smali nobllity. Its capital, cities and countryside
boast many ancient buildings, castles,cathedrals,
and the "statelyhomes" of the nobility' Every year
there are historical ceremonies,for example the
State Opening of Parliament, the Lord Mayor's
Show, o. the meeting of the Knights of the Garter
at Windsor each St George's Day' It is easyto think
thesesymbolsare a true representationof the past'
Britainls real history, however, is about the whole

183

Inoex
TI

Aberdeen56,61, I53
Adam, Robert 11
Adelard of Bath 99
Africa (seealsowest,south,
north and east Africa) 4,
r45-8, 169,r?Z
Africa Company 75
Agincourt43, 53,54
Albert, Prince Consort 144
aldermen 13
Alexander,King ofScots 30
Alfred' King 15' 1
Alliance, Liberal and Social
Democratic I79_8z
Allies (1939_45)16-18
America seealsoSouth America,
United Statesand Canada l,
3I, 69' 73, 74' 8'97, 99,
05,I2, II3,1z3' z8' I47,
145, r48, r54, 16r, 163,164
Civil War 174
112,
War of Independence
34,136
-Anne,Queen 8?, 88, 96, 97,
107
Angles 11, 20, 71, 85
AnglcanChurch seeChurch of
England
Anglo-lrish32
Anglo-Saxons7, IZ-I5, 18,
23, 35, 37, 39,40,45
language4
Anglo-IrishTreaty (L9Z) 163
Anselm, Archbshopof Canter.
bury 29
Aquitaine 2' 44
Arab countries145,169
Arbroath, Declarationof ( 1320)
33
Argentina 173
Armada,Spansh43, 54, 7374,98, r8Z-3
army,British 9Z-3, 97, 109,
LLZ, r13, 128-9,145-6, r5960, 166=7,172,173,r75
Arthur, King 6, 45, 65, 75
Arthur, Prince of Wales 75
Arts and CraftsMovement 155
Atlantic Charter 18
Augustine,St 13, 14
Auld Alliance 43, 44, 56, 77,
96
Australia75, 116,I3Z, 148,
53
Austria27, 109,131,142,165
Austria-Hungary157
Avignon, popesof 49
Axis, (1939_45)16-168
BBC 171
Bacon, Francs99
Bacon, Roger 99
Balkans 132
Balliol,John de 37-33
BankofEngland 108' 19

Bannockbum, battle of (1314)

3 3 ,4 3

Baptists99
banows(burialmounds)4
Bath 99' 11
BayeuxTapestry l7
Beakerpeople5, 6
Beatles170-1
Bede,the VenerableIl, 14, 15,
99
Becket,Thomas,ArchbishoPof
23,29,64
Canterbury
Bedford,John dukeof 53
dukeof 117
Belfast15, 175,|78
Belgic tribes 7
Belgium 44, 68, 128, 129, 132,
r57, 160
Bevin,Emest 16
Birmingham 12, 84, 10?, 1I4,
rz8, r34,138,154
Black Death(1348)4
Black Prince 45, 48
Blenheim,battleof (1704\ 97
Boadicea8,9
Boers 146,157
Boleyn,Anne 68, 69,70
Bolsheviks,Bolshevism 10,
162, 165
BonaparteseeNapoleon
Booth,William 155
Boru, Brian 20
BostonTea Party 112
Bosworth,battleof (1485)55,
56, 68
Boyle, Robert 99
Boyne,battleothe (190) 97
Bradford134,177
Bretigny,Treatyof (130) 44
Bretons53,55
Bristol74, 103' l0, Iz5,I77
Britain, Great, new stateof
(170?) e6
Brittany 44
Britons,Ancient 21
BronzeAge -7
Bruce,Robert 32-3
Brunel, IsambardKingdom 139
Buckingham 134
duke of 55
BuckinghamPalace I77
Bunyan,John 99
burgh,borough i
Bursundy,dukeof 44, 53' 55
Burghley,Lord 80
Burke, Edmund I2_3, 128
Burma 167
BFon, Robert 142
cabinetgovemment 108
Cadbury,Arthur 15'l
Cadiz 74
Caernaron32,52
Caesar,Julius 7, 8
Calais 44, 53' 0

Caledonia 9
Calvin, John 9
Cambridge4I,55'6I, 5' 100'
T5I, 16Z
Canada109,112'11' 148
canals 103,123
Canning, Lord 747
Canon law 35
Canterbury13,29
Archbishopso 14' Z8, j0, 49,
89
Cape Colony 131
Catherineof Aragon 69, 70, 7l
Catholicism,Catholics(seealso
Church) 70-73, ?6, 7?, 85,
88' 89' 94_' 97' 108'113'
I4, 4I, I49, I54
Cavaliers(Royalists)91
Caxton,William 65, 75
Celts,Celtic culture-14, 182 1 , 3 1 , 3 7 ,4 5 ,5 6
Ceylon 131,153,7z
Chamberlain,Neville 16
CharlesI 86, 88-93
CharlesII 93-95, 100,101
CharlesV (ofSpain) 59, 70
CharlesEdward,Prince (Bonny
PrinceCharlie)I I l, 113
chartersoffteedom 40
Chartiss 135' l3' l43' l84
Chatham, William Pitt the
Elder, Lord 109, IIZ
Chaucer,Geoffrey 64, 65, 85,
99
China 145,173
|3_I5, 1?, 19,23'
Christianty
145
Church 13, 16, 23, 28, 29-30,
3 5 , 3 6 ,4 t , 4 9 ,5 3 , 6 r , 6 7 , 6 5 ,
69,70, 85, 94-95, 99, r05,

I5z,5

Celtic Church 14, 15, 21, 32

Church ofEngland 9' 88'
93-5,99, r73, rZ4, r39, r40,

r4t,r5z

Romn ehurch see also

Catholicism 14
Churchill, Winston Spencer
166-69, 174
civil law 35
C vil war (1642_45) 90, 9L,

95
clans21,32,56,77,113'11
Cnut, King 1
coffeehouses 104
Coke, Sir Edward 88
Columba, Sr 20, Zl
C ommons, House o 3I , 6|, 79,

80,87,88,92,rZ5,135,r4r,
r43,156
ColdWar 174
Commonwealth, British 148,

18'171'17z , 73

communism 12
Concorde 176

Conservative Party I43, 156-7,

76I7
' 9,
|6z ,169_70,174,
180-1,182

Co-operative Movement 143

Copenhagen, battle of
(1801) 128
Com Law 136, I4I
C omwall 4, 5, ?, 11
Conesponding Society 128
Crcy, battle of (346\ 44
Crimea 145, 146, 159
C romwe ll, Olive r 91, 9 Z- 4 , 9 9 ,
104
Cromwell, Richard 93
Cromwell, Thomas 68, 70
Culloden, battle of (746) 111'
113, 116
Cyprus 172
Czechoslovaka 16
Dail (lrish parliament) 13
Danegeld 1
Dane law 1, 3
Danes seealso Vikings 1' 17'

36

Dardanelles 10
Damley, Lord 78
Darwin, Charles 155
David, King of Scots 44
Defoe, Danel 109
Denmark 15
Derry (see also Londonderry) 76
Dcke ns,C harle s i31, I 3 z , 1 5 5
Disraeli, Bepjamin 143 Domesday Book 25, 34,36-37,

70
Dorset5, 6,8, 34
Drake,SrFrancis73_4, 109,

r42

Druids 8, 19
Dublin 20,32,97, Il3, 163
Dunkik 16
Durham,Lord 148
Dut c h 7 3 , ? 5 , 8 7 , 9 7
earl 13
eastAfrica 177
EastAnglia 12, 48,92
EastIndiaCompany 75, 9?, 110
EastIndies75, 108
EasterRising(1916) 13
EastlandCompany 75
zI, 44, 56,1' 113'
Ednburgh
116,49
EducationActs 151
Edwardthe Confessor16-17,
1 8 ,3 4
Edward1 30-4, 39, 43,52, 5?
Edwa r dI I 3 Z -3 , 4 3 , 5 1
EdwardIII 33, 44,45,48-9'
5r,61,64
EdwardIV (DukeofYork) 55'
56
EdwardV 55
Edwa r dVI7 0 , 7 1 , 7 7 ,7 9

lrrJe-x

manor lJ
\ ar c h , e a r l o f 5 , 5 L
\argaret of Scotland 33
\{argaret, daughter of Henry

vlt 77

Marlborough, duke of 97
Marlee, Wlliam 99
Marlowe, Christophet 85
Marshall Aid Programme 170
Mar x , K a r l 1 6 I , 1 6 Z
Mary, queen o Scots 72, ?7,

78

Mary Stuart'queen95-
MaryTudor,queen70-2' 73,
79
Matilda,Queen 26, 71
Mayflower99
Mediterranean48,97, I3I, I3Z
MerchantAdventurers0, 75
Mercia 12
Methodism,Methodists107,

|37
|z,|z4_5,

middleclasses61, 125, I39,

r4 0, r43, r5Z, 156,16 r- 2,
164,165
MddleEast I38, 145, 160, 167,

r7z,r73

Midlands11,85, 107,114,

rzz,rz3,r33,r34,165,r8Z

Mill, John Stuart 162

Milton, john 99
Montfort, Simon de 30, 31
More, Sir Thomas 68, 85
Muslims Z5 , 27, 145, I'12
Mussolini, Benito 1

Napoleon Bonaparte I07, 127,

128- 9,131,r 57,16r

Napoleonic !ars 125-9,

I3Z,I'13

Naseby,battleof (1645)9
Act
NationalAssistance
(1948)19
navy 73-75, 0,l |09, 127,
'
1z8_9, 13,I57, 160
Nelson,HoratioLmd 126-7,

rz8-9

Nightingale, Florence 145

National Health Service 169
Neolirhic 4, 5
Netherlands see also Holland,
Low Countries 56, 68, 73, 85,
9?, 9 8
New Liberals 155-6, 169
New Stone Age seeNeolithic
New Zealand 148, 153
Newcastle 40, 84, I03, 154
duke of 115
news p a p e r s1 0 1 , l l l - 1 2, 145,
160 ' 1 9
Newton, Sr Isaac 100
Nonconformsts 95, 99, I4,

rz0,n5, r40,r4r,r49

Norman 13, 16, I7, 20, Z3, 25,

26, 31,32, 35, 37,38, 39,52,
184
Norma nd y16,I'l, 25, 28, 34,
37, 40, 44,53
Norsemen21
North Africa 4, 17

North Atlantic Treaty

(NATO) 168
organsation
Nori-hemlrelandseealso
Ulster 150,163,164,175,183
NorthumbrialZ, 14, L0
Nottngham12,37, 9, Iz8
Norway 15,21,39
Ockham,William of 99
Offa,kingoMercia 12, 14
Dyke 12, 18
OpiumWars 145
OrangeLodges113
orange see,0illiamof
ordeal,trial bv 35-
OrkneyIslands4, 5, 21
Orleans,duke of 43
Ottoman Empireseealso
Turkey 145,157
battleof (1708)97
Oudenarde,
Owen,Roberr 154
Oxford 40, 41,49, 61, 65, 99'
100'15i ' l 2
Oxfordshre83
Paine,Tom II2, z8
PakistanI4Z-3, I77
Pale 32
Palestine160,I7Z
I4Z-3,I80
Palmerston
ParliamentseealsoCommons
andLords 28,30-1,39, 43,
47,61,67, 69,70,7r, '1 6 ,7 9 ,
82, 87,88_90,9 , 9z _ 6 ,I 0 7 ,
108,110, I, I I 4, I I 7 , I 7 5 ,
I34, 4|, I43, 156,|6I_z,
1 3' 180'182_3
ParliamentAct of 1911 15
Membersof (MPs) 79, 80,
88,97, 93, 94, 95, lrc, rrl ,
r35, r43, r49, 156,16r,
79_8z
Speakerof 80
StateOpeningof 183
Pamell,Charles 150
Pan, Catherine70
battleof
Passchendaele,
(1917)160
Revolt 48-9, 50
Peasants'
Peel,SrRobertl 16' |4' |4z,

r43

Penn,Villam 105' 119

115
Charter( l8l8)
People's
,l1,7z,,l3'
PhlipII (ofSpain)
74, 79
Pcts20, 21
Pilgrim Fathers99
of Grace(1539)82
Pilgrimage
Pitt the Elder,Villiam see
Chatham
Pitt the Younger,William 127,
128
PlaidCymru 176
Prime Minister, origins 108
Poitiers,battleof (1356)44
police 13, 164' 180
P o o rL aw s83, 118, 132
Pope,Alexander 100
population10' 38' 4' 48' 80_
1' 84' 103' I4_5,I3I, I33,

r50
r34,r41,149,

potato famine (1845-7) i49

Pre-Raphaelites 155
Presbyterians89, 95, 105
Protectorate 93, 104
Protestantism, Protestants 9_

7 2 , 7 6 , 7 ? -7 9 , 8 5 ,8 9 , 9 0 ,9 3 ,
95, 96, 97,98-9, 105,107,
|3, 149,I50, |54, I74, 175,
183
Prussia109,lZ9, I3l
Puritans84, 9Z-5, 98, IZ0, 1Z5
Pyrenees26
Quakers98,99, 102,105,114,
1 1 5 '1 1 9 '1 5 4 '1 0
Quebec 109
radicals112,IZ8, 134,135,
143,r49, 162
railway138-9
Raleigh,Sir \alter 74, 85
battleof (1706)97
Ramilles,
ReformBill (1832\ r34, I4Z,
143
( 1 8 7 ) 1 6 7
Reformation 68, 69-72, 76,
7?-79, 8s, r05
1Zthcentury41
Renaissance,
15th/1thcentury79, 85
Richard I (Coeurde Lion) 278,40,53
RichardII 51
Richard III, duke of
Gloucester55, 57
Rght,Petitionof (128) 89
Rights,Bill of (1689)95
Robertof Normandy ?5, 26
R o m a ns4 , 6 , 7 _ 1 0 , 1 3 , 5
Rome seealsoChurch,
Roman 33,49, 79
Roundheads91
Royal Sociery 99, 100
Royalists91
rurallfe I0, z-I3,37_38'
4 7 , 5 7 , 6 0 , 8 0 -8 1 '1 1 _ 8
RussiaseealsoSovetUnion 3,
6 , 2 0 , r 7 9 , r 3 l , r 3 Z , l 4 Z -3 ,
r57, 160,162,165,r74
St Paul'sCathedral 100
SalvationArmy 155
Sarajevo157
Saxons9, II-17, ZI, 23,32,
3 5 ,3 ?, 7 5 ,8 5
39, ?5,78
Scandinavia
schools,boarding IL), I37
elementaryl5l
grammar41, 85
public 140' 15
Scotland(andScots) 4, 5, ?, 8,
, 3,37,
9 , 1 ' | 4 ' 1 8 ,z0 _ 2 . | 2
43-4, 48, 52, 56, 61,6?, 723, 75,88-9, 90, 92, 93, 95,
9' 98' 105' I3' |I4, 116'

Settlement'Act of (t701) 9
Seymour,Jane 70
\illiam 55' 85
Shakespeare,
Sheffreld11.4,178,133,134
shires12,31
shirereeve(sheriff)12
Sidney,Algemon 95
Sidney,Sir Philip 85
Sinsapore131,167
slaviry 74, 97, 120,125,154
Smith,Adam 154
Social DemocraticParty 179
Somme,banleof the (191)
160
SouthAfrica I57, 146
South America seealso
America73,74,I09
South Sea Company (and
Bubble) 108
Soviet Union seealso
Russia159, 167,168,174
spcrn 67, 68, 69, 71, 72,73,

97,e8,1oe,
iz, rc,a+,8s,
r73,
rz8,r79,r4Z,r59,165,
r77

Speenhamland Act (1795) 118

Spenser, Edmund 76,85
Siaple, Company ofthe 60
Stai Chamber, Court of 8
Stephen of Blois 2
Stonehenge 2, 5,
Snathclyde 20
S tuarts 87-105, 107, 108, 1 1 3
Sudan 14, 147
S ue z C anal 147, 157, 16?, 1 6 9 ,

r7z

12-3
suffragettes
Act o (1534)9
Supremacy,
Tara 5, 19
Test Act (16?3) 94
Thatcher,MargaretI74, I79,
183
Thirty YearsWar (1618-48)
88, 101
TolpuddleMartyrs 134,154,

r8z

ToriesseealsoConservative
Parry94-5, i07-8' 113'128'
I 3 4 , I 4 0 , 1 4 I , 4 z,| 4 3 ,1 4 9 '
150
rownandcity life 8, 9, 16' 39,
4 0 ,4 r , 5 7-9 , 6 1 ,8 2 , 1 0 3 ,
IL4, T4O
tradeunions I75, 134-5, I43,
r59, 161,162,164
TradesUnion Congress143,

r64

Trafalgar, battle of (1805) l2-

7, rz8

Troyes53
Tudors5, 67_86,87,I04,

r05,rr7,159

r8z

Tull, Jethro117
TurkeyseealsoOttoman
Empite131,3z' |4z, |45,
160
Tyler,Wat 48,49,50

45) 101,r59,166-7,169,
r73

U l s t er5 , 1 8 ,1 9 , 7 6 , 9 0 ,9 7 ,
I T 3 ,T 6 3 , 1 7 5

134,138,r43,r49,r5r,r53,
r54,176,r8Z-3

Scottish Nationalist Party 17,

Second World War (1939-

Index

Union Act, Englandand

Scotland(1707) 96 , ,
UnitedNations 168,I7Z, L73
SecurityCouncil 18
United Statesseealso
America 35, 149,150' 15'
t57, 159,165-7, 168,169-

70,r73,r74,r83

universities41, 56,6I, 65, l5l

Utrecht,Treatyof (I7I3) 97
Valera, Eamonde 164
Versailles,Treatyof (1919) 11
Victoria,Queen 137,I38, 144,
148,L7r
Vikings 15-17,20, ZI, 3L, 39,
85
voting seeelectoralpolitics
\Vales
(andthe Welsh) 3, 4' 5,

188

7, II, T L ,T 3,1 4 ,1 8 ,1 9 ,2 1

zl,li,li, +l,++,
+b,sz,,t,
r34,135,
75,76,79,81,114,

143, I49, 51 ' 153' 165, I 75,

178,183
P rin c e of 30, 32, 52, 75, 144
Wallace, William 33,'52
Walpole, Robert 108-9
liUarsaw Pact 18
\Taterloo, battle of (1815) 129,
156
W a t t , Ja m es lZI , lZ)
Webb, Beatrice 162
Webb, Sidney 152
Wedgwood, Josiah 123
welfarestate I55-6, 169-74
Vellington, duke of 128-9
W esley,Joh n 123-5
W essex lZ, 15 , 17, ZI
west Africa 107, 109

!7estIndies97, 108-9, II7,

z5' I53' I77
15, |6, I?, 23, z5'
Westmnster
3 4 , 3 5 , 5 1 , 9 0 ,1 1 7 ,1 8 3
Whigs 94, 95, 108,110,128,
134, L4r, 142
!7htby,Synod o(663) 14, z|
Wilkes,John II0-7, IZ5
Wilkinson,John 121
willam I (theConqueror)17,
23,25,28,29,34,36
William II, Rufus 25, 29
willamof orange 8?, 95, 97'
113
Wilson,Woodrow 172
Winchester9 , 25, 34, 64
Windsor 45, 183
\X/inn12' 6
Wolsey, Cardinal 69, 70
wo m en8 , 6 0 , 6 2 -3 , 8 4 -5 ,

I05 IL9_20,35,I37, 16'

' r 78,18 21, 8 4
162-3,

workingclasses149,153, 156,
|6I, 162,164'65'I7
Wren, Sir Christopher100,l0l
Wyatt,Thomas 71
Wycliffe,John 49' 1
Wykeham,!illiam of 5
yeomanryregimenm128
yeomen47, 58, 81,84, 104,

r28

Y o r k 9 , 1 0 ,2 3 , 30 ,IZ 3
dukeof 55
Yorkists52, 55
Yorkshire+,37, 48,70,I4,

r52

Zimbabwe173
Zulus 147

Index

EdwardVII 148
EdwardVIII 171
Egypt 128,146,147,69
76
eisteddfods
Einstein,Albert 100
Eleanorof Aquitaine 2
I 67,70,72-4, 76,
Elizabeth
?7, 79-80,84, 87, 89, 118
ElizabethII 172
empire,British 74.-5,107,129,
L 45-8;I7I-2, 74
electoralpolitics 110,L34, I43,
16r-3, 176,t80-2
enclosures81-2, I07, lL6-7,
11 8
Engels,Friedrich11-2
Erasmus85
Ethelred,King 1
Eton College 55, 5
Europe3, 4, 5, 6, 7,8, 10' 13,
15,29,31, 40, 4r, 43, 59,68,
6 9, 73, 88, 97,101,10 3,114,
Lr7, tz), r21, Lz3, 127,LZ99, 131,t3Z, 136,138,145,
L55-7, 159,L6,164,|65,
l6_8, 170-1' I73' |74, I75'
183
Evangelicalism137
FactoryAct, First(1833) 125
Falklands173,180
familylife 6Z-3,84-5, 105,
1t9-20,136-7
FarEast l09' 16' 18
Fairfax,General 91
fascists,ascism15_
Fawkes,Guy 89
feudalism23-5, 28, 31, 32, 33,
39,43
FiannaFail 14
FirstWorld 'ar(l9l4- 18)
159-61,t63, t67, 169,L1Z,
173
Flanders44,48,60,61
Flemings40, 48, 56,83
Flden, battleof (1513) 77
Fox, CharlesJames 128
France(and the French) 15, 1'
r7 , 26,z7, 28, 29, 30,31, 32,
34,39,40,43, 44, 49,52,53,
56,6r, 67, 68,69, 72, 73, 77,
?8, 93, 96, 97, 98, 107,10810, 113,LZr, 123,lZ5-9,
L3r, L3Z,134,136,137,138,
1.42,r57, 159-61, 165,1668,173
French language41, 4
Franks 9, 15
Frederickof Prussia I 11
FrenchRevolution125, 128129, 134
Frobisher,Martin 73
Fry, Elizabeth 125
Gallipoli 10
Gandhi, Mahatma 172
Ganer, Order of the 45
Knightsof the 183
Gascony40,44,53
Gaul 8, 9
Gaulle,Generalde 173
18

Gaunt,John o 5I,55
generalstrike(I9L6) 164
Geoffreyof Monmouth 5
GeoffreyPlantagenet,duke of
Anjou 2
GeorgeI 107,108
GeorgelII109,110-1, 113
GeorgeV 148'156,7|
GeorgeVI 172
Germanicgroups9-11
Germany 14, 15, 39, 69, 78,
t3z, r43, 150,156-7,1596r, 164,165- 7, 172
German language108
Gibraltar97, 173
Gladstone,\i7illiam 141,I43,
148,180
Glasgow56,6I,107,|16' 34,
r49,153
GloriousRevolution 95, 108,

r87-3

Glyndwr, Owain 52
govemment, Saxon 12
Viking 1
early Middle Ages 23,3I,

34-5

late Middle Ages 57

Tudor 9' 79-80
Stuart 94-5
eighteenth century 108-9
nineteenthcentury 13
twentieth century 155_,

|69_70,79_82

loc a l govem m en |z, |3 , 57-

8 ,6 r ,7 2 ,8 ?- 3r, 5 Z -3

Great Exhibition (1851) 138,

155-6,170
Greeks142

Gregory the Great, Pope 13

Grey, Sir Mward 157
Grey, Lady Jane 71
Grey, Lord 134
Gruflydd ap Llewelyn 18
guilds 40-41' 7
Hadrian, Emperor 9
Halley, F/mund 100
Hanseatic League 8
Harold, King 17
Harvey, William 99
Hastings' battle of (106) 12'

I7
Hawkins,SirJohn 73, 74
Hanover 96, 107,110
Hebrides Zl
henges5,
HenryI 25, 26, 29, 31, 34, 35,
99, r08
HenryII 22, 76, 27, 29, 32, 35,
36
Henry III 30, 35
Henry IV (dukeof Lancaster)
50- 3, 55
HenryV 53, 54
HenryVl 53,55,65
HenryVII(Tudor)55, 5?,679, ?3, 75,?7- 9
HenryVIII 67, 68-70, 73, 757, 79, 82, 84, 87
HighlandersZl, 77, 96, 11I,
113,149-50

Highlands,Scottish 20, 2?.,32,

56, Lt6
hillforts' 7' 8
HillsboroughAgreement( 1985)

r75

Hitler, Adolf 164, 165-6

Holland see also Netherlands and
Low Countries 95, 97, lI7
Holy Land 25
Holy Roman Empire 8, 69, 98
homage 24-75
Hong Kong 173
Hooke, Robert 99
Howard, Catherine 8
Huguenots 99
Hundred Years War 44,53,56,
68, 173
Ice Age 3, 4
immigration, immigrants 39,

40,98,r77, 178,184
India 75,97,109,110,117,
129,138,r45-8, 153,167,
172,177-8
IndianMutiny 145
lndustrialRevolution I0?, z|_
9, r37, 162,178,180
industry48,84,tLl-3, 130,
|36, |54, 162'|64, 65,169,
178,180
Ireland(andthe lrish) 5, 7, 8,
9, 14, 15, 18,19-ZL,32,43,
74-6, 90, 93, 96, 97, 104,
rt3, r43, r49-50,153,163,

r75,r83

Irish Free State 13

lron Age 6
-169
Israel
I taly 8, 79, 14z, |65_?, 177
Jacobinism 128
Jacobites lO8, 113
James I (ofScotland) 5
James II (ofScotland) 5
James III (ofScotland) 5
James IV (ofScotland) 77
James V (ofScotland) 77
James VI (of Scotland) and I (of
Eneland) 77, 78, 87 -90, 93,
96, 98
James VII (of Scotland) and II
(of England) 94_97, 108, 13
James III, the Old
Pretender 108
Jellicoe, Admiral 160
J e ws 39, 99, lI 4, 143, 166-7
Exchequer of 39
jingoism 148
John, King 27 -8, Z9-30, 3?
Johnson, Samuel 114
/onson, Ben 85
jury system 3
Justice, Chief 88
justices of the peace (JPs) 61,
2' 80' 81' 82' 83' l04' 15l
J ute s 11, 85
Jutland, battle of (l91) 160
Katherine of Valois 53
Kelkl TheBookd 19

K ent 3 , 1 1 , 1 3 , 4 8 , 6 3 , 7 1,1 0 3
Kenya 172
Keynes,John Maynard 161,164
Kirk, the Scottish77, i8, 889, 96, r37
Korea,North and South 18
LabourExchanges155
LabourmovementLZ5,16Z,
r69
LabourParty 43,|56, I59,
6_z,164,|69_70,|?6,
179,180,182
LancashireI4' z3, I38, 152,
I )
Lancastrians 52,55
Langland, william 4
Latin 8, 5, 4I , 49
Laud, William 89
law and justice 15, 35-6, 6I,
8' 110
schools 1
League of Nations 16, 168'

7z

Leicester9, 177
earl of 30
Leinster19,20
LevantCompany75
Levellers93,98, L84
Liberals128,134,'140,141,
I4z, I43,149,50,5_6,
162,r79, r80
Unlidame GosPeL14
Liverpool107,111,114,171,
177
Llewelynap Gruffydd 30, 32
Locke, John 95
Lollardy '19-50
London 9, 10, 15, 16, 17, 21,
2 8 ,4 | , 7 , 8 | , 8 z, 8 4 ,9 I , 9 5 ,
1 0 3 '1 1 1 '1 1 3 '1 1 4 '1 L 5 'I7 ,
118,128,r34, r38, 165-7,

r7z,175

Docklands 181
T owe r of 43, 55, 82, 85, 1 1 1 ,
Underground 158
londonderry ?6,96,9?
longbow 44
Lord Mayor ofLondo 41
Lord Mayor's Show 183
Lord Protector 92, 93
Lords, House of 31, 40, 79' 80,

9 2 , 9 3 , 1 3 4 , 1 4 3 , 1 5 6Louis XIV (ofFrance) 93, 97,

99
[.ow Countries seealsoHolland,
Netherlands39, 40,68, 128,

r57

Lowlands, Scottish 20, 56, 90,

rr3,116,149

Loyalists, Ulster 183

Luddites 123
MacDonald, Ramsay 179
Macmillan, Harold 172
Magna Carta (1215) 28,29,30,
31, 88
Malaya (Malaysia) 17
Malplaquet, battle of (1709) 97
Manchester 84, 107, lL4, IZ3,

34,I 43,16I

An Illustrated History of Britain

people of Britain, and what has shaped.them as a

society. This means, for example, that the recent
story of black and Asian immigration to Britain is
as much a part of Britain's "heritage" as its stately
homes. Indeed more so, since the immigrant
community's contribution to national life lies
mainly in the future.
\7hen looking at Britain today, it is important to
remember the great benefits from the past. No
other country has so long a history of political
order, going back almost without intemrption to
the Norman Conquest. Few other countries have
enjoyed such long periods of economic and social
wellbeing.
It is also important, however, to remember the less
successfulaspectsof the past. For example, why did
the political views of the seventeenth-century
Levellers or ninetenth.century Chartists, which
today seem so reasonable, take so long to be
accepted? Why did the women's struggle to play a
fuller part in national life occur so late, and why
was it then so dificult and painful? Why is there
still a feeling of division between the north and
south of Britain? Is Britain, which in many ways
has been a leader in parliamentarydemocracy,
losing that position of leadershiptoday, and if so,
why?
The questions are almost endless, and the answers
are neither obvious nor easy. Yet it is the continued
discussion and reinterpretation of the past which
makes a study of Britain's history of value to its
present and its future.

184

t._

vAn Illustrated History of Britain

won so convincingly. Its emphasison personal

wealth and property ownership had begun to
change the way many traditional Labour supporters
voted. It may be that many lower income people
living in the Midlands and south shifted'their
loyalties to the right. On the other hand, in
Scotland the Conservativeslost half their seats.
mainly to Labour or the Scottish National Party, an
indication of the increasedsenseof division
between richer and poorer Britain, and an
indication that Scottish radicalismwas as strong as
ever.
Thatcherls victory causedconcem for both
opposition parties.Labour had done better than
many had expected.However, it still had to face
the fact that Thatcher's policies were creating a
society which seemeddecreasinglyinterestedin
Labour philosophy, and it had to decide how it
could make this philosophy more attractive without
givin! up.its principles. The Alliance also faced
seriousproblems. It had done worse than expected,
calling into question its claim to replacethe twoparty systemwith a three-partyone. It now seemed
that it would take two or three national elections
beforethis question, and the connected question of
proportional representation,would be decided.
The 1987 election brought some comfort, however,
to two underrepresentedgroups.In 1983 only
nineteen (3 per cent) of the 650 membersof
Parliament had been women, almost the lowest
proportion in westem Europe. In 1987 this flgure
more than doubled to fory'onewomen MPs (6.5
per cent), a figurewhich suggestedthat the political
partiesrealisedthat without more women
representativesthey might lose votes. Blacks and
Asians, too, gained four seats,the largestnumber
they had ever had in Parliament, although like
women they remained seriouslyunderrepresented.

Britain: past, present and future

By the late 1980smost British people felt that the
future was full of uncertainty. These doubts resulted
from disappointment with lost economic and
political power. Many people looked back to the
"Swinging Sixties" as the best ten years Britain had
had this century.

r8z

However, people were divided conceming the

nation's future possibilities.Some, those who had
voted for Thatcher, were optimistic. They believed
that material wealth was vital for national renewal,
and that economic successwas about to happen.
Others were unhappy wth the direction the nation
was taking. They believed that the emphasis on
material wealth encouragedselfishness,and a
retreat from an ideal of community to a desire for
personal gain. They were worried by the wBakening
of the welfare state, particularly in the educational
and health services.
The govemment said much about maintaining
..traditionalvalues'',partcularly
law and order.
Respect for the law, it argued,was rooted in British
tradition. It also spoke of a retum to Victorian
values. On the other hand, its opponentsargued
that the tradition of broad popular agreement on
the management of the nation's affairs was in grave
danger. Neither side was wholly right in its claim.
For example, the Conservative argumentforgot
that in the past, the law had been frequently
broken not only by criminals but also by those for
whom it was oppiessive,like the Tolpuddle
Martyrs. It forgot, too, that the Victorians had
valued not only enterprise and hard work but had
also cared about social reform to assist the weaker
membersof society. In the same way, when Labour
accusedthe'Conservativesof putting broad national
agreement in danger, it forgot that its own party
origins lay with the radicalswho stood against
acceptednational political practice. But such
awkwardfacts were easlyplaced on one side, and
the political partiesappealedto "history", as this
fitted their view of modem Britain and the glorious
future they offered if the people supported them.
There was nothing new in this. People have hlways
looked at history in the way that suited their system
of beliefs. In 1988 Britain celebratedtwo major
anniversaries, the defeat of the Spanish Armada in
1588, and the Glorious Revolution in tr88:One
was about Britain's successfulmilitary and foreign
policy, the other about its successfulconstitutional
development.The popular view is that both were
truly gloriousevents. However, the truth is less

1 The politcal world

politics should be open to free discussionby

everyone.Free speech,he believed, was the basic
right of every indvidual.\7hen George III made
peace with France in 1763 without telling his ally
Frederick of Prussia,Wilkes printed a strong attack
on the government in his own newspaper,The
NorthBnn. The king and his ministerswere
extremelyangry. They were unwilling to accept free
speechof this kind. Wilkes was arrestedand
imprisonedin the Tower of London and all his
private paperswere taken from his t-rome.
Wilkes fought back when he was tried in court.
The governmentclaimed it had arrestedl7ilkes "of
statenecessity".The judge tumed down this
argumentwith the famousjudgementthat "public
polcyis not an argumentin a court of law''. Wilkes
won his case and was released.His victorry
establishedprinciples of the greatestimportance:
that the freedomof the individual is more
important than the interestsof the state, and that
no one could be arrestedwithout a proper reason.
Govemment was not free to arrestwhom it chose.
Govemment. too. was under the law. Wilkes's
victory angeredthe king, but made Wilkes the most
popular man in London.
The ruling classwas not used to considering the
opinions of ordinary people. Between 1750 and

1770 the number of newspapershad increased.

These were read by the enormous number of literate
people who could never hope to vote, but who
were interested in the important matters of the
times. They were mainly clerks, skilled workersand
tradesmen.Improvedroads meant that a newspaper
printed in London could be reprinted in Liverpool
two days later.
Newspapers in their turn increased the amount of
political discussion.Even working people read the
papersand discussedpolitics and the royal family,
as foreign visitors noticed. "Conversation" clubs
met in different towns to discuss questions like
"lJnder what conditions is a man most free?", or
whether secret voting was necessaryfor political
freedom. The fact that ordinary people who had no
part to play in politics asked and discussedsuch
questionsexplains why John Wlkes was so popular.
His struggleshowedthat public opinion was now a
new and poweul influence on politics.
Wilkes's victory was important becausehe had
shown that Parliament did not representthe
ordinary people, and that their individual freedom
was not assured.As a result of his victory people
began to organisepolitical activity outside
Parliament in order to win their basic rights.
Politics were no longer a monopoly of the

Tlubattle of Clodenin early

1746 (seepage 113) mnked rhe
end not on$ of Bonnie Pnnce
Chnhe' s attempt to regain v
thronecyrt]le Stuorts. lt ako
ntarl,cd the beginning of the
drsmrction of the Highland clan
s.lstem. Dad Mryrier, the
ainter' wa abb a r,eHighlrn,n
fisorwrs nken at CuJloden ftn
this picure. k therefnre shows
the real d'res o dle Hchl*nders.
Although all tltse-men arc front
Clan Cameron, the uariety in
their dressand tartan showsit
wa twt exartly a unfatm. These
brson'ercweseflt m wcrk on
planations in theNew Wnrld.
Tlv arrist died as a debuvrin
Fbet arisotr.

111