The Peasant Revolt of 1381

A single act turned the irritation of the laboring and artisan classes into a revolt. So great had become the deficit of the government that three poll taxes were levied in succession, the last of which, authorized in November, 1380, was exceedingly heavy. The tax amounted to three groats, or twelvepence, on every lay person, male or female, of the age of fifteen years. Two-thirds of the tax was to be collected in January, 1381, and the remainder in the following June. On the appearance of the tax-collectors, Essex and Kent gave the first signal for revolt, followed by Norfolk, Suffolk, and other counties; and before the year was over a large portion of southern England, from the Humber to the Severn, was to a greater or less extent in insurrection.

In the three populous counties of Norfolk, Suffolk, and Cambridge, where the movement was earliest checked, the revolt had the appearance of a concerted uprising instigated by revolutionary agents working secretly among the people. The mob of Suffolk, consisting of villeins, hired laborers, members of the lesser clergy, tradesmen, and artisans, under the leadership of John Wrawe, a priest, slew John de Cavendish, the king's justice, who had been zealous in enforcing the Statute of Laborers, sacked manor-houses, and destroyed court rolls and manorial documents. Five days later, June 17, Norfolk rose, beheaded Sir Robert Salle, sacked houses in Norwich, opened jails, plundered and burned at will. They showed their hostility for the church and the law and their hatred of court rolls and kindred documents. The Cambridge mob wrecked manor-houses, plundered towns, and destroyed valuable papers. But this mob rule was brief. Before the end of June the rioting had been put down by Spencer, the warlike bishop of Norwich, and the leaders were hanged and quartered.

While this revolt was taking place, another uprising occurred on the southern side of the Thames. Early in June, Dartford had became the centre of a revolution in Kent, and a body of rioters sacked Canterbury, murdered a number of persons, and advanced on London. On June 12, men from Kent, Surrey, Sussex, and Essex came together at Blackheath. John Ball the preacher and Wat Tyler' the leader were at their head. Convinced that John of Gaunt was responsible for the evils that had come upon the country, the insurgents directed their wrath against him, and against Sudbury the archbishop, Hales the treasurer, and Legge the author of the poll tax. On the 13th the rebels entered London, and, joined by the prentices of the city, destroyed the Savoy, John of Gaunt's palace, Hales's manor-house, the Temple (the home of the lawyers), and the Inns of Court. The king and others sought refuge in the Tower. Finally, Richard agreed to meet the insurgents at Mile End, and there on the 14th promised to abolish serfdom and all forms of servile labor, to pardon all the rebels, to permit the villeins to trade outside the manors in the towns, and to fix rents of lands at fourpence all acre.

With their demands apparently satisfied, the more moderate of the insurgents dispersed to their homes. But others, more radical, were already enacting a tragedy at the Tower. Breaking in, they murdered Sudbury, Hales, and Legge, while others slew many Flemings in the city. Again the king faced the rioters those of them that remained; at Smith Field. There Wat Tyler was slain by the mayor of London, and the king, seizing the opportune moment, when confused by the loss of their leader they were uncertain what to do, was able to induce them to depart. From that moment the cause of the rebels was lost. On the 17th they were finally dispersed.

The reprisals were frightful. Rioters were hanged without mercy. Chief Justice Tressilian held bloody assizes in Essex, and none of the rebels were spared.

London n 1381  

John Ball was caught and hanged. Parliament compelled the king to repeal all the liberating charters and itself passed an act annulling all the concessions that had been made.

The results, so far as villeinage was concerned, were probably slight. The great value of the revolt lies in the fact that it gives us a view of the laboring classes of England at a critical time in their history, when they were passing out of villeinage into freedom, and when payments in kind were being replaced by payments in money. The revolt did little to hasten this process ; for the landlords, taking advantage of an unsuccessful uprising, probably made the lot of the peasant for the time being harder than it had been before. Certain it is that the releasing of the tenantry from the old bondage was not completed for another century.