Old Dive's History of Norwich Castle - Part the Eighth - From Tudor Torture to Georgian Gaol - Chapter V

Many are the legislative, financial and social reforms of Cromwell's Protectorate that were deemed so beneficial to the country that the succeeding monarchs kept them on the statute books, quietly ignoring who had framed them (all, that is, except Oliver's attempts to alleviate the suffering of the poor at the expense of the rich and his reforms of the corrupt court system).

Wart? What wart?

Cue Austin Powers 3 "Moley moley moley" scene …

Ollie, courtesy the interweb.

Here in Norwich things were nowhere near so bad as before the Civil War. Norwich Castle officially became the County Gaol and the torture chambers were dismantled (possibly sold off to what passed as the local BDSM community back then). No more folk were burned to death in the Lollards' Pit and the buildings and church windows wrecked in the Great Blow were gradually repaired.

Bit of a bummer then that, "In 1656, on Sunday July 20, about five in the evening, was a most terrible tempest of thunder and lightning, with hail stones as big as pullets eggs, which did great hurt to the corn, glass windows &c. to the value of 3,000l. in the city and adjacent country."

More rescued pieces of stained glass from the Great Blow, this time in St.Peter Hungate. Courtesy St.Peter Hungate.

In 1657 parliament offered Cromwell the crown which he mercifully turned down, albeit after weeks of hemming and hawing. He would have made a fine monarch, being a more than able administrator and organiser and a brilliant commander of armed forces, but monarchs tend to be hereditary and his son Richard was a wet slap, as useful as a one-legged man at an arse-kicking party, as the country would soon discover.

As Blomefield records: "In 1657, the Lord Protector Cromwell being proclaimed in London with great solemnity on July 1, on the 10th following he was proclaimed here, the mayor, justices and aldermen, riding in scarlet gowns, and the sheriffs in violet gowns, attended by two trumpeters, and two companies of volunteers, and the city waits, the whole company were gallantly entertained at the mayor's."

"In 1658, Sept. 3, the grand Usurper died, on which day the wind was so very high, that much damage was done in many places: and on the 7th of the same instant, the mayor received letters intimating his death, and ordering Richard Cromwell, his eldest son, to be proclaimed Protector of England, Scotland and Ireland …"

Note the change from "Lord Protector" to "grand Usurper."

A year or so later, Richard the wet slap was "laid aside" and his parliament kicked out by the army. General George Monck marched down from Scotland to London and somehow managed to negotiate the restoration of the monarchy in the teeth of violent dissent by the army, culminating in the Declaration of Breda, guaranteeing leniency for all but the regicides. On 14th May 1660 Charles the Second was declared king and all manner of merrie mayhem ensued, as we shall learn in good time.

George Monck, by Peter Lely, via the interweb.

But back to the good parts of Oliver's Protectorate …

First up: the "reform of the existing legal procedure, involving as it did, delay, uncertainty, corruption and of encouraging a disregard of legal obligations by the rich to the derogation or the ruin of the poor." (Inderwick, and following).

"The Quarter Sessions tried small actions of debt and trespass, the tediousness and cost (of which) were almost unbearable."

"In the superior courts, matters were even worse. Over twenty-thousand cases … were standing for judgement in the Court of Chancery, some of them even ten, twenty or thirty years old, and in some not less than five-hundred orders had been made."

"Everyone connected with the Courts of Justice exacted exorbitant fees, and gave preference in the cause list to those suitors who paid them best."

Under the Tudors, trade had been protected and prices regulated, ensuring or attempting to ensure the labourer a fair day's wage for a fair day's work.

"Under the apathy of the Stuarts … wages were fixed by their employers in the Quarter Sessions at the lowest figures possible to sustain life." (my emphasis).

"Then was formulated by the Protector, the Council and the army the 'Instrument of Government' … whereby for the first time in the history of this country the representation of the people was put upon a uniform and popular footing … No members were given to the old and rotten boroughs, but the counties had members in proportion to their population, and the large towns had a fair share of representation."

The good folk of our American Colonies learned from this and over the following century began to formulate their own ideas, but here in England the Restoration turned the clock back and it would be more than a-hundred-and-fifty years before the Reform Acts were passed and some semblance of sanity began to return. As for the revenge of the Court of Chancery on the poor, one need only read Bleak House and weep at Jarndyce v. Jarndyce …

Oliver did more for the labouring classes and the poor than anyone until Kier Hardie in the early twentieth century with the founding of the Labour Party, but history is written by the victors and the victors were once again the Stuarts.

Next up: Restoration.

Sources:

Acts and Monuments: Foxe: Old Dive's 1621 edition. 

The History of the Reformation of the Church of England: Gilbert Burnett: Old Dive's 1730 edition.

Clark's Lives - The Marrow of Ecclesiastical History: Samuel Clark: Old Dive's 1675 edition.

A  Discourse - Wherein is Examined What is Particularly Lawfull During the Confusions and Revolutions of Government: Anthony Ashcam: 1648 (Old Dive's copy which discusses what the hell to do if you're about to execute the king) in three parts (which influenced the policies of the Protectorate)

Francis Blomefield: An Essay Towards a Topographical History of the County of Norfolk: Volume 3: The History of the City and County of Norwich: published 1753 to 1775 

Norfolk Museums Service and the Norfolk Archæological Society

East Anglian Archæology Vol. 132: Norwich Castle: Excavations and Historical Survey: 1978-1988: Part II: c.1345 to Modern: Elizabeth Shepherd-Popescu: 2009

Cromwell, Our Chief of Men: Antonia Fraser: 1973

Diary and Correspondence of John Evelyn with Life: H. B. Wheatley: 1906: 4 Vols

Samuel Pepys' Diaries: H. B. Wheatley: 1911: 8 Vols (expurgated) bound in a rather lovely cornflower blue

The Diary of Samuel Pepys: Latham and Matthews: Folio Soc. Limited Edition: 11 Vols (unexpurgted)

Narcissus Luttrell's Diaries (ongoing transcription project by Old Dive)

The Interregnum, 1648 - 1660, Studies of the Commonwealth, Legislative, Social and Legal: F. A. Inderwick; 1891 (an exceedingly good read, despite the dull title; I lucked onto an inscribed and signed first edition for next to nothing … yay!)

Notable Historical Trials: Vol 2 of 4: Chapter III: The Trial of Charles I: Justin Lovell (ed) 1999

The History of England Vol 3: Civil War: Peter Ackroyd: 2014

The Printed Plans of Norwich 1558-1840, A Carto-Bibliography: Raymond Frostick: 2002 

Norwich Cathedral - Church, City and Diocese: 1096 - 1996: Various Eds. 1996

Norwich Cathedral Close: Roberta Gilchrist: 2005 

Norwich Since 1550: ed: Carole Rawcliffe & Richard Wilson: 2004 

Norwich - The Growth of a City: Barbara Green & Rachel M R Young: Norfolk Museums Service: 1981

Norwich Houses Before 1700: Vernacular Architecture, Vol 14: 1983

The Oxford History of England: Volume IX "The Early Stuarts 1603 - 1660" Godfrey Davies (ed): 1937

 

The Oxford History of England: Volume X "The Later Stuarts 1660 - 1714" Sir George Clark (ed): 1934