The Lincolnshire Uprising

The rebellion that later became known as the Pilgrimage of Grace began in Lincolnshire in October 1536. Although the Lincolnshire bit fizzled out within a matter of days, the 'rebels' were in touch with Robert Aske north of the River Humber and their actions lit the blue touchpaper. Yorkshire rose and Henry VIII found he had a serious problem on his hands, one which he solved by lying, cheating and generally going back on his promises. No change there, then. Robert Aske, who was sure he had an understanding with the King ended his days hanging in chains from St Clifford's Tower in York and Henry's generals led by the Dukes of Suffolk and Norfolk then filled the gibbets from Hull to Cumberland. Henry wanted blood - especially monastic blood because it had more importance in the ritual sacrifice he demanded of his revolting peasants. In a way, you can understand him. Henry has been described as the "great European maverick". His forces were way outnumbered by the rebels, not to mention under-provisioned - where have I heard that recently??? He would probably not have won an outright battle and if he had cut and run, there were two huge problems. First, his overweening pride could not have endured the humiliation and second, nobody in Europe would touch him with a ten foot barge pole, so, nowhere to run to. It is a wonderful 'what-if' moment to think what might have happened had the rebels won. Henry would most likely have been deposed and Mary put on the throne. No Edward VI, no common prayer book and no authorised Bible.

But, it all began in Lincolnshire. Henry regarded the county as "one of the most brute and beastly (shires) in the whole realm". Obviously a bit peeved with us. Us? Yes. I was born in Lincolshire right in the middle of where the whole thing began. It began in Louth church. Rumour had it that the subsidy commissioners were coming to confiscate all the church treasures of silver. In fact, the uprising had two distinct grievances. The first was the threat of the removal of church treasures in the general dissolution of the monasteries and the second was the overtaxing of ordinary people who simply didn't have the money to pay more taxes. The rebels even dragged the Bishop of Lincoln's chancellor off his horse and "did him to death with staves". They imprisoned any 'Gentlemen" they met and made them swear a sacred oath to support the commons. Sir Thomas Heneage, who owned the estate in a small village called Hainton was sent by the rebels back to the King with a letter and he thus escaped their wrath. The Heneage family still lives in Hainton Hall. My father began his working life on the estate and I was born about 100 metres from its front gate.

The rebels were certain about one thing. They were not rebelling against their King. They believed that he was being misled by greedy ministers and heretical bishops. They wanted the government of the realm back in the hands of the King, not "evil" ministers like Thomas Cromwell and Archbishop Cranmer, who, they believed, were hell-bent on despoiling all the churches and monasteries in the land for their own use. Sadly the rebels completely misjudged their monarch. Cromwell and Cranmer did nothing without his authorisation and he was more than incandescent that "the commons", i.e. the common people, should presume to tell him what he could and couldn't do.

A mixture of threats and promises had the Lincolnshire men agreeing to disperse, in effect leaving the Yorkshire rebels on the other side of the Humber, without any policy and believing that the Lincolnshire men had been pardoned. Then someone on the Yorkshire bank revived the Mouldwarp legend and twisted it to make the ordinary people believe that Henry was the Mouldwarp, a tyrant foretold by Merlin. In Lincoln, Louth and Horncastle, 46 rebels were hanged and later rebellions in the West Country and East Anglia seem to suggest that, had the rebels not believed their perfidious King and stuck to their guns, then there would have been a nationwide groundswell of support for the Pilgrimage of Grace and our history might have been very different.