STOKE ST  MARY,  SOMERSET,   ENGLAND

STOKE ST MARY HISTORICAL RECORDS


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The 1300s were disastrous for the peasants and farming families.

1315 - 1318 The Great Famine

Starting with bad weather in spring 1315, universal crop failures lasted through 1316 until summer harvest in 1317; Europe did not fully recover until 1322. It was a period marked by extreme levels of crime, disease, mass death and even cannibalism and infanticide. It had consequences for the church, state, European society and future calamities to follow in the fourteenth century.

In the spring of 1315, unusually heavy rain began in much of Europe. Throughout the spring and summer, it continued to rain and the temperature remained cool. These conditions caused widespread crop failures. The straw and hay for the animals could not be cured and there was no fodder for the livestock. The price of food began to rise.

In the spring of 1316, it continued to rain on a European population deprived of energy and reserves to sustain itself. All segments of society from nobles to peasants were affected, but especially the peasants who represented 95% of the population and who had no reserve food supplies. To provide some measure of relief, draft animals were butchered, seed grain was consumed, children were abandoned to fend for themselves (see "Hansel and Gretel"),

The height of the famine was reached in 1317 as the wet weather continued. Finally, in the summer the weather returned to its normal patterns. By now, however, people were so weakened by diseases such as pneumonia, bronchitis, and tuberculosis, and so much of the seed stock had been eaten, that it was not until 1325 that the food supply returned to relatively normal conditions and the population began to increase again. Historians debate the toll but it is estimated that 10–25% of the population of many cities and towns died.


1348 - 1350 - The Black Death [and recurrent epidemics]

The Black Death swept through towns and villages, and in some cases left no-one alive.   It is extremely difficult to ascertain even a rough number of deaths in the Holway manor.  Figures for Holway [of which Stoke was part] before and during the Black Death:-

Sale of Pasture – Reduced from £12 to £3

Sale of Corn - Reduced from £55 to £4


Fines & marriages  - Increased from £34 to £191

Heriots in pence - Increased from 5s to £2 9s


Expenses  Reduced from  £32 to £13


Fines   covers, amongst other things, entry onto lands, sales between villein tenants, fines on both parties in a suit for possession of lands,


Marriages covers fines for marriage of daughter within/without the manor, marriage of an heiress of land, inheriting  annual rent.


Heriots were a sort of death duty – charged in Somerset at 6d.  


At a rough guess that gives possible deaths of 99 tenants [how many others it’s impossible to say].  The next year it was down to 16s which gives deaths of 32 tenants.


After 1350 it has been calculated that Staplegrove and Holway [manors of Taunton]  lost a combined adult male population of about 48% between 1311 and 1377l


Although not in Holway, another report has stated that approx. 2/5 of the population died in Curry Rivel in the first 6 months of the epidemic.


After the Black Death


Before the Black Death, labour on the Bishop’s land was provided by the tenants in return for the right to hold land.  After the Black Death there are not enough tenants so labour has to be paid for.  Tenants were willing to have a higher rent in order that they didn’t have to work for the Bishop.  From now on land would be let for money rents and services would be paid for.


With the reduction in population, land ownership changed and the villein were able to enlarge their holdings.  The rule that only allowed them to only own one holding seems to have been dropped and holdings became much bigger, although only one, that of the Shordich family, seems to have been in Stoke.  Obviously not all improved economically.  


Peasants Revolt – 1381 Revolt


According Miss Levett in her book “The Black Death on the Estates on the See of Winchester” There was no apparent grounds for dissatisfaction on the Bishop’s manors, his tenants were prosperous and were increasing in wealth.  


The hand of the bishop, though heavy, was firm and consistent and his demands were probably being spread over an increasing population.  He was an absentee landlord, and as such probably gave more scope to the communal action of the tenants.  And on so well an organised estate there was little or no room for arbitrary action.”


However Somerset did see a small Revolt but not on the Bishop’s land.


1377 saw the Great Rumour when discontent gave way to protest. Peasants in Somerset organised themselves and refused to work for their lords. They claimed the Doomsday Book exempted them from such labouring. They took their case to court and, of course, lost.


The climax came in 1381 with the Peasants’ Revolt. Binegar would have been awash with rumour of what was happening in Bridgwater, the focus of local revolt.


Nicholas Frampton, Parish Priest, revived a row between town and Abbey over who controlled what. He had lost two elections to become Abbey Prior, which may just have played a part in his mischief.


Violence in London prompted Frampton to adopt strong-arm tactics. He had no trouble in recruiting allies from the local gentry. One such was Thomas Engilby who was prepared to murder to settle private grudges.


On June 20, they broke into the Abbey, seized the Prior, stole all the loan bonds, forced the Prior hand over all his rights and profits to Frampton and extorted 200 marks (£100,000 now) protection money.


Rampaging through the town, Engilby burnt writings and court rolls. He beheaded Walter Baron, the tax collector. He went off to Ilchester gaol, seized prisoner Hugh Lavenham and beheaded him too. He displayed both heads on lances on the bridge at Bridgwater. In two days, Engilby rid himself of his debts, his taxes and his enemies.


 If not a peasants’ revolt, it is important as the most serious case of lawlessness in the south-west and as an outbreak prompted by the example of the collapse of government authority in London.