February 1, 2016 • 28 mins
In early modern London, there was a tradition of sorts where apprentices would amass on holidays and physically destroy brothels. One of the largest such riot took place during Easter week in 1668, and it was a complicated event.
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Build it Beautiful. Welcome to stuff you missed in History
Class from how works dot com. Hello, and welcome to
(00:25):
the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson and I'm Holly Fry. Uh.
Possibly the weirdest thing that I've ever learned on this podcast,
and that includes having done a podcast about people who
turned into soap after they died. In early modern London,
when apprentices had a holiday, the thing to do was
to go knock over some brothels. Like that's not not
(00:47):
a thing right now. And I don't mean knock over
like uh like slang for robbing them. I mean knock
over like literally pull them down. And today we're going
to talk about one such riot, and it took place
during Easter Week of sixteen sixty eight, although this particular
riot was a lot bigger and a lot more complicated
than just the normal apprentices having a day off and
(01:11):
tearing down some brothels, which was the thing that they
like to do. So heads up, today's podcast is not
explicit and we are not going to talk about what
goes on in a body house. But yes, parents and teachers,
body house means what you think it means. So today's
show is maybe not for the youngest of the listeners. So,
(01:31):
as Tracy just suggested, lots of people rioted at London's
brothels in sixteen sixty eight, not just apprentices, but apprentices
are sited again and again is making up the bulk
of the crowd in this story. So we're going to
take a moment to shed some light on who these
young people, nearly all of them young men were. For
a few hundred years in England, apprenticeship was a seven
(01:54):
year indenture that combined both work and instruction, and originally
people had been apprenticed to the master of a guild.
Came quite a bit of prestige and was kind of
a systematized organization for apprenticeship. But by the seventeenth century,
when we're talking about today, London's guild system was really
in decline, and that meant that the apprentice system was
(02:16):
showing some strain as well. What had been a really
prestigious appointment directly with the master of a guild was
instead moving closer and closer to just flat out unpaid
servitude that did not come with many advantages, and this
is probably why by the mid sixteen hundreds a lot
of people were quitting were quitting their apprenticeships after two
(02:37):
or three years, even though they hadn't really finished. You
can look at charts of the average of how long
people stayed in their posts, and there's a precipitous decline
between year three and four. If people had the opportunity
to get out of their apprenticeship, they did. Although people
came from all over England to apprentice in London, most
of London's apprentices were from the surrounding area. The farther
(03:00):
away you got from London, the fewer people went to
London to be apprenticed, and most of the apprentices were
from relatively affluent families, at least ones who either had
or could borrow enough money to make an initial payment
to a master in exchange for taking their son on
as an apprentice. Once that money was paid and the
apprenticeship actually began, though apprentices usually did not make any
(03:24):
money of their own because they were being paid in
instruction and experience, not in wages, sort of an extreme
version of the unpaid internship. They also had very few freedoms.
They needed their master's permission to marry, socialized, to go
to the theater, to go to a tavern, basically anything fun.
In sixteen sixty, the average age of an apprentice was
(03:46):
seventeen or eighteen, So with all that in mind, it
may be a little less surprising than A popular pastime
among London's seventeenth century apprentices was the brothel riot on holidays,
particularly Shrove to Tuesday, which is the last Tuesday before lent.
Apprentices frequently wrecked London's brothels. Between sixteen o six and
(04:07):
sixteen forty one, there were twenty four Shrove Tuesday brothel
riots that we know about. That's twenty four full scale
riots in thirty five years. And in case the name
Shrove Tuesday doesn't ring a bell, folks might know it
better as Fat Tuesday or Marti gras Is. It's observed
or celebrated in a lot of different ways all over
(04:28):
the world, but Strove Tuesday is what people were mostly
calling it in in England at this time. During a
brothel riot, rioters would use tools like staves and bars
to literally pull down buildings and this naturally caused a
lot of property damage, and it displaced anybody who had
been living or working inside the damaged or destroyed structures.
(04:53):
And regardless of what your personal feelings are about brothels,
a lot of times these are people who did not
have any other options and for supporting themselves, so they
would be out of work in homeless after the riot.
And in spite of their popularity in terms of having
a pretty consistent customer base, brothels were not popular from
(05:14):
a religious or social standpoint. Plenty of people visited brothels,
but plenty of people thought brothels were a sinful scourge
on London. Sometimes these worked out to be the exact
same people. Because brothels, in spite of their popularity, were
viewed as cd and immoral, the apprentices who tore them
down didn't usually get a lot of harsh punishment. They
(05:36):
would see a small fine and a short imprisonment. If anything,
the general consensus was that apprentices were doing a good
thing by destroying the city's brothels. So when it came
to this Strove Tuesday writing tradition, English political writer James
Harrington called it and quote ancient administration of justice at Shrovetide.
(05:57):
The sixty eight Ryan, on the other hand, was exceptional.
It was much much bigger, and instead of happening at
shrove Tuesday before Lent, it happened on Easter Monday after
Lent was over, and it lasted for three days. The
property damage is much greater, and the perpetrators faced much
much harsher punishments, even harsher than might be expected by
(06:18):
the increase in the size of the riot. And we're
going to talk about the sixty eight riot with more
specificity after we paused for a brief word from one
of our fantastic sponsors. On Easter Monday sixty eight, which
fell on March twenty three of that year, rioters armed
with simple weapons like pole axes, staves and iron bars
(06:38):
started pulling down the Brothels and Poplar in London's East End.
And yes, fans of Call the mid The Midwife, that's
the same Poplar where that show is set. According to
historical accounts, these rioters were apprentices. They probably included other
people too, though Poplar was home to lots of sailors,
and many of them were currently at home without a
(06:58):
lot to occupy their time, having been recently released from
service after the end of the Second Anglo Dutch War,
which went on from sixteen sixty five to sixteen sixty seven.
The first brothel to be struck belonged to Demeri's Page,
who was known as quote the great body of the seamen,
by which we mean men who work on the sea
or sailors, not the other possible interpretation. Regardless, these rioters
(07:22):
organized themselves into regiments. Each one had its own captain
and its its own colors. Green was particularly popular. One
of those captains was named Peter Messenger, which is why
sometimes these riots are referred to as the Messenger Riots.
On Tuesday, similarly, armed rioters spread through London, targeting the
districts where the city's highest concentrations of body houses were located.
(07:46):
At least five hundred people were involved in this second
day of rioting and pulling down buildings. This is when
the Crown got involved. To try to maintain order. A
letter to the Lord Mayor and Lieutenancy of the city
was sent in the name of King Charles the Second,
ordering the watch to be doubled and for two companies
of militia to be mustered to suppress the riot. Famed
London diarists Samuel Peeps wrote about it in his diary
(08:08):
for the day of March at Whitehall. He said, there
was quote great talk of the tumult on the other
end of the town, about more fields among the apprentices
taking the liberty of these holy days to pull down
body houses, and Lord to see the apprehensions which this
did give to all people at court. That presently order
was given for all the soldiers, horse and foot to
(08:31):
be in arms, and forthwith alarms were beat by drum
and trumpet through Westminster, and all to their colors and
to horse, as if the French were coming into town.
I remember reading a lot of Peep's diary, and like
a literature class, I feel like they left out all
the funny parts. I do too, because I did the same,
(08:52):
And it wasn't until much later in life where I
was like, there's good stuff in there that's really entertaining.
This bit, in particular, made me laugh every the whole
time I was tiping it in there. Tuesday's riots led
to arrests, and some of the rioters laid siege to
Finsbury Jail, where they believed their compatriots were being held.
They did not actually find any other rioters in the
(09:15):
jail though, but for unrelated persons did manage to escape
in all the chaos, The rioters were more successful in
their goals at the new prison in Clerkenwell, which did
have some of the arrested rioters being held there and
they were broken out. Peep's also went out with his
friends to see the riots in action on Tuesday, but
(09:35):
they mostly found lots and lots of soldiers and people
who were vexed that the soldiers were going after the apprentices.
He repeats a couple of times in his Tuesday diary
entry overhearing people say quote it was only for pulling
down the body houses. He also notes that this whole
event apparently perplexed King Charles the Second. If the body
houses were such a scourge on London so much so
(09:58):
that people supported pulling them down own, then again from
the Peep's diary, the question quote why why do they
go to them then has a side note Uh, I
mean we established earlier in the podcast that this Strove
Tuesday brothel riot was a kind of a tradition, So
why would King Charles the sec gonna be so perplexed?
A lot of those riots had happened either before he
(10:18):
was born or while he was in exile in France
after the beheading of his father, Charles the First, so
it's possible that he this was the first time he
had really experienced firsthand or heard in more detail about
this idea of the London body House riot. I like
that he um can't see and grasp the two faced
(10:39):
nature of humanity in many cas I'm like, oh, Chuck,
come on, you have a conversation with Charles the Second
about the duality mankind. Uh. Then on Wednesday, a very
large group of rioters the exact numbers are unclear, but
it was probably in the thousands continue to attack bruthels
(11:01):
around more fields. The rioters started threatening to pull the
palace at Whitehall down and chanted things like quote, we've
been the servants, now will be the masters. And another
rallying cry was reformation and reducements. All of this rioting
continued to vex the crown and the court at Whitehall.
(11:21):
Peeps rode about Wednesday's riots and his diary as well,
and here's what he wrote. Quote the Duke of York
and all with him this morning were full of talk
of the prentices who are not yet put down, though
the guards and militia of the town have been in
arms all night and the night before, and the prentices
have made fools of them, sometimes by running from them
(11:42):
and flinging stones at them. Some blood hath been spilt,
but a great many houses pulled down, and among others,
the Duke of York was mighty mary at that of
Demaris Pages, the great Baud of the Seamen, and the
Duke of York complained merrily that he hath lost two
tenants by their houses being old down, who paid him
for their wine licenses fifteen pounds of a year. So
(12:06):
just to recap the Duke of York is upset that
his tenants, the Bauds who pay him for wine licenses,
have been displaced by this writing, but not really concerned
about them, just his income. Uh uh. It was on
the inconvenience and loss of income to himself. Yeah. It
(12:26):
was on Wednesday that the militia, guards and even the
King's lifeguard dispersed the rioters and arrested many of the
apparent ringleaders. Happening concurrently with the last two days of
this riot were the publications of a couple of pieces
of satirical writing. We don't actually know who wrote them,
or whether they were the work of the rioters or not.
(12:48):
We don't really have a sense of whether the people
writing these satirical things. We're working with the writers are
opposed to them, or exactly what, in terms of the
writers themselves, uh was going on. We can't accurately say
whether these particular writings reflected the views of the rioters,
but they definitely were reflecting the views of some people
(13:10):
alive at the time who were involved in all of this,
So they shed some light on sort of what people
were thinking out in London. The first, which was presented
in the form of a petition, was known as the
Poor Horse Petition. It was purportedly drafted by the displaced
bods whose brothels had been pulled down, and it came
out on March which was the Wednesday of the riot.
(13:33):
It lampooned both of the women who worked in the
body houses and Lady Castlemaine, or more properly Barbara Villiers,
Duchess of Cleveland, who was the notorious and married mistress
of Charles the Second. This faux petition was highly critical
of both the king and his mistress, but it also
contained a plea to Lady Castlemaine that she would try
(13:55):
to protect all these displaced women from the body houses.
After all, goes the logic of this writing, you are
one of us, Lady Castlemaine. The two satirical writings that
followed were both in the form of a letter from
Lady Castlemaine back to the displaced bods. They're identical except
for the first paragraph, and they go on to lampoon
(14:16):
both Lady Castlemaine and the Anglican Church. There's a lot
of criticism where woven into both the petition and the response.
They criticized Charles the Second for keeping the mistress, They
criticized Lady Castlemaine for being Catholic, They criticize the Catholic
Church for earning an income from taxes on brothels, and
(14:36):
they criticized the Archbishop of Canterbury for purportedly keeping a
mistress of his own. And it's these same themes of
religion and hypocrisy that may help to explain why this
particular riot got so very big and why the response
to it was so much bigger. And we're going to
talk about all that after we pause for a brief
word from one of our fantastic sponsors. While London's previous
(15:00):
Strove Tuesday brothel riots had been punished with which was
basically a slap on the wrist, the sixteen sixty eight
riots ended with a great many people being brought to trial.
It's unclear exactly how many people were prosecuted for participating
in the riot. Only seventy seven of those who wound
up in court were actually identified by name, either in
the records or historians having put all the pieces together
(15:22):
since then, but very little is known even about them.
Fifteen ultimately were indicted for high treason. De Veress Page
turned state's witness during the trial, with the court being
very careful to avoid mentioning precisely what her job was
so that she would appear credible in the account she
gave of destruction of her property. And many of the
(15:43):
other women who had worked in the destroyed body houses,
on the other hand, wound up being prosecuted in the
aftermath of the riot, in a punishment that was acknowledged
by the High Court and other people surrounding the case
as just incongruously harsh. Four of the men who were
convicted of high treason were hanged, drawn and quartered. This
was by far the most extreme punishment allowed under the
(16:05):
most severe interpretation of the law. It was far far
greater than how body house riots had typically been handled
in England. There are lots of possible explanations for exactly
why the crackdown on this specific riot was so extreme.
One described in the nine paper on in the Historical
(16:26):
Journal is by Dr Tim Harris, then at Emmanuel College,
Cambridge and now at Brown and his interpretation basically is
that the riot itself was more about dissatisfaction with the
restoration than it really was about the brothels, and that
the rioters were so harshly treated because of that political
and religious undertone. So an extraordinarily brief recap of the Restoration.
(16:50):
When Charles the Second's father was executed in sixteen forty nine,
Oliver Cromwell came to power, at which point England became
a republic. Charles the Second fled to the continent, and
Cromwell remained in power until his death in sixteen fifty eight.
Then in sixteen sixty Charles the Second ascended to the throne,
at which point the monarchy was restored. That's the restoration.
There are entire books about the restoration, and there was
(17:13):
a whole lot more that went on behind the scenes
and what we just said, So that is an extremely
quick summary for those of you who don't remember or
never learned that. In a lot of historical accounts, the
general description of the restoration was that London was really
really in favor of Charles the Second's return. There had
been demonstrations against the army and in favor of Charles
as the monarch in the years before the restoration actually
(17:35):
took place. Some of that agitation was as much about
religion as it was about the monarch. Some of the
people who were pressing for Charles the second's return to
England we're hoping that he would allow a greater degree
of freedom of religion. The religions that diverged in some
way from Anglican teachings, like Presbyterians, Quakers, Baptists, Methodists, and Unitarians,
(17:56):
among others, we're all branded as dissenting or non con
armist religions. Many of London's apprentices were adherence to one
of these non conforming denominations instead. In sixteen sixty, Charles
the Second, still in exile, issued the Declaration of Breda,
which was one of the last steps before he was
restored to the throne. He wrote this statement quote, and
(18:20):
because the passion and uncharitable nous of the times have
produced several opinions in religion by which men are engaged
in parties and animosities against each other, which, when they
shall hereafter unite in a freedom of conversation, will be
composed or better understood. We do declare a liberty to
tender consciences, and that no man shall be disquieted or
(18:41):
called in question for differences of opinion in matters of
religion which do not disturb the peace of the Kingdom,
And that we shall be ready to consent to such
an act of Parliament as upon mature deliberation shall be
offered to us, for the full granting that indulgence. In
other words, people would have free him of religion, provided
(19:01):
that their opinions did not quote, disturbed the peace of
the kingdom. And among those opinions apparently disturbing the peace
of the kingdom were various nonconformists. Quakers and Baptists in particular,
frequently wound up in court on charges of quote. Attendance
at a nonconformist Conventsicle Harris also cites this as the
reason why this huge riot took place after Easter instead
(19:24):
of on Shrove Tuesday, as had been so common in
prior years. Even though the Declaration of Breda hadn't really
allowed the nonconformists the practice of their religion uh freely,
at least there had been a period of relative laxity
in terms of the enforcement of religious conformity. The Great
Plague of London in sixteen sixty five and the Great
(19:45):
Fire of London in sixteen sixty six had both given
Parliament plenty of other things to worry about, and some
of the laws governing religion had lapsed. But in sixteen
sixty seven. In sixteen sixty eight, bills that would have
allowed Presbyterians the religious freedom start and circulating in Parliament.
The House of Commons was really deeply opposed to these, though,
and the proclamation on the matter that Charles the Second
(20:08):
ultimately signed on March tense six sixty eight, during Lent,
less than two weeks before the riot began, was instead
about enforcing obedience to the existing laws, not about allowing
greater religious freedom. This also circles back around to those
satirical petitions and letters that we talked about before the break.
One of their themes England was willing to tolerate brothels
(20:31):
but not religious nonconformity, which seems awfully hypocritical. Some of
the chance and rallying cries that they used during the riot,
like the ones that were about reformation, also have a
lot more religious tone to them than being about wanting
to strike down the sinfulness of a brothel. Running parallel
to this crackdown on religious nonconformity was also a crackdown
(20:54):
on theaters in London, and a running theme in this
increasing criticism of theater was that theaters were no better
than brothels, and there was a lot of just hateful
rhetoric that was used in all of this. So this
stoked dislike and disdain for both the brothels and the theaters.
And as we said at the top of the show,
London was full of sailors that were recently released from service,
(21:17):
as well as overworked and mostly pennelous apprentices whose system
of apprenticeship was quickly disintegrating. So there's some degree of
supposition and drawing of conclusions, and all of this uh
some degree of interpretation of what people's motives might have been. Men,
there's no smoking gun. None of the rioters left a
journal saying I'm really upset about my religious freedoms, and
(21:40):
so how about in the guise of a brothel riot,
I make that demonstration. Like, there's nothing documenting any kind
of thought presses like that, And there are also no
court documents. It's explicitly saying that the rioters are being
persecuted because of religious nonconformity, although it does seem like
there was some fear that people who were dissenting in
(22:02):
some way, we're also going to work with Cromwell's existing
supporters who were still around to try to overthrow the monarchy. So,
like a lot of events in history, this one was
definitely a confluence of a ton of different factors and
influences without one clear, single explanation that just explains the
(22:23):
motives of everyone involved at the same time. Oh, history,
You're never simple. Yeah, I wish I could remember where.
I wish I could remember where I stumbled across just
the words, uh, the brothel ride of sixteen sixty eight,
Like I was doing work on something completely unrelated last week,
(22:43):
and then the that's that series of words was on
my screen somewhere, and I went, well, okay, we gotta
talk about that. And then I fortunately was able to
find enough information to talk about that. And then when
I tried to reset retrace my steps to figure out
where I had origin ly seen reference d it, I
could not find it. So I don't remember, but that's
(23:05):
the brothel riot. Do you also have listener mail for us?
I do. I have to. I'm gonna sort of excerpt
two pieces of listener mail because we're getting farther and
farther away from our Unearthed in episodes, but we still
have several interesting insights that people have written to us
about it. So the first one is from Katie, and
(23:25):
Katie says, I just finished listening to the Unearthed episodes
and was sad that you didn't mention the news that
came out over the last year about the sal Jose
slabor that wrecked off the coast of South Africa. It
wasn't a unique ship in its time, but it is
a rather unique find as shipwrecks go, and that they
were able to confirm it was indeed a slaver because
of the artifacts located at the site. Matching them with
(23:48):
archival sources to identify exactly which ship it was. What
is really wonderful about this wreck discovery is the international
collaboration between experts in the US and several African countries.
They have found a They have a wonderful website that
will tell you way more than I ever could about
the project, the timeline, and what they found and what
is happening next. I happen to know all about what
(24:10):
is happening next. Several artifacts will be on loan to
the new Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture,
slated to open in September of this year. Announced it
made a few months ago to great fanfare. The objects
will be featured in a section on slavery to Freedom
exhibit about the Middle Passage which is separate, which is
in a separated room and has meant as a place
(24:30):
where visitors can go in remembrance of those who experience
this traumatic event. Uh. And then she goes on with
some detail that I am not going to get into
because privacy. However, I wanted to read this for two reasons. Um. One.
The website that she links to is the Slave rex Project,
which is fascinating. It is basically a whole project to
document um wreckage of slips of ships that were used
(24:53):
in the slave trade. And I heard about it for
the first time on Slate's podcast The History of American Slavery,
which is extremely good if folks are interested in learning
more about that um and it just I had heard
about it in the context of that podcast, and then
for some reason it never made it into the list
of things to talk about in Unearthed, and so thank
(25:15):
you so much, Katie, and I will put a link
to that website in the show notes for this episode.
The other one is from Anne, and Ann said, I
just finished listening to Unearthed and Part two. My ears
perked up when you mentioned repatriation during the listener mail segment.
I'm responsible for NAGRA Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation
Act compliance. And then I'm going to skip where because
(25:37):
privacy she works with tribal representatives to repatriate Native American
human remains and other cultural items. So I'm gonna get
back to the letter. The history of NAGRA is very interesting,
the attitudes and practices that led to museums and institutions
across the country and globe quote owning human remains of
curiosities or specimens, the Indian rights movements that lead to
(25:59):
Nagara another legislation, and shifting attitudes regarding cultural appropriation. When
Nagro was first passed, there was panic that museum vaults
would be emptied. That hasn't happened, and instead, meaningful and
mutually beneficial relationships have developed between museums and tribes that
have led to improved care of collections and other collaborations.
(26:19):
There's still lots of problems, and a few have been
in the news lately. Some of the examples she sides
are the kennewick Man slash, the Ancient One, the former
MPs superintendent who's still human remains from f D mounds,
and the fight over the remains of Jim Thorpe. That
can be a very frustrating process to go through, but
the work can be very satisfying. I've invited, I've been
invited to attend three reburials following repatriations, and I was
(26:43):
very honored to be a part of returning those native
ancestors to the earth. Um So I wanted to read
that part of Ann's letter to talk a little bit
more about repatriations. We also got another letter that was
about repatriations and about how often UH, the way that
human remains were preserved for display in museums in the
(27:03):
past involved treating them with chemicals that were toxic. So
there's a whole ongoing UH attempts to figure out how
you can return remains to a triber culture that they
came from to be reburied, when reburying them would actually
be an environmental hazard, which is a whole other thing
I had never actually thought about. So thank you both
(27:26):
for sending us these letters, and I will have links
to interesting stuff and the show notes for this episode
for people to look at later. If you would like
to write to us, We're at History Podcasts at how
stuff works dot com. We're also on Facebook at facebook
dot com slash miss in history and on Twitter at
miss in History. Our tumbler is missed in History dot
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com slash missed in History. You can come to our
(27:48):
parent company's website, which is how stuff Works dot com,
and you can find all kinds of information about just
odd events in history. You can also come to our website,
which is missing history dot com and that is where
we have show notes for all of the episodes that
Holly and I have worked on. We have an archive
of every single episode we've ever done on the show.
Lots of other cool stuff, so you can do all
that and a whole lot more at how stuff works
(28:10):
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Build it Beautiful. Welcome to stuff you missed in History
Class from how works dot com. Hello, and welcome to
(00:25):
the podcast. I'm Tracy V. Wilson and I'm Holly Fry. Uh.
Possibly the weirdest thing that I've ever learned on this podcast,
and that includes having done a podcast about people who
turned into soap after they died. In early modern London,
when apprentices had a holiday, the thing to do was
to go knock over some brothels. Like that's not not
(00:47):
a thing right now. And I don't mean knock over
like uh like slang for robbing them. I mean knock
over like literally pull them down. And today we're going
to talk about one such riot, and it took place
during Easter Week of sixteen sixty eight, although this particular
riot was a lot bigger and a lot more complicated
than just the normal apprentices having a day off and
(01:11):
tearing down some brothels, which was the thing that they
like to do. So heads up, today's podcast is not
explicit and we are not going to talk about what
goes on in a body house. But yes, parents and teachers,
body house means what you think it means. So today's
show is maybe not for the youngest of the listeners. So,
(01:31):
as Tracy just suggested, lots of people rioted at London's
brothels in sixteen sixty eight, not just apprentices, but apprentices
are sited again and again is making up the bulk
of the crowd in this story. So we're going to
take a moment to shed some light on who these
young people, nearly all of them young men were. For
a few hundred years in England, apprenticeship was a seven
(01:54):
year indenture that combined both work and instruction, and originally
people had been apprenticed to the master of a guild.
Came quite a bit of prestige and was kind of
a systematized organization for apprenticeship. But by the seventeenth century,
when we're talking about today, London's guild system was really
in decline, and that meant that the apprentice system was
(02:16):
showing some strain as well. What had been a really
prestigious appointment directly with the master of a guild was
instead moving closer and closer to just flat out unpaid
servitude that did not come with many advantages, and this
is probably why by the mid sixteen hundreds a lot
of people were quitting were quitting their apprenticeships after two
(02:37):
or three years, even though they hadn't really finished. You
can look at charts of the average of how long
people stayed in their posts, and there's a precipitous decline
between year three and four. If people had the opportunity
to get out of their apprenticeship, they did. Although people
came from all over England to apprentice in London, most
of London's apprentices were from the surrounding area. The farther
(03:00):
away you got from London, the fewer people went to
London to be apprenticed, and most of the apprentices were
from relatively affluent families, at least ones who either had
or could borrow enough money to make an initial payment
to a master in exchange for taking their son on
as an apprentice. Once that money was paid and the
apprenticeship actually began, though apprentices usually did not make any
(03:24):
money of their own because they were being paid in
instruction and experience, not in wages, sort of an extreme
version of the unpaid internship. They also had very few freedoms.
They needed their master's permission to marry, socialized, to go
to the theater, to go to a tavern, basically anything fun.
In sixteen sixty, the average age of an apprentice was
(03:46):
seventeen or eighteen, So with all that in mind, it
may be a little less surprising than A popular pastime
among London's seventeenth century apprentices was the brothel riot on holidays,
particularly Shrove to Tuesday, which is the last Tuesday before lent.
Apprentices frequently wrecked London's brothels. Between sixteen o six and
(04:07):
sixteen forty one, there were twenty four Shrove Tuesday brothel
riots that we know about. That's twenty four full scale
riots in thirty five years. And in case the name
Shrove Tuesday doesn't ring a bell, folks might know it
better as Fat Tuesday or Marti gras Is. It's observed
or celebrated in a lot of different ways all over
(04:28):
the world, but Strove Tuesday is what people were mostly
calling it in in England at this time. During a
brothel riot, rioters would use tools like staves and bars
to literally pull down buildings and this naturally caused a
lot of property damage, and it displaced anybody who had
been living or working inside the damaged or destroyed structures.
(04:53):
And regardless of what your personal feelings are about brothels,
a lot of times these are people who did not
have any other options and for supporting themselves, so they
would be out of work in homeless after the riot.
And in spite of their popularity in terms of having
a pretty consistent customer base, brothels were not popular from
(05:14):
a religious or social standpoint. Plenty of people visited brothels,
but plenty of people thought brothels were a sinful scourge
on London. Sometimes these worked out to be the exact
same people. Because brothels, in spite of their popularity, were
viewed as cd and immoral, the apprentices who tore them
down didn't usually get a lot of harsh punishment. They
(05:36):
would see a small fine and a short imprisonment. If anything,
the general consensus was that apprentices were doing a good
thing by destroying the city's brothels. So when it came
to this Strove Tuesday writing tradition, English political writer James
Harrington called it and quote ancient administration of justice at Shrovetide.
(05:57):
The sixty eight Ryan, on the other hand, was exceptional.
It was much much bigger, and instead of happening at
shrove Tuesday before Lent, it happened on Easter Monday after
Lent was over, and it lasted for three days. The
property damage is much greater, and the perpetrators faced much
much harsher punishments, even harsher than might be expected by
(06:18):
the increase in the size of the riot. And we're
going to talk about the sixty eight riot with more
specificity after we paused for a brief word from one
of our fantastic sponsors. On Easter Monday sixty eight, which
fell on March twenty three of that year, rioters armed
with simple weapons like pole axes, staves and iron bars
(06:38):
started pulling down the Brothels and Poplar in London's East End.
And yes, fans of Call the mid The Midwife, that's
the same Poplar where that show is set. According to
historical accounts, these rioters were apprentices. They probably included other
people too, though Poplar was home to lots of sailors,
and many of them were currently at home without a
(06:58):
lot to occupy their time, having been recently released from
service after the end of the Second Anglo Dutch War,
which went on from sixteen sixty five to sixteen sixty seven.
The first brothel to be struck belonged to Demeri's Page,
who was known as quote the great body of the seamen,
by which we mean men who work on the sea
or sailors, not the other possible interpretation. Regardless, these rioters
(07:22):
organized themselves into regiments. Each one had its own captain
and its its own colors. Green was particularly popular. One
of those captains was named Peter Messenger, which is why
sometimes these riots are referred to as the Messenger Riots.
On Tuesday, similarly, armed rioters spread through London, targeting the
districts where the city's highest concentrations of body houses were located.
(07:46):
At least five hundred people were involved in this second
day of rioting and pulling down buildings. This is when
the Crown got involved. To try to maintain order. A
letter to the Lord Mayor and Lieutenancy of the city
was sent in the name of King Charles the Second,
ordering the watch to be doubled and for two companies
of militia to be mustered to suppress the riot. Famed
London diarists Samuel Peeps wrote about it in his diary
(08:08):
for the day of March at Whitehall. He said, there
was quote great talk of the tumult on the other
end of the town, about more fields among the apprentices
taking the liberty of these holy days to pull down
body houses, and Lord to see the apprehensions which this
did give to all people at court. That presently order
was given for all the soldiers, horse and foot to
(08:31):
be in arms, and forthwith alarms were beat by drum
and trumpet through Westminster, and all to their colors and
to horse, as if the French were coming into town.
I remember reading a lot of Peep's diary, and like
a literature class, I feel like they left out all
the funny parts. I do too, because I did the same,
(08:52):
And it wasn't until much later in life where I
was like, there's good stuff in there that's really entertaining.
This bit, in particular, made me laugh every the whole
time I was tiping it in there. Tuesday's riots led
to arrests, and some of the rioters laid siege to
Finsbury Jail, where they believed their compatriots were being held.
They did not actually find any other rioters in the
(09:15):
jail though, but for unrelated persons did manage to escape
in all the chaos, The rioters were more successful in
their goals at the new prison in Clerkenwell, which did
have some of the arrested rioters being held there and
they were broken out. Peep's also went out with his
friends to see the riots in action on Tuesday, but
(09:35):
they mostly found lots and lots of soldiers and people
who were vexed that the soldiers were going after the apprentices.
He repeats a couple of times in his Tuesday diary
entry overhearing people say quote it was only for pulling
down the body houses. He also notes that this whole
event apparently perplexed King Charles the Second. If the body
houses were such a scourge on London so much so
(09:58):
that people supported pulling them down own, then again from
the Peep's diary, the question quote why why do they
go to them then has a side note Uh, I
mean we established earlier in the podcast that this Strove
Tuesday brothel riot was a kind of a tradition, So
why would King Charles the sec gonna be so perplexed?
A lot of those riots had happened either before he
(10:18):
was born or while he was in exile in France
after the beheading of his father, Charles the First, so
it's possible that he this was the first time he
had really experienced firsthand or heard in more detail about
this idea of the London body House riot. I like
that he um can't see and grasp the two faced
(10:39):
nature of humanity in many cas I'm like, oh, Chuck,
come on, you have a conversation with Charles the Second
about the duality mankind. Uh. Then on Wednesday, a very
large group of rioters the exact numbers are unclear, but
it was probably in the thousands continue to attack bruthels
(11:01):
around more fields. The rioters started threatening to pull the
palace at Whitehall down and chanted things like quote, we've
been the servants, now will be the masters. And another
rallying cry was reformation and reducements. All of this rioting
continued to vex the crown and the court at Whitehall.
(11:21):
Peeps rode about Wednesday's riots and his diary as well,
and here's what he wrote. Quote the Duke of York
and all with him this morning were full of talk
of the prentices who are not yet put down, though
the guards and militia of the town have been in
arms all night and the night before, and the prentices
have made fools of them, sometimes by running from them
(11:42):
and flinging stones at them. Some blood hath been spilt,
but a great many houses pulled down, and among others,
the Duke of York was mighty mary at that of
Demaris Pages, the great Baud of the Seamen, and the
Duke of York complained merrily that he hath lost two
tenants by their houses being old down, who paid him
for their wine licenses fifteen pounds of a year. So
(12:06):
just to recap the Duke of York is upset that
his tenants, the Bauds who pay him for wine licenses,
have been displaced by this writing, but not really concerned
about them, just his income. Uh uh. It was on
the inconvenience and loss of income to himself. Yeah. It
(12:26):
was on Wednesday that the militia, guards and even the
King's lifeguard dispersed the rioters and arrested many of the
apparent ringleaders. Happening concurrently with the last two days of
this riot were the publications of a couple of pieces
of satirical writing. We don't actually know who wrote them,
or whether they were the work of the rioters or not.
(12:48):
We don't really have a sense of whether the people
writing these satirical things. We're working with the writers are
opposed to them, or exactly what, in terms of the
writers themselves, uh was going on. We can't accurately say
whether these particular writings reflected the views of the rioters,
but they definitely were reflecting the views of some people
(13:10):
alive at the time who were involved in all of this,
So they shed some light on sort of what people
were thinking out in London. The first, which was presented
in the form of a petition, was known as the
Poor Horse Petition. It was purportedly drafted by the displaced
bods whose brothels had been pulled down, and it came
out on March which was the Wednesday of the riot.
(13:33):
It lampooned both of the women who worked in the
body houses and Lady Castlemaine, or more properly Barbara Villiers,
Duchess of Cleveland, who was the notorious and married mistress
of Charles the Second. This faux petition was highly critical
of both the king and his mistress, but it also
contained a plea to Lady Castlemaine that she would try
(13:55):
to protect all these displaced women from the body houses.
After all, goes the logic of this writing, you are
one of us, Lady Castlemaine. The two satirical writings that
followed were both in the form of a letter from
Lady Castlemaine back to the displaced bods. They're identical except
for the first paragraph, and they go on to lampoon
(14:16):
both Lady Castlemaine and the Anglican Church. There's a lot
of criticism where woven into both the petition and the response.
They criticized Charles the Second for keeping the mistress, They
criticized Lady Castlemaine for being Catholic, They criticize the Catholic
Church for earning an income from taxes on brothels, and
(14:36):
they criticized the Archbishop of Canterbury for purportedly keeping a
mistress of his own. And it's these same themes of
religion and hypocrisy that may help to explain why this
particular riot got so very big and why the response
to it was so much bigger. And we're going to
talk about all that after we pause for a brief
word from one of our fantastic sponsors. While London's previous
(15:00):
Strove Tuesday brothel riots had been punished with which was
basically a slap on the wrist, the sixteen sixty eight
riots ended with a great many people being brought to trial.
It's unclear exactly how many people were prosecuted for participating
in the riot. Only seventy seven of those who wound
up in court were actually identified by name, either in
the records or historians having put all the pieces together
(15:22):
since then, but very little is known even about them.
Fifteen ultimately were indicted for high treason. De Veress Page
turned state's witness during the trial, with the court being
very careful to avoid mentioning precisely what her job was
so that she would appear credible in the account she
gave of destruction of her property. And many of the
(15:43):
other women who had worked in the destroyed body houses,
on the other hand, wound up being prosecuted in the
aftermath of the riot, in a punishment that was acknowledged
by the High Court and other people surrounding the case
as just incongruously harsh. Four of the men who were
convicted of high treason were hanged, drawn and quartered. This
was by far the most extreme punishment allowed under the
(16:05):
most severe interpretation of the law. It was far far
greater than how body house riots had typically been handled
in England. There are lots of possible explanations for exactly
why the crackdown on this specific riot was so extreme.
One described in the nine paper on in the Historical
(16:26):
Journal is by Dr Tim Harris, then at Emmanuel College,
Cambridge and now at Brown and his interpretation basically is
that the riot itself was more about dissatisfaction with the
restoration than it really was about the brothels, and that
the rioters were so harshly treated because of that political
and religious undertone. So an extraordinarily brief recap of the Restoration.
(16:50):
When Charles the Second's father was executed in sixteen forty nine,
Oliver Cromwell came to power, at which point England became
a republic. Charles the Second fled to the continent, and
Cromwell remained in power until his death in sixteen fifty eight.
Then in sixteen sixty Charles the Second ascended to the throne,
at which point the monarchy was restored. That's the restoration.
There are entire books about the restoration, and there was
(17:13):
a whole lot more that went on behind the scenes
and what we just said, So that is an extremely
quick summary for those of you who don't remember or
never learned that. In a lot of historical accounts, the
general description of the restoration was that London was really
really in favor of Charles the Second's return. There had
been demonstrations against the army and in favor of Charles
as the monarch in the years before the restoration actually
(17:35):
took place. Some of that agitation was as much about
religion as it was about the monarch. Some of the
people who were pressing for Charles the second's return to
England we're hoping that he would allow a greater degree
of freedom of religion. The religions that diverged in some
way from Anglican teachings, like Presbyterians, Quakers, Baptists, Methodists, and Unitarians,
(17:56):
among others, we're all branded as dissenting or non con
armist religions. Many of London's apprentices were adherence to one
of these non conforming denominations instead. In sixteen sixty, Charles
the Second, still in exile, issued the Declaration of Breda,
which was one of the last steps before he was
restored to the throne. He wrote this statement quote, and
(18:20):
because the passion and uncharitable nous of the times have
produced several opinions in religion by which men are engaged
in parties and animosities against each other, which, when they
shall hereafter unite in a freedom of conversation, will be
composed or better understood. We do declare a liberty to
tender consciences, and that no man shall be disquieted or
(18:41):
called in question for differences of opinion in matters of
religion which do not disturb the peace of the Kingdom,
And that we shall be ready to consent to such
an act of Parliament as upon mature deliberation shall be
offered to us, for the full granting that indulgence. In
other words, people would have free him of religion, provided
(19:01):
that their opinions did not quote, disturbed the peace of
the kingdom. And among those opinions apparently disturbing the peace
of the kingdom were various nonconformists. Quakers and Baptists in particular,
frequently wound up in court on charges of quote. Attendance
at a nonconformist Conventsicle Harris also cites this as the
reason why this huge riot took place after Easter instead
(19:24):
of on Shrove Tuesday, as had been so common in
prior years. Even though the Declaration of Breda hadn't really
allowed the nonconformists the practice of their religion uh freely,
at least there had been a period of relative laxity
in terms of the enforcement of religious conformity. The Great
Plague of London in sixteen sixty five and the Great
(19:45):
Fire of London in sixteen sixty six had both given
Parliament plenty of other things to worry about, and some
of the laws governing religion had lapsed. But in sixteen
sixty seven. In sixteen sixty eight, bills that would have
allowed Presbyterians the religious freedom start and circulating in Parliament.
The House of Commons was really deeply opposed to these, though,
and the proclamation on the matter that Charles the Second
(20:08):
ultimately signed on March tense six sixty eight, during Lent,
less than two weeks before the riot began, was instead
about enforcing obedience to the existing laws, not about allowing
greater religious freedom. This also circles back around to those
satirical petitions and letters that we talked about before the break.
One of their themes England was willing to tolerate brothels
(20:31):
but not religious nonconformity, which seems awfully hypocritical. Some of
the chance and rallying cries that they used during the riot,
like the ones that were about reformation, also have a
lot more religious tone to them than being about wanting
to strike down the sinfulness of a brothel. Running parallel
to this crackdown on religious nonconformity was also a crackdown
(20:54):
on theaters in London, and a running theme in this
increasing criticism of theater was that theaters were no better
than brothels, and there was a lot of just hateful
rhetoric that was used in all of this. So this
stoked dislike and disdain for both the brothels and the theaters.
And as we said at the top of the show,
London was full of sailors that were recently released from service,
(21:17):
as well as overworked and mostly pennelous apprentices whose system
of apprenticeship was quickly disintegrating. So there's some degree of
supposition and drawing of conclusions, and all of this uh
some degree of interpretation of what people's motives might have been. Men,
there's no smoking gun. None of the rioters left a
journal saying I'm really upset about my religious freedoms, and
(21:40):
so how about in the guise of a brothel riot,
I make that demonstration. Like, there's nothing documenting any kind
of thought presses like that, And there are also no
court documents. It's explicitly saying that the rioters are being
persecuted because of religious nonconformity, although it does seem like
there was some fear that people who were dissenting in
(22:02):
some way, we're also going to work with Cromwell's existing
supporters who were still around to try to overthrow the monarchy. So,
like a lot of events in history, this one was
definitely a confluence of a ton of different factors and
influences without one clear, single explanation that just explains the
(22:23):
motives of everyone involved at the same time. Oh, history,
You're never simple. Yeah, I wish I could remember where.
I wish I could remember where I stumbled across just
the words, uh, the brothel ride of sixteen sixty eight,
Like I was doing work on something completely unrelated last week,
(22:43):
and then the that's that series of words was on
my screen somewhere, and I went, well, okay, we gotta
talk about that. And then I fortunately was able to
find enough information to talk about that. And then when
I tried to reset retrace my steps to figure out
where I had origin ly seen reference d it, I
could not find it. So I don't remember, but that's
(23:05):
the brothel riot. Do you also have listener mail for us?
I do. I have to. I'm gonna sort of excerpt
two pieces of listener mail because we're getting farther and
farther away from our Unearthed in episodes, but we still
have several interesting insights that people have written to us
about it. So the first one is from Katie, and
(23:25):
Katie says, I just finished listening to the Unearthed episodes
and was sad that you didn't mention the news that
came out over the last year about the sal Jose
slabor that wrecked off the coast of South Africa. It
wasn't a unique ship in its time, but it is
a rather unique find as shipwrecks go, and that they
were able to confirm it was indeed a slaver because
of the artifacts located at the site. Matching them with
(23:48):
archival sources to identify exactly which ship it was. What
is really wonderful about this wreck discovery is the international
collaboration between experts in the US and several African countries.
They have found a They have a wonderful website that
will tell you way more than I ever could about
the project, the timeline, and what they found and what
is happening next. I happen to know all about what
(24:10):
is happening next. Several artifacts will be on loan to
the new Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture,
slated to open in September of this year. Announced it
made a few months ago to great fanfare. The objects
will be featured in a section on slavery to Freedom
exhibit about the Middle Passage which is separate, which is
in a separated room and has meant as a place
(24:30):
where visitors can go in remembrance of those who experience
this traumatic event. Uh. And then she goes on with
some detail that I am not going to get into
because privacy. However, I wanted to read this for two reasons. Um. One.
The website that she links to is the Slave rex Project,
which is fascinating. It is basically a whole project to
document um wreckage of slips of ships that were used
(24:53):
in the slave trade. And I heard about it for
the first time on Slate's podcast The History of American Slavery,
which is extremely good if folks are interested in learning
more about that um and it just I had heard
about it in the context of that podcast, and then
for some reason it never made it into the list
of things to talk about in Unearthed, and so thank
(25:15):
you so much, Katie, and I will put a link
to that website in the show notes for this episode.
The other one is from Anne, and Ann said, I
just finished listening to Unearthed and Part two. My ears
perked up when you mentioned repatriation during the listener mail segment.
I'm responsible for NAGRA Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation
Act compliance. And then I'm going to skip where because
(25:37):
privacy she works with tribal representatives to repatriate Native American
human remains and other cultural items. So I'm gonna get
back to the letter. The history of NAGRA is very interesting,
the attitudes and practices that led to museums and institutions
across the country and globe quote owning human remains of
curiosities or specimens, the Indian rights movements that lead to
(25:59):
Nagara another legislation, and shifting attitudes regarding cultural appropriation. When
Nagro was first passed, there was panic that museum vaults
would be emptied. That hasn't happened, and instead, meaningful and
mutually beneficial relationships have developed between museums and tribes that
have led to improved care of collections and other collaborations.
(26:19):
There's still lots of problems, and a few have been
in the news lately. Some of the examples she sides
are the kennewick Man slash, the Ancient One, the former
MPs superintendent who's still human remains from f D mounds,
and the fight over the remains of Jim Thorpe. That
can be a very frustrating process to go through, but
the work can be very satisfying. I've invited, I've been
invited to attend three reburials following repatriations, and I was
(26:43):
very honored to be a part of returning those native
ancestors to the earth. Um So I wanted to read
that part of Ann's letter to talk a little bit
more about repatriations. We also got another letter that was
about repatriations and about how often UH, the way that
human remains were preserved for display in museums in the
(27:03):
past involved treating them with chemicals that were toxic. So
there's a whole ongoing UH attempts to figure out how
you can return remains to a triber culture that they
came from to be reburied, when reburying them would actually
be an environmental hazard, which is a whole other thing
I had never actually thought about. So thank you both
(27:26):
for sending us these letters, and I will have links
to interesting stuff and the show notes for this episode
for people to look at later. If you would like
to write to us, We're at History Podcasts at how
stuff works dot com. We're also on Facebook at facebook
dot com slash miss in history and on Twitter at
miss in History. Our tumbler is missed in History dot
tumbler dot com. Are also on Pinterest at priest dot
com slash missed in History. You can come to our
(27:48):
parent company's website, which is how stuff Works dot com,
and you can find all kinds of information about just
odd events in history. You can also come to our website,
which is missing history dot com and that is where
we have show notes for all of the episodes that
Holly and I have worked on. We have an archive
of every single episode we've ever done on the show.
Lots of other cool stuff, so you can do all
that and a whole lot more at how stuff works
(28:10):
dot com or miss than history dot com for more
on this and thousands of other topics, because it how
stuff works dot com.
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