Then they went to Barrs Farm and I heard Giles Griffin demand 40s in silver from Farmer Barr for each machine broke. I heard John Oadam say to Farmer Barr that they would be having half a crown after Ladyday or the wind would get the bettermost. This was by the Ricks in the Court. It appeared to me that he meant by this as farmers would have more than their machines broke if no satisfaction in wages was to come. They were about two hundred by then. I should think they staid about twenty minutes in Barrs Farm & were given more bread. Farmer Barr brought out a lanthorn and I saw by that light Edward Pyke and James Malt and Solomon Webb who were against the Door of the Barn. They entered with Farmer Barr and he said he would be glad if they Broke his machines, for they threwed men upon the Parish. They beat and smashed his threshing Machine and chaff-Cutting machine and they drew out his iron Plough and took all of the other pieces out into the Court in a pile. I don’t know who the others were as broke the machines. I did not see the £4 given.
The mob left the Court yard and walked across the fields to the Estate (of Ulverton House.) They tore up the Fences in the fields named Marridge Butt & Whitesheet Haw, & also in Little Hangy to the crab-apple. I heard many men holloeing that they would have their land back or there would be Blood spilt. Some men carried the fence poles as weapons. Because there was only one lanthorn I do not know who destroyed the fences & I did not recognise any Shout. The lanthorn was bandied about from one to another down the line. The horn was blown several times and the Mob advanced across the meadows as belong to Ulverton Hall (meaning Ulverton House) & they broke down the Hedgerows in several places. I believe John Oadam and Giles Griffin were the leaders. Joseph Scalehorn who is a cripple was carried by two men. This was about seven o’clock. It was first light then. They crossed the river by Bottom Bridge and came up Chalky Lane to Plum Farm (meaning Ulverton House Farm).
When they came to the yard of the said Farm there was Lord Chalmers MP on a horse. The Riot Act was read out from a paper by the said Lord Chalmers. He maintained to the mob that there would be £500 for any man informing against 10 other men. They did not heed him. John Oadam called out that they would be having 2s a day for they wd not starve no more. He went to Lord Chalmers but I did not hear what was said between them. The barn was entered and a threshing machine broke and a Winnowing machine. There were six horses on the said threshing machine and they were unstrapped. I saw them running out of the barn but I did not see the machines smashed. I should think it took thirty minutes to break the machines.
The Mob then proceeded to the Hall (meaning Ulverton House) where there was said to be a great machine also. Myself and the Mob crossed the river again at Bottom Bridge and advanced towards the House through the Park. There was a woman in a black bonnet with a rake. She ran away holloeing and the Yeomanry appeared from behind the Temple: they rode down to meet us at the Lake there. They stopped before they reached us, and pointed their muskets at us. About fifty yards away. The mob called out bread or blood but there were no sticks thrown. Smoke came from a gun. There was a loud noise. I believe from the gun. Saw James Malt falling with a great wound in his face: I believe from a musket-ball. The Mob struck the Yeomanry with Sticks and hammers & crow-bars stones hay-forks and so on.
I was struck by a horse and fell to the ground. I should think they were fighting for thirty minutes. There were many wounds and the Blood was spilling on the ground: I saw John Oadam strike a Yeoman with a hay-fork. Another Yeoman struck the said John Oadam on the shoulder with the butt of his musket. I believe it was Edward Pyke who knocked the said Yeoman down to the ground with a dibble. A horse ran the said Edward Pyke into the Lake. I heard him shout that these d — d villains would boil in their blood for this. Men from both sides fell into the Lake: they were beating the swans away from their persons. Alfred Dimmick was wearing a white hat: he had a sign on a pole, he told me before it read No Machines. The sign was torn away & he took a blow on his crown. Joseph Scalehorn was carried from the fighting but the yeomen went after them. Some men were running to the House across the Lawn. Tom Ketchaside who is eighty was knocked to the ground & also William Bray.
Lancelot Heddin (Examinant’s twin brother) who is a cripple came up to take me away from the Fight. He had no weapon. My dress was torn and I had received a wound on the arm. A yeoman caught my brother by his neck and my brother fell & pulled the Yeoman from his horse. My brother rose & was knocked down by a horse and it appeared to me as he (meaning the Examinant’s brother) was Lifeless. Then I ran to fetch assistance, but was apprehended in the Wilderness
you imagine, my dear Emily, the tediousness of this Sessions when in the forefront of my thoughts runs the said matter relating to your health & our Fortune. I have staid in a room without air for three days — ’tis in the Squire’s aged house, insufferably near the Church. The stench of the labourers vies with the stench of the smoke — we have an ill-built chimney-piece — while I persevere in the translation of but thick grunts into some semblance of Rational discourse. I scribble this between whiles. O for the sweet melody of your name! Quam vellem me nescire literas, as those I face each day, when that gift shuts one up in such a fug as this, far from your person, my dearest. (How fitting a classical reflection, when one learns it came from Nero — in his compassionate youth — about to set his pen upon a writ for the execution of some Malefactor!)
Edward Hobbs, saith that on Monday the 22nd of November instant about two hundred persons were unlawfully and riotously assembled together at Ulverton House in the said county and Examinant saw the Prisoner John Oadam strike Robert Jefferies who was then and there aiding and assisting in suppressing the said Riot. The Prisoner hit the said Robert Jefferies with a hay-fork. I struck him on the back with my musket and he fell to the ground and I then heard him say he would have that d — d Bailiff’s blood for posset on the morrow (meaning this Examinant)
I have never insisted anything of the sort. Far be it for me to be adjudged wanting in this matter, for I have ever been solicitous (if you will pardon the play) after your well-being — even before I declared these feelings for you. Indeed, were it not for my appeals to your father, you would not have been released earlier, and so avoided further complexities — as you no doubt have by going North, as it were — to the favour of your uncle and his codicil, however reluctant the climate to shine upon your fair visage, my dearest Emily
Edmund Bunce had a brown Smock.
whereas, if you had but hearkened to my appeals — you were released post-chaise long ago: but be that as it will
Oadam had a crown of bedwine upon his head: of old man’s beard. I heard him say that he would be King before tomorrow — this was in jest. Other men had yarrow flowers on their Caps and in their Coats, and I held a flag out of a rag. Most of the Mob departed after thirty minutes but we staid at the Malt Shovel for the remainder of the day. We blew a horn and sang some songs to keep our spirits high. We went to bed early but a Press Gang came round at four o’clock in the night & made us go with them to Bursop & Little Bursop, where we broke up three Machines:
if nothing else, we shall be content at least, with this matrimonial arrangement, that can only be of advantage to all concerned — if one absents from that inclusive gathering your dear father — who cannot be content with a place, as it were, in Heaven. O the Sessions winds on, or down, as my timepiece — regular but slow. We must sweep the floorboards twice a day, as those discharged on their own recognizance to appear in person come for their Examination, it seems, straight from the Field, & those from Prison reek of a cow-byre — which should not surprise, since a cow-byre is indeed their Prison (albeit emptied of the lower beasts) — however, the subsequent foul dunginess means I must hold my handkerchief to my nose nevertheless, or feel giddy. There is no other recourse: the town Gaol being full to its gills, our Lord Chalmers (does your father know him?) has donated his secure cow-house of brick for their incarceration, this being, no doubt, an improvement upon the town lodgings — but meaning I am hardly in the town, where there is a decent theatre on the main road, tho’ one’s attention is much disturbed by the coaches outside and their infernal clatter, and there are too many pigs in the road, that one must wade through them, if one chooses the wrong morning. Alas, it is always the wrong morning — without your fair white face, my dearest love: I have never, in all my life, seen so many brown Ploughmen as I have seen thro’ these last few days — and waggoners, and shepherds, & reapers, and paupers, and Jobbers of every fowl & four-legged beast one might imagine, and Well-diggers, & mealy Mealmen and ruby-cheeked Farmers: it has quite enervated my desire to flee the city’s smoke. We are set up in a room of the Manor in the settlement (for so I grace it) named Ulverton — or Ulvers — or Ulverdon — makes no difference — the most dismal place one can imagine — the seat of the Riots in this part of the county — with ditch-mud in the place of road and not a head of thatch without its sprout of moss & weeds. The main Square hardly merits justification of its nomination: but is more a Circle of despondency about a dripping well, whose handle creaks the rope up so loud it forces me to ask for repetition from the Examinants at least ten times of a morning (I exaggerate for effect, for the Manor is some hundred yards along the road, but the church bells shake us each quarter — I feel quite at home as in Bow.) If only you, my dear Emily, had witnessed these Troubles, that you could sit before me and Deposition in the sweetest of tones, while your Examiner gazed upon you from his high table and cross-questioned (but not wiggingly) on the issue of Love — for which there is no Defence. I also have my manly cough returned, tho’ the flush