1685 Monmouth Rebellion

                            From R.D.Blackmore's classic novel of Exmoor                                      Picture of R D Blackmore in public domain courtesy of Wikipedia UK  This blog post is a companion piece to my general thoughts on  Lorna Doone  for  the 'A Burnt Ship' blog    Would that I had never been there! Often in the lonely hours, even now it haunts me;would far more, that the piteous thing had never been done in England. John Ridd, Volume III Chapter XII of 'Lorna Doone' R.D Blackmore's 'Lorna Doone' (1869)  is the most well known novel to feature the Battle of Sedgemoor, well the immediate aftermath at least. In the whole of the novel's 700 pages, there is little about the Rebellion. Monmouth is referred to almost in passing Judge Jeffreys appears for a few pages as Lord Chief Justice in 1683. And not every filmed version of the novel even includes the Battle of Sedgemoor scene, though the 2000/2001 film version depicts it well.   Th

                                                Interview with A Poet Reading History    Here, on the beach, west of the Cobb, They landed, Monmouth and 82 men. Eager to free England, Not sure how, A bit like Clinton in Kosovo. Hoping for a rising; Riding out of the West; Hoping old Jamie Milosevice Would do the decent, hand over  His land to the Proddy dog, Hoping.                              In a previous post  I quoted from Malcolm Povey's  poetry collection 'Sedgemoor', from 2006, published by  Smokestack Books  . Malcolm also has another collection of poetry 'Missing' , about the illness and loss of his wife Jackie from breast  cancer ( 2016- also available from 'Smokestack') , and his most recent poems feature in the  magazine  Acumen Malcolm's poetry is stark, very visual , no word is wasted. Hard hitting with a great sense of humanity. And  ' Sedgemoor' looks at the events of 1685, and finds strange parallels with the early 21st century

                Duke of Monmouth biography by Laura Brennan , published by 'Pen & Sword'   This biography came out in 2018 and now available on kindle. Only two years after Anna Keay's extensive biography 'The Duke of Monmouth- The Last Royal Rebel'. I treated myself to the hardback version and noticed straight away that the book seems quite short, 133 pages text  ( excluding index and bibliography). The book has attracted some criticism due to errors, typos and poor editing. Which is a shame, because there are some valuable questions raised about the Duke of Monmouth and the 1685 Rebellion.   Although titled 'Life and Rebellion' , the book is  not a standard biography. The life of James, born in Rotterdam in 1649, to Lucy Walter, mistress to the young Charles II in exile and uncrowned, his initial promotion and rise to a leading Restoration figure,  even as illegitimate son to the king, only to be executed by his Uncle James II after leading a doomed r

                            This post first appeared in the blog   A Burnt Ship   in April 2021                                                                  'The Morning of Sedgemoor ' by Edgar Bundy  (1905) , Tate Britain, courtesy of 'Wikipedia'  Below are some strangely prophetic words written by Aphra Behn and published in 1681, concerning the Duke of Monmouth. Ironically, after being defeated at the Battle of Sedgemoor, Monmouth was captured dressed as a shepherd whilst on the run.                          Young Jemmy: OR, The Princely Shepherd'  Aphra Behn                                                           But oh unlucky fate                                                         ah Curse upon Ambition:                                                         The busie Fops of State,                                                         have ruin'd his condition :                                                         For glittering hope he l

This post originally appeared on line in the blog  A Burnt Ship  in 2019. Does not necessarily reflect my current opinion about the Monmouth Rebellion                              James Duke of Monmouth portrayed in poetry Part I  '                   On the Duke of Monmouth's Expedition Into Scotland In The Summer Solstice 1679' by Edmund Waller '        James Duke of Monmouth in Garter Robes' by Sir Peter Lely, courtesy of pinterest.co.uk                          Edmund Waller was born in 1606, educated at Eton and Kings College Cambridge, and presented at the Court of King James when he was 18.He became an MP by 1624, and leaned more towards the Parliamentarian side during the disputes of Charles I reign. However once war broke out in 1642,  Waller was in favour of a negotiated settlement  between Parliament and  the King. in 1643, he was arrested for his part in a conspiracy to seize London for Charles I. Waller had no qualms about bribing fellow MPs and readily

         This post first appeared in the blog  A Burnt Ship  in March 2018. Some of the comments made might not reflect my current view of the Monmouth Rebellion  '  M icah Clarke '  Sir Arthur Conan Doyle novel  about the  Monmouth Rebellion from 1889.                                                                                                                                                                     H.M.Brock  illustration 1903 edition  I am very grateful to the 'ECW  & Stuart era Fiction' Facebook group  for directing me to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's novel  'Micah Clarke- His Statement As Made To His Three Grandchildren Joseph, Gervais, and Rueben During The Hard Winter of 1734'. The images are taken from the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Encyclopedia website and their use is much appreciated  https://www.arthur-conan-doyle.com ''Micah Clarke' is a fictionalised account of a young veteran of the doomed 1685 West Country rebellion le