1685 Monmouth Rebellion

                 Argyll & Monmouth's Military Campaigns Against The Government of King James   Have to state straight away that I am not a Monmouth supporter, but think that this book is magnificent. Even a 'York toady' like myself has to be impressed. The sheer weight of information is incredible. Mr Carter has researched the subject for many years and we can all reap the benefit. He presents many contemporary illustrations, maps, colour plates showing banners, diagrams displaying battle positions which he has created himself. Charts showing the losses on both armies, the number of defeated rebels executed, transported, and pardoned during the Bloody Assizes, town by town.  There  is a most welcome chart commuting 17th century dating to modern dating. So the book will be used for as a crucial source of reference  for a long time to come. 'Fighting for Liberty' is  also a most readable but demanding text. Perhaps ...

                            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 Lo...

                                                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 Mal...

                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 ...

                            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                            ...

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 o...