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Revolutionary Lives
Gerrard Winstanley: The Digger's Life and Legacy: The Digger's Life and Legacy
'The power of property was brought into creation by the sword', so wrote Gerrard Winstanley (1609 - 1676) – Christian Communist, leader of the Diggers movement and bête noire of the landed aristocracy. Despite being one of the great English radicals, Winstanley remains unmentioned in today's lists of 'great Britons'.
John Gurney reveals the hidden history of Winstanley and his movement.
As part of the radical ferment which swept England at the time of the civil war, Winstanley led the Diggers in taking over land and running it as 'a common treasury for all' – provoking violent opposition from landowners. Gurney also guides us through Winstanley's writings, which are among the most remarkable prose writings of his age.
Gerrard Winstanley: The Digger's Life and Legacy is a must read for students of English history and all those seeking to re-claim the commons today.
John Gurney reveals the hidden history of Winstanley and his movement.
As part of the radical ferment which swept England at the time of the civil war, Winstanley led the Diggers in taking over land and running it as 'a common treasury for all' – provoking violent opposition from landowners. Gurney also guides us through Winstanley's writings, which are among the most remarkable prose writings of his age.
Gerrard Winstanley: The Digger's Life and Legacy is a must read for students of English history and all those seeking to re-claim the commons today.
176 pages, Paperback
First published May 22, 2012
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May 12, 2017
Wrote a really long review and then accidentally shut down my browser page. FML.
Well what I was saying was that the Civil War*, being roughly analogous to the French Revolution was a bourgeois revolution. An upheaval in society where Capital has grown enough to challenge feudalism in order to obtain a free market. Ending feudalism means the common land can be divied up between the wealthy, forcing the peasants out of their livelihoods forcing them to go and work for capitalists as they no-longer have the means to provide themselves with food and shelter from the land. This creates the working class. At the time only a small portion of the working class had been created. In a bourgeois revolution these sections are the most advanced, revolutionary and visionary groups. In the Civil War these groups were the Levellers and the Diggers (Robespierre and co. represented this in the French Revolution "The thieves have won!" he cried upon his defeat by the capitalists).
Strange, then, you say why Winstanley-of merchant extraction-should become the figure head of an advanced section of peasants and landless workers. At the time he had been a merchant in London but the societal upheaval had ruined his trade, therefore he was forced into a more humble position. Meaning he became subject to oppression by Capital. Obviously he had some clarity of sight to see the contradictions of capital being brought into play even if he didn't use that terminology he was more likely to say something Biblical along the same lines as Jesus smashing up the banks.
Winstanley and the Diggers were not merely seeking a return to the Feudal period and a restoration of the Monarchy and the Common Land, they had envisioned and were trying to bring about a new society based on values of equality and sharing, i.e. socialism/communism, and I think rightly so Winstanley is seen as a figurehead for many political groupings from Communists, Socialists, Anarchists, Greens, Quakers and so on. The book's final chapter dwells on more modern movements that drew/are drawing on Winstanley's Digger legacy which is useful for examining how wide his influence has become.
What also strikes me about Winstanley's life is how well documented it was. I'm ascribing this to his petit bourgeois extraction. His class background led him first into the merchant trade, obviously his name crops up in trade documents of the time. Then obviously he was a relatively important figure in the 1640s and 50s with his political activity and writing, after this period he became a landowner and held several regionally important roles as a public servant and hence his name also occurs in documents related to those.
*This is an imperfect term for what was a very complicated set of events that needs a very nuanced approach to understanding. In England they call it the 'English Civil War' or simply the 'Civil War', in Scotland and Ireland they may be more likely to call it the 'War of the Three Kingdoms' it being a war that was fought throughout the entirety of Britain and Ireland. This is still an imperfect term 1, because it ignores the national characters the war took on in Cornwall and Wales and 2, the class character it took on elsewhere. In areas where Capitalism was more developed we see a more class-character the war took on, largely a fight between Capitalist desire for Bourgeois democracy and market freedom from feudal restraints but also proletarian desire to be free of capital and the blunt anger of the peasants being forced from the land. In other areas where feudalism very much still reigned national or religious factors were more likely to sway the populace for the crown (see the Civil War in Cornwall where the Cornish by and large sided with the Crown and their own feudal lords in a national struggle against what they saw as an English army come to force itself upon them).
Well what I was saying was that the Civil War*, being roughly analogous to the French Revolution was a bourgeois revolution. An upheaval in society where Capital has grown enough to challenge feudalism in order to obtain a free market. Ending feudalism means the common land can be divied up between the wealthy, forcing the peasants out of their livelihoods forcing them to go and work for capitalists as they no-longer have the means to provide themselves with food and shelter from the land. This creates the working class. At the time only a small portion of the working class had been created. In a bourgeois revolution these sections are the most advanced, revolutionary and visionary groups. In the Civil War these groups were the Levellers and the Diggers (Robespierre and co. represented this in the French Revolution "The thieves have won!" he cried upon his defeat by the capitalists).
Strange, then, you say why Winstanley-of merchant extraction-should become the figure head of an advanced section of peasants and landless workers. At the time he had been a merchant in London but the societal upheaval had ruined his trade, therefore he was forced into a more humble position. Meaning he became subject to oppression by Capital. Obviously he had some clarity of sight to see the contradictions of capital being brought into play even if he didn't use that terminology he was more likely to say something Biblical along the same lines as Jesus smashing up the banks.
By the cheating sons in the theeving art of buying and selling, and by the burdens of, and for the Souldiery in the beginning of the war, I was beaten out both of estate and trade, and forced to accept of the good will of friends crediting of me, to live a Countrey-life.
Winstanley and the Diggers were not merely seeking a return to the Feudal period and a restoration of the Monarchy and the Common Land, they had envisioned and were trying to bring about a new society based on values of equality and sharing, i.e. socialism/communism, and I think rightly so Winstanley is seen as a figurehead for many political groupings from Communists, Socialists, Anarchists, Greens, Quakers and so on. The book's final chapter dwells on more modern movements that drew/are drawing on Winstanley's Digger legacy which is useful for examining how wide his influence has become.
What also strikes me about Winstanley's life is how well documented it was. I'm ascribing this to his petit bourgeois extraction. His class background led him first into the merchant trade, obviously his name crops up in trade documents of the time. Then obviously he was a relatively important figure in the 1640s and 50s with his political activity and writing, after this period he became a landowner and held several regionally important roles as a public servant and hence his name also occurs in documents related to those.
*This is an imperfect term for what was a very complicated set of events that needs a very nuanced approach to understanding. In England they call it the 'English Civil War' or simply the 'Civil War', in Scotland and Ireland they may be more likely to call it the 'War of the Three Kingdoms' it being a war that was fought throughout the entirety of Britain and Ireland. This is still an imperfect term 1, because it ignores the national characters the war took on in Cornwall and Wales and 2, the class character it took on elsewhere. In areas where Capitalism was more developed we see a more class-character the war took on, largely a fight between Capitalist desire for Bourgeois democracy and market freedom from feudal restraints but also proletarian desire to be free of capital and the blunt anger of the peasants being forced from the land. In other areas where feudalism very much still reigned national or religious factors were more likely to sway the populace for the crown (see the Civil War in Cornwall where the Cornish by and large sided with the Crown and their own feudal lords in a national struggle against what they saw as an English army come to force itself upon them).
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