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‘A Gracelesse, and Audacious Companie’?1 the Family of Love in the parish of Balsham, 1550–1630
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2016
Extract
The doctrine and membership of the Family of Love in England remain something of a mystery, despite extensive recent work. Why should such an apparently small group have been the specific subject of a royal proclamation? Between June 1575 and November 1580 the sect was referred to a dozen times in Privy Council correspondence, and was clearly the object of considerable anxiety. The Bishops of London, Norwich, Exeter, Ely, Winchester, Lincoln, Salisbury and Worcester were all instructed to conduct investigations. Puritan writers like John Rogers and William Wilkinson published books attacking the sect. The reasons for such sustained persecution over so short a period are hard to establish. One fact which must have contributed to the panic was that there were Familists in the Queen’s guard, close to the centre of the political nation. Moreover, reports of the sect in each of the dioceses listed above had presumably been received. It is likely that the Family of Love was much larger than the surviving evidence reveals. Familism, as the proclamation suggests, was also thought to involve the threat of social revolution. In a series of letters which Rogers later published, one Familist writer stated that
I had rather heare an honest poore mans report truly spoken, than a rich credible mans that is a Iyer
and quoted Scripture to emphasize the point: ‘The Lorde preferueth the simple.’ Views like this were dangerously disrespectful, and implied social insubordination.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © Ecclesiastical History Society 1986
Footnotes
1
Anon, A Supplication of the Family of Love said to be presented into the King’s royall hands (Cambridge 1606).
References
2 Hamilton, Alastair, The Family of Love (Cambridge 1981)Google Scholar; Heal, Felicity, ‘The Family of Love and the diocese of Ely, Schism, Heresy and Religious Protest’ SCH 9 (Cambridge 1972) pp. 213–222.Google Scholar Also Spufford, Margaret, ‘The quest for the heretical laity in the visitation records of Ely in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries’ ibid. pp. 223–230.Google Scholar
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5 Rogers, J., The Displayinge of an Horrible Secte … naming themselves the Family of Love (London 1578).Google Scholar
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7 APC 10 pp. 332, 344.
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10 See n. 1.
11 Spufford, Margaret, Contrasting Communities (Cambridge 1974) p. 306.Google Scholar
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15 Cambridge, Gonville and Caius College MS 53/30, fols 72v-3r.
16 Cambridge University Archives, Ely Consistory Court Will Registers: Bartholomew Tassell (1577), William Cornell (1584), Leonard Dirgeon (1591), John Diss (1J96), Henry Marsh (1609), John Taylor (1623).
17 Camb. Univ. Arch, Ely Cons Court Will Reg: William Lorkin (1597), William Symond (1620). Probable Familists for whom no wills survive were George Woolward, John Smith and John Hasell.
18 As a rule, I have regarded as additional probable Familists only those witnesses whose names appear twice or more in the wills of other members, or whose own wills are witnessed by two or more definite members.
19 Camb Univ Arch, Ely Cons Court Will Reg: Richard Cornell (1544), John Taylor (1550), Richard Marsh (1557), Thomas Dirgeon (1558), Richard Rule (1558), William Lawrence (1558), Thomas Diss (1558), Marion Marsh (1560), Robert Diss (1564), John Lawrence (1567), John Rule (1567), John Tassell (1570), William Lawrence (1570), John Smith (1576), Elizabeth Rule (1578), Richard Marsh (1583), John Durgeon (1596).
20 Camb Univ Arch, Ely Cons Court Will Reg: John Bourn (1593), Thomas Hockley (1601), Thomas Pierson (1613), John Essex (1616).
21 Camb Univ Arch, Ely Cons Court Will Reg: Henry Barnard (1600).
22 PCC: Thomas Bridge (1590), Thomas Lawrence (1609), Thomas Diss (1614).
23 PCC: Lewes Steward (1593), William Raven (1598), John Frend (1608). The wills listed in notes 14-21 form the backbone of this paper. Because they are mentioned so frequently, I will not subsequently repeat the references. The testators’ names alone will be adequate for identification.
24 PRO, E179 82/244; E179 83/307.
25 Typed transcripts of the Balsham parish registers are available at the Cambridgeshire County Record Office.
26 Cambridge University Library, Ely Diocesan Records B/2/8, B/2/28.
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30 Gon. and Caius Coll MS 53/30, fol 73r.
31 I am extremely grateful to Dr. Claire Cross for suggesting to me that the Cambridgeshire Familists could have been connected with Henry Hart and the Free-willers, who were operating in Kent and Essex at this time. Further work is needed, though as yet no link has been established.
32 My information in this section is taken from the historical notes available in Balsham parish church.
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34 Joint beds were more ornamental and valuable than those made by carpenters.
35 Most of the Elizabethan subsidies for the Radfield hundred, in which Balsham was situated, recorded only the total sums collected. The 1598 roll includes names, but the list is very faded.
36 See n. 22 for references.
37 I am extremely grateful to Dr. Roger Schofield for advising me on this section.
38 Camb Univ Lib, EDR, B/2/8.
39 Camb Univ Lib, EDR, B/2/8.
40 Camb Univ Lib, EDR, B/2/28.
41 A shortened version of this confession was printed in J. Rogers, The Displayinge
42 I am indebted to Dr. Roger Schofield for checking my figures and assuring me that they are conclusive.
43 Anon, , A Brief Rehersal of the Belief of the Good Willing in England, which are named the Family of Love … (London 1656).Google Scholar
44 I am deeply indebted to Dr. Margaret Spufford for the great encouragement she has offered me in the research for, and writing of, this paper. Her tremendous enthusiasm has not been inhibited in the slightest by the fact that one of her main concerns has been to show that dissent was not restricted to the more comfortable members of local communities.
45 Hill, Christopher, The World Turned Upside Down (1972 repr Harmondsworth 1975) p. 27.Google Scholar
46 A Coppy of the voluntary confession of Leonard Romsie … some time of the familye of Love, PRO, SP 12 133.