Quote of the week

Life isn't about finding yourself, it is about creating yourself'

George Bernard Shaw
If you cannot mould yourself entirely as you would wish, how can you expect other people to be entirely to your liking?
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Wednesday, January 22, 2014

The Peasants Revolt 2014



Suffolk has always been a county of non-conformists, iconoclasts, and rebels.

The skull of the decapitated Archbishop of Canterbury, Simon of Sudbury, remains to this day locked in a cupboard in St Gregory’s Church, keeping alive memories of the county’s active participation in the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381.



Post reformation there is considerable evidence that shows that the puritans were very popular in the county and that iconoclasts such as Dowsing met little resistance when they wrought havoc in our local churches.  

A strong non-conformist tradition persisted after the Civil War, the family of Sudbury’s greatest son, Thomas Gainsborough, being one of many that turned their backs on the establishment.  In a letter to his Doctor in 1779, Gainsborough comments that his sister Mrs Gibbon, ‘cares not a farthing for what Bishops may say’.

Gainsborough's brother Humphrey, a famous non-conformist Minister

 This streak of independence and general bolshiness survives to this day.  While generally of a conservative frame of mind people in Suffolk value their independence and integrity.  We do not like being bullied or pushed around.   It is no coincidence that our newspapers are called the Free Press, or that another ‘Peasants Revolt’ appears to be in progress at present.

Image courtesy of order-order.com

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