Leveller Successors of the 1680s

Abstract

The sectarian communities in London and nearby localities in which the Levellers originated remained catalysts of radical opposition in 1678–1683 and of support for toleration in 1687–1688. Prosopographic analysis focuses on London clubs and neighbourhoods and on the Rye House plotters. The late Restoration politics of sectarian communities in the counties that had once produced Leveller followings also show traces of surviving Leveller and popular republican perspectives. Considering their social backgrounds and their ideas, the Rye House plotters and the urban advocates of James II’s toleration are appropriately considered Leveller successors. Ironically, some of those with strong intellectual connections to the revolutionary Levellers of the 1640s were allied with a king whose ‘popery and arbitrary government’ provoked the Glorious Revolution of 1688–1689.

Appendix 7.1: Rye House Plot Recruits

Guide to Sources for Appendix 7.1

The Sources column includes the major sources used to identify Rye House plotters and their occupations and residences. Manuscript sources from the British Library and the National Archives are cited with their abbreviated collection titles and numbers: Add MS (Additional Manuscripts), Eg MS (Egerton Manuscripts), SP 29 (State Papers, Domestic, Charles II, 1660–1685). Volumes of the Calendar of State Papers, Domestic (CSPD) are cited by year with CSPD 1683 (January–June) abbreviated as CSPD 1683 (J–J) and CSPD 1683 (July–September) abbreviated as CSPD 1683 (J–S). The following additional short titles and abbreviations are used in Appendix 7.1:

Appendix 7.1 Rye House plot recruits

GRC:

Harris, Tim. ‘The Green Ribbon Club,’ unpublished essay with ‘Appendix-Members of the Society,’ an annotated biographical list of members found in the Pepys Library, Magdalene College, Cambridge University: MS 2875, fols. 465–491.

Hearth:

London Hearth Tax, 1662–1666, British History Online at https://www.british-history.ac.uk.

Luttrell 1:

Luttrell, Narcissus. A Brief Historical Relation of State Affairs, 6 vols. (Oxford, 1859), vol. 1.

Morrice 2–3:

Morrice, Roger. The Entring Book of Roger Morrice, 1677-1691, Mark Goldie, ed., 7 vols. (Woodbridge, 2007), vols. 2–3.

North Examen :

North, Roger. Examen; or, an Enquiry into the Credit and Veracity of a pretended complete History (1740).

ODNB :

Dictionary of National Biography.

ST 9–11:

A Complete Collection of State Trials, T. B. Howell and T. J. Howell, eds. 34 vols. (London, 1811–1828), vols. 9–11.

Whitley:

Whitley, W. T. The Baptists of London 1612–1928 (1928).