|
|
|
The following article was taken from the Star Newspaper and written by Allan Tunningley. A campaign by Friends of the Earth to preserve the rich natural environment of Thorne and Hatfield moors is the latest in a war of change which has waged on and off for 366 years. An early battle to preserve the ancient fen dwellers' unique way of life was lost when Dutchman Cornelius Vermuyden agreed to drain thousands of acres of the boggy levels. Then came years of riots and floods as the local inhabitants resited the change and broke down the painstakingly built banks and sluices. Many people were killed and countless homes destroyed before peace was restored. Allan Tunningley examines this turbulent period in Doncasters history and focuses on one remarkable man who devoted 60 years of his long and adventurous life to quelling the bloody insurgence. Without doubt Nathanial Reading was the man for the job. The Dutchmen who were struggling to control the newly-drained land around Hatfield and Thorne viewed his pedigree with satisfaction. He was in his early forties and had survived much of his adult life as a soldier of fortune. It was even reputed that Reading had once talked him-self out of a sentece of death in Italy. Ingenious And his connections were good. He was married to Arabella Churchill, the famous Duke of marlborough's aunt. He settled in Sandtoft in 1655 and began a law practice. But Reading was mistaken if he thought a return to his native land meant days of action were over. The problem was the fiercely inde[pendent nature of the original inhabitants of the Humberhead Levels. To some chroniclers of the time, like the historian William Camden, they were "rude and uncivil". They certainly caused a fair bit of bother when Cornelius Vermuyden began to drain and convert it for Agriculture. In Saxon times locals had been known as the Gyvrii and they jealously guarded their vast and virtually unaccessible domain. Half of it was under water at any time -an average depth of three feet - and they had to employ ingenious methods of moving about from one raised area to another. They used flat-bottomed boats where they could, but to traverse marshes and fens they walked on stilts or fastened "cleat boards" to their feet. The land was owned by the monarch but for 200 years successive royal landlords had generally ignored the area, even though it was a paradise abundant in deer, fish and wildfowl. Locals could largely hunt and fish as they pleased and it was little wonder they resisted Dutch moves to drain their heritage away down the newly-dug dykes. Violent rioting had already ocurred before Reading came on the scene. In 1650, for example, 82 houses and barns were destroyed along with crops of rape and corn. Around £80,000 worth of damage was caused and for 10 days the locals were in a state of open rebellion. 'Monsters' The insurgence so upset the Hollanders, who had lost possession of much of their drained land, they decided to call upon Readings courage for a salary of £200. He agreed to organise a force of 20 mercenaries (£20 a year each plus food, arms and horses) to quell the riots and restore the land, It wasn't easy, as a glowing memorial to his efforts - prepared by the Court of Sewers - testifies. "...after 32 set battles, wherein several of his men were killed, divers others wounded and many lamed and very many actions and hundreads of indictments against him and his assistants, and several years spent under inexpressible hazards and difficulties; besides the loss of his [practice and damage to his wife and children, never to be repaired, he subdued these monsters to obedience, and quitened the crown and participants in their said allotments, repaired the church, settled another minister, restored the congregation, and thereby maid the said Levels and tracts adjacent, quiet, safe and flourishing." And a mammoth task it proved, for Reading was still involved in conflict 41 years after he started. In 1696, for example, when he was 82, his lands were laid waste and the houses of his tenants attaked, along with his own house at Sandtoft which was set on fire. An account of the time reports: "Colonel Robert Reading, son to Mr Reading, by almost superhuman exertion, succeeded in wrenching out one of the iron bars of a window and conveyed his aged parents through the opening, when the burning rafters of the building were ready to fall on their heads," The rioting continued for a number of years, some of the perpetrators being imprisoned and others outlawed. It wasn't until 1719 that the spirit of the fen dwellers descendants was finally broken and peace reigned. Reading of course, did not witness the day. He died in 1712 aged 101. After his arduous efforts to secure the land for the Dutch he was left financially ruined. But Reading had helped preserve the drainage of 90 per cent of the humberhead Levels, leaving behind, as one 19th century chronicler observed, the legacy of a "smiling plain". Today, there are few conservationists with smiles to match, for much of what remained of the wetlands in Reading's day has been added to farming or earmarked for peat extraction. Species of plants and insects, like the bog rosemary and the Thorne ground beetle, look set to follow the unfortunate fate of the Gyvrii - into extinction. Endangered birds are fast losing what little is left of their habitat in this part of the world. Since the late 1970s the merlin has reduced its population on Thorne moor from six to two; the hen harrier has halved its numbers to three and the snipe, whinchat and teal are also disappearing from the area. The battlefield is rapidly changing its appearance but the war, it seems, is set to go on and no one can posssibly predict the outcome.
|