Hardcover. Book Condition: Very Good. Text clean and solid. Two of the world's great Marxist historians present a classic social history of the Great English Agricultural Uprising of 1830. For generation upon generation, the English farm laborer lived in poverty and degradation. With the onset of the Industrial Revolution, however, new forces came into play--and when capitalism swept from the cities into the countryside, tensions reached the breaking point. From 1830 on, a series of revolts, known as the "Swing," shook England to its core. Here is the background of that upheaval, from its rise to its fall, and the people who tried to change their world. A masterpiece of British history. The book is divided into four parts. "Before Swing" sets the scene with an examination of the historical context within which Swing occurred in relation to the development of agriculture in England, how the rural poor were dealt with, an appreciation of the world of the early 19th century village, before ending with a detailed look at developments in what was one of the most miserable periods for ordinary people in English history, the period after the Napoleonic Wars ended. "The Rising" is a forensic account of the rising in the different regions that were affected by Swing, and ends with a general summary of the distribution of rioting, and the different character that the riots took in different areas. "The Anatomy of Swing" is a more detailed look at the patterns of revolt, those who were the victims of Swing (primarily farmers in some areas, the receivers of tithes in others, factory owners in a few areas) and who were their allies (often artisan workers, farmers - who supported Swing rioters when they thought they could be used to batter down their onerous tithe payments in return for an increase in wages). Finally the authors look into the aftermath of the riots, the legal process as it took effect in the early swing areas of the south-eastern, and where in some cases the magistrates dispensed justice with relative leniency, to the rest of the country where a special commission dealt with rioters more brutally: in the end some 500 were transported to Australia and 19 hanged. The rioters themselves hadn't taken a single life and never intended too: property was their target, but judging by the number of executions and the number of those whose families and communities were torn apart by transportation the English ruling class judged the protection of property to be more important than life. Ironically (or par for the course) many of those transported ended up in Tasmania where the colonial policy vis-a-vis the aboriginals was functionally genocidal. The accounts of the life experience of those transported and who left their mark in official records, or other written matter behind them are fascinating. Overall it delivers a fascinating and forensic re-creation of what was perhaps the last widespread peasants revolt in England.
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