THE PEASANTS’ REVOLT OF 1381. 15 
In Kent, where villenage was unknown, the cry was for a more 
equal division of property. In London and the centre of England 
John of Gaunt was singled out as the cause of the woes of the 
poor, while in the north of England he was held up as the great 
emancipator of the serf. In some districts itinerant preachers 
had stirred up the people against the clergy, while in others the 
clergy infused into the people their own feeling of impatience at 
the oppression from which, they held, the Church suffered. 
There was general discontent, but no common cause. The move- 
ment, universally of a mixed democratic and socialistic character, 
owed the possibility of its organisation to three causes :— 
1.—The existence of associations called into existence by the 
general determination to defeat the aims of the Statute of 
Labourers. 
2.—The preaching of Lollard emissaries, who travelled about 
the country as the friars had done before them, and, in 
some cases, drawing into their ranks many of Wycliffe’s 
itinerant preachers, spread through the country perverted 
social views in the guise of religion. 
3.—The existence of a large number of discharged soldiers in 
all parts of the country, and possibly of mechanics thrown 
out of employment by war. 
The outbreak was simultaneous north and south of the Thames. 
In Essex, a baker at Fobbing boldly resisted a collector, while at 
Dartford in Kent, a tiler murdered a tax-officer who had 
exasperated him by outrageous conduct towards his daughter. 
The weakness of the effort made by the authorities to put a stop 
to such deeds of violence only led to further outrages. 
The revolt spread with startling rapidity, and paralysed the 
authorities with fear. From Kent alone, 100,000 men are said to 
have marched towards London, the immediate neighbourhood of 
which they reached on June 13th, 1381. The Hertfordshire men 
made their headquarters at Highbury, the men of Essex at Mile 
End, while the Kentish men occupied Tower Hill. Thesame day 
the poorer London artisans insisted that the gates should not be 
closed against the insurgents, who proceeded to show their dislike 
