e abbey to
hand over to them all the documents giving to the monastery power over
the townsmen. There were also a large number of detached attacks on
persons and on manor houses, where manor court rolls and other
documents were destroyed and property carried off. There was more
theft here than in London; but much of the plundering was primarily
intended to settle old disputes rather than for its own sake. In
Norfolk the insurrection broke out a day or two later than in Suffolk,
and is notable as having among its patrons a considerable number of
the lesser gentry and other well-to-do persons. The principal leader,
however, was a certain Geoffrey Lister. This man had issued a
proclamation calling in all the people to meet on the 17th of June on
Mushold Heath, just outside the city of Norwich. A great multitude
gathered, and they summoned Sir Robert Salle, who was in the military
service of the king, but was living at Norwich, and who had risen from
peasant rank to knighthood, to come out for a conference. When he
declined their request to become their leader they assassinated him,
and subsequently made their way into the city, of which they kept
control for several days. Throughout Norfolk and Cambridgeshire we
hear of the same murders of men who had obtained the hatred of the
lower classes in general, or that of individuals who were temporarily
influential with the insurgents. There were also numerous instances of
the destruction of court rolls found at the manor houses of lay lords
of manors or obtained from the muniment rooms of the monasteries. It
seems almost certain that there was some agreement beforehand among
the leaders of the revolt in the eastern districts of England, and
probably also with the leaders in Essex and Kent.

Another locality where we have full knowledge of the occurrences
during the rebellion is the town and monastery of St. Albans, just
north of London. The rising here was either instigated by, or, at
least, drew its encouragement from, the leaders who gathered at
London. The townsmen and villains from surrounding manors invaded the
great abbey, opened the prison, demanded and obtained all the charters
bearing on existing disputes, and reclaimed a number of millstones
which were kept by the abbey as a testimony to the monopoly of all
grinding by the abbey mill. In many other places disorders were in
progress. For a few days in the middle of June a considerable part of
England was at the mercy o