Captain Swing
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
Markings: No markings
A landmark work of social history, Captain Swing chronicles the dramatic rural uprising that swept across southern England in 1830, when desperate agricultural laborers rose against the mechanization of farming and the grinding poverty imposed by the enclosure system. Hobsbawm and Rudé meticulously reconstruct the movement through parish records, court documents, and contemporary accounts, presenting a vivid portrait of the men and women who burned hayricks, smashed threshing machines, and sent threatening letters signed by the mythical Captain Swing. Written with scholarly rigor yet driven by a deep sympathy for the dispossessed, the work argues that these rioters were not a lawless mob but a coherent social force articulating legitimate grievances against an agrarian capitalism that had stripped them of their traditional rights and livelihoods. The authors illustrate how the uprising, though ultimately crushed by mass trials and transportation to Australia, represented one of the last great collective protests of the English rural poor and left an indelible mark on the history of labor and class struggle.
Author: E.J. Hobsbawm And George Rudé
Format: Hardback
Published: 1970, Readers Union / Lawrence and Wishart
Genre: British & Irish history
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good
Markings: No markings
A landmark work of social history, Captain Swing chronicles the dramatic rural uprising that swept across southern England in 1830, when desperate agricultural laborers rose against the mechanization of farming and the grinding poverty imposed by the enclosure system. Hobsbawm and Rudé meticulously reconstruct the movement through parish records, court documents, and contemporary accounts, presenting a vivid portrait of the men and women who burned hayricks, smashed threshing machines, and sent threatening letters signed by the mythical Captain Swing. Written with scholarly rigor yet driven by a deep sympathy for the dispossessed, the work argues that these rioters were not a lawless mob but a coherent social force articulating legitimate grievances against an agrarian capitalism that had stripped them of their traditional rights and livelihoods. The authors illustrate how the uprising, though ultimately crushed by mass trials and transportation to Australia, represented one of the last great collective protests of the English rural poor and left an indelible mark on the history of labor and class struggle.