do not thereby take away other men’s rights, nor demand of this Court, nor from the Parliament, what is theirs and not ours.  But we demand our own to be set free to us, and to them, out of the tyrannical oppression of ancient customs of kingly prerogative; and let us have no more gods to rule over us, but the King of Righteousness only.

“Therefore, as the Freeholders claim a quietness and freedom in their enclosures, as it is fit they should have, so we that are younger brothers, or the poor oppressed, we claim our freedom in the Commons; that so elder and younger brother may live quietly and in peace, together freed from the straits of poverty and oppression in this Land of our Nativity.”

His written address to the Court at Kingston concludes as follows: 

“Thus we have in writing declared in effect what we should say, if we had liberty to speak before you, declaring withal that your Court cannot end this controversy in that equity and reason of it which we stand to maintain.  Therefore we have appealed to the Parliament, who have received our Appeal and promised an answer, and we wait for it.  And we leave this with you, and let Reason and Righteousness be our Judge.  Therefore we hope you will do nothing rashly, but seriously consider of this cause before you proceed to execution upon us.”

Of course, the Court paid no heed to his pleadings, and he details the subsequent proceedings in the following business-like manner: 

“Well, this same writing was delivered into their Court, but they cast it out again, and would not read it, and all because I would not fee an Attorney.  And then the Court-day following, before there was any trial of our cause, for there was none suffered to speak but the Plaintiff, they passed a judgement, and after that an execution.  Now their Jury was made of rich Freeholders, and such as stand strongly for the Norman power.  And though our digging upon that barren Common hath done the Common good, yet this Jury brings in damages of L10 a man, and the charges of the Plaintiff in their Court, twenty-nine shillings and a penny:  and this was their sentence and the passing of the execution upon us.”

Winstanley then mentions one instance descriptive of the way he and his comrades were “boycotted” by his neighbours, and of the men responsible therefor.  He says: 

“Before the report of our digging was much known, I bought three acres of grass from a Lord of the Manor, whom I will not here name because I know the counsel of others made him prove false to me.  For when the time came to mow, I brought money to pay him beforehand, but he answered me that I should not have it, and sold it to another before my face.  This was because his Parish Priest and the Surrey Ministers have bid the people neither to buy nor to sell us, but to beat us, imprison us, or to banish us.”

He then relates that two days later “they sent to execute the execution, and they put Harry Bickerstaffe in prison, but after three days Mr. Drake released him again, Bickerstaffe not knowing of it till the release came.  They seek after Thomas Star to imprison his body, who is a poor man, not worth ten pounds.”  He continues: