Editing Diggers (section)

== Practice ==

=== St George's Hill, Weybridge, Surrey ===
[[File:Gerrard Winstanley memorial - geograph 6433963.jpg|thumb|upright|right|A memorial to [[Gerrard Winstanley]], located close to [[Weybridge railway station]], was unveiled in December 2000.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.diggerstrail.org.uk/assets/documents/surrey-diggers-trail-leaflet.pdf |title=Surrey Diggers Trail |author=<!--Not stated--> |date=3 March 2005 |publisher=[[Elmbridge Museum]] |access-date=14 September 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210924233023/https://www.diggerstrail.org.uk/assets/documents/surrey-diggers-trail-leaflet.pdf |archive-date=24 September 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/6433963 |title=Gerrard Winstanley Memorial Stone |last=Davis |first=Sean |date=20 February 2007 |publisher=Geograph UK |access-date=14 September 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210914184352/https://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/6433963 |archive-date=14 September 2021}}</ref>]]
The Council of State received a letter in April 1649 reporting that several individuals had begun to plant vegetables in common land on [[St George's Hill]], [[Weybridge]] near [[Cobham, Surrey]]{{sfn|Woolrych|2002|pp=449–450}} at a time when harvests were bad and [[food prices]] high.<ref>{{Cite book |title=The English Republic 1649–1660 |last=Barnard |first=Toby |author-link=Toby Barnard |publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]] |year=1982 |isbn=978-0582080034}}</ref> Sanders reported that they had invited "all to come in and help them, and promise them meat, drink, and clothes". They intended to pull down all [[enclosure]]s and cause the local populace to come and work with them. They claimed that their number would be several thousand within ten days. It was at this time that ''The True Levellers Standard Advanced'' was published.{{sfn|Winstanley|Jones|2002}}

Where exactly in St. George's Hill the Diggers were is a matter of dispute. Sanders alleges that they worked "on that side of the hill next to Campe Close".<ref name="auto">{{Cite book |title=Winstanley and the Diggers, 1649–1699 |last=Bradstock |first=Andrew |publisher=[[Taylor & Francis]] |year=2000}}</ref> George Greenwood, however, speculated that the Diggers were "somewhere near Silvermere Farm on the Byfleet Road rather than on the unprofitable slopes of St. George's Hill itself".<ref>{{Cite book |title=Brave Community |last=Gurney |first=John |publisher=[[Manchester University Press]] |year=2007 |pages=138}}</ref>

Winstanley remained and continued to write about the treatment they received. The harassment from the [[lord of the manor]], Francis Drake (not the famous [[Francis Drake]], who had died more than 50 years before), was both deliberate and systematic: he organised gangs in an attack on the Diggers, including numerous beatings and an arson attack on one of the communal houses. Following a court case, in which the Diggers were forbidden to speak in their own defence, they were found guilty of being sexually liberal Ranters (though in fact Winstanley had reprimanded Ranter [[Laurence Clarkson]] for his sexual practices).{{sfn|Laurence|1980|p=57}}{{sfn|Vann|1965|p=133}} If they had not left the land after losing the court case then the army could have been used to enforce the law and evict them; so they abandoned Saint George's Hill in August 1649, much to the relief of the local [[Fee simple|freeholders]].

=== Little Heath near Cobham ===
Some of the evicted Diggers moved a short distance to [[Little Heath, Surrey|Little Heath]] in Surrey.{{sfn|Woolrych|2002|pp=449–450}} {{Convert|11|acre|ha|sigfig=2}} were cultivated, six houses built, winter crops harvested, and several pamphlets published. After initially expressing some sympathy for them, the local lord of the manor of [[Cobham, Surrey|Cobham]], Parson [[John Platt (parson)|John Platt]], became their chief enemy. He used his power to stop local people helping them and he organised attacks on the Diggers and their property. By April 1650, Platt and other local landowners succeeded in driving the Diggers from Little Heath.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web |url=https://elmbridgemuseum.org.uk/network/6-the-aftermath-of-the-diggers-at-little-heath/ |title=Little Heath – Surrey Diggers Trail |website=Surrey Diggers Trail |publisher=Elmbridge Museum|access-date=11 September 2024 }}</ref><ref name="auto"/>

=== Wellingborough, Northamptonshire ===

This community was probably founded as a result of contact with the Surrey Diggers. In late March 1650, four emissaries from the Surrey colony were arrested in Buckinghamshire bearing a letter signed by the Surrey Diggers including Gerrard Winstanley and Robert Coster inciting people to start Digger colonies and to provide money for the Surrey Diggers. According to the newspaper ''A Perfect Diurnall'' the emissaries had travelled a circuit through the counties of [[Surrey]], [[Middlesex]], Hertfordshire, [[Bedfordshire]], Buckinghamshire, [[Berkshire]], Huntingdonshire and Northamptonshire before being apprehended.<ref name="Thomas">{{cite journal |author-link=Keith Thomas (historian) |first=Keith |last=Thomas |title=Another Digger Broadside |journal=Past and Present |issue=42 |year=1969 |pages=57–68 |doi=10.1093/past/42.1.57 |jstor=650182}}</ref>

On 15 April 1650 the Council of State ordered Mr Pentlow, a [[justice of the peace]] for Northamptonshire, to proceed against "the Levellers in those parts" and to have them tried at the next Quarter Session.<ref>{{cite book |title=Calendar of State Papers, Domestic, 1650 |location=London |date=1876 |page=106}}</ref>

=== Iver, Buckinghamshire ===
Another colony of Diggers connected to the Surrey and Wellingborough colony was set up in [[Iver]], Buckinghamshire about {{Convert|14|mi|km}} from the Surrey Diggers colony at St George's Hill.<ref name="Thomas" /> The Iver Diggers' "Declaration of the grounds and Reasons, why we the poor Inhabitants of the Parrish of Iver in Buckinghamshire&nbsp;..."<ref>[http://phoenixandturtle.net/excerptmill/hopton.htm#iver A Declaration of the Grounds and Reasons (Iver)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080328035809/http://phoenixandturtle.net/excerptmill/hopton.htm#iver |date=28 March 2008 }} from Hopton, Andrew, ed. ''Digger Tracts, 1649–50''. London: Aporia, 1989. (transcribed by Clifford Stetner)</ref> revealed that there were further Digger colonies in Barnet in Hertfordshire, Enfield in Middlesex, Dunstable in Bedfordshire, Bosworth in Leicestershire and further colonies at unknown locations in [[Gloucestershire]] and [[Nottinghamshire]]. It also revealed that after the failure of the Surrey colony, the Diggers had left their children to be cared for by parish funds.