Alonzo Marion Poe grows up

Alonzo Marion Poe awoke early on Tuesday 6 May 1845. ‘Marion’ was a naive 19-year-old eager for adventure with nothing keeping him in Missouri. 

He was about to mature in a hurry. 

John Lemmon had not been in Missouri long when he met Marion. ‘Old Lemmon’ had recently left New York after he and some of his family were ‘attacked with lung fever’.

‘The doctor told us: "Don't you stay here another winter…Go to Oregon…" So, I sold my house and made my way here with my family and friends.’ 

Lemmon thought for a moment then looking earnestly at Marion said, ‘I need someone to help look after the cattle, negotiate with the Indians and provide some muscle.’ Marion confirmed that he knew about cattle and said, ‘We often see the Sioux here’. Marion’s unpaid co-workers were Lemmon’s son and three of his son-in-law’s relatives. Marion always enjoyed chatting with them, though sometimes found them over-earnest.

Lemmon was aiming for the fertile Willamette Valley, south of the Columbia River. That is where almost everyone went, indeed the previous year, five families Marion knew had set off with the same objective.

‘Oregon Trail’ from The Ox Team or the Old Oregon Trail 1852-1906 by Ezra Meeker,
The University of Texas at Austin via Wikipedia.

Easily bored, Marion enjoyed shooting toads, snakes, squirrels, birds and rabbits, so his supply of ammunition was usually low or exhausted. 

This habit was about to change.

One morning Lemmon beckoned Marion to follow him. ‘Last night one of our cows fell behind the herd with its calf.’

They chatted as they rode, Marion on his spirited horse with its new-smelling saddle and Lemmon on his old faithful. ‘Do you think we’re safe?’, Lemmon asked. Marion remarked casually, ‘We’re only a few days out Missouri in a large group. We won’t have any serious trouble’.

They found the cow and Lemmon gave it a whack with his small ‘black snake’ whip, an ideal tool for managing cattle. The pair were ambling back to the wagons when they noticed a small group of Indians behind them.

Marion rode out to chat, confident in his ability to charm. As they spoke one of the Indians held his horse’s bridle while two others slipped his feet off the stirrups. Marion was too frightened to speak. And he had no bullets.

The Indians were ready to pull him off his horse, but the sharp-eyed Lemmon was watching. He galloped towards Marion, giving a well-placed crack with his whip across the Indian’s hands. He immediately let go of the bridle.

Lemmon gave Marion’s horse a whack saying in a firm voice, ‘Hold on to the saddle!’ The horse bounded, and the startled Indians stepped back. Lemmon kept up a barrage so the Indians had no time to draw their bows.

Campfire stories still included the Indians, but now Marion's comrades laughed when they told how Mr Lemmon rescued him from death. Everyone enjoyed the new mood for the rest of the journey.

The group reached Oregon mid-September and Marion set out by himself to find his friends. 

They would find him a more mature man. 

Postscript:
Poe's Missouri friends had moved north of the Columbia River to avoid the reach of new laws preventing coloured persons from owning land and so protect one of their number - George Bush. The move probably made Poe more of a pioneer than he may have intended to be. 

Breaking up Camp at Sunrise, by Alfred Jacob Miller, via Wikipedia.

Main source:

Details of the journey are found in Sara J. Cummins, Autobiography and Reminiscences, La Grande Printing Company, La Grande, Oregon, 1914. 

Further reading:

The when and where of Alonzo Marion Poe

The Mystery of Mak Sai Ying: What’s in a name?

Governor Macquarie proclaimed 29 January 1818 a public holiday in the newly named continent of 'Australia' to celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of the landing of the first fleet.

In China, the year of the Yellow Earth-Tiger began on 5 February.  

Three weeks later, the Laurel arrived at Port Jackson, Sydney, with a cargo of teas and manufactured goods from India and China. She had left Bengal in August 1817, stayed in the busy port of Guangzhou (‘Canton’) for most of October and November and then called at Malacca and Port Dalrymple (Tasmania) on the way.

Onboard was a young Chinese man in his twenties, a native of Canton, who would later become known as John Shying. But on his arrival, he was known as something like ‘Mark O’Pong’. One of the mysteries is working out what his original name may have been,

The ship’s third officer was George Blaxland, a relative of the more prominent merchant and land-owner John Blaxland. George befriended the man who then became a houseguest at Blaxland’s Newington Estate in Paramatta. He stayed there for about three years and worked as a carpenter.

Mak’s host. John Blaxland painting by Richard Read

Via Wikipedia

The Blaxland family may well have known ‘Mak’ before the voyage began, as they were merchants at a time of vibrant trade between Australia, India, China, Indonesia and Malacca.

In 1820 he obtained 30 acres of land under the name ‘Mark O'Pong' and was ‘anxious to become an agriculturalist’. He then obtained work with the Macarthur family at Elizabeth Farm also in Paramatta. The Farm’s day-book records him as 'Matchiping' - definitely a mangled pronunciation also.

 

Elizabeth Farm today. The building was renovated in the 1820s.
Plenty of work for Mak. Via Wikipedia 

Mak acquired other land and became Australia’s first Chinese hotel licensee as his prosperity increased.

In 1823, using the name John Shying, he married Sarah Thompson and by 1830 she had borne him three sons. He signed his marriage certificate with an ‘x’, usually indicating that the person signing was illiterate, even though he could have signed in Chinese had he been permitted. He would later claim that he changed his name at the time of marriage from Mark O’Pong ‘as is my country way’.

The origin of the name John Shying is not hard to imagine, even though it sounds nothing like Mark O’Pong. He would have been called ‘John’ by many people who may have found an attempt to pronounce his Chinese name impossible. ‘Shying’, seems to parallel a Chinese given name he used in 1842 for his second marriage when he is recorded in English as ‘John Shying’ but signed his name in Chinese as ‘Mak Sai Ying’ 麥世英. Although it comes first ‘Mak’ was his surname or family name and Sai-Ying although it came last was his given name. The pronunciation is Cantonese which he is presumed to have spoken because that’s where he was born.

Mak Sai Ying's signature
from his 1842 wedding.

However, I have jumped ahead of the chronology…

For some reason in October 1831 with a young wife and four young boys aged 8, 5, 3 and 18 months, he decided to return to China. His reasons are not known. Presumably, he had some kind of obligation – the death of his father, perhaps another family or an irresistible business opportunity…

The point is, his decision was not a whim. He considered what he was doing and made provision for the care of his family through a power of attorney with trustees to manage his affairs. On this occasion, he signed with characters that would sound ‘Mak Sai Pang’ – 麥世鹏. This may well be nearer to his original name and not too far from ‘Mark O’Pong’. Mak as his family name seems a consistent use, as is his middle name Sai (which he might have held in common with any brothers), while the last name is his personal name. There are occasions where he apparently used the name John Pong Shying (which would cover all bases) and, depending on the hearers, there are various spellings for Shying.

Mak Sai Pang signature from the 1831 power of attorney.
The final character seems elongated.

Almost immediately, Sarah Shying in the absence of her husband requested that the deeds to her husband’s land be made over to her indicating that her husband was a native of China and not naturalized. Sounds like she wasn't expecting/wanting him back anytime soon!

The Attorney General responded quickly and with as much sympathy as was legally possible. Naturally, he couldn’t grant the title to a married woman and unfortunately, as her husband was not naturalised he couldn’t own land either. A solution would be for it to be held by trustees for her use and the trustees could dispose of the property to her children – they were all males so it could be passed to them when they were old enough.

Unfortunately, Sarah died in March 1836. John Shying returned to New South Wales, possibly aboard the Orwell which arrived 12 July the same year. If this was his ship, he would have disembarked expecting to find his wife alive. We know that Captain Living ‘brought him down from China to join his family’ and he also noted that ‘he is a very civil, industrious, sober man’ who shows a ‘consistent character among the Europeans who know him in Canton’. No shipping records list him by any of his known names, although occasionally carriage of ‘a Chinaman’ is noted. He may also have been regarded as crew – meaning he could get a lift back and perhaps do some work.

Captain Living’s remarks and Mak's apparent prior friendship with the Blaxlands paints a picture of a man involved with international trading in some way and in regular engagement with Europeans.

Mak Sai Pang’s busy international workplace? Canton view by Louis Lebreton c. 1850 via Pinterest

After his return, John Shying wrote to Governor Sir Richard Bourke, indicating he'd been in China for the past five years, to have another shot at getting formal title to his land. He mentions that he'd left his affairs in the care of two trustees but had forgotten to write 'a memorandum' before his departure. He indicates he's brought money back with him (presumably unusual) and refers to being deceived by a Mr O'Brien. The letter was presumably written by a scribe but the signature in English is ‘John Shying’ and may be in a different hand.

His request was knocked back by the Governor on the basis of ‘regulations of October 1826 and 1827’.

As mentioned above we know that he married again in 1842. His new wife was Bridget Gillorley though unfortunately she died within four months.

In October 1844 John Shying evidently made a will. The will itself has not been found but it is mentioned in a later deed of 1854 to give effect to the intentions of the will before his actual death – as John Shying the elder seems to be a signatory of the deed. Again he seems to be looking after the financial welfare of his family.

Soon after that, he disappears.

There is no record of his death in or departure from the Colony.

John Sheen’s gravestone.
Picture and grave-clean by Chris Pigott

However, a fellow named John Sheen appears in 1846 and marries Margaret McGovern in Sydney. Sheen is a few years older than Shying and while he is described as a very old resident of the Colony, there is no other record of him. For his marriage Sheen claims he was born in ‘Chinese India’ - wherever that might be. When Sheen dies in 1880 his undertakers are two of John Shying’s sons.

Members of both the Shying and Sheen families have hoped that evidence will confirm that the two men are the same. It would solve two mysteries; where did Shying go and where did Sheen come from. Documentation has no far not helped and other historians have left it as a family riddle.

This looks like a case for genetic genealogy!

As it turns out, some family historians in 2001 did try a DNA test. The test was conducted by the then-new Department of Forensic Medicine in Sydney. Three samples were collected and two tested, one from the male line in each family. The results clearly indicate that the two men sampled did not have the same male-line ancestors.

This evidence, however, opens up more questions than it answers.

The Shying family have stories of a brother so this provides some hope. Further DNA testing may enable the families to establish a point of origin for their respective male lines and identify other connections. (One of the Sheen women apparently believed she was a Shying.) These tests may suggest places to look for further documentary evidence – perhaps the California goldfields, perhaps a particular village in Guangzhou.

In the meantime, there are more Mak mysteries to solve and further dusty windows into Australia’s multicultural past to clean…

Another view of Mak's busy home.

[Un-named] Artist in China, View of Guangzhou (Canton), about 1800. Watercolour and gouache on paper 24 1/2 x 47 inches (62.23 x 119.38 cm). Peabody Essex Museum purchased with funds donated anonymously, 1975. E79708. Courtesy of Peabody Essex Museum.

Some other sites about Mak Sai Ying

‘A native of Canton’, Signals Magazine, Issue 123, pages 25-36, Australian National Maritime Museum.

Mak Sai Ying Aka John Shying - Parramatta Heritage Centre 

John SHYING and John SHEEN - were they one and the same as MAI Sai Ying?

Pigott-Gorrie Blogspot

What you can do

If you have any Chinese ancestry with a male line surname of Mak (麥) write down what you know of family stories and take pictures of any relevant heirlooms. Tell your family about them. This is worth doing whatever your ancestral surnames are.

Check out Kate Bagnall’s Finding your Chinese roots.

Take part in a genetic DNA program. There’s only one prominent company, Family Tree DNA, which does a test for the male line (Y-DNA) – as well as the more common ‘cousin finder’. They have a project dedicated to Chinese family history.

You may wish to help fund DNA tests. Two tests have so far been conducted and results published in later posts. Let me know if you’d like details.

In Melbourne Australia, you might like to join The Chinese Australian Family History Group of Victoria (CAFHOV). There may be something similar near where you live and CAFHOV have some suggestions. Let me know of others.

There’s still more work to do before we can find where he ended up, but we can track many of his numerous Australian descendants. Two of the several collaborative efforts are FamilySearch and FindAGrave. Any additions, comments or corrections you might have would be great.

Let me know how you go.

See also:
Are you a Mak 麥?
The DNA search for ancestors of 麥世鹏.
A Singapore connection for Mak Sai Pang?

John Shying’s growing Australian family

Alonzo Marion Poe did not marry Sallie Burnett!

A minor matter of historical fact about Washington Territory pioneer Alonzo Marion Poe needs to be decisively corrected. 

He married Emma Hartshorn

The reporting of Alonzo’s marriage is itself a little unclear. Newspaper reports in far away  Olympia merely reported that he had married and don’t record the name of his bride. The marriage took place in Napa California and even the local paper assumed the bride's surname was Hartson.

Even with the aid of a drink, The Napa Reporter,
24 Jan 1863 spelt the bride's name incorrectly.

The fact is that on 19 January 1863, Alonzo Marion Poe was married to Miss Emma Hartshorn. The young Emma was a daughter of Michigan based Reverend Chancellor Hartshorn.

The index record of Alonzo’s marriage to Emma.
The original record and the church which housed it
were destroyed by fire in the 1800s.

To confuse matters, Emma was living with Judge Hartson – and his given name was also Chancellor!

Being a California politician, the Judge was much better known in the north-west United States than the reverend who lived in Michigan. Poe, being a 'lawman' and a newspaperman, visited the Judge which is probably where he met Emma. Some people assumed Emma was related to the judge as his daughter but this is impossible, as all his daughters were too young to marry in 1863. 

Judge Hartson in whose home all these people met. 
From the History of Solano and Napa Counties, 1912.

Certainly, confusion came about because Emma’s surname, Hartshorn, sounded similar and her father’s given name was also Chancellor the same as the judge. This error even crept into the reconstructed index of Poe’s marriage which spells her surname as Hartson.

How did the daughter of a Michigan minister come to live with a California Judge? We don’t know for sure, but both men were born and grew up in Otsego County, New York and were prominent Methodists, so there may well have been a long-standing connection. Perhaps the Reverend thought living in California would be good for his daughter’s health and living with a Judge may improve her prospects for a good marriage. 

Emma had apparently trained to be a teacher in 1845 at the prestigious Hamilton Academy in Madison New York, so may indeed have been a good match for Poe.

Who did Sallie marry?

So, for whatever reason, the story also circulated that Poe had married Sallie Burnett. How might this have come about? Sallie Burnett did marry a Poe but his name was Francis. Francis, as it turned out, was a lawyer as was Sallie’s father so they would all have known the Judge – and possibly each other. The possibilities for casual observers to get things mixed up were high – and then by the time these stories got back to Poe’s acquaintances in faraway Washington State…

However, the evidence is clear, we have the marriage details for Francis and Sallie – though she is recorded as Sarah there. Her gravestone does make it clear that she married Francis Poe and that she is a Burnette as well.

Sallie Poe nee Burnett’s grave marker.

After Poe’s tragic death from tuberculosis in January 1866, Emma returned to her father’s home with a group from the Methodist Church and spent the rest of her life there.

Emma Poe is buried with her Hartshorn parents.

Corrections are being made

Somewhere along the historical line, the story evolved that Poe married Sallie Burnette. This error has been repeated in a variety of places – even the excellent ‘Early Oregonian Search’ website of the Secretary of State of Oregon once repeated the story.

Now I am pleased to say that as of February 2019 this error has been corrected.  

Updated 7 February 2019.

Michael Farrell: building a life

Life in Cork

Michael Farrell was the first Farrell in the family to arrive in Australia. There is much we don't know about his life, but there is enough to get some idea of his character and the impression he made on a Bengal-born military officer who would become one of Australia most famous explorers.

Michael was born about 1808 in Brandon, County Cork, Ireland, and died in Adelaide 5 July 1850. He was a free settler, a convict and a carpenter. His profession would also attract some of his descendants, though not his raucous first-born Richard from whom we descend.

His death record suggests a birth in 1808 but the names of his Catholic parents are not known.

Prior to his departure for New South Wales, Cork’s economy had gone into decline. The end of the Napoleonic Wars contributed to a slump with prices for agricultural produce falling. Cork Harbour no longer regularly hosted the Royal Navy and that caused a decline in the provisions trade. Unemployment rose and was exacerbated by an influx of migrants from economically depressed rural areas. 

The growing Colony of New South Wales looked attractive for the young carpenter. Michael’s parents may have encouraged the move and may also have travelled the 30 kilometres from Bandon to Cork Harbour to see him off, guessing that they may never meet again.

Arrival In Port Jackson

On 25 May 1827, the Mariner arrived in Port Jackson with some free settlers and '158 male prisoners, having lost two on the passage’. The guard was an attachment of the 39th Regiment under Ensign Charles Sturt who would later become famous as an explorer. Michael, as we shall see, made a positive impression on Sturt.

In Sydney, Michael met others who had arrived from Cork at St Mary’s Chapel near Hyde Park the hub of Catholic activity under the leadership of Cork-born Father John Therry. Therry’s interest in Australia had been ‘aroused by the transportation of Irish convicts’ and he arrived in 1820 and as a ‘farseeing pastor making up for years of neglect’. One of his aims was to build a church and perhaps he took an interest in those of who the skills to help him build it.

Michael gets into strife

However, within a year, Michael had got himself into trouble. He was charged with being an accessory in a case of murder and robbery. The trial process lasted from April to August and he was ultimately found guilty in the Supreme Court of receiving stolen jewellery following a house robbery during which the owners’ servant was murdered.

William Regan was convicted of the murder and Father Therry encouraged him to write down the names of those who held the stolen property before his execution. Regan also a native of Cork and stone-mason, named Bartholomew Taylor and with a little more reluctance Michael Farrell. Regan’s trial detailing his shooting of James Davis made compelling reading in the papers.

The case that entangled Michael.
Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser
Monday 14 April 1828

Charges against Taylor were initially dropped for lack of evidence, but Frederick Hely, superintendent of convicts, was keen to pursue testimony showing that the pair had tried to sell the stolen goods. In June 1828, the Police Bench examined Taylor ‘a prisoner of the Crown, and until very lately assigned to his wife’ and Farrell ‘a youth of but a few months knowledge of the Colony … [and] a lodger in Taylor's house.’

Captain Sturt was a character witness for Farrell and stated that he knew him as a ‘carpenter's mate and that he bore the character of an orderly, honest man’. John Flood, Farrell’s employer, also attested to his ‘good character for honesty and industry’. Taylor was sentenced to 14 years transportation at Norfolk Island and Farrell to seven. Sturt’s reference when combined with Farrell’s youth, the fact that he was a boarder with Taylor and the suggestion that Regan had been reluctant to mention him may have helped confirm a lighter sentence.

Charles Sturt (1795-1869) Explorer, replica by
John Michael Crossland, oil on canvas, circa 1853.
National Portrait Gallery NPG 3302 used with permission.
Without him, Michael and Catherine may not have married.

Farrell's stroke of luck

Farrell made two petitions for pardon. The first less than six months after his transportation, a professionally written form letter, was quickly rejected.

The second came about by a stroke of good fortune. 

Captain Sturt happened to be stationed at Norfolk Island for a short time and after meeting Mick took the initiative in writing to Governor Burke on 22 February 1832 that ‘Farrell’s conduct has been so exemplary on Norfolk Island and his executions of his duties so satisfactory that I am convinced he erred more from pliancy of disposition…’. The pardon was granted by Governor Bourke three days later. 

Farrell’s pardon document has some luck for us also. It includes a description of him; 5 feet 5 ¼ inches tall, sallow complexion, brown hair and grey eyes. He had a scar on his left hand (perhaps showing he was a righthanded carpenter) and a tattoo on his left arm - ‘MFIN’. ‘MF’ refers to Michael Farrell himself and ‘IN’ may refer to a loved one. He did not arrive in 1828 as a convict so it is not clear whether the tattoo was made in Cork or on Norfolk Island.

Catherine Ahern leaves Cork

Back in Cork, Catherine Ahern was one of a group of 202 girls and young women removed from the Cork House of Industry and Foundling Hospital and dispatched to Sydney on the Red Rover in April 1832. The plan was to solve two problems: the care of orphaned girls and the lack of industrious women of marriageable age in New South Wales. The Red Rover was celebrated on its arrival in Sydney on 10 August 1832 as the first emigrant ship carrying solely non-convict women. The Sydney Gazette hoped that the women, ‘who presented … a neat and respectable appearance will be so treated by the families who apply for them, as to effect that important amelioration in the moral condition of our working population, which the measure is intended to accomplish’. Indeed.

Catherine made arrangements for employment as a housemaid with Mrs John Paul of George Street, not far from where Michael was living. Perhaps Michael and Catherine met at St. Mary’s at one of Father Therry's matchmaking events. In any case, they were married at St Mary’s on 19 February 1833. The marriage and arrival of several children, starting with our ancestor Richard on 16 February 1834, did ameliorate Michael who kept out of serious trouble for the rest of his life. In 1837 Catherine’s sister may have joined them perhaps to help with the growing family.

Mick and Catherine's marriage - witnessed by new friends.
The place was St Mary's Chapel. It became a Cathedral after their marriage.

Catherine kept in contact with several of her Red Rover companions; they showed up as witnesses at one another's weddings and children's baptisms. Michael's companions seem to have been other builders including John Mazagora a son of free settler Constable John Massagora whose family arrived in 1816. John and Mick both worked for Francis Reynolds a 'respectable builder in Kent Sreet'.

Adelaide calls

In 1846, immigration to Adelaide from other Australian Colonies increased as a result of the Colony’s mineral wealth. Steady work was available in the building industry and the Colony’s population rose from 22, 000 in 1846 to 63, 000 in 1850.

The Farrells got in early and arrived on board the Emma from Sydney on 28 April 1846, listed as ‘Farrell, M. Mr and wife and 3 children’. Up to that point, Catherine had given birth to seven children. Some may have died before they left for Adelaide and some may not have travelled with them perhaps staying with Catherine's sister. 

Charles Sturt was also in Adelaide and helped encouraged its development before leaving on an expedition in 1844. Although there is no evidence that he encouraged Michael to make the move it is possible.

In Adelaide, two more Farrell children were born; Anne and Thomas. 

The scourge of tuberculosis

At this time tuberculosis was a common cause of death in the Colonies. It was probably in Adelaide that Michael contracted tuberculosis which killed him in 1850 and his young son Thomas in 1852. 

There is no record of the burial of either Michael or Thomas although West Terrace Cemetery believes they buried there  -  it was the only cemetery in town and it has unmarked Catholic graves for which there are no records. Michael's undertaker was a neighbour in Currie Street, Adelaide. John Groser had been declared insolvent in 1846 as a carpenter and presumably found that the dead paid better than the living.

There is also no evidence of what happened to Catherine after the death of Thomas in 1852. Her daughter Anne was in Bendigo soon after her brother’s death. She was only about seven years of age so perhaps her mother took her there and perhaps she married again.

Michael may have been naive but benefited from Therry’s community, his marriage and the help of Charles Sturt who recognised his good nature and honoured the hopes the young carpenter felt when he left Cork Harbour.

Revised 9 November 2018.

"Wretched strangers": Shakespeare’s plea for tolerance towards immigrants in 'Sir Thomas More'

By Andrew Dickson

‘The Book of Sir Thomas More’ is the only surviving literary manuscript in Shakespeare’s hand. Andrew Dickson describes how the scene Shakespeare wrote for the play contains a moving plea for the plight of immigrants.

Among the 40ish plays written entirely or almost entirely by Shakespeare, there is a tantalising puzzle: a manuscript titled ‘The Booke of Sir Thomas Moore’ (booke in this context meaning ‘play script’). 

 William Shakespeare via Wikipedia

Now kept in the vaults of the British Library, the document is a play script from the late 16th century or early 17th, in draft form and dense with revisions and changes. Its main author seems to be the now little-known poet and playwright Anthony Munday (c. 1560–1633), but the text also appears to contain the handwriting of four fellow dramatists including a shadowy figure known initially as ‘Hand D’. In 1871, scholars proposed an identity for Hand D – William Shakespeare. 

If they are correct, the manuscript of Sir Thomas More contains something incalculably precious: the only example of Shakespeare’s handwriting in a literary manuscript.

The Book of Sir Thomas More: Shakespeare's only surviving literary manuscript

Harley MS 7368, the only surviving play script to include Shakespeare’s handwriting.

View images from this item  (4)

Usage terms The British Library has decided to make the images of pre-1800 collection items available on this website. For more information please refer to the following guidance.

What is the play about?

The play’s subject matter is the rise and fall of Thomas More, the Tudor lawyer and polymath who was sentenced to death for refusing to recognise Henry VIII as Supreme Head of the Church in England. Even by the fraught political standards of Elizabethan England, More’s story was dangerous stuff. The events the play depicts had happened only 60-odd years earlier, and More was a Catholic who had died for his principles. 

Catholicism was officially banned under Elizabeth I, and adherents of the old religion forced to worship in secret; to present a sympathetic portrait of a Papist martyr who defied his monarch, as Sir Thomas More does, was risky indeed.

Still more riskily, the play dwells on xenophobic riots that tore through London in 1517. These riots bore troubling similarities to disturbances that had occurred in the 1590s and early 1600s when the playwrights were working on the script. 

Incensed by what they saw as dangerous levels of immigration from the European continent, rioters had rampaged through London calling for ‘aliens’ or foreigners to be expelled or have their throats cut. As well as the handwriting of Munday, Shakespeare and the other dramatists – Henry Chettle, Thomas Dekker and Thomas Heywood – the manuscript also bears the exasperated comments and revisions of Edmund Tilney, Elizabeth’s theatre censor, who had the power to prevent performances of plays he deemed inflammatory. Sir Thomas More seems to have been one of those plays: as far as historians can tell, it was banned from public performance.

What is Shakespeare’s scene about?

What does Sir Thomas More reveal about Shakespeare? 

Much more than his rather cramped handwriting. The most contentious moment in the script is what was called the ‘insurrection’ scene, in which xenophobic Londoners poured onto the city’s streets baying for immigrants to be thrown out of England. Though we tend to think of Elizabethan playwrights operating in splendid isolation, it wasn’t uncommon for writers to work together, contributing sections or speeches as required. At some point in the development of Sir Thomas More, Shakespeare seems to have been commissioned to write the play’s emotional highpoint, in which the heroic More – who is at this point in the play the sheriff of London – pleads with the crowd to accept and welcome the asylum seekers in their midst. 

‘Imagine that you see the wretched strangers,’ More cries,

Their babies at their backs, with their poor luggage,Plodding to th’ ports and coasts for transportation, And that you sit as kings in your desires,Authority quite silenced by your brawl ... (Sc. 6, 84–88)

More turns the rioters’ arguments back on themselves: if they themselves were refugees, where would they go? Which country would want them? ‘Why, you must needs be strangers,’ he concludes, finding no ‘abode on earth’, with ‘detested knives against your throats, / Spurn[ed] like dogs’ (ll. 148–50). 

Ashamed and contrite, the mob backs down.

Sir Thomas More may have been too contentious to stage at the time, but the power it has in the theatre is all too clear. In the speech Shakespeare gives to More, the sheriff single-handedly quells the riot by appealing to the crowd’s better instincts, and with imagery that is painfully vivid: ‘wretched strangers’ lugging their babies and their belongings, plodding to the coasts to be shipped back home – if they still have a home. 

In its show-stopping emotional force, it calls to mind the Jewish moneylender Shylock’s agonised appeal for tolerance in The Merchant of Venice (‘Hath not a Jew eyes?’ (3.1.59)), and touches on a question repeatedly probed by that drama and others such as Othello and Measure for Measure: what does fairness and acceptance look like? And what are the delicate social contracts that underpin multiculturalism? 

As so often with Shakespeare, we have no way of knowing if More’s sentiments were the playwright’s too, but he makes the case for tolerance with blazing force.

Little-known though it is, and almost never performed, the scene is powerful even now, and not difficult to map on to refugee crises in the 21st century – whether in the apparently endless exodus seeking asylum from Syria’s bitter civil war or the stream of migrants heading overland to Europe from destinations as far-flung as Afghanistan and Eritrea. With the European Union divided over how to respond, and extremist and right-wing political movements capitalising on a wave of anti-immigrant feeling, these issues will not go away. 

Migration, as Shakespeare makes plain in this remarkable scene, is nothing new: the important question is how the rest of us respond.

Andrew Dickson is an author, journalist and critic. A former arts editor at the Guardian in London, he writes regularly for the paper and appears as a broadcaster for the BBC and elsewhere. His fascinating book about Shakespeare's global influence, Worlds Elsewhere: Journeys Around Shakespeare's Globe, is available now in paperback. He lives in London, and his website is andrewjdickson.com.  First published: 15 March 2016

The text in this article has been made available under the Creative Commons License.

A book you should read - Waste of a Nation: Garbage and Growth in India

Waste of a Nation: Garbage and Growth in India 
by Assa Doron and Robin Jeffrey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book turned out to be more engaging than the subject initially suggested. The first clue is the light humour in the title; a gentle spice throughout the narrative. Though the subject is perhaps intrinsically unattractive the book demonstrates that it is vital and while India’s situation has unique factors, the issues are universal as is the urgent need to address them. 

The authors sympathetic and perceptive observations have intrinsically constructive intentions, I think. Rancour, cynicism or despair may have been easy options, but their approach is to focus on suggesting how things can be made better. 

The comprehensive reading behind the book places India’s situation in its realistic geographic and historical context and thereby illustrates that the issues are universal. While various themes come up in different contexts, I didn’t feel like thinking ‘you told me that before’; the concept of a ‘binding crisis’ and the plight of the Dalits are examples. The book is thoughtfully structured by dedicated educators. 

Hopefully, this book will be widely read – it certainly deserves to be!

The authors talk about their book.