WHITECHAPEL INDEPENDENTS AND THE ENGLISH REVOLUTION

Abstract

The existence of an Independent church at Stepney presided over by William Greenhill is already well known as too is the association of the eastern suburbs generally with religious and political radicalism in the 1640s. What is less familiar, however, is the fact that Stepney's neighbouring parish, St Mary Matfellon, Whitechapel, also came to possess an Independent church gathered under the divine Thomas Walley (or Whalley), and that prominent members of that church and their sectarian allies had for some time assumed key roles in local politics and were eventually to engineer an Independent take-over of the parish after a protracted struggle. This article will focus upon the composition of the Whitechapel Independents, the form taken by the parochial factionalism, the identities and reactions of their local opponents and the way in which events and personalities in Whitechapel related to broader religious and political themes in the capital.