Appleby on the Nonconformists and the Plague 1665 Part 2

... In some cases the courage of certain Nonconformists drew praise even from Anglicans. When the impeccably royalist third Earl of Devonshire, Lord Lieutenant of Derbyshire, received a request 

that the ejected minister Thomas Stanley be expelled from his residence at Eyam, the Earl replied 'that it was more reasonable, that the whole Country should in more than Words testifie their Thankfulness to him, who together with Isis Care of the Town had taken such Care, as none else did, to prevent the Infection of the Towns adjacent. If Nonconformist clergy had demonstrated their worth by preaching and pastoral work in the affected areas, the plague had also worked to their disadvantage. The finances of many merchants who had previously provided financial support for the Nonconformist ministry had been badly affected. Meanwhile, the ecclesiastical authorities were 

stung by pamphlets deriding those Church of England clergy who had fled from their livings in panic, allowing Nonconformists to take their places. Even a pamphlet such as A Friendly Letter to the Flying Clergy, which praised Archbishop Sheldon for remaining at his post, gave a damaging impression of Anglican pusillanimity. This public perception was later reinforced by Daniel Defoe in his fictitious Journal of the Plague Year, and even more so by Richard Baxter's published memoirs. The appropriation of the vacant London pulpits, however, was not in itself responsible for the Five Mile Act. Among the items that had been occupying Sheldon's attention even before the Great Plague marooned him in Lambeth Palace had been the results of a questionnaire that he had sent to his subordinate bishops in order to ascertain the state of the ministry within the Church of England. The responses that he received in return included alarming appraisals regarding the potential scope of Nonconformist activities and the extent to which the ejected ministers continued to exercise influence over their former congregations. The various concerns of the Lords and Commons meeting at Oxford in October 1665 also served to fuel their anxieties regarding Dissent, and in particular the need to restrict the movements of ejected ministers. Michael Wafts has opined that it is possible to justify the Conventicle Act by reason of the Cavalier Parliament's fear of rebellion, but no such excuse can be offered in defence of the Five Mile Act of 1665 In fact, a deteriorating military situation coupled with political and economic dislocation caused by the worst plague for three hundred years had rendered a fragile state more vulnerable to sedition than ever before. The Cavalier Parliament probably had more excuse for anxiety in 1665 rather than less. As ever, Clarendon recoiled from such indiscriminate repression, and so joined the earls of Manchester and Southampton, and Lord Wharton, in opposing the bill. The preamble to the Five Mile (or 'Oxford') Act declared that many clergy who had refused to subscribe to the various declarations required by the Act of Uniformity had nevertheless continued to preach illegally, and conducted worship at meetings in contravention of the law. Such people were now to be required, as from 24 March 1666, not to live or approach within five miles of any city, corporate town or borough of England, Wales or Berwick-on-Tweed, unless passing through whilst travelling to another destination. The ejected ministers were in addition forbidden to live or come within five miles of any parish, town or place where they had had a ministry since the Act of Oblivion (1660), unless they first took the oath of non-resistance detailed in the Act of Uniformity, with the additional clause that they would not seek any change of government, either in church or state. This became known as the 'Oxford Oath'. The fine for each transgression was to he £40. Any cleric or lay person refusing to take the oath was further forbidden to teach or take on boarders to instruct, on pain of a fine of £10 for each offence. Any two or more justices were henceforth empowered to imprison any found guilty of such offences for  aperiod of six months without bail.

Appleby on the Nonconformists and the Plague 1665 Part 1

From David J Appleby's essay in The Great Ejectment of 1662: Its Antecedents, Aftermath, and Ecumenical Significance editor Alan P F Sell

In 1665 plague crossed the Channel, bringing perhaps the worst visitation since the Black Death of 1348. Over the next two years it spread across England and Wales, mainly through the cloth trade routes. As London citizens began to die in droves, the wealthy and well connected fled. King and Parliament removed to Oxford, leaving George Monck, Duke of Albemarle and his army in charge of London. England was by now at war with the Dutch and, with the economic and political life of the capital seriously disrupted, the authorities were understandably more nervous than usual. The traditional ties between English religious dissenters and the Netherlands gave rise to suspicions of treasonable collaboration, and Albemarle kept his soldiers busy rounding up both Quakers and more conventional Nonconformists. Many of these unfortunate individuals subsequently died of plague in the unhealthy environs of London's prisons; including Richard Flavell, a minister who had come to London after having been ejected from his Gloucestershire living, only to perish in Newgate. Hundreds of arrests were also made in the provinces. Charles appointed his brother, James. Duke of York to supervise operations in the areas so recently affected by the Northern Rising. Predictably, little effort was made to distinguish been radicals and moderates, with the result that peaceable Presbyterian ministers such as Philip Henry found themselves caught in the net.

Whatever else he may have been, Gilbert Sheldon was no coward. He remained working in Lambeth throughout the epidemic. Similarly, at least nineteen Anglican clergy stayed to comfort their London congregations, and eleven of them paid for this devotion with their lives. Several of their colleagues, however, deserted their parishes in panic. Nonconformist clergy who had remained in the city promptly climbed into the empty pulpits, or held prayer meetings in private houses to bring spiritual solace to people by now desperately afraid that judgement day was approaching. Calamy records the names of fourteen such ministers who preached in London during these troubled times, the best known being Thomas Vincent, formerly of St. Mary Magdalen, Milk Street. Several more ministers are known to have been living in London and may also have participated in the work. A number of others, Richard Baxter among them, moved out of the city, taking the plague with them in some cases. Relatively little work has been done to investigate the conduct of Nonconformist clergy (and 

their episcopalian counterparts, for that matter) in provincial areas affected by the Great Plague, although it has been suggested that matters in the grievously afflicted cloth-working town of Colchester in Essex followed a similar course to London. The former Colchester minister Owen Stockton may well have engaged in pastoral work in the plague-ridden town, for example, and Obadiah Grew certainly did so in Coventry. ....