In this book Kesselring provides a much needed history of a neglected sixteenth-century English uprising—the Northern Rebellion of 1569—arguing that it should be regarded as a popular rebellion and not merely as an aristocratic plot. Traditional histories have seen the uprising of 1569 as an attempt by two northern earls, Northumberland and Westmoreland, to replace Elizabeth with Mary Queen of Scots and restore England to Catholicism. While resistance to religious change certainly lay at the heart of the movement, Kesselring convincingly argues that it was much more than an elite plot against Elizabeth: the six thousand or so rebels who joined the two earls in this uprising did so because of their own misgivings about the reformed Protestant religion enforced by Elizabeth and not out of feudal loyalties.

There is plenty in this study for those interested in the high politics of these events. Chapter 1 sets the scene effectively by surveying relations between England, Scotland, and Ireland and the destabilizing effect of Mary Queen of Scots's flight from Scotland to England in 1568. Chapter 3 does the same, reviewing the international situation after the collapse of the rebellion and how this conditioned the treatment of the earls once they fled to Scotland and Elizabeth's own response to the rebellion. But the real meat of the book lies in chapter 2, which is concerned with the rebellion itself. Every rebellion leaves its own distinct pattern of documentation, which allows the historian to focus in on particular elements of the events but leaves others in the dark. For 1569 there is particularly good detail about how the two earls and their allies plotted to start the rebellion and needed carefully to justify their actions in rising against the queen, both to themselves and to those who they hoped would follow them. There are reasonably comprehensive lists of those who took part in the rebellion, allowing participation to be mapped and giving some indication of the rebels' social background and motivations. There is very detailed evidence about the rebellion's aftermath, with large numbers of rebels punished in retribution and hanged under martial law. This provides the material for chapter 4, perhaps the most innovative and interesting in the book. What 1569 noticeably lacks, however, is evidence of the rebels' voice: we know they swore an oath of loyalty but not what it was; and no petition of demands survives. Nonetheless, it is clear from their actions that religion was the key issue: they burned Protestant books, victimized married priests and their wives, held traditional church services, and restored the fabric of parish churches.

There are plenty of parallels to be drawn with earlier English popular rebellions. As in the Pilgrimage of Grace of 1536, church bells were rung to raise rebellion: after 1569 churches with more than one bell had the others confiscated as punishment. Men were gathered together using the established (and legal) practice of mustering the local militia under the leadership of village constables, a method used at least as far back as Jack Cade's Revolt of 1450. Once gathered, the banner of the five wounds of Christ was held aloft once more, as it had been in 1536 and during the Western Rebellion of 1549. The actions of the rebels were very largely symbolic, and as in many rebellions, the leaders seemed unsure what they should actually do once the fighting force had been gathered. There are elements that set this rebellion apart, however. There is no doubting that the 1569 rebellion was started by an aristocratic and gentry clique. None of England's other large-scale popular rebellions, for instance, 1381, 1450, 1536, or 1549, were started by the gentry or aristocracy. Can a movement be popular without having popular beginnings? This is an interesting question, which the book does not tackle as directly as it might have. The second element that makes the rebellion unusual is the government's response. At no point was a general pardon offered, and many more were hanged as punishment for taking part than in earlier revolts. Not only that, but under a system of martial law, lists of participants were drawn up and men selected in cold blood to be punished as examples. Some were selected for their actions, but others were chosen because they had property the Crown wished to confiscate. This shows the Elizabethan state at its most brutal, not scrabbling around to restore order and making compromises, but clinically seeking to both punish and profit from the events.

Kesselring's detailed examination of the Northern Rebellion of 1569 adds a great deal to our understanding of both English popular rebellion and Elizabethan government. It joins a growing body of work that convincingly demonstrates that political knowledge and action were not the preserve of the elite in sixteenth-century England. It might perhaps have been rewarding to have more details about the ordinary people who took part, given that the popular nature of the revolt is such an important strand of the argument presented. But some valuable morsels are provided, particularly about women's role in the rebellion: not just widows petitioning for their property after the revolt had ended, but women carrying lime and sand to restore the alter stone to Sedgefield parish church, the rebel who sought to avoid hanging by claiming he had been led astray by his wife, and Anne, Countess of Northumberland, who “rode daily with the rebels despite her pregnancy” (78), joining her husband as a result of her own religious and political convictions.