In July 1830 rural disturbances began in Kent which rapidly spread across much of Southern England in the following months, and which engulfed Hampshire the following November.  Agricultural workers desperate for better wages and regular employment rioted, attacked the threshing machines that they believed had displaced them and burned down hayricks, barns and other farm buildings.  The disturbances also saw the distribution of threatening letters signed by a mythical “Captain Swing”, from which the riots took their name.