Men of Kent and Kentishmen/Wat Tyler
Wat Tyler,
THE INSURGENT LEADER, temp. RICHARD II.
Is said to have been a man of Dartford, where he exercised the trade implied by his name, or, as some say, that of a blacksmith. The story of his rebellion is well known: how it commenced by his beating out the brains of the Collector of the poll tax; culminated in his assembly of 100,000 men on Blackheath, and his marching with them to London; and ended with his death at the hands of Sir William Walworth in Smithfield, 1381. After his death, his head was placed upon London Bridge; what became of his body is unknown.
[See "Hasted's Kent," "Archæologia Cantiana," vol. iii., and Histories of the period.]