This paper constitutes an exercise in the critical analysis of historical media discourse. It presents an investigation of a pamphlet published in London in 1642 concerning a military incident that took place at the strategically important town of Hull in East Yorkshire during the build-up to the start of the English Civil War. The analysis shows how the pamphlet combines a number of elements including the ominous tale of a miraculous ‘toad fish’, a prayer and news of the incident itself. It also shows how the pamphlet reports on the incident from a royalist perspective and contrasts this with another report of the same event from a parliamentary perspective.
Edward Haig (Tue,) studied this question.