Gerrard Winstanley and the Fight to Save Common Lands in England By Cheryl Lo On April 1, 1649, a small group of poor men walked onto St George’s Hill in Surrey carrying  shovels and seeds. They began digging into land that local landowners had long claimed as  private property, planting beans, parsnips, and carrots in the soil. At first glance, the scene might have seemed unremarkable: a handful of men turning over the  earth and sowing crops. But their actions carried a far more radical message. The group, later known as the Diggers and led by Gerrard Winstanley and William Everard,  believed that the earth should belong to everyone. Land, in their eyes, was never meant to be  owned by a select few, but shared and worked in common. At a time when England was emerging from civil war and political upheaval, this small act of  digging challenged one of the most deeply rooted assumptions in society: that land itself could  exist as private propert...