Who stole Henry ‘Orator’ Hunt? ……..

Now for those who don’t know Henry ‘Orator’ Hunt was one of the outstanding Radicals of the early 19th century.

Henry 'Orator' Hunt, circa 1820

He had campaigned for the reform of Parliament, called for universal suffrage, and demanded an end to child labour, and was imprisoned for two years for being at Peterloo.

Added to which in 1830 he was elected as the MP for Preston on a radical platform and went on to oppose the Reform Act because it didn’t go far enough.

And given such an illustrious commitment to reform and to Manchester, in 1842 he was commemorated by a monument, which four decades later was stolen.

The statue was not in one of the principle public places in the city but out on the edge, sandwiched between rows of working-class dwellings and in the shadow of a textile mill, and surrounded by an iron works, a chemical plant, and umpteen coal wharfs.

All of which I suppose was an appropriate spot for someone who had spent his adult life promoting equality and demanding a better deal for working people.

The Round Chapel and burial ground, Every Street, 1844

The monument was by all accounts an impressive thing.

The base was nearly six feet square and the plinth on which the monument rested was ten feet square.

There were spacious vaults underneath which were intended for “the remains of those who shall distinguish themselves in promoting the principles advocated by the late Henry Hunt”. *

And beneath the foundation stone were placed, the “memoirs of Henry Hunt, the history of the Peterloo massacre and his letters from Lancaster goal to the Reformers [along with] the placard announcing the ceremony, a copper plate likeness of Mr. Fergus O’Connor, and a copy of the address which was subsequently read to the meeting by Mr. Scholefield”.

Fergus O’Connor was one of the leaders of the Chartist movement and Mr. Scholefield, was the Rev. James Scholefield of the Every Street Chapel, and the monument was erected in the burial ground of the chapel.

Media coverage reported that “no less than 15,000 probably one half of whom were Chartists” [congregated] in Every Street and its neighbourhood”.

The Round Chapel, burial ground and Mr. Hunt's monument, 1851

The address referred to the events at Peterloo and the decision “to perpetuate the memory of Henry Hunt, Esq, and of those who fell in that action, by erecting a public monument and thus show to future generations how the people of these times estimated sterling worth, and how they appreciate genuine patriotism”.  

And that pretty much seems to be what happened over the next decade with leading members of the movement buried beside the monument.

In all five were interred in the grave which was “covered by a flat stone bearing the inscription “Names of the members of the Committee interred beneath.  Peter Rothwell died 6th of September 1847, aged 78 years; George Hadfield, died 12th of January 1848, aged 59 years; George Exley, died 24th of January 1848, aged 79 years; Henry Parry Bennet, died 10th of November 1851, aged 65 years; James Wheeler, died 13th of September 1854, aged 63 years”. **

Peterloo, 1819

Sadly, the passage of time had not been kind to Mr. Hunt’s memorial and when the foundation stone was moved in 1888, the printed material had all but disintegrated and was in the words of an observer “rendered almost to pulp”, but there was a “medal of white metal” which was not mentioned in earlier accounts.

It had the figure of justice on one face and on the other a crown and a scroll bearing the words ‘Maga Charta, Liberty, Unity, Justice” and an inscription in the rim ‘Manchester Political Union, established August 16th, 1838’ ‘Universal suffrage, vote by ballot, annual Parliaments’”. **

And that leads me to the destruction of the monument, which was undertaken on the pretext that it was unsafe, although one visitor to the site at the time was less convinced that this was so.

Peterloo, 1819

Nevertheless, the contractor employed to make good the burial ground which had become neglected, broke the monument up and sold the stone for £3, which was then sold on again to “a man at Irlam-o’-the Height” who subsequently could not be traced.

This act of vandalism was condemned at the time and within days of its destruction an appeal was launched to raise money for a new monument.

There was some disagreement about what form the new memorial should take, with some arguing that the old site was unsuitable give the high wall that surrounded the old burial ground and its position on Every Street, “it had long been practically inaccessible for Manchester people” and a better alternative might be “a small marble tablet near the scene of Peterloo”.***

The Round Chapel, 1959

Today, little is left of the burial ground which is now an open piece of land surrounded by social housing and new build, but the outline of chapel has been preserved.

It was demolished in 1986 and a few of the original grave stones have been preserved.

Alas Mr. Hunt’s memorial is lost forever, although not as I first thought because of a vengeful act of conspiracy on the part anti-democratic forces but out of wanton greed compounded by neglect on the part of the family of the late Rev. Scholefield who had died in 1855.

Still I do have the names of the five interred beside the monument and they may yet bring forth fresh insights into Peterloo and that monument, in the centenary year of that massacre in St Peter’s Fields.

Location; Manchester

Pictures; Henry Hunt, circa. 1810, watercolour, by Adam Buck, 1759–1833, Peterloo, 1819 by Richard Carlile, m01563, Peterloo, 1819, m07589, the Round Chapel, 1959, m6868 , Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, the Round Chapel and burial ground, 1844, from the OS map of Manchester and Salford, 1842-44, and the Every Street burial ground, showing Mr. Hunt’s memorial, 1851, from Adshead map of Manchester, 1851, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Monument to the late Henry Hunt, Manchester Guardian, March 27, 1842

**Henry Hunt’s Monument, Manchester Guardian October 6, 1888

***The Henry Hunt Memorial, The Manchester Guardian October 18, 1888

Henry Hunt ………. “and the Manchester Monument to Perpetuate His Memory”

I am back with Henry “Orator” Hunt who the Chartist newspaper described as the “one of the most bold, most strenuous , most disinterested and most able advocates of LABOUR’S CAUSE, that the cause ever had to boast of”.*

He was scheduled to speak at the “Manchester Reform Meeting” in St Peter’s Fields in the August of 1819, which was broken up by the authorities, with much loss of life, hundreds of casualties and which was for ever afterwards known as Peterloo.

What I hadn’t known was that years later a monument was erected in the grounds of Every Street Chapel in Ancoats.

It is a story  I have written about already, but until today had never come across an image of the actual monument which was demolished in 1888, and so I was more than pleased when Jon Silver, reproduced this one, which according to the Northern Star, “represents a monument, now in the course of erection Manchester, in the burial ground of the Chapel, belonging to the Rev. Mr. Schofield, in Every Street …..raised by means  of a subscription amongst the working people of England, to perpetuate the name and fame” of Mr. Henry Hunt.**

Jon found the image on another blog site, which referenced the Northern Star, and so as you do I went back to the collection of Northern Star editions, and came across the one for August 20th 1842, which not only carried the story of the monument but a detailed report on the events of Peterloo, including the names of the Manchester Yeomanry who brutally attacked the peaceful demonstrators.

Some of the Yeomanry, 1819

The list complements that of those who are recorded as casualties on the day long with those who were charged into the crowd.***

Most are from Manchester and Salford, with a few drawn from Stretford, Pendleton and Eccles with two are listed as “Foreigners”.

And while there are a smattering of the “gentry” and the professions, most were shop keepers, small businessmen and labourers, including Savage who is described as a quack doctor”.

All of which points to that simple truth that those who cut and sabered were little different in their class origins and occupations than the majority of the demonstrators who were their victim.

Now I am well aware that all the published names will have been trawled over by the eminent and the interested long before I got to see them, but that won’t stop me spending hours doing the same.

Leaving me just to highlight the link to online collection of the Northern Star, which makes fascinating reading.****

Such is research and the fun of history.

Location; Manchester, 1819, and 1842

Pictures; the engraving of the Henry Hunt memorial, the Yeomanry list and the front page of the Northern Star, from the edition of the Northern Star, August 20th, 1842

*Henry Hunt and the Manchester Monument to Perpetuate His Memory
Henry Hunt, The Northern Star, August 20th, 1842

**Henry Hunt, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/search?q=henry+Hunt


***What did you do at Peterloo? https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2019/08/what-did-you-do-at-peterloo.html

****The Northern Star, https://ncse.ac.uk/index.html

Exploring the butchers of Peterloo ………. The 101 men of the Manchester Yeomanry

The passage of 200 years has not dimmed the horror of the actions of the Manchester Yeomanry on that hot day in the August of 1819.

The Manchester Yeomanry at Peterloo, 1819

The order to charge the crowd, and the reported glee at the way members of the Yeomanry performed their task have quite rightly stood as an awful example of repression, sitting alongside Sharpeville, the Kent Massacre and Tiananmen Square.

And I suppose they are best summed up by the comment “often wrongly described as ‘soldiers’, by amateur historians. These were petty paramilitary thugs, recruited from the ranks of small business, ill disciplined and drunk, out to enforce the ‘will of their betters.’, against the crowds who they saw as scum. One could imagine parallels in today’s troubled times”.

"oh pray Sir, don't kill mammay" 1819

So armed with that observation which pretty much chimed in with my own thoughts, I went looking for the men who rode down the innocent in St Peter’s Fields.

Now I am well aware that academics and those interested in Peterloo will have quarried this topic already, but I haven’t, and having come across a list of the Manchester Yeomanry in the Chartist paper, the Northern Star for August 20th, 1842 I decided to look at these men more closely.

And here I have to offer up the caveat, that I am only using the newspaper’s list and in the course of the research discovered misspellings of names which might hint at bigger inaccuracies.
Still the list is a start.

It lists 101 men, who were drawn from a broad spectrum of backgrounds, 87 of whom have a stated occupation and 74 who we can place in the twin cities of Manchester and Salford or some of the surrounding townships.

There are gaps in the information and some of these have been supplemented by referring to the street directories for the 1820’s and maps which have filled out details of residency, and occupations.

Residency of the 74 of the Manchester Yeomanry, 1819

As you might expect the bulk of the men were from Manchester and Salford with a few more from Broughton, Eccles and Pendleton, and more from Stretford.

Their occupations, pretty much fit the received assumptions with over a third drawn from the “people of plenty”, another 29% who made their living as publicans and shopkeepers, which left the rest as a mix of skilled, and manual workers, with the odd surprises which include a “Professor of Dance” and a quack doctor.

Occupations of the 87 of the Manchester Yeomanry, 1819

In some ways for me, the real find is the names, and the detailed street locations, which offer up the prospect of more research using contemporary maps, and trawling the rate books for the period with a look at the census records for the mid-century which may yield more background.

And for those who like their history in a tangible form which can be visited, many of the Manchester and Salford street locations still exist, and in the of the Briton’s Protection is still standing and still offering up a pint.

"Cut them down" 1819

Other pubs like the Fox, the Hen and Chicken, Crown and Thistle and the Blue Cap in Salford may have gone but we know exactly where they stood.

So, there you have it…………. More to follow in time.

Location; Manchester & Salford

Picture; "Manchester Heroes", Peterloo, print from etching by unknown artist, published by S W Fores, 1819, m07587, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, and information drawn from the list of the Manchester Yeomanry published in the Northern Star, August 20th, 1819

Bringing to account William Benson, Richard Whitelaw and the other 99 of the Manchester Yeomanry on August 16th 1819

Now no matter how many horrific stories come out of Ukraine and other places, nothing still prepares you for the violence of Peterloo.

According to one source, a quarter of the known recorded causalities were women, even though they comprised just 12% of those present on the day. *

And when you delve deeper into each one, the horror is all the greater.

Margaret Downes was “dreadfully cut in the breast; secreted clandestinely and not heard of, believed dead”, Mary Hays, “knocked down, trampled by cavalry, foot stripped of flesh & nails, pregnant, died 17 December 1819”, Sarah Jones, “severely beaten on the head, and much bruised by constables’ truncheons, suspected dead”, and Martha Partington, “thrown into a cellar on Bridge Street and was killed, died 16 Aug 1819.”**

Added to these, there was William Fildes aged just two, who was the “child of Ann,and was  rode over by cavalry, died 16 August 1819, and is buried Swedenborgian Chapel, Salford”.

In the case of four of the five, we know where they lived, and while their houses will have vanished long ago, using maps and street directories it is possible to revisit both their homes and the surrounding area as it would have been in the early 19th century.

And those maps, directories along with other official records allow us to zoom in on those who perpetuated the crimes, most of which were at the hands of the Manchester Yeomanry, who we might think of as a volunteer military defence force, first raised during the early years of the wars with Revolutionary France, but were also used to quell civil unrest.

The Manchester Yeomanry was raised in 1817, in the aftermath of the March of the Blanketeers, when a group of mainly Lancashire weavers intended to march to London and present a petition over the dire state of the Lancashire textile industry and the recent suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act. ****

Following its suppression, the authorities set about establishing a local yeomanry, which was drawn not only from the “people of plenty” but also included, both skilled and unskilled workers and a range of shopkeepers, publicans and others.

Leaving aside the question of how some of the men could afford to provide a horse, they were indeed a cross section of the population, and we know the names of 101 of them who were at Peterloo, and despite my dislike for their actions I am curious about them.

At which point it would be easy to dismiss them all as bunch of “class traitors”, vicious thugs who participated with glee in the suppression of the “Manchester Meeting”, and while that might be accurate of some if not most of them, it doesn’t go deeper enough in offering up an explanation.

I doubt that there exists a detailed collection of the thoughts and sayings of the 101, but it is possible to track many of them, not only through their occupations but to where in the city they lived.

Moreover, their devotion to the social order can be tracked back across the late 18th century through a series of “loyalist” activities during the 1790s, including the Church and King movement, the attack on the home of the radical Thomas Walker in South Parade, and the burning of effigies of Thomas Pain, of which the one that occurred at the top of Deansgate in December 1792 was recorded in detail.

And similar loyalist activities happened during the Jacobite rising in 1745, and back into the 17th century.  Further evidence is there in the split over the abolition of the Slave Trade.

So while I take pride in reading that 10,000 Mancunians signed a petition to Parliament in 1788 calling for the abolition of the trade, there was a counter petition of 4,000, which must have been well organized.

And that same organization can be seen in the way that the spontaneous outbursts of loyalty were worked on, both in the opposition to granting greater freedom to non-Anglicans to hold official posts and the reaction to the French Revolution.

The impetus clearly comes from those in the establishment who felt they had most to lose, but according to an excellent short piece by Frank O’Gorman, “Members of the highest classes tended to fill ornamental roles, the practical functions of loyalism being the work of men from the middling orders”, who were “principally from the ranks of the trading, manufacturing and official elements, some of whom were from quite humble backgrounds”.*****

All of which might explain why amongst the ranks who charged into the crowd on St Peter’s Fields we can count, William Benson , the landlord of the Fox on Jackson’s Row, Mr. Richard Whitelaw, an Attorney, living on King Street, and Robert Thorpe, a surgeon living at 21 Oldham Street.

Along with Samuel Green who had a printing business on New Garrett, and a host of shop keepers, and skilled and non skilled workers, with just “two gentleman”, a Professor of Dance and even a quack doctor.

Nor were they drawn exclusively from Manchester, for the same pattern of occupations can be replicated by those from Salford, including Edward Hulme of the Blue Cap on Greengate, the tobacconist, James Hardman, the businessman, John Bowker and the “hackney writer”, James Hamnett.

And for those who want to stray into Stretford, the township offered up a collection of butchers, a saddler, that quack doctor and even a labourer.

None of which might help explain the glee at which the Yeomanry went about their task, but might just throw a bit of light on who they were, leaving a heap more research to be done and a lot more detailed investigation of those who pulled the loyalist strings.

Location; Manchester

Picture; "To Henry Hunt, Esqr. as chairman of the meeting assembled on St. Peter's Field, Manchester on the 16th. of August, 1819", Peterloo, Manchester, print published by Richard Carlile, m01563, and Manchester Heroes", Peterloo, print from etching by unknown artist, published by S W Fores, 1819, m07587
courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*Morgan, Alison, Starving mothers and murdered children in cultural representations of Peterloo, Return to Peterloo Manchester Regional History Review volume 23 2012

**Records of the Manchester Peterloo Witnesses and casualties, 1819, findmypast, www.findmypast.co.uk

***Sarah Jones, 96 Silk Street, off George Leigh Street, Mary Hayes, Rawlinson Buildings Oxford Road, Chorlton Row, Mary Partington, King Street Eccles, William Fildes, 23 Kennedy Street

****The march was violently broken up and its leaders imprisoned. Bamford, Samuel, Bamford’s Life of a Radical, Vol 2, 1905 page 32

*****O’Gorman, Frank, Manchester Loyalism in the 1770s, Return to Peterloo Manchester Regional History Review volume 23 2012

The grim side to some of our Manchester pubs

Now I am back with Peterloo and the dastardly actions of the Manchester Yeomanry who on August 16th, 1819, charged a peaceful crowd in St Peter’s Fields, leaving many dead and wounded.

The Manchester Yeomanry in action, 1819

And over the last few days I have been exploring* the background of the 101 men listed in the Northern Star as participating in the outrage.**

We can track the occupations of 87 of them, and they represent a cross section of the population, with over a third drawn from the “people of plenty”, another 29% who made their living as publicans and shopkeepers, which left the rest as a mix of skilled, and manual workers, with the odd surprises which include a “Professor of Dance” and a quack doctor.

But today I am interested in the nine publicans.  They were William Bowker of the King's Head at 4 Old Shambles, John Beeston who ran the Windsor Castle in Salford, and later took over the George at 47 Deansgate, and William Benson of the Fox at 1 Jackson’s Row.

The Briton's Protection, 2016 as seen in the book

To these three we can add Mr. Burgess of the Hen & Chicken on 163 Deansgate, Parker Horsefield of the Briton’s Protection on Waterloo Street by Great Bridgewater Street, Edward Hall of the Blue Cap at 80 Greengate, Jacob Chadderton who offered up beer and cheer at the Wool Pack in Pendleton, John Reid of the Globe, Gartside Street and Samuel Lees of the Crown and Thistle, 9 Half Street, Manchester.

Of these I am pretty sure that only one of the nine pubs still in business is the Briton’s Protection, but some will have lasted longer than others.

So, while the Blue Cap on Greengate had vanished by 1850, the Windsor Castle on New Windsor in Salford was still there thirty-one years after Peterloo.

The Windsor Castle Salford, 1850

Had I come across this bit of information back in 2016, it might well have been included in our book on city centre Manchester Pubs, that said as the book is only about ones you can visit today that would have limited the inclusion of the Manchester Yeomanry landlords to just the Briton’s Protection.

That said, I see no reason why I shouldn’t pursue the remaining eight, starting with the Fox on the corner of Deansgate and Jackson’s Row which was still selling happiness or sadness in 1844, but now sits under Onward Building.

So in the fullness of time we  shall see just what can be found out about the two Salford pubs and their landlords, followed up by the more  Manchester landlords and their pubs.

The Fox, Jacksons Row, 1844

Location; Manchester and Salford

Pictures; "Manchester Heroes", Peterloo, print from etching by unknown artist, published by S W Fores, 1819, m07587, courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass, New Windsor, Salter’s Street Directory, 1850,  The Fox Inn, Jackson’s Row, 1844, from the OS for Manchester & Salford, 1844, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/


*The Manchester Yeomanry, https://chorltonhistory.blogspot.com/2019/08/exploring-butchers-of-peterloo-101-men.html

**The Northern Star, Chartist newspaper, August 20th 1842

*** Manchester Pubs- The Stories Behind the Doors, Centre Centre along with  our two companion volumes,  Manchester Pubs- The Stories Behind the Doors, Chorlton-cum-Hardy, and  Manchester Pubs- The Stories Behind the Doors are available from www.pubbooks.co.uk and Chorlton Books

Peterloo ..... or the Blanketeers?

There is I think a danger about the present coverage of Peterloo, which is that it begins to overshadow some of the other significant events during the period following the end of the wars with Revolutionary and Napoleonic France.

The massacre in St Peter’s Field was awful but outside Manchester, it doesn’t always achieve the recognition it should as a moment when the Establishment ruthlessly challenged the legitimate call for reform.

And it is right that as we have now passed the 200th anniversary of that dreadful moment played out in front of perhaps 60,000 peaceful demonstrators, the murder of 16 people and the wounding of countless others should be highlighted.

So I am pleased at the launch of an interactive website which seeks to reconstruct the events of August 1819.

The web site features a 3D model showing how the day unfolded which will reach a new audience unfamiliar with what happened.

But the preoccupation with the day misses out that later in the evening at New Cross there was a further violent confrontation, and should always be seen against a determined policy of State repression, reflected in the Gag Acts, the arrest of suspected “agitators” and the use of paid informants.

Only two years earlier there had been the suppression of what became known as the March of the Blanketeers when after much discussion about the tactic of delivering a petition directly to the Crown.

It was a bold initiative and would lead to 5,000 leaving Manchester on March 10th 1817. Each marcher had a blanket or rolled overcoat on his back, to sleep under at night and to serve as a sign that the man was a textile worker, giving the march its eventual nickname. The plan was for the marchers to walk in separate groups of ten, to avoid any accusation of illegal mass assembly.

Samuel Bamford argued against the tactic pointing out in what would become prophetic, that
“the authorities of Manchester were not likely to permit their [the Blanketeers] leaving town in a body”**

And as it turned out, the magistrates read the Riot Act, the military broke up the demonstration, and 27 were arrested, with more violence meted out in Ancoats and Stockport.

Now while fewer were killed it was a significant event, but while there was some activity back in 2017, the March of the Blanketeers slid quickly back into history.

Does it matter that it has been eclipsed?  Yes I think it does.

Will the current coverage of Peterloo stand for all the other class acts of repression?

They may do, but we shouldn’t forget the Blanketeers.

In the meantime I shall read Samuel Bamford’s book.

Location; Manchester

Pictures; demonstations a century and a bit later, Liverpool, 1980, Birmingham, 1983, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*peterloo1819.co.uk

** Bamford, Samuel, Bamford’s Life of a Radical, Vol 2, 1905 page 32

Joseph Johnson, radical, farmer and almost a Didsbury Radical

The Peterloo Massacre still has the power to shock and ranks alongside the Sharpville Massacre in South Africa in 1960 and the Kent State killings in Ohio in 1970 as a moment when peaceful demonstrations were met with the full ferocity of State power.*

And it is of Peterloo I want to think about today and in particular the part played by Joseph Johnson, one time radical who lived in Northenden and whose political past gave rise to a potato being called the “radical.”

Now as many of you know I am searching for our radical past here in Chorlton, not out of a nostalgic wish make the place politically correct but because it seems to me that there would have been people here with views that ran directly opposite to those of the establishment and the wealthy.

There is evidence that there were people from both Stretford and Urmston present at Peterloo, and this shouldn’t surprise us either.  Both were places where there were significant numbers of weavers and these were a group who had become radicalised as their industry went into decline.  So according to one source 151 of those wounded at Peterloo were weavers, which represents 50% of all casualties whose occupations are known.**  And we had some weavers.

So it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that we made a contribution to that 80,000 strong crowd, but that is where at present we have to leave it, with just a maybe.

His home in 1905

That does still leave me with Joseph Johnson, who was on the platform in St Peter’s Field, during the Peterloo Massacre and was arrested for “assembling with unlawful banners at an unlawful meeting for the purpose of inciting discontent,”  found guilty, and on his release in 1821 settled in Northenden.

He was born in Manchester which some sources narrow down to Didsbury in 1791 and became a successful brush maker.

A strong supporter of universal suffrage and annual parliaments, Johnson joined the Manchester Hampden Club formed by John Knight. In 1818 Johnson helped John Knight, James Wroe and John Saxton to start the radical newspaper, the Manchester Observer. Within twelve months the Manchester Observer was selling 4,000 copies a week. Although it started as a local paper, by 1819 it was sold in most of the large towns and cities in Britain. Henry Hunt called the Manchester Observer "the only newspaper in England that I know, fairly and honestly devoted to such reform as would give the people their whole rights."

In March 1819 Joseph Johnson, John Knight and James Wroe formed the Patriotic Union Society. Johnson was appointed secretary of the organisation and Wroe became treasurer. The main objective of the Patriotic Union Society was to obtain parliamentary reform and during the summer of 1819 it was to hold a meeting here in Manchester at St Peter’s Field.  The rest as we know was a tragic outcome, and one which in its way was no less awful for Johnson.  For after being imprisoned his wife fell ill and died and he was refused permission to attend the funeral. ***

On his release he settled in
Northenden and we can track him in the village from 1841 through till his death in 1872.  During that time he gave his occupation variously as brush maker and later land proprietor and it will be as such that he planted potatoes which became known as “radicals” 

A fact that might have been lost to us had not another radical who described his visit to Chorlton in the June of 1847.  This was Alexander Somerville who having crossed over the Mersey recorded that

‘My companion said-“It was in this way; it was a sort of potato introduced here by Mr Johnson of Northern; and as he was a radical, they called the ‘tatoes radicals too.  Don’t you remember the song that used to be sung?  ‘God Bless Hunt and Johnson, and all who take their part;’ that was the Mr. Johnson, now of Northern, a very good gentleman he is who brought this very good kind of potato here which they call radical.”’

Which should really be the end of the story but I shall close with his will.  On his death he left £2000 and was described as “gentleman.”  I wonder if he would have approved of the description.

Pictures: Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council Peterloo, 1819, m77801, Ravenswood home of Joseph Johnson, 1905, m36100, Veterans of Peterloo 1884, m07594

*On an August day in 1819, anything between 60,000 and 80,000 men, women and children had assembled in St Peter’s Field to listen to the case for reforming the representation of Parliament.  Just before 2 in the afternoon a unit of Cavalry charged into the crowd with their sabres.  The deaths resulting from that charge have never been exactly established but sources claimed between 11 and 15 people were killed and up to 700 injured.  At Sharpeville in March 1960, after a day of demonstrations, the South African police opened fire on the demonstrators, killing 69 people. At Kent State University in Ohio, four students were shot and nine wounded by the National Guard during a peaceful protest at US involvement in the Vietnam War.

**Bush, Michael, The Casualties of Peterloo, 2005

*** http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/PRjohnson.htm

What did you do at Peterloo?

Now anyone who is interested in the events of Peterloo, and can track their family back to Greater Manchester in the early 19th century will have wondered if one of their’s was at Peterloo.

Remembering Peterloo, 2019

The names of many of those who were have long been in the public records, trawled over by historians, students and the curious.

But now findmypast has made it easier, by an online database, which allows you to glance down the 1,180 people contained in a list of witnesses and casualties.

“Each record includes a transcript of the vital information about the individual and their involvement at Peterloo. The amount of information you can find can vary, but most transcripts will include, a name, gender, an occupation, residency, which can include a street address, and whether they were wounded or died”.*

I remain hopeful that amongst the thousands who congregated in St Peters Fields, I will come across one from Chorlton-cum-Hardy, and I have come, close, with one from Fallowfield, another from Withington, and four from Stretford, all of whom appear on the list.

Sadly the database has not provided me with such a name.  But I know that a Mary War of Fallowfield was there and needed “White dress used for bandages…….. [and] Suffered psychologically and was committed to an asylum” and that William Batson/Bateson from Rusholme was wounded, sustaining bruising of the chest from “the pressure of the crowd”.

While from Stretford there was Parker Risinghill who was a butcher, and George Derbyshire who was a shop keeper.

Remembering ......... 2019

Most intriguing was Robert Feilden/Fielden, from Withington, an individual who I suspect most of us will have less time for, given that he was one of the magistrates, and lived in Withington Lodge.

For me the real attraction of the lists are that they hold out the potential for further research, with the possibility that many can be tracked through directories, census returns and other records.

I know for instance that Mary Pritchard who was “beaten by constables, when escaping from the hustings” was a member of the Manchester Female Reform Society and lived at 3 Comet Street, Beswick Square, and that Edward Lancaster who received a  “sabre cut on the back of his head, had his throat trodden on by a horse, had to be carried insensible to the Infirmary”, lived at 9 Potter’s Building, on Oxford Road.

Each will have a story, and in the absence of a Chorlton name I shall cast my net wide, beginning with  Mary Ashcroft who lived at 10 Griffith’s Court off Chapel Street in Salford.

Location; Manchester 1819





Pictures; remembering Peterloo, Manchester, August 16th, 2019, from the collection of David Harrop

*Manchester, Peterloo Witnesses And Casualties, 1819, findmypast

The Peterloo death which links Manchester to Salford and Prestwich ......... and brings young William Fildes out of the shadows

William Fildes deserves more than history has so far allotted him. *

Labour Party demonstration for Jobs, Birmingham, 1983

He was born in 1817 and died just two years later from injuries he sustained at Peterloo, when he was caught in the cavalry charge of the Manchester Yeomanry.

According to the witness account of his mother, Mrs. Ann Fildes, he fell from her arms when she was knocked down accidently by a sergeant-major, who was following the main body of horseman.

He died at ten that evening and was buried three days later in the New Jerusalem Temple on Bolton Street in Salford, in the shadow of Salford Railway Station, just beyond the New Bailey Prison.

New Jerusalem Temple, Salford, 1844

The church opened in 1813 and was part of the “New Church Movement” deriving its teachings from the writings of the Swedish theologian Emanuel Swedenborg. Along with the Salford church there were also churches and schools on Peter Street, in Manchester and at the Round House, on Every Street, in Ancoats. **

The New Jerusalem Temple, closed in 1890s, and after a succession of industrial uses was demolished in the 1990s, and is now a cap park.  “The initial removal of human remains from the surrounding graveyard in 1988 was followed by further excavations and re-burials at Agecroft between 2003 and 2007. Archaeologists estimate that there could be a further 6,000 burials remaining on the Bolton Street site”. **

So far, I have come across only one other reference to young William, and this comes from his baptismal record, dated September 23rd, 1817 just thirteen days after his birth.  The service was conducted at the Cross-Street Chapel and the document offers up the names of his parents, and the occupation of his father.  Charles Fildes and Ann Fray were married in St Mary in Prestwich, on December 5th, 1816, and both came from Whitefield.

Kennedy Street, 1844

And by 1819 they were in Manchester living at no. 23 Kennedy Street, which, then as now is a narrow street, which in the early 19th century consisting of rows of back to back houses, and closed courts.

We know that the family were still there in 1820, when Mr. Fildes is recorded as a waiter, but three years later he is the landlord of Haunch of Venison at 51 Dale Street.

But after that they are lost to us, although the 1841 census does turn up an Ann Fildes living in a closed court close to Redbank, with five children, the eldest of whom is 13 and the youngest five.  It is a remote possibility given that she was 50, her youngest just 5 and that she would have had to be 16 when she married.

All of which leads to that obvious observation that tracking the families of those who were at Peterloo can be difficult, and some will question the validity of doing it in the first place.

But I disagree.  For those that want, they can visit Kennedy Street, and the site of the New Jerusalem Temple, and with just a bit of imagination and empathy place themselves back beside the Filde family.

Kennedy Street, 2017,    but the opposite side and end to where the Filde's lived

Added to which we can put Charles and Ann amongst those who stood to one side of the Church of England, first at the Cross Street Chapel, and later the New Jerusalem Temple, which in turn might suggest their politics.

And as you do, while following their trail I came across another Filde family, who were radical enough to have named one of their children, James Washington, another Henry Hunt, and yet another Thomas Paine.

Location; Manchester 1819

Pictures; Birmingham, 1983, from the collection of Andrew Simpson, Kennedy Street, and Bolton Street, Salford, 1844, from the OS of Manchester & Salford, 1844, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Bush, Michael, The Casualties of Peterloo, 2005, page 94, Marlow, Joyce The Peterloo Massacre, 1969, page 150-1, Casualty and Witness Records, findmypast, www.findmypast.co.uk

** New Jerusalem Temple Burials at Agecroft, Agecroft Chapel Restoration Group, https://agecroftchapel.org/swedenborg-church-memorial/

Just how do you discover the life of Sarah Judge ………………. killed at Peteroo?

The simple answer is that it is not easy, for Sarah like so many of the casualties at Peterloo, was never likely to fall into official documents.

Remembering Sarah and the others, August 2019

She was born and died before the State made it compulsory to register births, deaths, and marriages, and it would be another twenty-two years before census returns included names, occupations and places of both of those living in a property.

But she is important, because along with thousands of others she was in St Peter’s Field’s on August 16th, 1819, when the Manchester Yeomanry charged the assembled masses.

And she died from wounds sustained not from a saber but a police truncheon.  This we know because she appears in the lists of casualties which records, she was “severely beaten on the head, and much bruised by constables' truncheons. SUSPECTED DEAD”.*

Now a search of the records so far shows no reference to a burial for Sarah, but I think we can be pretty sure she died of those injurious.

But we know where she lived, which was 96 Silk Street, which was off Cornwall Street in a complex of streets bordered by Great Ancoats Street to the east, George Leigh Street to the south, Oldham Road to the north and an arm of the Rochdale Canal to the west.

Silk Street, with Sarah's possible home marked in red, 1851

It is still there today, although Cromwell Street is now Bengal Street and it has lost most of its buildings and looks pretty ripe for development, with two car parks, some open land and a couple of industrial buildings, all of which  may follow the properties at the western end which are now city apartments.

But if you are curious and go looking for it, you will find a narrow street which in the 19th century consisted of back to back properties, with more than a few closed courts which were accessed by tiny alleys off Silk Street.

Sarah’s house was at the western end just a few doors from the corner of Poland Street and today is a car park.

Silk Street was developed very quickly, so while in 1793 there appears few buildings along it stretch, by 1819, it was fully built up, and by 1850 there a was mill close side.

Sadly, I can find no reference to Sarah in the Rate Books for Silk Street, and as yet all the official records are blank.

All of which is to be expected.

Location; Manchester

Picture; Remembering Peterllo, 2019, from the collection of David Harrop, and Silk Street, in 1851 from Adshead’s map of Manchester, 1851, of Digital Archives Association, http://www.digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Records of the Manchester Peterloo Witnesses and casualties, 1819, findmypast, www.findmypast.co.uk

I wonder what Henry Orator Hunt did wrong? …… puzzled of Peterloo

Now it has taken me a while to get around to watching Mike Leigh’s film on Peterloo and I am a tad puzzled.

Henry Hunt circa 1820

The film I enjoyed, if you can enjoy watching innocent people cut down by a group of men on horses armed with sabres against a backdrop of poverty and unemployment.

The story of Peterloo is one I grew up with, having got the “O” level version from history text books, listened to the songs which praised Henry Hunt, and spent my share of time reading accounts of the massacre.

All of which I thought meant I could pass muster with most people when it came to the story and the results of that day in St Peter’s Fields.

But not so, because I seem to have got Henry Hunt very wrong.

For those who don’t know he was the main speaker on that August day, and understandably so given that he had a record of campaigning for the reform of Parliament, universal suffrage, and an end to child labour, and was imprisoned for two years for being at Peterloo.

He had earned the nickname Orator for his powerful speeches advancing the cause of reform and continued to do so until his death in 1835.

So, I am puzzled that in the film, he is portrayed as overbearing, single minded and more than a bit dismissive of Samuel Bamford, Joseph Johnson and the other Manchester Radicals, who were also at Peterloo and were arrested and imprisoned after the event.

Scenes from Peteroo, 1819

I wondered if it was because he was a wealthy farmer which marked him out as very different from the working-class people who are at the core of the film, or that he opposed those who advocated carrying weapons to the demonstration.

Or that in conversations he had with other radicals, he was insistent that the focus should be primarily on the issue of Parliamentary reform, and nothing else.

Today there might be those who have no time for him because he was wealthy, while others, knowing the violence which was unleashed at the meeting condemn the way he seems to have surrendered the means by which there could have been a fight back.

I suppose I will have to go back to basics, read his autobiography, and his speeches, along with what he did after Peterloo, which included standing successfully for election to Parliament in 1830 as the radical candidate for Preston, which was one of the few towns in England that had given the vote to all males who paid taxes.

Peterloo, 1819

During the course of which he had addressed not only Parliamentary reform but the need for a ten hour day and an end to child labour, commenting that "I have personally visited the factories, and witnessed the sufferings of the overworked children. but, my friends, you never heard of this. 

No, no, my speeches on the subject were all suppressed by the press."

After his victory, he and an estimated crowd of 16,000 people, marched to Manchester and held a meeting at the site of the Peterloo Massacre.

While in Parliament he opposed the 1832 Reform Act as it did not grant the vote to working class males. Instead he proposed what he called the Preston-type of universal suffrage, "a franchise which excluded all paupers and criminals but otherwise recognized the principle of an equality of political rights that all who paid taxes should have the vote." *

All of which makes me even more puzzled at just how he came across in the film.

Location; Manchester& Preston

Pictures; Henry Hunt,  (c. 1810), watercolour, by Adam Buck, 1759–1833, Peterloo, 1819 by Richard Carlile, m01563, Peterloo, 1819, m07589, and Veterans of Peterloo from a photograph taken in 1884, m07594, Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass

*At which point I have admit the last bit was a straight crib from that excellent site called Spartacus Educational, ........ sometimes you just have to be lazy. Henry Hunt, Spartacus Educational, https://spartacus-educational.com/PRhunt.htm

The Second Peterloo .............. in New Cross on the evening of August 16 1819

The events on the evening of August 16 at New Cross doesn’t even merit a footnote in books on Peterloo.

A comment on the events of Peterloo, 1819

Of course compared with what happened earlier in the day at St Peter’s Field, the deaths of William Bradshaw and Joshua Whitworth who were shot by the military at New Cross are small beer.

The big picture which became known as Peterloo was an awful event.

It had all begun on an August day in 1819 when anything between 50,000 and 80,000 men, women and children had assembled in St Peter’s Field to listen to the case for reforming the representation of Parliament.

Just before 2 in the afternoon a unit of Cavalry charged into the crowd with their sabres.  The deaths resulting from that charge have never been exactly established but sources claimed between 11 and 15 people were killed and up to 700 injured.

Now New Cross is on the other side of town at the junction of Great Ancoats Street and Oldham Street which seems an odd spot for the incident.

But not so. To the east and south of New Cross there was a densely packed warren of small streets which were home to textile workers and those on the margins of subsistence.

The spot was known for food riots like the one that broke out in April 1812 in Oldham Road, when a food cart carrying food for sale at the markets in Shudehill was stopped and its load carried off.  Nearby shops were also attacked and looted.  The mob was eventually dispersed by soldiers but only as far as Middleton.

New Cross, 1794

There they met with an assembly of handloom weavers, miners and out of work factory operatives gathered to protest against the introduction of power loom machinery at Barton and Sons weaving mill.

The mob which had grown to 2000, was dispersed by “ a party of soldiers , horse and foot, from Manchester arriving, pursued those misguided people, some of whom made a feeble stand; but here again death was the consequence, five of them being shot and many severely wounded.”  

Revolution it was thought was in the air, and the Government responded with the Gag Acts, the suspension of Habeas Corpus   and the rounding up and imprisonment of political suspects.  Here in Manchester radicals were arrested and some like John Night were thrown into the New Bailey prison before being sent on to London, others like William Ogden were just “roughed up”.

And in the run up to Peterloo and in the days afterwards the area was seething with opposition to the authorities all of which are well documented in The Casualties of Peterloo which offers up some fascinating leads into the story of the area.*

In time I am minded to follow up those leads and delve deeper into the area which was the home of my old friend Richard Buxton** and accounted for 80 casualties from Peterloo.  It may even be possible to uncover something of the story of William Bradshaw and Joshua Whitworth.

Pictures; Peterloo, 1819, m77801,courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council, http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and New Cross 1794 from Green’s map of Manchester, courtesy of Digital Archives Association, http://digitalarchives.co.uk/

*Bush, Michael, The Casualties of Peterloo, 2005

**Richard Buxton, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Richard%20Buxton

With Henry Hunt we’ll go, We’ll raise the cap of liberty, In spite of Nadin Joe*

Manchester, 1819

It is time for another two pictures from the collection of Manchester’s history of protest.

I tried resisting using an image of Peterloo but it remains an important event in the history of the city and one that I have written about before.

So I shall confine myself to the picture and move on to a more peaceful demonstration which wound its way through the city streets passing close to St Peter’s Field in November 2011 and represented one of the biggest protests in Manchester since the the Coalition Government was formed.

* Henry Hunt, a popular song from the period of Peterloo.  Henry Orator Hunt was a radical who argued for annual parliaments and universal suffrage,

He had been invited to speak at the rally in St Peter’s Field in the August of 1819 and was arrested and convicted for his part in the demonstration.

Manchester 2011

Joseph Nadin deputy-constable of Manchester 1801-1821.  “He was a renowned thief-catcher with the reputation of turning every offence into a felony.  The significance of this peculiar twist is that a successful felonious charge was rewarded with a fee of 40 shillings” Hewitt Eric J.,A History of Policing in Manchester, 1979

This  reputation  led the radical Samuel Bamford to observe of Nadin that “he had the homely tact to take care of his own interests.  

He housed a good harvest whilst his sun was up and retired to spend his evening in ease and plenty on a farm of his own within the borders of Cheshire.” Bamford Samuel Passages in the Life of a Radical, 1840-42, also quoted by Eric Hewit

Nadin was also no friend of popular protest and radical politics and during the period that Habeus Corpus was suspended was zealous in his arrest and imprisonment without trial of radicals, and those suspected of being radicals.

Pictures; Peterloo, 1819, m07589, Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives, Manchester City Council http://images.manchester.gov.uk/index.php?session=pass and 2011 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

The new book on Peterloo ...... published today

Now, you can never have enough books on Peterloo, which brings me to the new one written by Graham Phythian, called simply Peterloo and published today.

According to the History Press who have published the book "a peaceful demonstration of some 60,000 workers and reformers was brutally dispersed by sabre-wielding cavalry, resulting in at least fifteen dead and over six hundred injured. 

Within days the slaughter was named ‘Peter-loo’, as an ironic reference to the battleground of Waterloo. 

Now the subject of a major film, this highly detailed yet readable narrative, based almost entirely on eyewitness reports and contemporary documents, brings the events of that terrible day vividly to life. 

In a world in which the legitimacy of facts is in constant jeopardy from media and authoritarian bias, the lessons to be learned from the bloodshed and the tyrannical aftermath are as pertinent today as they were two hundred years ago".

So there you have it, Peterloo by Graham Phythian, price £16.99

Peterloo by Graham Phythian, price £16.99ISBN: 9780750967495
Published: August 1st, 2018