RADICAL REFORMERS - Part A; How significant was extra-parliamentary protest 1790-1819?

Question 1

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

Context: When was the Society for Constitutional Info formed? Who formed it?

Answer 1

Created in 1780 by Major John Cartwright

This body promoted social and political reform.

Consisted primarily of MC industrialists who wanted to discuss political affairs without partaking in radical activity.

Question 2

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

Context: When did the SCI cease to exist? Why?

Answer 2

It ceased to exist in 1795 because members were joining other, more radical organisations from 1783 onwards.

Question 3

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

When was the LCS founded? Who formed it?

Answer 3

1792

By Thomas Hardy

Question 4

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

What were the twin causes?

Answer 4

Was significantly influenced by the SCI and so advocated for the same twin pillars:

Universal suffrage

Annual parliaments

Question 5

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

How did the LCS promote political education?

Answer 5

1792 Pamphlet titled ‘Address of the LCS to the other Societies of Great Britain’ in which they explained how their methods would be peaceful because they intended to petition Parliament.

Question 6

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

What was membership like?

Answer 6

Never limited to a particular class

‘our membership be unlimited’

They charged low fees

Question 7

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

Why was Pitt nervous about the LCS?

Answer 7

Because he believed it had the potential to become a military body - it was still legal, bc govt spies confirmed it operated within the law.

Question 8

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

What are loyalist societies? Give an example of a Loyalist society.

Answer 8

These were societies established, countering the radicals, claiming that the radicals were disloyal to the king.

1792 - est. of the Association for Preserving Liberty and Property against Republicans and Levellers.

Dominated by the MC

Govt welcomed the loyalists - they used the press to promote patriotism

Question 9

LONDON CORRESPONDING SOCIETY 1792-93

By the 1790s, what conspiracy theory grew?

Answer 9

Landed classes, influenced by Burke, and the growth of radicalism, encouraged a theory that a conspiracy was being organised to create social and political revolution.

Question 10

SPA FIELDS 1816

Context: What was Lord Liverpool’s govt like in 1815?

Answer 10

Lord Liverpool’s govt was facing numerous challenges to its authority.

Radical groups were struggling to remain united on their aims - support was growing for the moderate reforming programme of MC leaders

Question 11

SPA FIELDS 1816

Context: Who is Thomas Spence?

Answer 11

He was a self-taught radical who called for abolition of the monarchy and aristocracy, and for universal suffrage of both men and women - he favoured active revolution such as the French Revolution.

He died in 1814 but his following was significant.

His followers founded the Spencer Philanthropist Society in 1815 and they contributed to Spa Fields in 1816.

Question 12

SPA FIELDS 1816

How many people gathered in Spa Fields, London, Nov 1816?

Answer 12

10,000 people were there

They wanted to hear Henry Hunt speak - he was invited to address the meeting.

Question 13

SPA FIELDS 1816

What was the result of the meeting?

Answer 13

Hunt was asked to present a petition to the Prince Regent, urging him to reform Parliament.

Hunt unintentionally came close to suggesting use of physical force if the petitioner’s demands were not met.

Prince Regent did not receive Hunt.

Question 14

SPA FIELDS 1816

When was the second meeting called?

Answer 14

December

Question 15

SPA FIELDS 1816

Describe the events that happened in the second meeting?

Answer 15

Hunt was riled up by Spenceans who were stirring up the crowd and urged him to take a direct course of action.

Some left the meeting and looted a gunsmith, trying to sieze the Tower of London and Royal Exchange - if it weren’t for the constables dispersing rioters and arresting ring leaders, this would have been increasingly dangerous.

Question 16

SPA FIELDS 1816

Consequences of the second meeting?

Answer 16

Ringleaders trial of 1817 where the role of govt agent provocateurs was outlines.

They infiltrated radical groups in order to persuade their members to break the law.

There was significant disunity between those who supported peaceful protest and those who tended towards violence.

Question 17

SPA FIELDS 1816

What RR newspaper condemned the violence?

Answer 17

Leeds Mercury was a RR newspaper - but it condemned Spa Fields, stating that ‘a reform obtained by the intimidation or physical force would differ in nothing but in name from a Revolution, and would probably lead to the horrors of a civil war to the establishment of a military despotism’

Question 18

PENTRIDGE 1817

Context: What did Liverpool’s govt create which would help them penetrate violent activity and planning?

Answer 18

Committee of Secrecy which operated a network of spies who gathered info about the whereabouts of outbreaks of violent activity

Question 19

PENTRIDGE 1817

Describe the events of 1817

Answer 19

Revolutionary activists held meetings in Pentridge discussing plans for insurrection

Oliver joined in May 1817 and told them radicals in London were preparing a similar insurrection

Leader of radicals in Pentridge, Jeremiah Brandreth led 300 men towards Nottingham in the hopes of seizing the city.

Rebels intercepted by a regiment of soldiers before they could flea

Question 20

PENTRIDGE 1817

Who is Oliver?

Answer 20

Agent provocateur who was being paid by the Home Sec to spy and lead on radicals into committing treasonous activities.

Leeds Mercury published an investigation exposing Oliver’s role in the rising.

Question 21

PENTRIDGE 1817

Consequences of Pentridge Uprising

Answer 21

14 men were transported

Brandreth was hanged and beheaded in public.

Question 22

BLANKETEER MARCH 1817

How did this exemplify WC radical activity in Manchester?

Answer 22

Manchester and its surrounding mill towns provided huge ground for WC radicalism to flourish.

Why? Tradition of trade unionism in the area, large textile mills employing hundreds of W.C people establishing a WC identity.

This was a badly organised attempt of textile workers publicising their grievances.

Question 23

BLANKETEER MARCH 1817

Why it sucked

Answer 23

Insufficient - local yeomanry arrested many of the marchers within six miles of Manchester and dispersed most of the rest.

Yeomanry = young volunteers recruited from the ranks of the MC who were unsympathetic to the radical cause.

Question 24

PETERLOO 1819

Describe the events

Answer 24

Manchester meeting in 1819 was organised by radicals who invited Henry Hunt to address the gathering.

This was held in Saint Peter’s Fields.

It attracted 80,000 men, women, and children - it was the largest crowd gathered in England.

Groups carried banners calling for universal suffrage and annual parliaments.

Magistrates were watching from a nearby house and issued a warrant for his arrest and ordered the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry to ride through the crowd.

Men + horses panicked because of the density of the crowd and they began hacking the crowd with sabres

Question 25

PETERLOO 1819

Consequences

Answer 25

11 died

500+ were injured

Question 26

PETERLOO 1819

Why is Peterloo called Peterloo?

Answer 26

This was done because of the Manchester Observer - the same men who fought alongside each other in Waterloo were now fighting each other:

One of the men on horseback yelled ‘this is your Peterloo’ to the protestors.

Question 27

PETERLOO 1819

What does Historian Gash believe?

Answer 27

He believes this was hardly a massacre and that it was uncharacteristic.