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John Francis Bray

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

M. F. Jolliffe
M. F. Jolliffe*
Affiliation:
University College of North Wales
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Extract

Until 1916, though much had been written about Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy), nothing was known of the life of its author John Francis Bray, except that he was a journeyman printer in Leeds. In December of that year John Edwards published in the Socialist Review the results of research that he had made into Bray's career based on letters discovered in Leeds which had been written to Bray by his brothers. With these, he described Bray's life up to 1850 and discoveries of other letters by Alfred Mattison of Leeds brought the story up to 1854 which is the last date mentioned by Max Beer in his article on Bray in the Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review for Social History , Volume 4 , January 1939 , pp. 1 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1938

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References

page note 1) See for example Foxwell's, H. S. Introduction to Menger, A., The Right to the whole production of labour(1899); Marx, K., Misére de la Philosophic (1847); Lowenthal, E., The Ricardian Socialists (1911); Quack, H. P. G., De Socialisten: Personen en Stelsels, (1899–1901); Bray, J. F. (1903). Note also Hearnshaw, F. J. C., Survey of Socialism, (1928), in which the author, despite the article in the Socialist Review, declares that nothing is known of Bray's career except that he was a compositor at Leeds.Google Scholar

page 2 note 1) See Leeds Times of 12 19th, 1835, 01 9th, 23rd, 30th and 03 13th, 1836. These letters were traced by Mr. Mattison.Google Scholar

page 2 note 2) See Leeds Times, 09 2nd, 1837.Google Scholar

page 2 note 3) See Leeds Times, 09 23rd, 11 11th, 18th, 25th and 12 2nd, 1837.Google Scholar

page 3 note 1) See Labour's Wrongs and Labour's Remedy by Bray, J. F., Page 214. (London School of Economics Reprints of Scarce Tracts in Economic and Political Science, No. 6. 1931). All references in this article to Labour's Wrongs are made to this edition.Google Scholar

page 3 note 2) See Marx, K., Poverty of Philosophy, page 60. (English Edition 1939). Marx declares that he found in Bray the “key to the past, present and future works in M. Proudhon.”Google Scholar

page 3 note 3) See Ricardo, D., Principles of Political Economy and Taxation, 1891 (edited by Gonner, E. C. K.) page 72.Google Scholar

page 3 note 4) Ibid, page 76.

page 3 note 5) Ibid, page 273. (Ricardo quoting from Say).

page 4 note 1) See Ricardo, D.. Principles of Political Economy and Taxation, 1891 (edited by Gonner, E. C. K.) page 263.Google Scholar

page 4 note 2) Ibid, page 344.

page 4 note 3) Ibid, page 260. I have given full details of quotations because Dr Lowenthal in her study of The Ricardian Socialists minimises the influence of Ricardo on Bray. See Chapter V and VI of that work.

page 4 note 4) Bray, C.f. J. F.. Die Leiden der Arbeiterklasse und ihr Heilmittel. Eingeleitet und iibersetzt von M. Beer. 1920.Google Scholar

page 4 note 5) Edwards', C.f. J. article on Bray in the Socialist Review, 12 1916.Google Scholar

page 5 note 1) i.e. England.

page 9 note 1) See Leeds Times, 02 23rd, 1839. Reviews that were favourable include the Sheffield Iris, 12 24th, 1839, the Yorkshireman, 02 2nd, 1839, the Chartist, 05 18th, 1839, the New Moral World, 04 27th, 1839, the Northern Star, 09 7th, 1839, Cleave's Gazette, 05 2nd, 1840, the People's Journal, August, 1846 and even the Spectator 03 16th, 1839 paid tribute to it.Google Scholar

page 9 note 2) In 1841 Bray had evidently contemplated a visit to France because in a letter of that year, Charles replying to a letter sent by John in February, said that he too would like to visit France but considered it “a dangerous place for young people to reside in, from the low state of the morals of the people and the dissipation that attaches to the French capital in particular.”

page 10 note 1) Some of the manuscripts found in the trunk were written on farm order sheets.

page 10 note 2) Miss Inglis has traced Bray's letters in the following papers:–The Detroit Socialist, the Detroit Labor Review, Detroit Labor Leaf, (later Advance and Labor Leaf), the Word, the Working Man's advocate, John Swinton's Paper, The Weekly Worker, Paterson Labor Standard, Canadian Labor Reformer, National Labor Tribune, The Carpenter, The Trades, The Irish World, The Hartford Examiner. For all extracts from American Labour papers which appear at the end of this article, I am indebted to her researches.

page 15 note 1) I hope to publish shortly a Collected Works Edition of John F. Bray which will include a biographical preface, A Voyage from Utopia, The Coming Age pamphlets, American Destiny, God and Man a Unity and Bray's autobiography.

page 23 note 1) Pyne was editor of The Examiner.

page 33 note 1) Bray ought to have written “sixty-four years since.”