^{page 51 note 1} Only a fragment exists of the first edition of the Northern Star, in the Place Newspaper Collection, Set 56 (1836 – 06 1838), f. 155Google Scholar, British Museum. Of the first seven editions only Nos 3 and 5, 12 2 and 16, 1837Google Scholar, have been located, in the files of the Public Record Office, HO 73/52.

^{page 51 note 2} Schoyen, A. R., The Chartist Challenge (London, 1958), p. 34Google Scholar, comments: “In its columns […] isolated incidents gained an added significance as part of a larger whole, and working-class Radicals scattered about the country could see themselves for the first time as part of a great movement of men with like ideas.”

^{page 51 note 3} See Jephson, H., The Platform, Its Rise and Progress (London, 1892), II, pp. 603–04Google Scholar, for a discussion of the relationship of the platform to the press.

^{page 52 note 1} For instance, see Cleave's, Weekly Police Gazette, 12 26, 1835, p. 3Google Scholar; Weekly True Sun, 01 3, 1836, p. 982.Google Scholar From his earliest days on the Irish platform, O'Connor saw the importance of the presence of the press. Daunt, William J. O'Neill, Eighty-Five Years of Irish History, 1800–1885 (London, 1886), I, pp. 232, 236–37.Google Scholar

^{page 52 note 2} Bronterre's National Reformer, 01 28, 1837, p. 29.Google Scholar Feargus recalled in 1841: “In 1837, I visited Yorkshire and the North again; but the first blush of curiosity having faded, I found that the press was entirely mute, while I was working myself to death, and that a meeting in one town did nothing for another.” Northern Star, 01 16, 1841, p. 7.Google Scholar

^{page 52 note 3} Northern Star, 07 21, 1838, p. 3.Google Scholar

^{page 52 note 4} Adams, W. E., Memoirs of a Social Atom (London, 1903), I, p. 204Google Scholar, noted: “The ascendency of Feargus O'Connor would have been unaccountable but for the fact that he owned the Northern Star. […] It was almost the only paper that the Chartists read”.

^{page 52 note 5} For the unstamped press, see Collet, C. D., History of the Taxes on Knowledge (2 vols; London, 1899)Google Scholar; Wickwar, W. H., The Struggle for the Freedom of the Press (London, 1928)Google Scholar; Hollis, P., The Pauper Press (Oxford, 1970)Google Scholar; Wiener, J. H., The War of the Unstamped (Ithaca, N.Y., 1969).Google Scholar

^{page 53 note 1} True Sun, 04 22, 1836, p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 53 note 2} For O'Connor's defence of the True Sun, see Parliamentary Debates, Third Series, XXV (1834), cc. 400–03Google Scholar; Weekly True Sun, 06 22, 1834, pp. 338, 341–43Google Scholar; July 6, pp. 354, 356; July 27, pp. 377–78. For O'Connor and the unstamped in general, see True Sun; Weekly True Sun; Cleave's Weekly Police Gazette, 1835–36; Poor Man's Guardian, late 1835; Radical, 1836; Twopenny Dispatch, 1836; Wiener, op. cit., pp. 254–57.

^{page 53 note 3} London Dispatch, 09 17, 1836, p. 1.Google Scholar

^{page 53 note 4} Speaking in favour of total repeal in 1836, O'Connor had claimed “that the great object of the Whigs had been to separate the middle and working classes; and that a penny stamp would go to secure this object. The middle classes would have cheaper newspapers than they hitherto had, but the working classes would have no papers at all.” Cleave's Weekly Police Gazette, 04 23, 1836, p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 53 note 5} Northern Star, 06 2, 1838, p. 1.Google Scholar

^{page 54 note 1} Ibid., November 18, 1837, p. 1.

^{page 54 note 2} Hovell, M., The Chartist Movement, ed. and completed by Tout, T. F., 2nd ed. (Manchester, 1925), p. 96Google Scholar; Place in British Museum, Add. Mss 27820, f. 154. Hovell's view of the question of the Star's establishment and financing was taken from Lovett, W., Life and Struggles of William Lovett (London, 1967 ed., p. 143, note)Google Scholar, which in turn was based on Robert Lowery's autobiography, published in The Weekly Record of the Temperance Movement, 10 11, 1856, p. 235.Google Scholar

^{page 54 note 3} Glasgow, E., “The Establishment of the Northern Star Newspaper”, in: History, XXXIX (1954), pp. 54–67.Google Scholar This view is incorporated in Read, D. and Glasgow, E., Feargus O'Connor: Irishman and Chartist (London, 1961), pp. 56–65.Google Scholar

^{page 54 note 4} On the question of the need for a serious re-evaluation of O'Connor's leadership, see Professor J. Saville's introduction to Gammage, R. G., History of the Chartist Movement, reprint of 2nd ed. (London, 1969)Google Scholar; also my review of Ward, J. T., Chartism (London, 1973)Google Scholar, in Bulletin of the Society for the Study of Labour History, No 28 (1974), pp. 70–71.Google Scholar

^{page 55 note 1} The following account is based largely on the letters which Joshua Hobson wrote to the Manchester Examiner, November-December 1847, and primarily on the letter of November 6. This also formed the basis for the account given by E. Glasgow in his article, loc. cit.

^{page 55 note 2} Northern Star, 03 10, 1838, p. 8Google Scholar; January 18, 1845, p. 4; O'Connor, F., Reply to John Watkins's Charges (London, 1843), p. 16.Google Scholar

^{page 56 note 1} Manchester Examiner, November 6, 1847.

^{page 56 note 2} Ibid. For example, O'Connor was in Oldham in September 1837, speaking on the principles on which he intended to conduct a new paper called the Northern Star. Several weeks later he was in Rochdale, where only thirty shares had so far been taken up. Manchester and Salford Advertiser, 09 23, 1837, p. 3Google Scholar; October 7, p. 3; Butterworth manuscript diary, Oldham Public Library, September 16, 1837. O'Connor was continually agitating in South Lancashire and the West Riding in autumn-winter 1837, see Leeds Times, August 5 – December 16, 1837.

^{page 56 note 3} Northern Star, 01 18, 1845, p. 4Google Scholar; O'Connor, Reply, op. cit., p. 16.

^{page 56 note 4} Holyoake, G. J., Life of Joseph Rayner Stephens (London, 1881), p. 181Google Scholar.

^{page 56 note 5} Manchester Examiner, November 6, 1847.

^{page 56 note 6} Northern Star, 01 16, 1841, p. 7Google Scholar; Manchester Examiner, November 6, 1847.

^{page 56 note 7} British Museum, Add. Mss 27820, f. 13.

^{page 56 note 8} Manchester Examiner, November 6, 1847.

^{page 57 note 1} Glasgow, loc. cit., p. 64. Dr Glasgow only seems to consider the evidence of Hobson and Alexander Somerville in the Manchester Examiner, October-November 1847, Robert Lowery in his autobiography, loc. cit., and Watkins, John in his Impeachment of Feargus O'Connor (London, 1843).Google Scholar Of these hostile sources only Hobson had first-hand knowledge concerning the Star's establishment. Although Hobson's account appears to be accurate, it should be noted that his articles were written in the context of a bitter financial dispute between himself and O'Connor.

^{page 57 note 2} London Mercury, 06 4, 1837, p. 297Google Scholar, cited by P. Hollis, The Pauper Press, op. cit., p. 135. It was more expensive to start a provincial paper than a London paper. Because of the large number of printers in London it was possible to arrange a trial run for a new paper. This was usually impossible in the provinces. Thus a large initial capital outlay was necessary to start a provincial paper, without the benefit of a trial run. Read, D., Press and People, 1790–1850 (London, 1961), p. 80Google Scholar.

^{page 57 note 3} Northern Star, 03 10, 1838, p. 8Google Scholar; London Dispatch, 03 11, 1838, p. 620Google Scholar; March 18, p. 628.

^{page 57 note 4} Northern Star, 04 24, 1841, p. 7Google Scholar; January 18, 1845, p. 4, in reply to a letter in Lloyds Weekly London Newspaper, 01 12, 1845 p. 5Google Scholar, from “An Independent Chartist“ (John Watkins); O'Connor, Reply, op. cit., p. 16.

^{page 57 note 5} O'Connor, , Reply of Feargus O'Connor to the Charges against His Land and Labour Scheme (Manchester, 1847), p. 10Google Scholar. According to Wheeler, O'Connor sold Fort Robert, his Irish home, in 1841 to keep the Star going. Wheeler, T. M., A Brief Memoir of the Late Feargus O'Connor (London, 1855), p. 7Google Scholar.

^{page 58 note 1} Hobson claimed O'Connor still owed money for Irish election contests. Manchester Examiner, November 6, 1847.

^{page 58 note 2} Knapp, J. W. and Omler, E., Cases of Controverted Elections in the Twelfth Parliament of the United Kingdom (London, 1837), pp. 393–94Google Scholar, quoted by Glasgow, loc. cit., p. 58.

^{page 58 note 3} Hadfield, A. M., The Chartist Land Company (Newton Abbot, 1970), p. 64Google Scholar; MacAskill, J., “The Chartist Land Plan”, in: Chartist Studies, ed. by Briggs, A. (London, 1959), p. 331Google Scholar.

^{page 58 note 4} Northern Star, 01 16, 1841, p. 1Google Scholar, but examples can be found throughout O'Connor's career, whenever the legitimacy of his leadership is under challenge.

^{page 59 note 1} Ibid., January 30, 1841, p. 7.

^{page 59 note 2} Ibid., May 5, 1838, p. 5. Also November 17, p. 8; Dewsbury Radical Association celebrated the Star's anniversary.

^{page 59 note 3} Ibid., November 3, 1838, p. 4; April 24, 1841, p. 7: O'Connor had paid off £270 of original shares; January 18, 1845, o. 4: O'Connor reported about £400 of original £690 in shares had been bought up and interest paid; also O'Connor, Reply to John Watkins's Charges, op. cit., p. 16.

^{page 59 note 4} Thompson, D., “La presse de la classe ouvrière anglaise, 1836–1848”, in: La Presse Ouvrière 1819–1850, ed. by Godechot, Jacques (Paris, 1966), p. 25Google Scholar. Mrs Thompson's article has influenced this essay substantially at many points.

^{page 59 note 5} Northern Star, 07 11, 1840, p. 7.Google Scholar O'Connor claimed joint-stock ownership led to splits and cited the failure of the Charter. “I have always had, and always shall have, so long as I am concerned with the Star, undivided possession, and individual responsibility. […] There never was, there never will be, so truly a Democratic Journal as the Northern Star.”

^{page 60 note 1} Charter, 03 1, 1840, p. 1.Google Scholar For the establishment of the Charter upon a joint-stock committee basis, see Place Collection, Set 66, handbills, “Prospectus of a Weekly Newspaper Entitled the Charter”; “An Address from the Provisional Committee for the Establishment of a Weekly Newspaper Entitled the Charter”. O'Brien's Operative was organized on a similar basis, 4000 five-shilling shares were to be sold, Operative, 11 4, 1838, p. 1.Google Scholar The shareholders of the Charter seem to have had little control over the paper's editor, Carpenter, William, whom they blamed for the paper's demise, Charter, 03 15, 1840, p. 1.Google Scholar Ultimately the Charter depended upon the largesse of wealthier men such as Place, Dr Black and Colonel Thompson, see correspondence, Place Collection, Set 56 (01-04 1841), ff. 15–17.Google Scholar

^{page 60 note 2} Gammage, History of the Chartist Movement, op. cit., p. 16.

^{page 60 note 3} Northern Star, 12 16, 1837, p. 3.Google Scholar

^{page 61 note 1} Ibid., April 27, 1839, p. 4.

^{page 61 note 2} Place Collection, Set 70, ff. 619–21, prospectus addressed to the “Unrepresented Men of England”, proposing to launch the Liberator from Hull. Also see enclosed letter of Henry Collinson to Place, December 27, 1836, asking Place for a contribution and informing him that “Mr. Hill of Bradford, Yorkshire to be the Editor of the paper”.

^{page 61 note 3} Leeds Times, 01 14, 1837, p. 8Google Scholar; January 21, p. 5: O Connor and Hill at Bradford and Barnsley together; February 11, p. 5; February 18, p. 5: Hill touring Yorkshire. At the Bradford dinner at which O Connor was the main speaker, many of the radicals who were to be instrumental in launching the Star were present, including Pitkeithley and Oastler from Huddersfield, Henry Rawson from Halifax, as well as J. Douthwaite, Chris Wilkinson, Samuel Bower and John Jackson, all from Bradford.

^{page 62 note 1} Ibid., May 13, 1837, p. 4.

^{page 62 note 2} Glasgow, loc. cit., pp. 60–61. Glasgow bases this assertion upon Paterson, Alexander, “Feargus O'Connor and the Northern Star”, in: Leeds Mercury, 02 24, 1900, Supplement, p. 1.Google Scholar Paterson also wrote an earlier letter on Rev. Hill and the Star, in Newcastle Weekly Chronicle, 03 10, 1883, p. 2.Google Scholar However, Glasgow has misread the evidence. Hill's project was based on Hull. It may be that O'Connor considered publication from Barnsley. It also should be noted that despite the bitter hostility which developed between Hill and O'Connor after Hill's dismissal in 1843, Hill never claimed that O'Connor had merely taken over his scheme. According to Hobson, Hill and O'Connor, Hill was approached after the plans for the Star were well off the ground. Both Hobson and O'Connor state that it was Hobson who recommended Hill as editor. See Hill, William, The Rejected Letters (n.p., 1843)Google Scholar (copy in Seligman Collection, Columbia University); id., A Scabbard for Feargus O'Connor's Sword (Hull, 1844)Google Scholar; F. O'Connor, A Letter from Feargus O'Connor, Esq., to the Rev. Hill, William. In Answer to Several Charges Contained in Recent Documents Published by that Gentleman (London, 1843)Google Scholar; Manchester Examiner, November 6, 1847.

^{page 62 note 3} Northern Star, 05 26, 1838, p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 63 note 1} Ibid., November 19, 1842, p. 4. Hobson paid similar tribute: “No man, excepting the proprietor of the Northern Star, could have made the paper anything like what it is, or have overcome the almost insurmountable obstacles opposed to the establishment of an organ so entirely opposed to all existing abuses.“ Ibid., October 5, 1839, p. 4.

^{page 64 note 1} For O'Connor's contact with these radicals, see Leeds Times, 1836–38. For Oastler, see Driver, C., Tory Radical: The Life of Richard Oastler (New York, 1946)Google Scholar. For Hobson, see obituary in Huddersfield Weekly News, May 13, 1876; J. F. C. Harrison, “Chartism in Leeds”, in: Chartist Studies, op. cit., pp. 67–68; id., Owen, Robert and the Owenites in Britain and America, The Quest for a New Moral World (London, 1969), p. 226Google Scholar, note 2. For Pitkeithley, see obituary in Huddersfield Chronicle, June 5,1858; Newcastle Weekly Chronicle, September 27, 1879; Harrison, , Robert Owen, p. 227, note 1.Google Scholar For the important behind-the-scenes work which a radical like Pitkeithley undertook on the Star's behalf, see HO 40/47, ff. 529ff., letters from Pitkeithley to Joseph Broyan of Sutton-in-Ashfield, seized by the local magistrates in 1839. Pitkeithley had been a friend of Hunt's and played a key role in the defence movements for the Dorchester Labourers and Glasgow Spinners. He was a close friend of both Oastler and O'Connor. John Leech was the manager of Pitkeithley's woollen draper's shop. For George White, see Geering, K., “George White: a Nineteenth Century Workers' Leader” (Sussex University B.A. diss., 1972)Google Scholar; Harrison, “Chartism in Leeds”, loc. cit., pp. 70ff., also for William Rider. For Peter Bussey, see Charter, 05 5, 1839, p. 229.Google Scholar John Jackson was an old Huntite and among Bradford's oldest radicals, see A Young Revolutionary in Nineteenth Century England: Selected Writings of Georg Weerth, ed. by I., and Kuczynski, P. (Berlin, 1971).Google Scholar John Douthwaite had been involved along with O'Connor, O'Brien and John Bell in the radical Central National Association in 1837. James Ibbetson was a victim of the unstamped, see Hollis, op. cit., p. 113. For pre-Chartist radicalism in Bradford generally, see Peacock, A. J., Bradford Chartism [Borthwick Papers, 36] (York, 1969), pp. 8–9.Google Scholar For Ben Rushton and William Thornton, see Wilson, Benjamin, The Struggles of an Old Chartist (Halifax, 1887)Google Scholar; Thompson, E. P., The Making of the English Working Class (London, 1963), pp. 398–400.Google Scholar For the Barnsley radicals, see John Hugh Burland, “Annals of Barnsley”, manuscript in Barnsley Reference Library; “The Life and Times of John Vallance”, in: Barnsley Times, April 15 – July 29, 1882. I would like to thank Fred Kaijage and Dorothy Thompson for drawing my attention to these last two sources.

^{page 64 note 2} Burland, , “Annals of Barnsley”, f. 71Google Scholar; Paterson, “Feargus O'Connor and the Northern Star”, loc. cit.

^{page 64 note 3} For Stephens, see Ward, J. T., “Revolutionary Tory: The Life of Joseph Rayner Stephens of Ashton-under-Lyne (1805–1879)”, in: Transactions of the Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society, LXVIII (1958), pp. 93–116.Google Scholar For James Wheeler, see obituary in People's Paper, 09 23, 1854, p. 1.Google Scholar Both Wheeler and Rev. James Scholefield had been active in radical politics from before Peterloo. The Hunt Monument erected by the Chartists in 1842 stood in the yard of Scholefield's Manchester chapel.

^{page 65 note 1} For Jessie Ainsworth, coal-owner, James Holladay, master-spinner, and John Knight, see Foster, J., Class Struggle and the Industrial Revolution: Early industrial capitalism in three English towns (London, 1974).CrossRefGoogle Scholar Also see obituary for Knight in Northern Star, 09 8, 1838, p. 8Google Scholar; September 22, p. 7.

^{page 65 note 2} Hollis, op. cit., p. 109

^{page 65 note 3} Northern Star, 03 31, 1838, p. 4.Google Scholar Weekly circulation figures for the previous six weeks, average of 10,659 a week, of which: Leeds 1,903, Bradford 836, Halifax 837, Huddersfield 1,000. Presumably Barnsley would have been on par with Bradford and Halifax.

^{page 65 note 4} Wiener, op. cit., p. 190.

^{page 66 note 1} Maehl, W. H. Jr, “Augustus Hardin Beaumont: Anglo-American Radical”, in: International Review of Social History, XIV (1969), pp. 237–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Beaumont sold the Liberator to Robert Blakey for £500 in January 1838. Blakey claimed the machinery for producing the paper had originally cost £900, The Memoirs of Dr. Robert Blakey, ed. by Miller, H. (London, 1879), p. 108Google Scholar. Also see W. E. Adams, Memoirs, op. cit., I, p. 179; for the post-Beaumont period of the Liberator's career, see Devyr, T. A., The Odd Book of the Nineteenth Century (Greenpoint, New York, 1882).Google Scholar

^{page 66 note 2} Although the same price as the Star, the Liberator was only half its size. In July 1839, at the height of the Chartist agitation, it was enlarged to an eight-page paper like the Star. However, it never had the wide range of reporting of the Star. Reports outside the North-East were usually quoted from the Star. As for quality, Gammage, op. cit., p. 18, commented: “It was conducted with spirit and ability; its original matter was superior to that either of the Star or the London Dispatch”. In May 1840 the Liberator merged with the Champion.

^{page 66 note 3} Northern Star, 12 21, 1850Google Scholar, quoted by Read, D., The English Provinces, 1760–1960: A study in influence (London, 1964), p 117.Google Scholar

^{page 67 note 1} Northern Star, 04 7, 1838, p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 67 note 2} Ibid., December 2, 1837, p. 1; also see December 16, p. 4.

^{page 67 note 3} Many provincial radicals saw London as the centre of national corruption, and contrasted the relative inactivity of the capital with the action of the North. See, for instance, O'Connor's speech reported in Northern Star, 07 21, 1838, p. 3Google Scholar, or the letter from a “Yorkshire Chartist” (John Watkins) ibid., April 3, 1841, p. 7.

^{page 67 note 4} See Edsall, N. C., The Anti-Poor Law Movement (Manchester, 1971), pp. 169–70.Google Scholar The agents listed in Northern Star, December 2 and 16, 1837, were mostly from the West Riding and South Lancashire.

^{page 67 note 5} Northern Star, January 20 – February 17, 1838, published a complete account of the Glasgow Spinners' trial. Place commented: “The case of the men [Glasgow Spinners] was dealt upon, and commented on in the Northern Star, and as it was at the time a subject about which most of the Trades in Great Britain took an interest, it helped to a considerable extent to promote the sale of the paper. The introduction of the new Poor Law into the Northern counties was another subject of excitation, it caused many riots and being opposed in every possible way it also tended to increase the sale of the paper. O'Connor, Oastler and Stephens made common cause in public meetings; by publications, and correspondence to embarrass the proceedings of the Poor Law Commissioners and were very successful.” British Museum, Add. Mss 27820, f. 153.

^{page 68 note 1} Champion, 10 27, 1839, pp. 4–5Google Scholar; Northern Star, 11 2, 1839. p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 68 note 2} For instance, Manchester and Salford Advertiser, 01 27, 1838, p. 2Google Scholar, condemns Stephens's violent rhetoric and compares this to the “far more legitimate model of radicalism” of Thomas Attwood and the Birmingham Political Union. Northern Star, 02 10, 1838, p. 1Google Scholar, defends Stephens. N. C. Edsall, op. cit., pp. 120–21, is thus mistaken in his assertion that the Star did not fill a gap in terms of the anti-Poor-Law movement.

^{page 68 note 3} HO 48/32, case 13; HO 49/8, ff. 214–16. Local authorities immediately drew the attention of the Government to the “seditious” speeches published in the Star: Major Phillips to General Jackson, Bradford, December 3 and 11, 1837, HO 40/35, ff. 63–64, 76–77; R. Baker to Poor Law Commissioners, Leeds, January 5, 1838, Ministry of Health Papers, 12/14830, Public Record Office; ibid., 12/14720 (Bradford); Northern Star, 01 6, 1838, p. 5Google Scholar; Mather, F. C., “The Government and the Chartists”, in: Chartist Studies, p. 375.Google Scholar For later proceedings, see HO 48/33, case 22; HO 49/8, ff. 289–90, 307–08, 312–15; Northern Star, 04 20, 1839, p. 4Google Scholar; July 27, p. 6. O'Connor was eventually sent to prison largely for speeches published in the Star, see Treasury Solicitor's Papers 11/813–14, 817, Public Record Office; Northern Star, March 21 and May 16, 1840, for reports of the trial.

^{page 68 note 4} From the first edition, Northern Star, 11 18, 1837, p. 1Google Scholar, O'Connor placed universal suffrage as the first demand. By October 1838, the anti-Poor-Law protest was regarded as “only one grievance among many”, 10 13, 1838, p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 68 note 5} Rose, M. E., “The Anti-Poor Law Movement in the North of England”, in: Northern History, I (1966), p. 88Google Scholar; Edsall, op. cit., pp. 169–72.

^{page 69 note 1} Northern Star, 02 3, 1838, p. 5.Google Scholar

^{page 69 note 2} Ibid., January 6, p. 4; March 31, p. 4.

^{page 69 note 3} Ibid., November 24, p. 4. As early as May 26, p 4, the Star was claiming a higher circulation than the Leeds Mercury. With the Star's success sales of the radical middle-class Leeds Times fell seriously, Read, Press and People, op. cit., p. 94. For the Star's circulation history see Appendix. For comparative figures, Report of the Select Committee on Newspaper Stamps, 1851, Appendix 4.

^{page 69 note 4} Northern Star, 02 2, 1839, p. 4Google Scholar, claimed that the January 26 edition of the paper sold 17,640 copies; March 9, p. 4, announced that the average weekly sales over the previous three months had been around 12,000 copies; and April 20, p. 4, claimed they were “printing more weekly, than were ever sent out of a paper our size, from a single printing machine”.

^{page 69 note 5} Estimates of the Star's circulation high vary. Hovell, , The Chartist Movement, pp. 173, 269Google Scholar, note 1, estimated 48,000 (February-May 1839). Benjamin Wilson, The Struggles of an Old Chartist, op. cit., p. 3, estimated 60,000, as did Peel, Frank, The Risings of the Luddites, Chartists and Plug-drawers, 4th ed. (London, 1968), p. 314Google Scholar. Alexander Paterson, loc. cit., estimated “nearly 50,000”. Northern Star, 06 1, 1839, p. 4Google Scholar, announced a weekly average over the preceding two months of 32,692; August 17, p. 4, announced 42,000 to be the average weekly sales for the period April-June 1839.

^{page 69 note 6} Northern Star, 02, 22, 1840, p. 4Google Scholar; Appendix.

^{page 70 note 1} Cole, G. D. H., The Life of William Cobbett, 3rd ed. revised (London, 1947), p. 207Google Scholar, estimated the sale of the Trash (the cheap edition of the Political Register, excluding news items) to have reached between 40,000 and 50,000 in 1816–17; Hollis, op. cit., p. 95, reckons 20–30,000. Hollis, p. 124, has estimated the circulation of Cleave's Gazette to have reached a high of 40,000 a week in 1836. Neither the Trash nor Cleave's Gazette were stamped or carried news. The stamped Political Register was estimated by the Home Office to have sold 20,000 copies a week in 1817, at the price of 6d, Hollis, p. 119. The Poor Man's Guardian at its height, 1832–33, sold around 15,000 copies, ibid., p. 118. No Chartist paper came close to the Star's circulation.

^{page 70 note 2} Daunt, Eighty-Five Years, op. cit., I, p. 268.

^{page 70 note 3} E. Richardson to R. J. Richardson, February 16, 1839, HO 40/53 (file of intercepted letters to members of the Chartist Convention), f. 928; Mrs Richardson to R. J. Richardson, February 26, 1839, ff. 953–57.

^{page 70 note 4} Hollis, op. cit., p. 119.

^{page 70 note 5} See Read, Press and People, p. 202; Webb, R. K., The British Working Class Reader (London, 1955), pp. 31–34.Google Scholar

^{page 70 note 6} Northern Star, 06 9, 1838, p. 4Google Scholar; April 6, 1839, p. 3.

^{page 70 note 7} For instance, see the list of agents, Northern Star, February 9, 1839. About one hundred localities are represented, by about two hundred agents. Halifax had no less than seven agents and Birmingham six. By the fifth number of the Star, December 16, 1837, the original West Riding – South Lancashire base had been extended to include Newcastle, Glasgow and Edinburgh.

^{page 71 note 1} Northern Star, 03 24, 1838, p. 3.Google Scholar

^{page 71 note 2} Guest, James, “A Free Press and How it Became Free”, in: Hutton, W., The History of Birmingham, 6th ed. (Birmingham, 1861), p. 506Google Scholar. Joshua Hobson, agent for the Ashton-under-Lyne district of South Lancashire, received 1,330 copies a week in February 1839, Northern Star, 02 23, 1839, p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 71 note 3} Northern Star, 05 26, 1838, p. 4.Google Scholar

^{page 71 note 4} See R. K. Webb, op. cit.; id., “Working Class Readers in Early Victorian England”, in: English Historical Review, LXV (1950)Google Scholar; Altick, R. D., The English Common Reader (Chicago, 1957)Google Scholar; Harrison, J. F. C., Learning and Living (London, 1961), p. 42Google Scholar, and Pt I in general; Sanderson, M., “Literacy and Social Mobility in the Industrial Revolution”, in: Past & Present, No 56 (1972)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, would suggest a higher rate of illiteracy in early-nineteenth-century Lancashire.

^{page 72 note 1} Northern Star, May 26, 1838, p. 4.

^{page 72 note 2} Ibid., September 29, 1838, p. 7.

^{page 72 note 3} Ibid., June 13, 1840, p. 1; Nottingham Review, June 12, 1840, p. 8.

^{page 72 note 4} Fielden, Samuel, “Autobiography of Samuel Fielden”, in: Knights of Labour (Chicago), February 19, 1887.Google Scholar

^{page 73 note 1} Adams, W. E., Memoirs, I, pp. 164–65.Google Scholar

^{page 73 note 2} Brierley, Ben, Home and Memories (Manchester, 1886), pp. 23–24.Google Scholar Brierley's main reading in his early years had been Cleave's Gazette, ibid., p. 26.

^{page 73 note 3} Grime, Benjamin, Memory Sketches: History of Oldham Parliamentary Elections, 1832–53 (reprinted from Oldham Weekly Chronicle, 1887), p. 26.Google Scholar

^{page 74 note 1} Wilson, Benjamin, Struggles, p. 10.Google Scholar

^{page 74 note 2} Merrick, Daniel, The Warp of Life, or, Social and Moral Threads, A Narrative (Leicester, 1876), pp. 18, 22.Google Scholar Although not strictly an autobiography, the pamphlet is a teetotal-morality tract; obviously Merrick drew on his experiences as a stockinger in this sketch.

^{page 74 note 3} Harrison, Learning and Living, op. cit., pp. 30, 101.

^{page 74 note 4} Northern Star, January 27, 1838, p. 5; May 5, p. 4; see the cartoon “The Goose Show”, satirizing O'Connell and the middle-class Leeds Parliamentary Reform Association, ibid., January 23, 1841, p. 1.

^{page 75 note 1} Adams, W. E., Memoirs, I, pp. 163–64.Google Scholar

^{page 75 note 2} Northern Star, November 20, 1841, p. 5.

^{page 75 note 3} Ibid., May 26, 1838, p. 4.

^{page 75 note 4} James Guest, “A Free Press”, loc. cit., p. 506; CEH to R. J. Richardson, March 14, 1839, HO 40/53, f. 1001; also Shaw to Home Office, Manchester, December 8, 1839, f. 774.

^{page 75 note 5} Northern Star, August 4, 1838, p. 3.

^{page 75 note 6} Ibid., May 26, 1838, p. 4.

^{page 75 note 7} Ibid., February 24, 1838, p 7.

^{page 75 note 8} Ibid., March 31, 1838, p. 4.

^{page 76 note 1} See Hill's comments to readers, ibid., May 26, 1838, p. 4, or February 9, 1839, p. 4.

^{page 76 note 2} For instance, most of the Birmingham Chartist weekly meetings in the winter of 1839 began with local leaders reading from the Star, HO 40/50, spies' reports, October-December 1839. This was still common practice in 1841, see reports of Birmingham Chartist meetings, HO 45/102 A, Pt 1. Also see “The Reminiscences of Thomas Dunning”, ed. by Chaloner, W. H., in: Transactions of the Lancashire and Cheshire Antiquarian Society, LIX (1947), pp. 112–13, 121.Google Scholar

^{page 76 note 3} Northern Star, February 3, 1838, p. 5; February 24, p. 7. The Mossley Working Men's Association numbered around fifty at this time.

^{page 76 note 4} Ibid., February 26, 1842, p. 4. The Northern Star reading societies at Glasgow and Walworth sent donations to the O'Brien press fund.

^{page 76 note 5} This was certainly true of the Leicester Chartists with regard to the Midland Counties Illuminator, Northern Star, November 14, 1840, p. 2; Midland Counties Illuminator, May 1, 1841, p. 47. They believed their paper would “prove a precursor to a more wide dissemination of the Northern Star” in the East Midlands. For a full discussion of the importance of the press to a group of local Chartists, see Kemnitz, T. M., “Chartism in Brighton” (Ph.D., Sussex University, 1969), pp. 179–89.Google Scholar

^{page 77 note 1} Glover, W., History of Ashton-under-Lyne and the Surrounding District, ed. by Andrew, J. (Ashton, 1884), p. 322.Google Scholar On the death of Ashton's Joshua Hobson the local radicals sent a poem in his honour to the Northern Star, March 24, 1838, p. 6.

^{page 77 note 2} Northern Star, December 2, 1837, p. 8: along with Ashton's Hobson, John Knight of Oldham and Abel Heywood of Manchester, the West Riding victims Ibbetson, Titus Brooke, C. Tinker were early agents. Four of Birmingham's six agents in 1839 had been prosecuted for selling the unstamped.

^{page 77 note 3} Guest, James, “A Free Press”, pp. 493–507.Google Scholar Guest went to prison for selling the unstamped in 1834. He again risked imprisonment in the summer of 1839 for printing the declaration from the Chartist Convention condemning the authorities over the Bull Ring riots.

^{page 77 note 4} Nottingham Review, January 29, 1836, p. 4; February 5, p. 4.

^{page 77 note 5} Northern Star, March 31, 1838, p. 5.

^{page 78 note 1} The middle-class press was very scornful of such independence: “It is more pleasant for him [Deegan] to get drunk as chairman of a dinner, as president of a tavern club […] than piece laps in the card room, and earn his bread by the sweat of his brow”, Manchester Times, June 9, 1838, p. 3.

^{page 78 note 2} “The Reminiscences of Thomas Dunning”, loc. cit., p. 112.

^{page 78 note 3} Report of the Select Committee on Newspaper Stamps, p. 152.

^{page 79 note 1} Gammage, op. cit., p. 17.

^{page 79 note 2} Hollis, op. cit., p. 261.

^{page 79 note 3} Northern Star, January 9, 1841, p. 4. However, it seems likely that the major London daily papers spent considerably more on reporting than the Star.

^{page 79 note 4} Sometimes O'Connor paid local radicals to act as regular correspondents, such as Deegan at Stalybridge or William Griffin at Stockport in 1840. Joseph Crabtree of Barnsley was paid £10 a year to send reports of the Barnsley radical meetings, HO 20/10. But generally the Star depended on local leaders to forward material. Thus, for instance, the Star carried no reports of a Bolton miners' strike because the Lancashire leaders had sent no communications to the paper, Northern Star, November 14, 1846, cited by Challinor, R. and Ripley, B., The Miners' Association, A Trade Union in the Age of the Chartists (London, 1968), p. 196.Google Scholar

^{page 79 note 5} Frost, Thomas, Forty Years' Recollections (London, 1880), pp. 119–20Google Scholar, contrasted the fallacious twelve-line report of a meeting of the Croydon Chartists in 1842 published in the liberal South-Eastern Gazette with the full report of the Star, whose reporter, unlike that of the Gazette, stayed for the entire meeting. As for currency of news, on occasion Feargus claimed he had to complain to Hobson that the Star looked as “if it was taken from an old almanac”, A Letter from Feargus O'Connor, Esq., to the Rev. William Hill, op. cit., p. 13. Accuracy of reporting had been generally improved in the 1830's. Harland's shorthand system enabled reporters to take down the proceedings of meetings verbatim, Read, Press and People, p. 86.

^{page 80 note 1} Northern Star, December 22, 1838, p. 8; also December 8, pp. 1, 3, 4, for Stalybridge and Ashton addresses. The Star was quickly crowded with resolutions supporting O'Connor and Stephens against the Birmingham leaders

^{page 80 note 2} See the comments of Mrs Toll, president of the Birmingham Female Political Union, who told the female Chartists that the Birmingham Journal now “but laughs at female virtue and female politicians […] but ladies, we have a substitute […] in our own Northern Star (cheers)”. Northern Star, July 6, 1839, p. 8. Also see the comments of the Birmingham Chartist James Taylor, ibid., August 3, p. 7.

^{page 81 note 1} Hobson was convicted three times between 1833 and 1836, and sent to prison twice for his role in the unstamped campaign. Collet, History of the Taxes on Knowledge, op. cit., I, p. 39; Report of the Select Committee on Newspaper Stamps, Appendix 2; Voice of the West Riding, August 10, 1833.

^{page 81 note 2} Harrison, Learning and Living, p. 98.

^{page 81 note 3} Newcastle Weekly Chronicle, March 10, 1883, p. 2; Alexander Paterson, loc. cit.; Harrison, , “Chartism in Leeds”, p. 74Google Scholar, note 1; British Museum, Add. Mss 27820, f. 150, for Place's predictably low opinion of Hill.

^{page 81 note 4} Ultimately Ardill and O'Connor quarrelled over finances, but keeping the Star's accounts in order was no easy job. Apparently O'Connor rarely bothered to look at the accounts. Manchester Examiner, November 6, 1847.

^{page 81 note 5} Northern Star, January 27, 1838, p. 4. O'Brien was paid one guinea per column, ibid., May 10, 1845, p. 1.

^{page 81 note 6} For an analysis of the importance of O'Brien and the Poor Man's Guardian, see Hollis, op. cit., ch. 7, and p. 313 for a breakdown of the papers with which O'Brien was associated during the years of the unstamped. Although a brilliant journalist, the originality of O'Brien's thought has probably been exaggerated, as Dr I. Prothero has pointed out in his review article “Chartism, early and late”, in: Bulletin of the Society for the Study of Labour History, No 24 (1972), p. 52.Google Scholar For O'Brien in general, see Plummer, A., Bronterre: A Political Biography of Bronterre O'Brien, 1804–1864 (London, 1971).Google Scholar

^{page 82 note 1} Holyoake, Life of Stephens, op. cit., p. 86.

^{page 82 note 2} Northern Star, December 16, 1837, p. 5.

^{page 82 note 3} British Museum, Add. Mss 27820, ff. 154–55.

^{page 82 note 4} Northern Star, October 13, 1838, carried O'Brien's last letter for the paper. Watkins, John, John Watkins to the People, in Answer of Feargus O'Connor (London, 1844), pp. 9–12Google Scholar, reproduces a letter from O'Brien in which he discusses the question of O'Connor wishing to employ him in the early 1840's. Rumours of such a move were current enough for Hill to write to O'Connor in January 1842 about O'Brien and the Star. Hill, A Scabbard, op. cit., pp. 7–8.

^{page 82 note 5} Read and Glasgow, Feargus O'Connor, op. cit., p. 65, mistakenly wrote that Harney became editor in 1847. For Harney, see Schoyen, The Chartist Challenge.

^{page 82 note 6} For Fleming, see obituary in Manchester City News, May 25, 1878, p. 3; Holyoake, G. J., History of Co-operation (London, 1875), chs 9, 10 and 12Google Scholar. Along with the Star's publisher in 1852, McGowan, Fleming bought the paper from O'Connor.

^{page 83 note 1} Schoyen, op. cit., p. 131 and note 1, for periods Engels was writing for the Star. For Marx's and Engels's high opinion of the Star, Northern Star, July 25, 1846, p. 1.

^{page 83 note 2} O'Connor, A Letter to Hill, op. cit., p. 13; in Northern Star, August 26, 1848, p. 1, O'Connor again gave a breakdown of his editorial costs. Hobson had been paid £6 a week as editor, and Harney £4 as assistant editor. When Harney worked as editor of the provincial Northern Tribune in 1854, he was paid £1 a week. Regular contributors to the Star were paid 10/– a column. Schoyen, pp. 101, 236.

^{page 83 note 3} London Dispatch, September 17, 1836, p. 1, quoted by D. Thompson, “La presse de la classe ouvrière anglaise”, loc. cit., pp. 18–19.

^{page 83 note 4} O'Connor, , A Letter to Hill, p. 14.Google Scholar

^{page 83 note 5} Northern Star, March 10, 1849, p. 5. After Hobson's departure in October 1845, O'Connor claimed that he was editor in all but name, ibid., November 21, 1846, p. 1.

^{page 84 note 1} Frost, Forty Years' Recollections, op. cit., p. 181. In a letter to Marx Engels compared O'Connor's literary style favourably with that of Cobbett. Marx, K., Engels, F., Werke, Vol. 27 (Berlin, 1963), p. 99 (October 25–26, 1847).Google Scholar

^{page 84 note 2} For instance, John Arlom recalled reading the Star to his illiterate parents. “As soon as the paper came, my father would say, ‘Come, take up the paper, and see first of all if George Julian has owt to say this week.’ George Julian [Harney] was my father's high priest.” Newcastle Weekly Chronicle, August 27, 1892, quoted by Schoyen, p. 125. Also, see the reminiscences of F.P. (Frank Peel?) in Newcastle Weekly Chronicle, March 17, 1883.

^{page 84 note 3} Hollis, op. cit., p. 125.

^{page 84 note 4} D. Thompson, loc. cit., pp. 28–30, makes this point very well.

^{page 85 note 1} British Museum, Add. Mss 27820, f. 25. For the careers of other Chartist newspapers, see D. Thompson, loc. cit.; Kemnitz, T. M., “Chartist Newspaper Editors”, in: Victorian Periodicals Newsletter, No 18 (1972), pp. 1–11Google Scholar; Hollis, op. cit., p. 119, has some useful comparative circulation figures.

^{page 85 note 2} Northern Star, October 9, 1841, p. 8.

^{page 85 note 3} The Executive Journal of the NCA, price Id, weekly, 8 pp., October 16 – November 6, 1841. It was published by Philp, R. K. from Bristol. Complete set in Place Collection, Set 56 (September-December 1841), ff. 195ff.Google Scholar Place noted that a circulation of only 2,000 copies would have kept the paper going.

^{page 85 note 4} Engels, F., The Condition of the Working-Class in England, in Marx and Engels on Britain (Moscow, 1962), p. 260.Google Scholar

^{page 85 note 5} Northern Star, November 19, 1842, p. 4.

^{page 86 note 1} This is hardly surprising when one notes the number of Owenites on the Star's staff, Hobson and later Fleming as editors, and full-time reporters like Edmund Stallwood and T. M. Wheeler. O'Brien maintained that the Star had done much to unite radicals and Owenites, Northern Star, June 23, 1838, p. 4. In reply to an Owenite inquiry about coverage of Owen's Northern tour in 1838, the Star wrote: “The Socialists need not fear. The lectures of Mr. Owen shall have that space and notice which his station and motives entitle him to.” Ibid., September 8, p. 4; September 15, p. 6, and September 22, for reports of the tour. Throughout the spring and summer of 1838, John Finch, a leading Owenite, wrote a regular weekly letter to the Star. Nor was this coverage of socialist activity short-lived. To take a few examples from 1840: Northern Star, May 23, carried a. front-page report of the annual Owenite Congress; June 13, p. 3, a full report of the opening of the Manchester Hall of Science; September 26, 1840, p. 1, a report of an Owenite tea for James Rigby at Leeds. Throughout 1843 William Galpin wrote a long series of letters on Harmony Hall. An open dialogue existed between Chartists and Owenites throughout the period. For a wide-ranging discussion of the relationship between Owenism and Chartism, see Yeo, E., “Robert Owen and Radical Culture”, in: Robert Owen, Prophet of the Poor, ed. by Pollard, S. and Salt, J. (London, 1971), pp. 84–115.Google Scholar

^{page 86 note 2} See Northern Star, October 19 – November 30, 1844. O'Connor argued that London as the national capital was the proper place for the Star. He drew attention to improved communication facilities which London provided. The price of the paper was raised to 5d.

^{page 86 note 3} Ibid., November 16, 1844, p. 1.

^{page 86 note 4} Ibid., particularly late January – February 1842.

^{page 87 note 1} Prothero, I., “London Chartism and the Trades”, in: Economic History Review, Second Series, XXIV (1971), p. 210.Google Scholar

^{page 87 note 2} Challinor and Ripley, The Miners' Association, op. cit., pp. 40–41.

^{page 87 note 3} Groves, R., But We Shall Rise Again (London, 1938), p. 52.Google Scholar

^{page 87 note 4} Holyoake, G. J., Sixty Years of an Agitator's Life (London, 1892), I, pp. 106–07.Google Scholar

^{page 87 note 5} Northern Star, September 21, 1839, p. 7; October 5, p. 6; October 12, p. 1. These letters were also published in the Champion, and coincided with an all-out attack by that paper on O'Connor's leadership. W. G. Burns, also an ex-member of the Convention, was accorded similar latitude in attacking O'Connor in the summer of 1840, ibid., June 13, p. 8; June 27, p. 8; July 18, p. 5. So was Hetherington in 1841, ibid., May 8, p. 7; May 15, p. 1; June 12, p. 7. Nor are these isolated examples.

^{page 87 note 6} Ibid., June 12, 1841, pp. 1, 3; June 19, pp. 5, 7; June 26, pp. 1, 4, 7–8; July 3, pp. 1, 5; July 10, p. 4.

^{page 87 note 7} Ibid., March 3–31, 1849.

^{page 87 note 8} For Chartist criticism of O'Connor's handling of the Star, see Philp, R. K., Vindication of his Political Conduct and an Exposition of the Misrepresentations of the Northern Star (Bath, 1842)Google Scholar; O'Brien, J. B., Vindication of his Conduct at the late Birmingham Conference (Birmingham, 1842)Google Scholar; Hill, The Rejected Letters, op. cit., and A Scabbard; John Watkins, Impeachment, op. cit.; Thomason, W., O'Connorism and Democracy Inconsistent with Each Other; Being a Statement of the Events in the Life of Feargus O'Connor (Newcastle, 1844).Google Scholar

^{page 88 note 1} Thus O'Brien wrote: “I therefore demand the publication of this [letter]. I demand it, not as a favour […] but as a matter of right”. Northern Star, April 23, 1842, p. 5.

^{page 88 note 2} For instance, Northern Star, May 30, 1840, p. 4.

^{page 88 note 3} Ibid., April 3, 1841. Despite O'Connor's view that both temperance Chartism and Christian Chartism were tendencies detrimental to the need for Chartist unity, they received publicity in the columns of the Star. It is also mistaken to believe that O'Connor was opposed to teetotalism as such. For a clear exposition of O'Connor's position on drink, see Harrison, B., “Teetotal Chartism”, in: History, LVIII (1973), pp. 193–217.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

^{page 88 note 4} The Harney Papers, ed. by F. G., and Black, R. M. (Assen, 1969), p. 241Google Scholar; also see pp. 251–52.

^{page 89 note 1} O'Connor's dissatisfaction with Hill's general editorial style went back to 1839. O'Connor, F., Reply to Mr. Hill's “Scabbard” (London, 1843), pp. 2, 4.Google Scholar HO 20/10, details of an interview with O'Connor while in prison in 1841: “He [O'Connor] complains greatly of the present Editor, Hill, and his injudicious mode of conducting it [the Northern Star].”

^{page 89 note 2} Hill issued a series of severe censures upon the NCA executive in late 1842 and early 1843. Eventually O'Connor felt it necessary to intervene to declare that Hill's opinions did not represent his own. Hill in his reply to O'Connor's letter corroborated O'Connor's statement that he “has been no party to any syllable that I have written upon the conduct of the Executive”. Northern Star, February 4, 1843, pp. 1, 5. The issue blew up again in summer of 1843 with Hill's denunciation of Dr M'Douall, and O'Connor dismissed him as editor. Ibid., July 8, p. 4; July 15, p. 4; August 12, p. 4.

^{page 89 note 3} O'Connor did not reject the need for foreign news as such, nor was he totally hostile towards the Fraternal Democrats. See The Harney Papers, op. cit., letters 79 and 80; Weisser, H., “Chartist Internationalism, 1845–48”, in: Historical Journal, XIV (1971)Google Scholar; id., “The Role of Feargus O'Connor in Chartist Internationalism”, in: The Rocky Mountain Social Science Journal, VI (1969).

^{page 89 note 4} See Weisser, , “Chartist Internationalism”, pp. 55–56Google Scholar; Schoyen, p. 131, notes “the considerable truth in his [O'Conner's] boast that his editors were given a free hand”. O'Connor seems to have sincerely regretted losing Harney's services when he finally did resign, see his letter to Harney of August 20, 1850, The Harney Papers, p. 64.

^{page 89 note 5} D. Thompson, loc cit., pp. 28–29.

^{page 89 note 6} Gammage, op. cit., p. 200.

^{page 90 note 1} For instance, contrast the Star's attitude to the proposed new Charter newspaper with that of both the Operative, November 4, 1838, p. 1; November 18, pp. 40–41; December 2, p 72, and the London Dispatch, October 14, p. 868. The Star, November 10, 1838, p. 4, welcomed the Operative, the True Scotsman and the Charter, the organ of the London Working Men's Association, with enthusiasm: “A good cause can never have too many champions. There is room enough for the labour of all […] in […] helping forward the glorious consummation of our hopes.” In 1841 the Star referred to the National Vindicator, the journal of Vincent and Philp (hardly O'Connor's closest allies), as “the ablest fellow-worker in the cause of Chartism”, September 18, p. 4.

^{page 90 note 2} O'Connor, A Letter to Hill, p. 28; Northern Star, September 28, 1839, p. 4; December 28, p. 5; January 11, 1842, p. 4; July 9; Southern Star, January 26, 1840, p. 5; Plummer, Bronterre, op. cit., pp. 140, 164–65. Carpenter and O'Brien had trouble for several months arranging sureties with the Stamp Office, which had turned down both Joshua Hobson and Harriet West. O'Connor and Alderman Scales eventually were accepted.

^{page 90 note 3} In the English Chartist Circular, No 57 (1842), O'Connor gave his reasons for offering his services gratuitously to the paper.

^{page 90 note 4} John Seal to Place, Leicester, July 15, 1841, British Museum, Add. Mss 27835, ff. 165–68: O'Connor gave £7 and Duncombe later gave £10 for the Illuminator. For Cooper's later paper, The Commonwealthsman: or, Chartist Advocate, two copies exist in HO 45/260, of which No 20, June 18, 1842, carries the third of a series of letters from O'Connor.

^{page 90 note 5} See, e.g., the letter of James Harris, editor of the English Chartist Circular, on the demise of the paper, in No 153 (1843).

^{page 91 note 1} Northern Star, March 17, 1838, p. 4, announced the establishment of the Evening Star, to be published from London from November 1, and to involve Hill, O'Brien and O'Connor.

^{page 91 note 2} Ibid., June 23, 1838, p. 6.

^{page 91 note 3} Ibid.; also July 14, p. 4; December 8, p. 5.

^{page 91 note 4} O'Connor was still proposing to bring out a daily paper at a meeting of the St Pancras WMA, ibid., December 22, p. 8. Perhaps O'Connor was put off the idea by his comrades. In August 1838, Oastler wrote to Stephens: “O'Connor promised me that until the Star was clear and independent, he would not meddle with a daily paper.” Holyoake, Life of Stephens, p. 85.

^{page 91 note 5} Northern Star, July 18, 1840, p. 6. As soon as O'Connor came out of prison in late 1841, he was again campaigning for a daily paper, ibid., October 9, 1841, p. 1.

^{page 92 note 1} Ibid., June 23, 1838, p. 6.

^{page 92 note 2} O'Connor was editor of the Evening Star from August 23, 1842, until February 1, 1843; G. F. Pardon was the publisher. Due to heavy losses the price of the Evening Star was raised from 3d to 4d a copy, Evening Star, September 19, p. 2. According to O'Connor the paper lost £3500 supporting Chartist principles, ibid., February 1.

^{page 92 note 3} O'Connor told Chartists: “I do not ask you, already too poor, to buy this Paper, but I do ask you to push it into every resort of the Working Classes.” Evening Star, August 23, p. 2.

^{page 92 note 4} Northern Star, May 13, 1848, p. 4; Gammage, op. cit., p. 328.

^{page 92 note 5} Schoyen, p. 105; Northern Star, October 9, 1841, p. 7; January 30, p. 5. Wheeler, like so many of the Star's staff, had been connected with the Owenite movement. He was secretary of the Kensington socialists. New Moral World, November 16, 1839, p. 893. For Wheeler, see Stevens, William, A Memoir of Thomas Martin Wheeler (London, 1862)Google Scholar; obituary in Reynold's Weekly Newspaper, June 8, 1862. From 1839 to 1841, R. E. Lee, prominent figure in the unstamped as editor of The Man, was the Star's London correspondent. From 1843 Edmund Stallwood, also a veteran of the unstamped, was O'Connor's London reporter, until August 1850, after which Wheeler again took the job.

^{page 92 note 6} Northern Star, April 24, 1841, p. 7.

^{page 93 note 1} Ibid., April 30, 1842, p. 6.

^{page 93 note 2} Ibid. For accusations that the Star's reporters were just O'Connorite “tools”, see Jackson, John, The Demagogue Done Up (Bradford, 1844)Google Scholar; Parry, John Humffreys, A Letter to Feargus O'Connor, Farmer and Barrister (London, 1843)Google Scholar. According to Parry only “the Whites, the Wheelers, the Hartleys, and the Stallwood? of this world” supported O'Connor, p. 11. This pamphlet brought indignant replies from both O'Connor and White. O'Connor, F., A Letter from Feargus O'Connor, Esq., to John Humffreys Parry, Barrister at Law; But neither Farmer nor Lawyer (London, 1843)Google Scholar; White, G., An Answer to John Humffreys Parry, of the Middle Temple, Barrister at Law; and An Exposure of the Self-Styled Liberals and Free Traders (London, 1843).Google Scholar

^{page 94 note 1} Northern Star, September 16, 1843, p. 6; Stevens, A Memoir of Wheeler, op. cit., p. 24.

^{page 94 note 2} Northern Star, December 7, 1839, p. 4. O'Connor also gave £20 a year from the Star's profits to Mrs Frost, ibid., May 22, 1841, p. 5; an initial contribution from the Star to the Stephens Defence Fund was £50, February 9, 1839, p. 4; O'Connor opened the National Defence Fund with a contribution of £20, June 15, 1839, p. 4; in just over six months, while in prison, O'Connor gave £110 to the Victims Fund, December 19, 1840, p. 5. While O'Brien was in prison the Star paid his family one pound a week, totalling £80, Plummer, Bronterre, p. 153; also see O'Connor to Allsop, April 26 [1840], Allsop Collection, British Library of Political and Economic Science, University of London. Privately O'Connor complained of the great financial burden of affording such massive relief to families of victims, HO 20/10. Although we have no comprehensive breakdown of the expenditure of the Star's profits, the examples cited above and other such examples suggest that Government prosecution placed considerable strain on these profits.

^{page 94 note 3} Northern Star, September 21, 1839, p. 3.

^{page 94 note 4} See ibid., October 5, 1839, p. 4; July 18, 1840, p. 6; January 30, 1841, p. 7; June 24, 1843, p. 1; November 23, 1844, p. 1; August 26, 1848, p. 1; and Schoyen, p. 133, note 1.

^{page 95 note 1} Northern Star, January 18, 1845, p. 4.

^{page 95 note 2} Ibid., November 3, 1838, p. 8; also see editorial on first anniversary, November 17, p. 4.

^{page 95 note 3} Ibid., April 30, 1842, p. 6.

^{page 96 note 1} Ibid., August 18, 1838, p. 3; also see address of the Dewsbury Chartists to O'Connor, ibid., December 11, 1841, p. 7.

^{page 96 note 2} Ibid., January 16, 1841, p. 7.

^{page 96 note 3} Annual stamp returns were published in Parliamentary Accounts and Papers. They are also conveniently listed in the Report of the Select Committee on Newspaper Stamps, Appendix 4.

^{page 96 note 4} Northern Star, August 26, 1848, p. 1.

^{page 97 note 1} Advertising duty can also be discovered through Accounts and Papers up until 1843. Most provincial papers with half the Star's circulation had many times its advertising revenue. O'Connor often claimed that he refused advertisements in order to keep space open for politics.