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The United Englishmen and Radical Politics in the Industrial North-West of England, 1795–1803*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2008

Alan Booth
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The theory of a secret revolutionary tradition, closely woven into the fabric of early working-class activity and surfacing at particular moments of crisis, continues to fascinate historians. In their attempts to assess its validity much recent effort has been directed at the ten years following the introduction of the infamous Two Acts in December 1795. There has been intensive study of the secret societies in the metropolis and their counterparts in the West Riding of Yorkshire and of their relationship to the Irish rebels. Yet whilst it si now generally recognised that radicalism did not simply evaporate in the oppressive aftermath of the “gagging acts”, its nature and significance continue to provoke disagreement. This paper is a contribution to this debate and an attempt to help stitch together a convincing account of plebeian protest in a region which, despite its prominent position in the radical history of this period, has received little systematic attention.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Review of Social History , Volume 31 , Issue 3 , December 1986 , pp. 271 - 297
Copyright
Copyright © Internationaal Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis 1986

References

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17 Notably James Dixon and Richard Stansfield. Charles Bent may also have been a member of both bodies, and Thomas Devenney and James Coulter were also suspected of joint membership.

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28 Leeds, Mercury, 24 06 1797Google Scholar. See also Further Information of Dixon, J., 7 05 1798.Google Scholar

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30 Information was hidden from novitiates as in 1801. Joseph Jackson, a Stockport cotton-spinner, revealed that only certain parts of some printed articles were read to him at his initiation, Voluntary Examination of Jackson, J., 3 05 1798, HO 42/43.Google Scholar Other members knew very little of the inner workings of the society. See Examination of S. Ashworth, 16 April; Examination of R. Gray, 15 April; Bancroft to Portland, 24 November 1797.

31 Wadsworth, A. and de Lacy Mann, J., The Cotton Trade and Industrial Lancashire (Manchester, 1911), p. 313;Google ScholarDaniels, G. W., “The Cotton Trade During the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars”, in: Transactions of the anchester Statistical Society, 1915–16, pp. 59–61;Google ScholarHelm, E., Chapters in the Manchester Chamber of Commerce (Manchester, 1902);Google ScholarEdwards, M. M., The Growth of the British Cotton Trade, 1780–1815 (London, 1967), p. 12.Google Scholar

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33 Examination of Gray, R., 15 04 1798.Google Scholar

34 James Dixon told of twenty-five divisions of the society in Manchester, Further Information of J. Dixon, 7 May. See also “Notes 1 and 2, found at William Cheetham's in the one pair of stairs, 14 April 1798”, HO 42/40.

35 Examination of Ashworth, S., 16 04Google Scholar; Examination of Patterson, S., 17 04Google Scholar; Patterson, S. to Bayley, , 24 05, PC 1/42/A143. See also the notebook “found in Mr. Mime's back yard after Patterson had left the yard, 23 03 1798”, PC 1/41/A136. This contained the initials of seventeen members and was clearly a divisional record.Google Scholar

36 Rev.Waring, J. to Home Office, 15 02, PC 1/42/A 152.Google Scholar Similarly ridiculous were reports of 1,800 “put-up” in Wigan, , Bayley to Wickham, 31 03, PC 1/41/A136.Google Scholar

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39 See especially Elliott, Partners in Revolution, passim.

40 See Goodwin, , The Friends of Liberty, pp. 432–38Google Scholar; Wells, , Insurrection, pp. 75–76Google Scholar; Elliott, , Partners in Revolution, pp. 145–46, 174–82.Google Scholar

41 Further Evidence of R. Gray, 15 April 1798; Floud to Wickham, 14 April, PC 1/41/A139; Minutes taken from R. Gray, 23 March; Further Information of J. Dixon, 7 May. The printer and newspaper proprietor William Cowdroy, however, had certainly printed numbers of the United Constitutions for the society, Examination of W. Cowdroy, 15 April.

42 Examination of R. Gray, 15 April; Bayley to Lord Stanley, 1 April. See also Minutes taken from R. Gray, 23 March.

43 The infiltration of Joseph Tankard, a sergeant in the Galloway Fencibles quartered at Manchester, did much to confirm Gray's testimony. See the Information of J. Tankard, 15 April, HO 42/45; Examination of J. Murdoch, 14 April, PC 1/41/A139; Brownrigg to Wickham, 29 April 1799, HO 50/9; Examinations respecting Simmonds, April 1798, PC 1/41/A139; Lord Stanley to Earl of Derby, April; Bayley to Lord Stanley, 3 April, ibid.; Blackburn Mail, 5 July 1797; Examination of R. Henwood, 13 April 1798, PC 1/41/A139; Examination of J. Harrison, 26 April, PC 1/41/A140; Further Informatin of J. Dixon, 7 May. The authorities strongly suspected others, but lack of evidence precluded prosecution, Wickham to Brownrigg, 28 April, HO 51/152/172.

44 For opposing views on this, see Goodwin, , The Friends of Liberty, pp. 441–42;Google ScholarWells, , Insurrection, pp. 76–77, 126–27.Google Scholar

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46 Examination of R. Gray, 19 March, HO 42/45.

47 Examination of Gray, R., 15 03, PC 1/41/A136Google Scholar. Other Irish agents had also stressed the strength of the Irish societies and their military preparedness, Examination of J. Dixon, 5 May. Confidence in invasion was therefore high among radicals in the North-West, see Examinations of J. Murdoch, April, HO 42/45; Bancroft to Portland, 7 January, PC 1/40/A133; Bayley to Wickham, 26 and 28 March, PC 1/41/A136; Examination of J. Tankard, 15 April. However, only in Cumberland did anything resembling a plan of revolution come to light, Senhouse to Portland, 28 April 1799; Lawson to Portland, 27 March, HO 42/47.

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53 Bancroft to Portland, 7 January. For evidence that this was also true in Manchester, see Mrs Greg to W. Rathbone, April, Rathbone Papers II 1/65, Liverpool University Library; Examination of J. Dixon, 5 May.

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58 See the Manchester Mercury for April onwards; Harrop, J. to Freeling, 16 04, HO 42/213; Bayley to Wickham, 15 09, HO 100/66/233.Google Scholar

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63 Orr, G. to King, , 12 and 20 09 1799, PC 1/44/A161Google Scholar; id. to King, 12 October, HO 100/87/310; Notes on the Irish residents at Liverpool, enclosed in R. Fletcher to Pelham, 18 November 1801, PC 1/3534.

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65 Enclosure in Littleholes, E. to Wickham, , 14 01 1799, HO 100/85/69.Google Scholar See also enclosure in Shaw, J. to Castlereagh, , 26 03, HO 100/86/228.Google Scholar

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83 Th. to Peel, 12 March, HO 42/61. See also Hodgkinson to Lilford, 22 March; Bayley to Portland, 30 November 1800, HO 42/53; Manchester, Gazette, 27 12; Bancroft to King, 9 02 1801, HO 42/61; Bayley to Home Office, 21 10; Mayor of Wigan to Portland, 20 09, HO 42/51.Google Scholar

84 Bayley, to Portland, 21 03 1801, HO 42/61.Google Scholar

85 A.B. to Home Office, 22 March. On the tension in Lancashire in this month, see also the letters of Bancroft and Ainsworth in HO 42/61; Hodgkinson to Lilford, 22 March.

86 Wells, , Insurrection, pp. 187, 195–209.Google Scholar

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89 Bayley, to Portland, 21 03 1801.Google Scholar

90 Id. to Home Office, 18 November 1800, HO 42/53.

91 Major Clayton to Home Office, 5 November, HO 42/53. On the Yorkshire meetings, see Wells, , Insurrection, pp. 186, 194–95Google Scholar; Donnelly, and Baxter, , “Sheffield and the English Revolutionary Tradition”, loc. cit., pp. 406–07.Google Scholar

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93 Bancroft to King, , 9 02 1801Google Scholar; Watson, H. to Bayley, , 15 11 1800, HO 42/53Google Scholar. In particular James Moorhouse and John Magee were back at work, Bayley to Portland, 15 and 16 November 1800, HO 42/53; Bancroft to King, , 15 12, HO 42/55Google Scholar. See also Bayley, to King, , 1611 1799, PC 1/45/A164, for early evidence of a renewal of radical activity in Stockport.Google Scholar

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98 Wells, , Insurrection, pp. 209–13Google Scholar; Elliott, , Partners in Revolution, p. 284.Google Scholar

99 Th. Coke to Portland, 7 and 18 April 1801, HO 42/61; Bancroft to Portland, 2 May; Hay to Portland, 4 May, HO 42/62.

100 Examination of Th. Bennett, 21 May, and Examination of Nadin, J., 20 05 1801, HO 48/10Google Scholar. See also Hay to Portland, 4 and 13 May, and Bancroft to Portland, 2 and 27 May, HO 42/62.

101 Copy of the Commitment […] of those arrested on 18 March 1801, HO 42/61; Chester Courant, 24 March. The spy Hilton claimed that Bent had read this out to the audience, Information of Hilton, E., 18 03, HO 42/61.Google Scholar

102 Further Evidence of Gray, R., 15 04 1798Google Scholar; Further Information of Dixon, J., 7 05.Google Scholar

103 Notably John Rushworth Robert Gill, John Bennett and John Scorr. SeeFletcher, to Pelham, , 31 07 1802Google Scholar, HO 42/66; Examination of Halliwell, G., 18 03 1801Google Scholar, HO 42/61; Examination of Nadin, J., 20 05; Recognisance olls, 1801, Lancashire County Record Office QSB1/1801 (Gill).Google Scholar

104 Bancroft to Portland, 27 May; Examination of Th. Kay, 4 April, HO 42/61.

105 Examination of Th. Bennett, 21 May.

106 Bancroft to Portland, 17 May, HO 42/62.

107 Examination of Nadin, J., 20 05.Google Scholar

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113 Examination of Nadin, J., 20 05.Google Scholar

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115 Hay to Portland, 18 May.

116 Examination of Th. Bennett, 20 May, and Informations of P. Doran and W. Bowman, 3 April, HO 48/10; Hay to Portland, 18 May and 17 06.

117 Cobbett's Parliamentary History, XXV, c. 1306: Second Report of the Commons Committee of Secrecy, 15 May 1801. For the printed rules on the appointment and duties of the Conductors and the oath of allegiance, see ibid., c. 1301: Report of the Lords Committee.

118 This test had first been discovered at the Britannia Inn meeting of 18 March in the pocket of the leading speaker, Charles Bent, Hay to Portland, 18 May.

119 See Wells, , Insurrection, pp. 213–15, for the impact of the London radicals.Google Scholar See also J. A. Busfield to Fitzwilliam, 14 April, Fitzwilliam Papers, f. 45/12, Sheffield Central Library.

120 Fletcher, to Portland, 6 06, HO 42/61.Google Scholar See Manchester Mercury, Chester Courant and Blackburn Mail, April-July. On the wave of arrests, see especially “Calendar of Crown Prisoners [ ‖] in Lancaster Castle”, 24 March, Lancashire County Record Office QJC/19; Examinations of Buckley, J., Stanfield, J. and Jackson, J., 3 05, HO 48/10Google Scholar; Fletcher, to Portland, 6 07, HO 42162Google Scholar; Hatton, to White, , 6 08, HO 49/3Google Scholar; Court Order Book, 1801, Lancashire County Record Office QSO.

121 Hay to Portland, 7 June, and Fletcher, to Portland, 6 06, HO 42/62Google Scholar. The same was true of Yorkshire, Bancroft, to Portland, 23 07, HO 42/62.Google Scholar

122 Bancroft to Portland, 2 May, 9, 23 and 29 June, and Fletcher, to Portland, 31 July, HO 42/62. For Robinson's activities in 1797 see above, p. 278.Google Scholar

123 Fletcher, to Portland, 6 07 July 1801.Google Scholar For the reasons for this difference of opinion, see Hone, , For the Cause of Truth, p. 96.Google Scholar

124 Fletcher, to Portland, 28 07, HO 42/62. See his note “To the Friends of Freedom at Manchester, 20 June 1797”, PC 1/43/A152.Google Scholar

125 Id. to Portland, 28 July; to Pelham, 31 August and 2 November, HO 42/62; to Pelham, 7 January and 3 April 1802, HO 42/65.

126 Manchester, , 10 10 1801Google Scholar. See also Rowbottom, , 10, 8 11.Google Scholar

127 Rowbottom, , 16 11. The trade revival continued in the following year, Report from the Select Committee on Manufactures, Commerce and Shipping [Parliamentary Papers, 1833, VI], q. 9437; Blackburn Mail, 26 May 1802; Daniels, “The Cotton Trade During the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars”, loc. cit., p. 63.Google Scholar

128 Fletcher to Pelham, 7 and 27 January, 3 April, 31 July 1802, HO 42/65. See also the many letters from Liverpool to Home Office, ibid. Ireland was still felt to be the scene of the “first burst of Rebellion”.

129 Fletcher, to Pelham, 7 01 and 3 03Google Scholar. Cheetham, one of the State prisoners of April 1798, had been released in March 1801, and was soon “very forward to renew his evil Practices and to avow his bad Principles”, Bayley to Portland, 11 April, HO 42/61.

130 Fletcher, to Pelham, 3 04 1802Google Scholar; Donnelly, and Baxter, , “Sheffield and the English Revolutionary Tradition”, p. 409.Google Scholar

131 Fletcher to Pelham, 7 July 1802, HO 42/65.

132 J. Notary to Bruce Mr, 7 February 1803, in M.W. Patterson Sir, Francis Burdett and his Times (2 vols; London, 1931), I, p. 169.

133 Fletcher to King, 8 April 1802, HO 42/70.

134 See Fletcher's letters to King and Pelham in HO 42/72, 73, 77, 80–82. On the growing state of watchfulness at Liverpool letters in HO 42/67, 68, 71.

135 Fletcher to King, 24 December 1805, HO 42/83. He was immediately ordered to dismantle his spy network, enclosed note from King, ibid.

136 Hay to Portland, 7 June 1801.

137 Elliott, Partners in Revolution, passim.

138 Wells, Insurrection, ch. 12. On the French invasion of 1797, see Jones, E.H. Stuart, The Last Invasion (Cardiff, 1950)Google Scholar. For the reaction to the invasion of 1797 in the NorthWest, see Recollections of a Nonagenarian (Liverpool, 1863), PP. 53–55.

139 On the attempts of this small band of activists to turn events to their advantage, see King to J. Leaf, 24 May 1803, HO 42/70; Fletcher to Home Office, 23 November 1804, HO 42/79; id. to King, 16 February 1805, HO 42/80; id. to King, 16 January and 7 March, HO 42/82; Chippendale to Fletcher, 29 January 1806, HO 42/87; id. to Fletcher, 25 December 1807, in Fletcher to Home Office, 27 December, HO 42/91; Fletcher to Home Office, February 1808, HO 42/95. On the Luddite disturbances Dinwiddy, “Luddism and Politics in the Northern Counties”, bc. cit. Copies of the United oath were found at the scene of the attack on Westhoughton factory, Leigh Monthly Magazine, 1845, p. 3.