‘The greatest hilarity and good humour’
For some weeks now, in the villages and towns of Lancashire and the West Riding of Yorkshire, people had been preparing for their march to the great mass meeting in Manchester. That preparation included the mending and cleaning of best clothing, the crafting of festive decorations, floral and foliage buttonholes and favours, and the making of banners. Far more sinister, from the authorities’ point of view, were the reports – gleaned from James Murray among many others – of drilling and marching practice, which smacked of military discipline. What, local magistrates and constables asked themselves, was their purpose? Local people were keenly aware of such activities occurring on the moors beyond their towns and dwellings; they would acknowledge that they had watched from a distance, out of curiosity, but few were prepared to admit to participating.
More worrying still were reports coming to the magistrates’ attention that these bands of men were being drilled by British army veterans. William Morris, a weaver from White Moss, recognized a John Whitworth ‘who was a private in the 6th regiment of foot; he was drilling the men… John Hayward, who was a private in the 16th dragoons, was doing the same’.1 Morris was a veteran himself, having been a non-commissioned officer in the 104th Regiment and a recruiting officer, serving in Ireland. ‘I know what marching is,’ was his trenchant observation.2
To some, including the magistrates, these could not be preparations for a peaceful political meeting – their militaristic overtones suggestive of imminent revolution, from which violence and bloodshed must surely ensue. As early as 2 March, Henry Hobhouse had sent a private letter to Colonel Fletcher, acknowledging receipt of updates from the Bolton magistrate and his informant William Chippindale which confirmed ‘the opinion long since formed by his Lordship that your Country [region] will not be tranquillized [sic], until Blood shall have been shed either by the Law or the sword. Lord Sidmouth will not fail to be prepared for either alternative, and is confident that he will be adequately supported by the Magistracy of Lancashire.’3
Seen from another, less jaundiced point of view, the organizing and drilling of participants could be interpreted as a way of instilling discipline, thereby ensuring that the vast crowds gathered on 16 August would be anything but an unruly, riotous mob bent on destruction and revolution. If the crowds could maintain peaceable order both en route to St Peter’s Field and on the ground itself, then, it was hoped, there would be no excuse for the authorities to break up the meeting. Besides which, as argued by Bamford, the people maintained the right to do what they could to defend themselves against unprovoked attacks.
But no matter how many times Hunt and his fellow organizers requested that the people arrive unarmed and conduct themselves peacefully, no one could guarantee that everyone present was of the same mind. The authorities had been known to hire individuals who actively incited violence, which suggested that the so-called ‘peace makers’, the magistrates and constables, could not be fully trusted either.
On the day, the crowds would march in formation, accompanied by music and banners or ‘colours’. Dr Joseph Healey later explained (in court) that in Lancashire ‘military habits are almost interwoven with the people’ who ‘walk in procession with music and flags’.4 His point was that the practice of orderly marching was rooted in local tradition and culture.5 James Dyson, a Middleton weaver, observed that ‘it is customary at our wakes and rush-carts in Lancashire to have banners and music; the rush carts are held of a Saturday, and on the following Monday the men walk in procession’, although, he adds, ‘they do not keep the step’.6 Samuel Bamford elaborated on this description: ‘it is an annual custom to have a cart on which rushes are neatly placed; this cart is drawn by young men decorated with ribbons, and preceded by young women, music, &c.’7
Healey, Dyson and Bamford present the marching not as an overture to bloodshed and unrest, but as an extension of these community parades and as a means to preserve public order.8 William Morris adds another dimension: ‘I have seen many processions with music at Middleton, of the Orangemen, and Odd Fellows; they had flags and inscriptions.’9 John Eaton, a plumber and glazier from Middleton, also observed that the ‘procession of the Orangemen and Odd Fellows (one of whom I am) often move in regular order… Our flag is called the Union, but it has no inscription. I don’t know Mr. Fletcher, the Magistrate, but that he is in our lodge.’10 In other words, there was a cultural link between the parading of the magistrates in their loyalist fraternities* and the marches being planned by those drilling on the moors in support of parliamentary reform.
Writing in the 1870s, the folklorists John Harland and Thomas Wilkinson observed that in Lancashire ‘formerly almost every parish had its rush-carts and rush-bearing festival’.11 These customs were also current in the West Riding of Yorkshire.12 Some of these rush-carts were extraordinary structures: ‘On a fixed day in every year – in Rochdale on the 19th August – a kind of obtuse pyramid of rushes, erected on a cart, is highly ornamented in front, and surmounted by a splendid garland. To the vehicle so laden, from thirty to forty young men, wearing white jackets and ornamented with ribbons and flowers, are harnessed in pairs.’ On arrival at the parish church, ‘the rushes were spread on the clay floor under the benches used as seats by the congregation, to serve as a winter carpet; while the garlands were hung up in the chancel and over the pews of the families by whom they had been presented, where they remained till their beauty faded.’13
In a description of the procession from 1825, the author recalls that these ‘carts are sometimes drawn by horses gaily caparisoned, but more frequently by young men, to the number of twenty or thirty couple, profusely adorned with ribands [sic], tinsel, &c. They were generally preceded by men with horse-bells about them, grotesquely jumping from side to side, and jingling the bells.’14
Music was a key communal activity and a core element of the parades. And it was to be an integral part of the march to Manchester. Firstly, it helped the marchers keep to the pace; secondly, it indicated local affiliation and pride; thirdly, it provided a rallying point on the field itself; and lastly – and just as important – it helped to keep the folk entertained on the journey to and from Manchester. Music was also integral to Christian services, whether Methodist or Church of England. Singing was particularly important in Methodism, the great Wesleyan hymns forming part of a large body of religious songs which supported the act of communal worship. In 1815 Jonathan Crowther observed, ‘Singing makes a more considerable part of the worship of the Methodists than perhaps of that of any other denomination of Christians; hardly any exercise, so powerfully affects and raises the soul to heavenly things, as that of singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. The hymns used, by the Methodists not only breathe a spirit of piety, but are beautifully poetic.’15 One of the most popular, now as then, was Charles Wesley’s ‘Rejoice the Lord is King’, later set to music by the great eighteenth-century composer, and naturalized Briton, George Frideric Handel:
Rejoice, the Lord is King,
Your Lord and King adore;
Mortals give thanks and sing,
And triumph evermore:
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice;
Rejoice, again I say, rejoice!16
In Anglican services the congregation and choir were supported by ‘Gallery Minstrels’ of varying levels of accomplishment. In 1831 John La Trobe, giving advice to harassed vicars, believed that very bad musical habits had developed over the previous decades, particularly in rural parishes: ‘In the place of the boisterous anthems and fugues, as they are impudently termed, which so generally obtain in country churches, he would seek to substitute simpler and more sober compositions… adhering to the genuine church tune, specimens of which are still extant in the very worst orchestras.’ La Trobe favoured tunes such as the staple known as ‘Old Hundredth’, to which Psalm 100, ‘All people that on earth do dwell’, was set. Next, he draws the vicar’s attention to ‘the instruments, badly-sorted and worse played’. Bassoons, he declares, should be dispensed with immediately. Finally:
When he is able to devote an hour to his singers, he will find ample employment. The evils that require a reforming hand are chiefly these, – singing out of tune, frequently too flat, with a nasal twang, – straining the voice to an unnatural pitch, as though it were a contest of physical strength, – introducing awkward drawls, and tasteless ornaments. To remedy these defects, time, care, patience, and perseverance would be required, – but the reward would be ample.17
For the local rush-cart celebrations, Samuel Bamford recalled, ‘Musicians were also secured in good time; a fiddler for the chamber dancing always, and never less than a couple of fifers and a drummer to play before the cart.’ ‘But,’ he continues, ‘if the funds would allow, and especially in later times, a band of instrumentalists would be engaged, often a sorry affair certainly, but still “a band” to swear to, and that would be a great thing for the ears of the multitude.’18 All in all, local musicians seem to have been famed more for their enthusiasm and gusto than for their musicianship.
These parades traditionally occurred in the late summer – precisely the time of year when the meeting at St Peter’s Field was to be held: ‘The practice is general in the months of July, August, and September. Those held round this place are at Ashworth, Littlebro, Minbrow [Milnrow?], Shaw, Oldham, Royton, Middleton, Heywood, and Whitworth; the customs at each place being much alike.’19 The Rochdale parade occurred every year on the same day, 19 August. Spectators too were an important part of the festivities: ‘A band of music is always in attendance, which strikes up on the cart moving on, and thousands of spectators, attracted from a distance of ten or even twenty miles around, hail with repeated cheers the showy pageant.’20
In his autobiography, Bamford provides a detailed description of the annual rush bearing at Middleton, as he calls it, ‘the great feast of the year’.21 This usually occurred on the third Saturday in August, so in 1819 it was due to occur five days after the meeting at St Peter’s Field. The rush-cart processions, like the reformers’ march, required preparation and organization well in advance. In both cases, Middleton and Rochdale, the preparations for these two separate events would have been combined.
Bamford describes the evolution of the rush-cart ceremony, from a simple means of keeping parishioners’ feet warm during winter church services, to a much more elaborate event, through a natural individual and then collective competitive spirit; ‘thus the present quaint and graceful “rush-cart” would be in time produced. Music, dancing, and personal finery would accompany and keep pace with the increasing display; the feast would become a spectacle for all the surrounding districts, and the little wood-shadowed village, would annually become a scene of a joyous gathering and a hospital festivity.’22 The young women ‘would all be employed at over-hours getting their own finery and that of their brothers or sweethearts ready for the great even[t]’.23
The overall effect of the parades was of colour, movement, noise, gaiety and pageant, not least because of the participants’ banners or ‘colours’, as described in 1825. Following the men with ‘horse-bells’, already quoted,
is a band of music, and sometimes a set of morris dancers (but without the ancient appendage of bells), followed by young women bearing garlands; then comes the banner made of silk of various colors [sic], joined by narrow riband [sic] fretted, the whole profusely covered on both sides with roses, stars, &c., of tinsel (which in this part is called horse gold), and which, being viewed when the sun shines upon it, dazzles the eye. The banners are generally from four to five yards broad, and six to eight yards long, having on either side in the centre a painting of Britannia, the king’s arms, or some other device.24
The colours on 16 August would not only show the pride of the local people, emblazoned with messages behind which all could happily march, but would also, like the band, create a rallying point for anyone who lost their way in what was expected to be an enormous crowd.
A committee of Middleton residents met at Langley Dingle, ‘a pleasant and retired spot’, to discuss the upcoming march. After his unsatisfactory meeting with Henry Hunt, and bearing in mind the confrontation with James Murray at White Moss, Samuel Bamford was fearful of what the authorities might do. He attempted to persuade his fellow townsmen that some of their contingent should be armed, ready to defend themselves, their loved ones and, as important in his eyes, their banners, the protection of which he saw as a matter of local and personal honour: ‘I, now more than ever, impressed with the belief that we should meet with opposition of some sort, proposed that a party of men with stout cudgels should be appointed to take care of the colours, in order, that at all events, they might be preserved. This was discussed at some length, but the more confiding [ie trusting] views of my neighbours, together with Mr. Hunt’s admonition prevailing, my suggestion was over-ruled, and we shortly after separated.’25
On the Monday, Middleton was abuzz by eight o’clock in the morning.26 Some were gathering for the march, while others waited around to see this extraordinary mass of local people set off. The crowd came together on open ground at Barrowfields. The Middleton weaver James Dyson was among the throng. He recalled that between nine and ten o’clock there were six or seven hundred people, men, women and children present.27 Although parades were common, nothing on this scale had taken place in the town before and the excitement must have been palpable. All those present, according to Bamford, were prepared to show a collective strength, a unity of aim and spirit, but in a manner that was peaceful and joyous.
In forming the parade, Samuel Bamford noted, twelve of the most ‘comely and decent-looking youths’ were placed at the front in two rows of six, each holding a laurel branch ‘as a token of amity and peace’. They were followed by men from the various districts that had gathered at Middleton, in rows of five. The band came next, ‘an excellent one’, followed by the colours. The first was a silk square in a rich Prussian blue with elegant gold inscriptions, likely to stir the heart and soul: ‘Unity and Strength’, the date ‘1819’ at the lower edge, and on the reverse, ‘Liberty and Fraternity’. The next was green silk, again with gold inscriptions: ‘Parliaments Annual’, ‘Suffrage Universal’ – the core demands, indeed rights, of the freeborn Englishman. Between these two, on a tall staff, was a red velvet Cap of Liberty, ‘tastefully braided with the word, LIBERTAS’.28 The remainder of the men, from the districts of Back-o’th’-Brow, Heatons and Blackley, followed on, again in rows of five abreast. Each group had a leader, wearing a sprig of laurel, who followed the directions from a man at the head of a column – Bamford called these latter individuals ‘principal conductors’ – who were all tasked with maintaining orderliness and, more broadly, keeping this large group of people together. A bugle sounded, a silence descended on those gathered, and Samuel Bamford prepared to address them with a mixture of pride, hope and caution.
Dyson recalled that Bamford climbed onto a chair and commenced with the greeting, ‘Friends and neighbours.’29 Bamford himself, many years later, summarized his speech:
I reminded them, that they were going to attend the most important meeting that had ever been held for Parliamentary Reform, and I hoped their conduct would be marked by a steadiness and seriousness befitting the occasion, and such as would cast shame upon their enemies, who had always represented the reformers as a mob-like rabble: but they would see they were not so that day. I requested they would not leave their ranks, nor shew carelessness, not inattention to the order of their leaders; but that they would walk comfortably and agreeably together. Not to offer any insult or provocation by word or deed; nor to notice any persons who might do the same by them, but to keep such persons as quiet as possible; for if they begun to retaliate, the least disturbance might serve as a pretext for dispersing the meeting. If the peace officers should come to arrest myself or any other person, they were not to offer any resistance, but suffer them to execute their office peaceably. When at the meeting, they were to keep themselves as select as possible, with their banners in the centre, so that if individuals straggled, or got away from the main body, they would know where to find them again by seeing their banners; and when the meeting was dissolved, they were to get close around their banners and leave the town as soon as possible, lest, should they stay drinking, or loitering about the streets, their enemies should take advantage, and send some of them to the New Bailey.
Bamford also announced the resolution of the committee that ‘no sticks, nor weapons of any description, would be allowed to be carried in the ranks; and those who had such, were requested to put them aside, or leave them with some friend until their return’. As a result, he recalls, many sticks were left behind ‘and a few only, of the oldest and most infirm amongst us, were allowed to carry their walking staves’. He concludes, ‘I may say with truth, that we presented a most respectable assemblage of labouring men; all were decently, though humbly attired; and I noticed not even one, who did not exhibit a white Sundays’ shirt, a neck-cloth, and other apparel in the same clean, though homely condition.’30
James Dyson remembered that Bamford’s address was met with hearty cheers.31 Then the column was formed, and the band struck up a lively tune as the silk banners waved and flashed in the bright sunlight. Dyson recalled:
We had music on that day; we had a drum; they do not use it in church music unless at oratorios. We have sacred music sometimes in church, at Middleton; we also have bassoons and clarionets, &c. occasionally on [Sundays]. The bassoon, in our party, belonged to the man who played it; the drum belonged to a man who keeps a farm… Thomas Ogden, a musician; he did play in church… I know [Thomas] Fitton: he and Ogden played with our party.32
The Rochdale party then joined that of Middleton and Bamford writes that another shout, this time from a several thousand-strong assembly, ‘startled the echoes of the woods and dingles. Then all was quiet save the breath of music; and with intent seriousness, we went on.’33 James Dyson says that, ‘There were men by the side to keep order, and when the step was lost it was recovered again by their calling out, “Left – Right.”’34
The combined group was now led by a few hundred women, mainly the young wives (‘mine own’, Bamford later recalled, ‘was amongst them’) and ‘our handsomest girls, – sweethearts to the lads who were with us’. Mary Yates, a mother of six, was walking within this group and recalled, ‘I saw Bamford’s wife on the way. We walked arm-and-arm together.’35 They danced to the music, or sang along to the popular airs. A few of the children were sent back, but some continued with the main party. Among the young women was Elizabeth Sheppard, fourteen years old and the daughter of a Middleton publican.36 On that bright, hopeful morning, as Bamford recounted, ‘we went in the greatest hilarity and good humour, preceded by a band of music, which played several loyal and national airs ; and that our fathers, our mothers, our wives, our children, and our sweethearts were with us.’37 ‘And thus,’ he continued, ‘we went slowly towards Manchester.’38
Mima Bamford recollected that, ‘I was determined to go to the meeting, and should have followed, even if my husband had refused his consent to my going with the procession.’ She had heard ‘that if the country people went with their caps of liberty, and their banners, and music, the soldiers would be brought to them’. As a result, she says, ‘I was uneasy, and felt persuaded, in my mind, that something would be the matter, and I had best go with my husband, and be near him; and if I only saw him I should be more content than in staying at home.’ Having left her little daughter, Ann, with a kindly neighbour, Mima ‘joined some of the married females at the head of the procession’. However, she continued to worry and, when glancing across at her husband, ‘an ominous impression smote my heart. He looked very serious, I thought, and I felt a foreboding of something evil to befall us that day.’ Clearly Mima, knowing Samuel as well as she did, sensed his inner concerns, which his cheerful and encouraging demeanour belied. She continues, ‘I was dressed plainly as a countrywoman, in my second best attire. My companions were also neatly dressed as the wives of working men; I had seen Mr. Hunt before that time; they had not, and some of them were quite eager to obtain good places, that they might see and hear one of whom so much had been reported.’39
William Elson, a farmer, had joined the procession, accompanied by three of his children: his daughter, aged seventeen, and two sons aged fourteen and thirteen. All three had begged their parents to allow them to participate. Even so, ‘I should not have allowed my children to go to the meeting,’ Elson said later, ‘had I apprehended any disturbance or riot; nor would I have gone myself, had I entertained such a fear… I had no other motive but curiosity in going to the meeting.’40
Mary Lees, a mother of five, married to a plumber and glazier from Middleton, stood at the door of her house with her children to watch the procession pass through the town. ‘They all seemed quiet and cheerful,’ she recalled, noting a great number of women among the Rochdale party. The women, she said, ‘were persons of good character’. Mrs Lees remembered that several toasts were made, ‘among the rest “God save the King,” which though not a common toast, is made use of by the country people.’ She also heard the cry ‘Hunt for ever!’41
* ‘Orangemen’ refers to members of the Orange Order, a Protestant fraternity originally formed in support of William III (of Orange). The Oddfellows were a benevolent society akin to the Freemasons in structure.