Inside History: Protest. Revolt & Reform

More documents

Recommendations

Info

PETERLOOA coloured print of the Peterloo Massacre published by Richard Carlile (Public Domain/ Manchester Libraries)06 INSIDE HISTORY
How women’sbravery helpedchange Britishpolitics foreverProfessor Robert PooleUniversity of Central LancashireSt. Peter’s Fields in Manchester: the year is1819, and a crowd of around 60,000peaceful pro-democracy and antipovertyprotesters have gathered to hear radicalspeaker Henry Hunt call for parliamentaryreform. What should have been a peacefulappeal, ends with an estimated 18 deadand hundreds injured.This was a time in Britain’s history whenmost people didn’t have the vote andmany regarded the parliamentary system– which was based on property ownershipand heavily weighted towards the south ofEngland – as unrepresentative and unfair.Factory workers had very few rights andmost of them worked in appallingconditions.As Hunt began his speech, the order wasgiven for him to be arrested. After he hadgiven himself up and again urged thecrowd to order, the volunteer ManchesterYeomanry Cavalry attacked the platform,the flags, and those around with sabres,while special constables weighed in withtruncheons. A charge into the panickingcrowd by the 15th Hussars completed therout.As well as an attack on the workingclasses, Peterloo was also an episode ofviolence against women. According to thehistorian Michael Bush, women formedperhaps one in eight of the crowd, butmore than a quarter of those injured.They were not only twice as likely as mento be injured, but also more likely to beinjured by truncheons and sabres.This was no accident, for femalereformers formed part of the guard forthe flags and banners on the platform,which were attacked and seized by theManchester Yeomanry cavalry as soon asHenry Hunt had been arrested. But howdid the women come to be in such anexposed position and why were theyattacked without quarter?The female reform societies ofLancashire were a novelty, formed in thesummer of 1819 in the weeks before thegreat Manchester meeting of August 16.They were not asking for votes forwomen, but they were claiming the votefor families, and a say in how that votewas cast. In an address which was tohave been presented on the platform atPeterloo, The Manchester FemaleReformers declared that “as wives,mothers, daughters, in their social,domestic, moral capacities, they comeforward in support of the sacred cause ofliberty”.They were there supporting theirhusbands, fathers and sons in thestruggle for a radical reform ofparliament. They took care to befeminine, but not what we would callfeminists, yet they stretched theboundaries of femininity to breakingpoint and, in the eyes of governmentloyalists, renounced their right tospecial treatment.More provocative still, parties of femalereformers on reforming platformspresented flags and caps of liberty tothe male reform leaders. The cap ofliberty had been the symbol ofrevolution in France, but on theManchester Reformers’ flag it wascarried by the figure of Britannia, asshown on English coinage until the1790s.This ceremony took the patriotic ritualof women presenting colours tomilitary regiments and adapted it toradical ends. The Manchester FemaleReformers planned to proclaim:May our flag neverbe unfurled but inthe cause of peaceand reform, andthen may a female’scurse pursue thecoward who desertsthe standard.INSIDE HISTORY 07
Page 1: ISSUE 7VOLUME 1HISTORYbraveryUK £6
Page 4 and 5: INSIDETHIS ISSUE06Peterloo: How wom
Page 8 and 9: PETERLOOAt previous meetings, the a
Page 10 and 11: REBECCA RIOTSPROTEST &PETTICOATSTHE
Page 12 and 13: To some, John Brown was a revolutio
Page 14: For Brown, the continued talk of th
Page 17 and 18: Bringing Shields Green to life is D
Page 19 and 20: cynical about their motives. Their
Page 21 and 22: Bloody Sunday, 1887. This engraving
Page 23 and 24: 20th CenturyIn 1909, Clara Lemlich
Page 25 and 26: or risk a hard cold winter without
Page 27 and 28: “Remember thedignity of yourwoman
Page 29 and 30: (Above) Christabel Pankhurst, Flora
Page 31 and 32: months previously and been utterly
Page 33 and 34: WSPU’s newspaper, Suffragette, wa
Page 35 and 36: The drive behind Rosa’s fight was
Page 38 and 39: FIGHTING TO VOTEPhoto: Rokeby Venus
Page 40 and 41: "I know you will sentence me, but i
Page 42 and 43: sticks and umbrellas - were bannedf
Page 44 and 45: BILLIE HOLIDAY& THE IMPACT OFSTRANG
Page 46 and 47: BILLIE HOLIDAYIt wouldn’t take lo
Page 48 and 49: WORDS: Ben PurdieWHEREWORDSFAIL...4
Page 50 and 51: When the war in Vietnam began, many
Page 52 and 53: PROTEST &SPORT52 INSIDE HISTORY
Page 54 and 55: PROTEST & SPORTfrom the 1972 Summer
Page 56 and 57:
Demonstrators marching in the stree
Page 58 and 59:
“Let us notseek tosatisfy ourthir
Page 60 and 61:
WIR SINDDASVOLK!WEARETHEPEOPLE!Mond
Page 62 and 63:
internment camps” including Ranis
Page 64:
sticks and umbrellas - were bannedf
show all

Inside History: Protest. Revolt & Reform

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?