Part 2

"Perhaps it would be said that the course of policy hitherto pursued in Ireland was a bad one. Let that be granted, then, for the sake of argument; still, was it possible to remove the evils of that bad and imperfect policy in an hour--or by the 25th of April? Would it be possible, even to gentlemen opposite, to change on a sudden the whole habits and manners of so large a class of the community, and to introduce, as by magic, a radical and effectual reform? It was utterly impossible. He was perfectly satisfied of the inefficiency of these temporary remedies, but meanwhile the hand of the robber must be arrested, or else the whole frame of civilized society must be now dissolved, and a residence in Ireland be rendered absolutely impracticable. He was of opinion that good might be done in that country by a reformation of the police, and he should prefer an army of police if he might so call it, to a military army. He deeply regretted the very imperfect character of the police in Ireland. Since he had the honour of filling the station he occupied, he had turned much of his attention to the subject of police, and proposed alterations which the House had sanctioned. Real, substantial, and permanent reform, however, amongst the lower classes, could be looked for only from the general diffusion of knowledge, and from enlightening their minds. From such sources of reform he anticipated the grandest and the noblest results. (Hear, hear, hear.) He could state it as a fact within his own knowledge, that the greatest eagerness for instruction prevailed amongst the lower classes. It was the duty of every one, even in these times of economy, not to obstruct the progress or the limits of education, which ought to be as widely as possible diffused. It would be infinitely better for Ireland and for this country to have a well instructed and enlightened Catholic population than an ignorant and a bigoted one!"

Hansard's _Debates_, Vol. XXXII. pp. 926, 1816.

THE STATE OF ENGLAND (1818).

=Source.=--_Life and Correspondence of Lord Sidmouth_, by Dean Pellew. Vol. III. p. 242. London, 1847.

_Letter from Earl of Sheffield to Lord Sidmouth._

"Sheffield Place, Dec. 13th, 1818.

"My dear Lord,

"Although I doubt not your Lordship has ample information, I cannot resist the pleasure of communicating the very satisfactory accounts I have received from different parts, of the state of trade and manufactures, and particularly from the neighbourhood of Birmingham, Warwickshire, and Staffordshire. Both trade and manufactures are in a flourishing condition, and likely to improve still further. There appears to be little speculation beyond the regular demands of the different markets, men without adequate capital finding it almost impossible to procure credit; so that there is now no disposition to force a trade, and no injurious competition among the merchants to procure the execution of orders, and, consequently, wages are fair and reasonable. I conceive that things cannot be in a much better train either for the merchant or manufacturer, not so for the constitution or agriculture of the country: the first, I fear, is _en décadence_; the case, however, of the latter is somewhat better than it was, though far short of that of the trading part of the community. The demand for land is considerably increased, but in many instances at reduced rents. Agriculture, the most essential of all concerns, is so extremely depressed by the great increase of tithes and of parochial rates, that I cannot refrain from being its strenuous advocate: and so strongly am I impressed with the evil consequences of the excessive load of such taxation on the landed interests, and particularly on the occupiers in the southern and midland parts of England, that it is wonderful to me that agriculture has not been in those districts annihilated; and there is nothing of which I am more thoroughly convinced than the necessity of affording it every relief and encouragement possible. I do not conceive that the subject of the corn laws can be renewed at present with advantage. The ignorance and supineness of the landowners generally is so excessive; the violence of the middling and lower classes so overbearing; the use made of it by the popularity hunters of all descriptions so pernicious and vile; the fears of government so great, and at the same time so natural, that, upon the whole, I do not entertain a hope of any beneficial results from any efforts that are now making, or may be made, for a considerable time. It is greatly to be regretted, however, that in the last correction of the corn laws, foreign grain, under any circumstances, should be admitted duty free; it would have been sufficient to have lowered the import duties, as to wheat, when the price in our market was 5l. per quarter; but I by no means wish ministers so soon to be embroiled again on that subject, nor do I think, earnest as I am on this head, that this is the proper time to renew the discussion, or to attempt a change with respect to the duties. I would not, however, wish to damp the ardour of those who urge the principle, that every thing arising from the soil, and every manufacture of the country, should be protected by adequate import duties; as that principle is generally observed with regard to every article except wool, and must be in a country so heavily tithed, and necessarily burdened with such an extraordinary degree of taxation. Previously to the year 1793, no direct or assessed tax, affecting agriculture, was tolerated, and surely it is now expedient, whenever possible, to relinquish those taxes which particularly affect that most essential interest of the country, and to adopt such other measures as will enable it to support the heavy imposts which fall upon it. The legislature might now show attention to the grievances of the occupiers of land, by relinquishing all the direct taxes imposed on agriculture during the late war; and it will only be common justice to protect the wool of the country from being debased in value, by the import of wool from every part of the world free of duty, and it is not difficult to demonstrate that a moderate duty on the import of foreign wool would not affect, even in a slight degree, the great mass of our woollen manufacture.... The levity of the public on the most interesting and important subjects is often not only very extraordinary, but even ridiculous. The well-founded alarm on the ruinous and impolitic management of the poor, which appeared to make a deep and general impression, seems now to be forgotten except by the oppressed occupiers of lands, who so severely feel the effects of it. The public mind is not yet ripe for such a great measure as might prove an effectual remedy; but in the meantime I think something might be done. Is your Lordship disposed to repeal all the laws relating to the poor (heterogeneous, discordant, impracticable, unintelligible, and absurd as they are), to the 43d of Elizabeth, and to re-enact all those parts of them which the circumstances of the times may require (defining the powers of the magistrates, the parish officers, and the claims of the poor), and form them into a regular intelligible code? for I verily believe there is not one magistrate, nor any clerk (who governs him) who is acquainted with them all. I believe I am one of the oldest magistrates in the kingdom, being in my fiftieth year, and yet I have never met with any man who seemed fully acquainted with them. If an intelligent select committee, having a practical knowledge of the subject (without which the ablest men are not competent to it), could be induced to undertake this work, I have no doubt but that a law could be so framed as to lead to a great amelioration of our present vile system, if not gradually to a complete remedy. But I must not impose more of my notions on your Lordship. You must be now quite tired of me. If you think there is any thing in this letter worthy of Lord Liverpool's attention, I wish it to be communicated to him; but as I inflicted on his Lordship some time ago a large dose respecting the poor, I refrain from a direct communication. I am, seemingly, as well as ever I was; but I must not risk myself in town before the end of March, except for two nights on the meeting of parliament, in order to take my seat and enable me to leave a proxy. I have the honour to be, with very sincere regard, my dear Lord, most truly your Lordship's faithful servant,

"SHEFFIELD."

PARISH REGISTERS (1818).

=Source.=--_The London Medical Repository_, Vol. X. p. 267.

_George Man Burrows on Parish Registers._

But I must reiterate, that it will be a work of supererogation to offer either remarks or proposals for establishing improved registers of marriages, births, baptisms, burials, diseases, &c. or for attaining any of the other objects upon which I have dilated, unless all denominations of religion in the whole of the united kingdom be included.

On recapitulation, it appears that the principal defects in the present system are:

1. Registers of marriages, births, baptisms, and burials, or bills of mortality are not kept in every place of religious worship; nor in hospitals and infirmaries having private burying-grounds.

2. Children who die unbaptized are not entered in any register or bill of mortality.

3. Registers of baptism do not set forth the place and date of birth.

4. Registers of burial do not specify where a person died, as well as where he lived, nor his condition, whether single, married, or widowed.

5. There is no certificate provided, showing in what parish a person died, with other necessary particulars, as to age, the disease, &c.

6. A corpse may be removed from a parish within the bills of mortality of London to one without, and the burial be omitted in the returns.

7. There is no medical authority for ascertaining and certifying the nature of the disease of which a person died, &c.

8. The names of diseases in the bills of mortality are either unintelligible, or so arranged as to confound diseases very distinct in their characters.

9. In respect to ages, the periods are injudiciously divided; so that many of the purposes to which the bills are applicable in medical and political science are defeated.

10. The law enforcing the keeping of Registers is defective; and does not adequately regard political, civil, or medical information.

11. All parishes and places of worship within that circle denominated the bills of mortality of London, are not included in the weekly or general annual returns; nor is there any existing authority to enforce their being made, and regularly entered.

* * * * *

Among some of the advantages in medical, political, and moral science, which would result, were proper parochial registers and bills of mortality established and kept throughout the united kingdom, the following present:

I. MEDICALLY.--They point out:

1. The causes of many diseases, and their affinity to one another.

2. The rise, situation, increase, decrease, and cessation of epidemic and contagious diseases.

3. The means of guarding against their extension and effects.

4. The comparative healthiness of different countries and places, climates and seasons.

5. The influence of particular trades and manufactures on the human constitution.

6. They elucidate many important and dubious medical points essential to the perfection of the preventive and curative arts.

II. POLITICALLY.--They are a means:

1. Of ascertaining the increment or decrement of the population in every place, and at any period.

2. Of accurately ascertaining the population of the country, and at any period.

3. Of diminishing, if not nearly superseding, the immense expense incurred by a census.

4. Of obviating the difficulties, great expense, and frequent disappointment in proving marriages, births, baptisms, and burials, to which persons who are desirous of establishing legal proof of their identity, descent, consanguinity, &c. are still exposed.

5. The present extensive and beneficial system of assurance on lives, reversionary payments, annuities, and legacy duties on the latter species of testamentary property, is founded on calculations deduced from numerous bills of mortality.

6. The prosperity or decay of commerce, manufactures, or trade of any place, is shown by comparing bills of mortality of different dates.

III. MORALLY.--They mark:

1. The prevalence of moral or licentious habits.

2. The diseases of which the inhabitants of a place die; and, consequently, those arising from luxury or intemperance.

3. The effects of the passions on human actions.

4. By knowing where they are most required, the means of correcting such effects may be the more effectually applied.

PETERLOO (1819).

=Source.=--_Life and Correspondence of Lord Sidmouth_, by Dean Pellew. Vol. III. p. 253. London, 1847.

_Letter of Sir Wm. Jolliffe to Thos. G. B. Estcourt._

"9 St. James's Place, April 11th, 1845.

"My dear Sir,

"Twenty-five years have passed since the collision unfortunately occurred between the population of Manchester and its neighbourhood, and the military stationed in that town, on the 16th of August, 1819.

"I was at that time a lieutenant in the 15th King's Hussars, which regiment had been quartered in Manchester cavalry barracks about six weeks. This was my first acquaintance with a large manufacturing population. I had little knowledge of the condition of that population; whether or no a great degree of distress was then prevalent, or whether or no the distrust and bad feeling, which appeared to exist between the employers and employed, was wholly or in part caused by the agitation of political questions. I will not, therefore, enter into any speculations upon these points; but I will endeavour to narrate the facts which fell under my own observation, although acting, as of course I was, under the command of others, and in a subordinate situation. The military force stationed in Manchester consisted of six troops of the 15th Hussars, under the command of Colonel Dalrymple; one troop of horse artillery, with two guns, under Major Dyneley; nearly the whole of the 31st regiment, under Colonel Guy L'Estrange (who commanded the whole force as senior officer). Some companies of the 88th regiment, and the Cheshire yeomanry, had also been brought into the town, in anticipation of disturbances which might result from the expected meeting; and these latter had only arrived on the morning of the 16th, or a few hours previously; and, lastly, there was a troop of Manchester yeomanry cavalry, consisting of about forty members, who, from the manner in which they were made use of (to say the least), greatly aggravated the disasters of the day. Their ranks were filled chiefly by wealthy master manufacturers; and, without the knowledge which would have been possessed by a (strictly speaking) military body, they were placed, most unwisely, as it appeared, under the immediate command and orders of the civil authorities.

"Our regiment paraded in field-exercise order at about half-past eight, or, it might be, nine o'clock a.m. Two squadrons of it were marched into the town about ten o'clock. They were formed up and dismounted in a wide street, the name of which I forget, to the north of St. Peter's Field (the place appointed for the meeting), and at the distance of nearly a quarter of a mile from it. The Cheshire yeomanry were formed, on our left, in the same street. One troop of our regiment was attached to the artillery, which took up a position between the cavalry barracks and the town; and one troop remained in charge of the barracks.

"The two squadrons with which I was stationed must have remained dismounted nearly two hours. During the greater portion of that period, a solid mass of people continued moving along a street about a hundred yards to our front, on their way to the place of meeting. Other officers, as well as myself, occasionally rode to the front (to the end of a street) to see them pass. They marched, at a brisk pace, in ranks well closed up, five or six bands of music being interspersed; and there appeared to be but few women with them. Mr. Hunt, with two or three other men, and, I think, two women dressed in light blue and white, were in an open carriage, drawn by the people. This carriage was adorned with blue and white flags; and the day was fine and hot. As soon as the great bulk of the procession had passed, we were ordered to stand to our horses. In a very short time afterwards the four troops of the 15th mounted, and at once moved off by the right, at a trot which was increased to a canter. Some one who had been sent from the place of meeting to bring us up led the way, through a number of narrow streets and by a circuitous route, to (what I will call) the south-west corner of St. Peter's Field. We advanced along the south side of this space of ground, without a halt or pause even: the words 'Front!' and 'Forward!' were given, and the trumpet sounded the charge at the very moment the threes wheeled up. When fronted, our line extended quite across the ground, which, in all parts, was so filled with people that their hats seemed to touch.

"It was then, for the first time, that I saw the Manchester troop of yeomanry: they were scattered singly, or in small groups, over the greater part of the field, literally hemmed up, and hedged into the mob, so that they were powerless either to make an impression or to escape; in fact, they were in the power of those whom they were designed to overawe; and it required only a glance to discover their helpless position, and the necessity of our being brought to their rescue. As I was, at the time, informed, this hopeless state of things happened thus: A platform had been erected near the centre of the field, from which Mr. Hunt and others were to address the multitude; and the magistrates, having ordered a strong body of constables to be in readiness to arrest the speakers, unfortunately imagined that they should support the peace officers by bringing up this troop of yeomanry _at a walk_. The result of this movement, instead of that which the magistrates desired, was unexpectedly to place this small body of horsemen (so introduced into a dense mob) entirely at the mercy of the people by whom they were, on all sides, pressed upon and surrounded.

"The charge of the hussars, to which I have just alluded, swept this mingled mass of human beings before it: people, yeoman and constables, in their confused attempts to escape, ran one over the other; so that by the time we had arrived at the end of the field, the fugitives were literally piled up to a considerable elevation above the level of the ground. (I may here, by the way, state that this field, as it is called, was merely an open space of ground, surrounded by buildings and itself, I rather think, in course of being built upon.) The hussars drove the people forward with the flats of their swords; but sometimes, as is almost inevitably the case when men are placed in such situations, the edge was used, both by the hussars, and, as I have heard, by the yeomen also; but of this latter fact, however, I was not cognisant; and believing though I do, that nine out of ten of the sabre wounds were caused by the hussars, I must still consider that it redounds highly to the humane forbearance of the men of the 15th that more wounds were not received, when the vast numbers are taken into consideration with whom they were brought into hostile collision; beyond all doubt, however, the far greater amount of injuries arose from the pressure of the routed multitude. The hussars on the left, pursued down the various streets which led from the place; those on the right met with something more of resistance. The mob had taken possession of various buildings on that side, particularly of a Quaker's chapel and burial-ground enclosed with a wall. This they occupied for some little time; and, in attempting to displace them, some of the men and horses were struck with stones and brick-bats. I was on the left; and as soon as I had passed completely over the ground, and found myself in the street on the other side, I turned back, and then, seeing a sort of fight still going on on the right, I went in that direction. At the very moment I reached the Quaker's meeting-house, I saw a farrier of the 15th ride at a small door in the outer wall, and, to my surprise, his horse struck it with such force that it flew open: two or three hussars then rode in, and the place was immediately in their possession. I then turned towards the elevated platform, which still remained in the centre of the field with persons upon it: a few struggling hussars and yeomen, together with a number of men having the appearance of peace officers, were congregating upon it. On my way thither I met the commanding officer of my regiment, who directed me to find a trumpeter, in order that he might sound the 'rally' or 'retreat.' This sent me again down the street I had first been in (after the pursuing men of my troop); but I had not ridden above a hundred yards before I found a trumpeter, and returned with him to the Colonel. The field and the adjacent streets now presented an extraordinary sight: the ground was quite covered with hats, shoes, sticks, musical instruments, and other things. Here and there lay the unfortunates who were too much injured to move away; and this sight was rendered the more distressing by observing some women among the sufferers.

"Standing near the corner of the street where I had been sent in search of a trumpeter, a brother officer called my attention to a pistol being fired from a window. I saw it fired twice; and I believe it had been fired once before I observed it.

"Some of the 31st regiment, just now arriving on the ground, were ordered to take possession of this house; but I do not know if it was carried into effect.

"I next went towards a private of the regiment, whose horse had fallen over a piece of timber nearly in the middle of the square, and who was most seriously injured. There were many of these pieces of timber (or timber trees) lying upon the ground; and as these could not be distinguished when the mob covered them, they had caused bad falls to one officer's horse and to many of the troopers'.

"While I was attending to the removal of the wounded soldier, the artillery troop, with the troop of hussars attached to it, arrived on the ground from the same direction by which we had entered the field: these were quickly followed by the Cheshire yeomanry. The 31st regiment came in another direction; and the whole remained formed up until our squadrons had fallen in again.