Peterloo - 196th anniversary
I must get on and give you my account of last week's Peterloo commemoration, which was our biggest and best yet. We usually do a formal wreath-laying on August 16, and hold a rally on the Sunday, but as Sunday fell on the 16th this year it was a single event, and our new idea was "the Peterloo Picnic" - Peterloo as it should have been, a peaceful rally with speakers, ending with everyone sitting down to eat their bread and cheese.
This was a huge success - we reckon we had about 600 people. Maxine Peake came for the third year running, and read selected highlights from Shelley's Masque of Anarchy. Christopher Eccleston came for the first time, and read the opening lines of Henry Hunt's speech (which was interrupted by the troops riding in and attacking the crowd). Before and after Chris, John Henshaw read Samuel Bamford's account of Peterloo. We had songs, including what was believed to be the first public performance of Bamford's Song of the Slaughter, which he wrote in prison, since 1821. We ate our bread and cheese! And it was a warm and sunny day.
For a few years we've had marches from a couple of the "Peterloo towns" which sent delegations in 1819; this time, we covered half the 28 towns, so we're hoping we may have all of them by the bicentenary. I marched from Stockport (about seven miles, taking two and a half hours), though I took the bus there first! Here's our party waiting to set off from the Bull's Head, where Hunt slept the night before Peterloo.
When we got to the Apollo in Ardwick, we joined forces with another march, from Gee Cross.
We also acquired this young recruit, who had some very spectacular ribbons flying from his chariot!
One of the exciting things about being involved in the Peterloo Memorial Campaign is the people whose paths one crosses. I'm just about getting used to the message "keith flett retweeted your Tweet" but a couple of weeks ago I was thrilled to learn that "LGSM followed you" - as in Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners! As in the actual group featured in the recent and very wonderful film Pride! Not the same individuals, of course, but I was delighted to meet some of them at the picnic. Jane (in the pink shirt on the left) marched with us from Stockport, and had told me the name of the woman who runs their Twitter account - who was subsequently baffled when I walked up to her and greeted her by name (the Tshirt was a clue!)
Some people had gone to a lot of trouble to dress the part, including red Liberty caps - the man without the cap is John Henshaw, who was our Samuel Bamford.
And here's Christopher Eccleston with his son. I was very touched that he wanted to take a photo of his son with our banners!
At this point, the ceremony began, with John Henshaw reading Bamford's account up to the moment when Henry Hunt began to speak.
None of the 19th-century pictures shows Hunt speaking with his small son draped over his shoulder, which is rather a pity, though given the way the troops behaved towards unarmed women and children it was probably safer not to try it. Chris appears to be a very good dad. I've now found a video of him and John reading - which ends with Paul Murphy, the Lord Mayor, reading the first of the names of the dead: William Fildes, aged two.
All of the above, plus various other names and not-names (eg me) read the names of the dead. This is John Thomson - I think he was reading the details of John Lees.
Maxine Peake prepares to read from Shelley's Masque of Anarchy. Famously she performed the entire poem at the Manchester International Festival two years ago; this was just edited highlights, but particularly fascinating for me, as I was standing just behind her and could see the notes she had written all round the text, such as "Let words come through" "Give it some juice!" and "FOODBANKS" (near a bit about hungry people) - I wanted to take photos of all this but thought it might be a bit much while she was reading, and someone was bound to be filming (they were, here - there's also a shakier version which includes Maxine calling on us all to join in at the end).
This is the Open Voice choir singing Bamford's Song of the Slaughter.
At this point I was free to walk around and take more photos, though the crowd was thinning out a little. The young man in the middle is holding up our giant Liberty Cap on a pole - I think he was asked if he could hold it for ten minutes and was still there an hour or so later, though I'm told he was offered a rest more than once and turned it down!
When we finally sat down for our bread and cheese (this wasn't compulsory, but it has a special resonance for Peterloo because one man attacked by the troops was saved from greater harm when the sabre came down on the bread and cheese he had stored in his hat for safe-keeping) I found I had left mine at home in the rush to get to Stockport, so I was very grateful to
legionseagle who had brought enough for two, and also did a lot of live tweets on the day as I don't have a fancy phone.
The wreath-laying was less of a thing this year because of all the other stuff going on, but we put it under the giant Liberty Cap, and other people brought flowers - and a loaf of bread! The names are those of the towns who were represented at Peterloo.
Afterwards, we took the flowers to the traditional place under the Red Plaque commemorating Peterloo on the wall of the Free Trade Hall (now a Radisson hotel).
They seem to survive a few days there, and it gets much more footfall during the working week.
The staff of Manchester Central, the conference centre (often used by the Labour and Conservative annual conferences) next to the site of Peterloo, were enormously helpful, though one of them said to Paul, who organises our group, "When you said 600 people were coming, I didn't actually believe you..." Paul himself said it was rather like his wedding - he knew it was all pretty wonderful, but he wasn't terribly sure what had happened!
We got good coverage on both the BBC and ITV local news that evening - this is the BBC report.
And finally, there was another event this weekend: a Peterloo Witness Workshop at the People's History Museum, which included an informative talk on Peterloo and the contemporary sources, a splendid lunch (highly unexpected given that the workshop was free!), a tour of the Peterloo exhibits in the museum, and then sitting down to transcribe some more handwritten contemporary documents, which will eventually be uploaded to the Peterloo Witness website for future research purposes. I got a list of casualties treated by Manchester Infirmary (who were very keen to assure the authorities that only a few of them had sabre wounds - we know the infirmary threw one man out because he wouldn't say that he'd stop going to Radical meetings). Maxine turned up at this too, as an ordinary participant, and did her own share of transcribing. She's a tremendous enthusiast!
Also posted on Dreamwidth, with
comments.
This was a huge success - we reckon we had about 600 people. Maxine Peake came for the third year running, and read selected highlights from Shelley's Masque of Anarchy. Christopher Eccleston came for the first time, and read the opening lines of Henry Hunt's speech (which was interrupted by the troops riding in and attacking the crowd). Before and after Chris, John Henshaw read Samuel Bamford's account of Peterloo. We had songs, including what was believed to be the first public performance of Bamford's Song of the Slaughter, which he wrote in prison, since 1821. We ate our bread and cheese! And it was a warm and sunny day.
For a few years we've had marches from a couple of the "Peterloo towns" which sent delegations in 1819; this time, we covered half the 28 towns, so we're hoping we may have all of them by the bicentenary. I marched from Stockport (about seven miles, taking two and a half hours), though I took the bus there first! Here's our party waiting to set off from the Bull's Head, where Hunt slept the night before Peterloo.
When we got to the Apollo in Ardwick, we joined forces with another march, from Gee Cross.
We also acquired this young recruit, who had some very spectacular ribbons flying from his chariot!
One of the exciting things about being involved in the Peterloo Memorial Campaign is the people whose paths one crosses. I'm just about getting used to the message "keith flett retweeted your Tweet" but a couple of weeks ago I was thrilled to learn that "LGSM followed you" - as in Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners! As in the actual group featured in the recent and very wonderful film Pride! Not the same individuals, of course, but I was delighted to meet some of them at the picnic. Jane (in the pink shirt on the left) marched with us from Stockport, and had told me the name of the woman who runs their Twitter account - who was subsequently baffled when I walked up to her and greeted her by name (the Tshirt was a clue!)
Some people had gone to a lot of trouble to dress the part, including red Liberty caps - the man without the cap is John Henshaw, who was our Samuel Bamford.
And here's Christopher Eccleston with his son. I was very touched that he wanted to take a photo of his son with our banners!
At this point, the ceremony began, with John Henshaw reading Bamford's account up to the moment when Henry Hunt began to speak.
None of the 19th-century pictures shows Hunt speaking with his small son draped over his shoulder, which is rather a pity, though given the way the troops behaved towards unarmed women and children it was probably safer not to try it. Chris appears to be a very good dad. I've now found a video of him and John reading - which ends with Paul Murphy, the Lord Mayor, reading the first of the names of the dead: William Fildes, aged two.
All of the above, plus various other names and not-names (eg me) read the names of the dead. This is John Thomson - I think he was reading the details of John Lees.
Maxine Peake prepares to read from Shelley's Masque of Anarchy. Famously she performed the entire poem at the Manchester International Festival two years ago; this was just edited highlights, but particularly fascinating for me, as I was standing just behind her and could see the notes she had written all round the text, such as "Let words come through" "Give it some juice!" and "FOODBANKS" (near a bit about hungry people) - I wanted to take photos of all this but thought it might be a bit much while she was reading, and someone was bound to be filming (they were, here - there's also a shakier version which includes Maxine calling on us all to join in at the end).
This is the Open Voice choir singing Bamford's Song of the Slaughter.
At this point I was free to walk around and take more photos, though the crowd was thinning out a little. The young man in the middle is holding up our giant Liberty Cap on a pole - I think he was asked if he could hold it for ten minutes and was still there an hour or so later, though I'm told he was offered a rest more than once and turned it down!
When we finally sat down for our bread and cheese (this wasn't compulsory, but it has a special resonance for Peterloo because one man attacked by the troops was saved from greater harm when the sabre came down on the bread and cheese he had stored in his hat for safe-keeping) I found I had left mine at home in the rush to get to Stockport, so I was very grateful to
legionseagle who had brought enough for two, and also did a lot of live tweets on the day as I don't have a fancy phone.
The wreath-laying was less of a thing this year because of all the other stuff going on, but we put it under the giant Liberty Cap, and other people brought flowers - and a loaf of bread! The names are those of the towns who were represented at Peterloo.
Afterwards, we took the flowers to the traditional place under the Red Plaque commemorating Peterloo on the wall of the Free Trade Hall (now a Radisson hotel).
They seem to survive a few days there, and it gets much more footfall during the working week.
The staff of Manchester Central, the conference centre (often used by the Labour and Conservative annual conferences) next to the site of Peterloo, were enormously helpful, though one of them said to Paul, who organises our group, "When you said 600 people were coming, I didn't actually believe you..." Paul himself said it was rather like his wedding - he knew it was all pretty wonderful, but he wasn't terribly sure what had happened!
We got good coverage on both the BBC and ITV local news that evening - this is the BBC report.
And finally, there was another event this weekend: a Peterloo Witness Workshop at the People's History Museum, which included an informative talk on Peterloo and the contemporary sources, a splendid lunch (highly unexpected given that the workshop was free!), a tour of the Peterloo exhibits in the museum, and then sitting down to transcribe some more handwritten contemporary documents, which will eventually be uploaded to the Peterloo Witness website for future research purposes. I got a list of casualties treated by Manchester Infirmary (who were very keen to assure the authorities that only a few of them had sabre wounds - we know the infirmary threw one man out because he wouldn't say that he'd stop going to Radical meetings). Maxine turned up at this too, as an ordinary participant, and did her own share of transcribing. She's a tremendous enthusiast!
Also posted on Dreamwidth, with
comments.