Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Book cover

Political Trials in an Age of Revolutions pp 237–263Cite as

Palgrave Macmillan

“Some Examples Should Be Made”: Prosecuting Reform Bill Rioters in 1831–32

  • Chapter
  • First Online:

  • 276 Accesses

Part of the book series: Palgrave Histories of Policing, Punishment and Justice ((PHPPJ))

Abstract

Following the House of Lords’ rejection of the parliamentary Reform Bill in the autumn of 1831, severe rioting broke out in a number of English towns. In the judicial retribution that followed, some 259 people were prosecuted, seven of them hanged and 43 transported. This essay takes a detailed look at the local circumstances and the choice of courts in which suspected rioters were brought to trial and the variable outcomes achieved as a consequence. Reform was a divisive and regionally nuanced issue and shaping a measured response was neither straightforward nor uniform. While prisoners at Nottingham and Bristol were tried with rigour by Special Commission, magistrates at Loughborough, Mansfield and Worcester were keen to confine cases to local courts, eschewing judicial terror in the interests of healing social wounds.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.

Chapter
USD   29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD   119.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Hardcover Book
USD   159.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Learn about institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    George Rudé, “English rural and urban disturbances on the eve of the First Reform Bill, 1830–1831”, Past & Present, 37 (1967), 87–102; M. Brock, The Great Reform Act (London, 1973), 248–54; J. Phillips, The Great Reform Bill in the Boroughs: English Electoral Behaviour, 1818–1841 (Oxford, 1992); J. Stevenson, Popular Disturbances in England, 1700–1870 (London, 1979), 218–28; Nancy Lopatin-Lumis, “Public disorder and parliamentary reform: rioting and the Reform Act of 1832”, Selected Papers, Consortium on Revolutionary Europe, 1750–1850, 24 (1994), 210–23; Nancy D. Lopatin, Political Unions, Popular Politics and the Great Reform Act of 1832 (Basingstoke, 1999).

  2. 2.

    The National Archives (TNA), Home Office (HO) HO 52/12, Charles Colville to Melbourne, 14 October 1831, ff, 431–3.

  3. 3.

    Bristol Gazette, 3 November 1831

  4. 4.

    Bristol Mercury, 17 January 1832; TNA, HO 40/28, Information of Catherine Shea, 15 November 1831; Trials of the Persons Concerned in the Late Riots before Chief Justice Tindal (Bristol, 1832), 35, 41; TNA, ASSI 6/3 Information of Isaac Lyons, 9 November 1831; Information of Samuel Shipstone, 14 November 1831; Information of John Harvey, 9 January 1832; British Museum, Add Ms. 27,790, f. 188; Examiner, 13 November 1831.

  5. 5.

    Derby Riots. The Trial of the Eleven Persons Charged with Breaking Open the Gaol of the Borough of Derby and Liberating the Felons and Other Prisoners (Derby, 1831); TNA, HO 52/12, “Statement of the Circumstances and the Time of the Attack on the County Gaol, 26 October 1831”; Joseph Strutt to Lord Melbourne, 10 October 1831, f. 467.

  6. 6.

    For a detailed account of the Nottingham riots see John Beckett, “The Nottingham Reform Bill Riots of 1831”, Parliamentary History, 24 (2005), 114–138. For the wider local context see also Malcolm I. Thomas, Politics and Society in Nottingham, 1785–1835 (Oxford, 1969), 217–237.

  7. 7.

    Worcester Herald, 15 October 1831.

  8. 8.

    Nottingham Review, 14 October 1831.

  9. 9.

    “Dorset”, in D. R. Fisher (ed.), The History of Parliament: The House of Commons, 1820–1832 http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1820-1832/constituencies/dorset (accessed 12 August 2017); Sherborne Mercury, 24 October 1831; Public Ledger, 28 October 1831; TNA, HO 52/12, John Smith to Melbourne, 19, 20 October 1831, f. 13–15; George Chard to Melbourne, 29 October 1831, ff. 36–9.

  10. 10.

    TNA, HO 52/12, Sir Henry Digby to Melbourne, 20 October 1831, ff. 17–19; Rev. John Parsons to Melbourne, 22 October 1831, ff. 21–24, 25 October 1831, f. 33.

  11. 11.

    Sherborne Mercury, 24 October 1831; Taunton Courier, 26 October 1831; TNA, HO 52/15, J. Phillips to Lord Bath, 23 October 1831, ff. 580–1.

  12. 12.

    See Chapter 10, “This is the Blaze of Liberty! The Burning of Bristol in 1831”, in Steve Poole and Nicholas Rogers, Bristol From Below: Law, Protest and Authority in a Georgian City (Woodbridge, 2017), 325–361; Mark Harrison, Crowds and History: Mass Phenomena in English Towns, 1790–1835 (Cambridge, 1988); Jeremy Caple, The Bristol Riots of 1831 and Social Reform in Britain (New York, 1990).

  13. 13.

    Public Ledger, 2 November 1831.

  14. 14.

    Worcester Journal, 10 November 1831; Worcester Herald 12 November 1831; Courier, 8 November 1831; TNA, HO 52/15, Henry Clifton and John Williams to Lord Melbourne, 1 November 1831, ff. 46–9; TNA, HO 40/29, anon to Melbourne, n.d. (October), f. 298.

  15. 15.

    TNA, HO 52/12, Lord Vernon to Melbourne, 21 October 1831, ff. 440–1.

  16. 16.

    TNA, HO 52/15, J. Phillips to Lord Bath, 23 October 1831, ff. 580–1; TNA, HO 52/15 John Goodford to Lord Melbourne 27 October 1831, ff. 606–8.

  17. 17.

    TNA, HO 52/15, Duke of Portland to Melbourne, 16 October 1831, ff. 315–6; TNA, HO 41/10 Melbourne to Portland, 18 October 1831; Nottingham Review, 21 October 1831.

  18. 18.

    TNA, HO 52/15, Duke of Portland to Melbourne, 16 October 1831, ff. 315–6

  19. 19.

    Beckett, “Nottingham Reform Bill Riots”, 124–5.

  20. 20.

    TNA, HO 52/15, Lancelot Rolleston to Melbourne, 28 October 1831, ff. 288–9.

  21. 21.

    TNA, HO 52/15, Rolleston to Melbourne, 19 November 1831, ff. 337–8.

  22. 22.

    TNA, HO 40/28, J. Gardner to Sir Francis Freeling, 2 November 1831, ff. 64–5; TNA, HO 42/29, P O’Farrell to Melbourne, 5 December 1831, ff. 490–492.

  23. 23.

    Leicester Chronicle, 22 October 1831.

  24. 24.

    Worcester Journal, 10, 17 November; TNA, HO 52/15, Charles Ridout to Melbourne, 6 November 1831, f. 63.

  25. 25.

    Nottinghamshire Archives, Quarter Session minute book, QSM/1/42, 17 October 1831; Nottingham Review, 21 October 1831.

  26. 26.

    TNA, HO 52/15, Middleton to Lord Melbourne, 20 October 1831, f. 284.

  27. 27.

    Evening Standard, 14 October 1831; Examiner 16 October 1831; TNA, HO 52/15, Rolleston to Melbourne, 2 November 1831, ff. 329-30A; TNA, HO 52/15, Duke of Newcastle to Melbourne, 3 November 1831, ff. 317–9.

  28. 28.

    London Evening Standard 3, 8 November 1831; Caple, Bristol Riots, 197–8.

  29. 29.

    HO 40/28, E. Ludlow to J. M. Phillips, 16 November, 2 December 1831, ff. 109–10, 133–4; HO 41/10, Melbourne to Ludlow, 3 December 1831, ff. 457–8; TNA, TS 11/415/1261, W. P. Taunton to Sergeant Ludlow, 7 December 1831.

  30. 30.

    Concern about this local veil of secrecy as well as the practice of putting capitally indicted prisoners up for trial within days of their arrest would haunt the handling of the Nottingham commission for the next six months, producing a petition of complaint to parliament. TNA, HO 41/10, Melbourne to Rolleston, 29 October 1832, ff. 298–9; Thomis, Politics and Society in Nottingham, 236–4; Nottingham Review, 9, 23 December 1831; Evening Mail, 21 December 1831.

  31. 31.

    TNA, HO 40/28, evidence submitted to Crown Solicitors, 2 December 1831, ff. 383–99; TNA, HO 52/15, Maule to Phillips, 24 December 1831, ff. 344–5.

  32. 32.

    Charge Delivered to the Grand Jury of the County and City of Bristol by the Right Hon. Sir Nicholas Conyngham Tindal… (London, 1832).

  33. 33.

    Trials of the Persons Concerned in the Late Riots before Chief Justice Tindal… (Bristol, 1832), 2.

  34. 34.

    TNA, HO 40/28, Information of John W. Gibbons and John Hobbs, 15 November 1831, ff. 308–9.

  35. 35.

    Trials of the Persons Concerned in the Late Riots, 137.

  36. 36.

    TNA, HO 40/28, ff. 306–7, Denman to Mayor of Bristol 22 November 1831.

  37. 37.

    Evidence of Robert Trickey, Mary Anne Coper, Trials of the Persons Concerned, pp.4, 10; TNA, ASSI 6/3, Information of Mary King, 19 November 1831 and Robert Harding Trickey, 24 November 1831.

  38. 38.

    C. H. Walker, The Petition of William Clarke, Convicted at the Late Special Commission at Bristol… with Prefatory Observations (Bristol, 1832); TNA, TS 11/415/1261, C. H. Walker to G. Maule, 31 December 1831.

  39. 39.

    Trials of the Persons Concerned, p.115.

  40. 40.

    A number of petitions on Vines’s behalf were forwarded to the Home Office. See for example, HO 17/68, affidavits of William Earle, Richard Lessey, John Williams, William Merryfield, and Henry Davis.

  41. 41.

    TNA, HO 17/69, Thomas Roberts to Sir Francis Denman, 24 January 1832.

  42. 42.

    Trials of the Persons Concerned, p.114; Incidents in the Life of Joseph Kayes who was Executed at the New Gaol (Bristol, 1832), 11.

  43. 43.

    Trials of the Persons Concerned, 105–112.

  44. 44.

    Carl J. Griffin, The Rural War: Captain Swing and the Politics of Protest (Manchester, 2012), 254–7.

  45. 45.

    Nottingham Archives, C/QA/CP/5/4/328, William Tallents to Thomas Godfrey, 8 January 1832; TNA, HO 52/19, Tallents to S M Phillips, 8 January 1832, f.88; TNA, TS 11/415/1261, Tallents to Maule, 6 January 1832; TNA, TS 11/1116/5736, Tallents to Maule, 15 January 1832.

  46. 46.

    TNA, TS 11/414/1260, Tallents to Maule, 11 January 1832.

  47. 47.

    TNA, TS 11/415/1261, Tallents to Maule, 8 January 1832.

  48. 48.

    Nottingham Review 13 January 1832.

  49. 49.

    Report of the Proceedings Against the Persons Charged with Burning Nottingham Castle, Firing Lowe’s Mill and Sacking Colwick Hall… (Nottingham: 1832); Nottingham Review 13 January 1832,

  50. 50.

    Report of the Proceedings; Nottingham Review 13 January 1832; TNA, HO 40/28, evidence submitted to Crown Solicitors, 2 December 1831, ff. 383–99.

  51. 51.

    TNA, TS 11/116/5736, Tallents to Maule, 15 January 1832.

  52. 52.

    Nottingham Review 13 January 1832.

  53. 53.

    Derby Mercury 18 January 1832.

  54. 54.

    Derby Mercury 8 February 1832.

  55. 55.

    Dorset County Chronicle 12 January 1832; Salisbury Journal, 16 January 1832.

  56. 56.

    Bristol Mercury, 17 January 1832.

  57. 57.

    C. H. Walker, The Petition of William Clarke.

  58. 58.

    Poor Man’s Guardian, 4 February 1832; A. Layman, Narrative of Conversations held with Christopher Davis and William Clarke, who were Executed January 27th, 1832 (Bristol, 1832).

  59. 59.

    TNA, HO 40/28, Pinney to Melbourne, 21 January 1832, f. 209.

  60. 60.

    John F. Sutton, The Date Book of Remarkable and Memorable Events Connected with Nottingham and its Neighbourhood, 1750–1850 (London, 1852), 431.

  61. 61.

    TNA, HO 17/64 Martin to Lord Melbourne, 4 February 1832.

  62. 62.

    TNA, HO 17/69, testimony of John Pearson and William Street, 25 January 1832.

  63. 63.

    TNA, HO 17/64, Deposition of Rosamund Martin, 30 January 1832; Deposition of John Armstrong n.d.; TNA, HO 40/30, Thomas Moore to Lord Melbourne, 2 February 1832, ff. 286–7. For the executions see also Nottingham Archives, DD/275/3, Some Particulars of the Life, Trial, Behaviour and Execution of George Beck, George Hearson and John Armstrong… (Nottingham 1832), and The Nottingham Tragedy!!! (Nottingham 1832),

  64. 64.

    Derbyshire Archives, 239 M/F/8936, Godfrey Meynell to Henry Fitzherbert, 10 March 1832.

  65. 65.

    Derby Riots. The Trial of the Eleven Persons; Derby Mercury 21 March 1832; Evening Mail, 19 March 1832.

  66. 66.

    Sherborne Mercury, 9 April 1832; Bath Chronicle, 5 April 1832; Salisbury Journal, 9 April 1832; TNA, HO 27/18 English Criminal Registers, Somerset.

  67. 67.

    Salisbury Journal, 19 March 1832; Morning Chronicle, 17 March 1832; Dorset County Chronicle, 22 March 1832; Hampshire Advertiser, 5 May 1832.

  68. 68.

    Trials of the Persons Concerned, 9.

  69. 69.

    Stanley H. Palmer, Police and Protest in England and Ireland, 1750–1850 (Cambridge, 1988), 310–11.

Bibliography

British Museum

Derbyshire Archives

Nottinghamshire Archives

The National Archives

  • Assizes, ASSI 6

    Google Scholar 

  • Home Office papers, HO 17, 27, 40, 41, 42, 52

    Google Scholar 

  • Treasury Solicitor’s papers, TS 11

    Google Scholar 

  • Bath Chronicle

    Google Scholar 

  • Bristol Gazette

    Google Scholar 

  • Bristol Mercury

    Google Scholar 

  • Derby Mercury

    Google Scholar 

  • Dorset County Chronicle

    Google Scholar 

  • Evening Mail

    Google Scholar 

  • Evening Standard

    Google Scholar 

  • Examiner

    Google Scholar 

  • Hampshire Advertiser

    Google Scholar 

  • Leicester Chronicle

    Google Scholar 

  • London Evening Standard

    Google Scholar 

  • Morning Chronicle

    Google Scholar 

  • Nottingham Review

    Google Scholar 

  • Poor Man’s Guardian

    Google Scholar 

  • Public Ledger

    Google Scholar 

  • Salisbury Journal

    Google Scholar 

  • Sherborne Mercury

    Google Scholar 

  • Taunton Courier

    Google Scholar 

  • Worcester Journal

    Google Scholar 

  • Worcester Herald

    Google Scholar 

  • Charge Delivered to the Grand Jury of the County and City of Bristol by the Right Hon. Sir Nicholas Conyngham Tindal… (London, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • Derby Riots. The Trial of the Eleven Persons Charged with Breaking Open the Gaol of the Borough of Derby and Liberating the Felons and Other Prisoners (Derby, 1831).

    Google Scholar 

  • Incidents in the Life of Joseph Kayes who was Executed at the New Gaol (Bristol, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • A. Layman, Narrative of Conversations held with Christopher Davis and William Clarke, who were Executed January 27th, 1832 (Bristol, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • Report of the Proceedings Against the Persons Charged with Burning Nottingham Castle, Firing Lowe’s Mill and Sacking Colwick Hall… (Nottingham, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • Some Particulars of the Life, Trial, Behaviour and Execution of George Beck, George Hearson and John Armstrong… (Nottingham, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • John F. Sutton, The Date Book of Remarkable and Memorable Events Connected with Nottingham and its Neighbourhood, 1750–1850 (London, 1852).

    Google Scholar 

  • The Nottingham Tragedy!!! (Nottingham, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • Trials of the Persons Concerned in the Late Riots before Chief Justice Tindal (Bristol, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • C. H. Walker, The Petition of William Clarke, Convicted at the Late Special Commission at Bristol… with Prefatory Observations (Bristol, 1832).

    Google Scholar 

  • John Beckett, “The Nottingham Reform Bill Riots of 1831”, Parliamentary History, 24 (2005), 114–138.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • M. Brock, The Great Reform Act (London, 1973).

    Google Scholar 

  • Jeremy Caple, The Bristol Riots of 1831 and Social Reform in Britain (New York, 1990).

    Google Scholar 

  • D. R. Fisher (ed.), The History of Parliament: The House of Commons, 1820–1832, http://www.historyofparliamentonline.org/volume/1820-1832/constituencies/dorset

  • Carl J. Griffin, The Rural War: Captain Swing and the Politics of Protest (Manchester, 2012).

    Google Scholar 

  • Mark Harrison, Crowds and History: Mass Phenomena in English Towns, 1790–1835 (Cambridge, 1988).

    Google Scholar 

  • Nancy Lopatin-Lumis, “Public disorder and parliamentary reform: rioting and the Reform Act of 1832”, Selected Papers, Consortium on Revolutionary Europe, 1750–1850, 24 (1994), 210–23.

    Google Scholar 

  • Nancy D. Lopatin, Political Unions, Popular Politics and the Great Reform Act of 1832 (Basingstoke, 1999).

    Google Scholar 

  • Stanley H. Palmer, Police and Protest in England and Ireland, 1750–1850 (Cambridge, 1988).

    Google Scholar 

  • J. Phillips, The Great Reform Bill in the Boroughs: English Electoral Behaviour, 1818–1841 (Oxford, 1992).

    Google Scholar 

  • Steve Poole and Nicholas Rogers, Bristol From Below: Law, Protest and Authority in a Georgian City (Woodbridge, 2017).

    Google Scholar 

  • George Rudé, “English rural and urban disturbances on the eve of the First Reform Bill, 1830–1831”, Past & Present, 37 (1967), 87–102.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • J. Stevenson, Popular Disturbances in England, 1700–1870 (London, 1979).

    Google Scholar 

  • Malcolm I. Thomis, Politics and Society in Nottingham, 1785–1835 (Oxford, 1969).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Arts, Creative Industries and Education, University of the West of England, Bristol, UK

    Steve Poole

Authors
  1. Steve Poole
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Steve Poole .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. School of Humanities, Languages and Social Science, Griffith University, Southport, QLD, Australia

    Michael T. Davis

  2. Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Stirling, Stirling, UK

    Emma Macleod

  3. School of History, Classics and Archaeology, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK

    Gordon Pentland

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Poole, S. (2019). “Some Examples Should Be Made”: Prosecuting Reform Bill Rioters in 1831–32. In: Davis, M., Macleod, E., Pentland, G. (eds) Political Trials in an Age of Revolutions. Palgrave Histories of Policing, Punishment and Justice. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98959-4_10

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98959-4_10

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-98958-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-98959-4

  • eBook Packages: Law and CriminologyLaw and Criminology (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation