PEOPLE’S PUBS

RMT helpline 0800 3763706 :: june 2010 :: RMTnews 32 The government reaction to the basic democratic demands of the Chartist movement in the 1830s and 1840s was to jail its leaders for sedition. By today’s standards the six demands were moderate: votes for all men, votes to be secret, lifting the condition that only men with property could stand for election, parliamentary districts to be of equal numbers of voters, payment of MPs, and annual general elections. In fact all but the last have since been granted. Yet when these simple demands were submitted on a charter signed by 250,000 people to the House of Commons in 1839 it was rejected by 235 votes to 46. And it was rejected again after being signed by an incredible 3,317,752 people in 1842. When Chartist mass street meetings and local general strikes took place in that year they were quelled by armed troops. They opened fire on crowds in Preston, including women and children, 56 people were transported, and, as mentioned, the leaders were jailed for sedition and other trumped up charges. One of these was William Lovett (1800-1877), the chief drafter of the Charter, whose portrait appears on the sign of this pub in Skelmanthorpe. His fisherman father was drowned before William was born in Penzance, Cornwall. At the age of 13 he became an apprentice ropemaker but, as ropes became replaced by chains, he trained to be a carpenter instead. Then he became a cabinet maker in London at the age of 21, and after a five-year wait became eligible to join the Society of Cabinet Makers (for which he had to buy a gallon of ale) and eventually became its president. He met radicals while attending evening classes of the London Mechanics’ Institute and was introduced to the co- operative ideas of Robert Owen. Lovett joined the London Co- operative Trading Association, and in 1828 was secretary of the British Association for the Promotion of Co-operative Knowledge. In 1831 he was selected at random for compulsory service in the London militia, which he refused. His property was seized as punishment and he formed the Anti-Militia Association with the slogan “No Vote, No Musket”. This campaign succeeded in ending compulsory service in the militia and he became a national political figure. The following year he was arrested for attending a peaceful demonstration and locked up in a small, dark, smelly, filthy cell with little air. His campaign for votes for all male adults continued through the National Union of the Working Classes, and Owen’s Grand National Consolidated Trade Union, both of which he joined. He founded the London Working Men’s Association in 1836, and at one of its meetings in 1838 he drew up the People’s Charter and became effective leader of the Chartists. The sedition charge was brought against him in 1839 for making a speech accusing the Metropolitan Police of being “a blood thirsty and unconsitutional force.” Found guilty he was sentenced to a year in prison. The food was infested by beetles so he tried to live on bread and water alone which made him so weak he was taken to hospital. He was offered three months’ remission for good behaviour but refused it as it would have meant admitting his guilt. He retired from politics in 1842, after the rejection of the petition signed by over three million, and concentrated instead on working class education, forming the National Association for Promoting the Political and Social Improvement of the People. This was financed by workers’ subscriptions and provided circulating libraries and lecturers. After opening a book shop in Tottenham Court Road, which failed to make any money, he died in poverty. The Skelmanthorpe Flag of the Chartists is proudly displayed in this pub which contains a poem written after the Peterloo Massacre in 1819 (when the militia slaughtered 15 people and wounded 600 others who were seeking the vote in Manchester). It pronounces: May Never A Cock in England Crow, Nor never a Pipe in Scotland Blow, Nor never a Harp in Ireland Play Till Liberty regains Her Sway. PEOPLE’S PUBS - Words by Mike Pentelow, Pictures by Peter Arkell THE CHARTIST 74 Commercial Road, Skelmanthorpe, West Yorkshire “A Pub Crawl Through History, The Ultimate Boozers’ Who’s Who,” by Mik e Pentelow and Peter Arkell, has now been published by Ja nus. ISBN 978-1-85756-701-4.