Peterloo

On 16 August, 1819, at St Peter's Field, Manchester, armed cavalry attacked a peaceful rally of some 50,000 pro-democracy reformers. Under the eyes of the national press, 18 people were killed and some 700 injured, many of them by sabres, many of them women, some of them children. The 'Peterloo massacre', the subject of a recent feature film and a major commemoration in 2019, is famous as the central episode in Edward Thompsons Making of the English Working Class. It also marked the rise of a new English radical populism as the British state, recently victorious at Waterloo, was challenged by a pro-democracy movement centred on the industrial north. Why did the cavalry attack? Who ordered them in? What was the radical strategy? Why were there women on the platform, and why were they so ferociously attacked? Using an immense range of sources, and many new maps and illustrations, Robert Poole tells for the first time the full extraordinary story of Peterloo: the English Uprising.

The story of the Peterloo massacre, a defining moment in the history of British democracy, told with passion and authority. 'Excellent' Zadie Smith 'Fast-paced and full of fascinating detail' Tim Clayton 'A superb account of one of the defining moments in modern British history' Tristram Hunt 'Peterloo is one of the greatest scandals of British political history... Riding tells this tragic story with mesmerising skill' John Bew On a hot late summer's day, a crowd of 60,000 gathered in St Peter's Field. They came from all over Lancashire – ordinary working-class men, women and children – walking to the sound of hymns and folk songs, wearing their best clothes and holding silk banners aloft. Their mood was happy, their purpose wholly serious: to demand fundamental reform of a corrupt electoral system. By the end of the day fifteen people, including two women and a child, were dead or dying and 650 injured, hacked down by drunken yeomanry after local magistrates panicked at the size of the crowd. Four years after defeating the 'tyrant' Bonaparte at Waterloo, the British state had turned its forces against its own people as they peaceably exercised their time-honoured liberties. As well as describing the events of 16 August in shattering detail, Jacqueline Riding evokes the febrile state of England in the late 1810s, paints a memorable portrait of the reform movement and its charismatic leaders, and assesses the political legacy of the massacre to the present day. As fast-paced and powerful as it is rigorously researched, Peterloo: The Story of the Manchester Massacre adds significantly to our understanding of a tragic staging-post on Britain's journey to full democracy.

On 16 August 1819 on St Peter's Field, Manchester, a peaceful demonstration of some 60,000 workers and reformers was brutally dispersed by sabrewielding cavalry, resulting in at least fifteen dead and over 600 injured. Within days the slaughter was named ' Peter-loo', as an ironic reference to the battleground of Waterloo. Now the subject of a major film, this highly detailed yet readable narrative, based almost entirely on eyewitness reports and contemporary documents, brings the events of that terrible day vividly to life. In a world in which the legitimacy of facts is in constant jeopardy from media and authoritarian bias, the lessons to be learned from the bloodshed and the tyrannical aftermath are as pertinent today as they were 200 years ago. Film director Mike Leigh has defined Peterloo as 'the event that becomes more relevant with every new episode of our crazy times'.

Reflections on the Bicentenary of the 1819 Massacre of Reformers in Manchester Two hundred years after the massacre of protestors in Manchester, known as Peterloo, distinguished scholars of Romantic-era literature join together in this commemorative volume to assess the implications of the violence. Contributors explore how attitudes toward violence and the claims of people to participate in government were reflected and revised in the verbal and visual culture of the time. Their analyses provide fresh insights into cultural engagement as a means of resisting oppression and a sign of the resilience of humanity in facing threats and force.Key FeaturesProvides a multi-perspectival, historical revaluation of the violence of Peterloo Draws on contemporary theorizations of violence by Judith Butler, Slavoj Zizek and Rob Nixon to account for the cultural factors leading to PeterlooSupplements treatments of Peterloo centering on English history with attention to the significance of that event from Scottish, Irish and North American perspectives

***The subject of the new major film by Mike Leigh*** Unity of the oppressed can make a difference in politically uncertain times A peaceful protest turned tragedy; this is the true story of the working class fight for the vote. On August 16 1819, in St Peter’s Field, Manchester, a large non-violent gathering demanding parliamentary reform turned into a massacre, leaving many dead and hundreds more injured. This catastrophic event was one of the key moments of the age, a political awakening of the working class, and eventually led to ordinary people gaining suffrage. In this definitive account Joyce Marlow tells the stories of the real people involved and brings to life the atrocity the government attempted to cover up. The Peterloo Massacre is soon to be the subject of a major film directed by Mike Leigh.