The Battle of The Press. Campbell Theophila Carlile

of the Six Acts Bill, and the suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act; and to take action with a view or endeavor to procure other reforms from a notably corrupt Parliament. There had been rumors of the military being called out if the meeting should be held as proposed. I wrote the Chairman of the committee saying that as the advocates of reform were threatened with military execution at that meeting, I felt it my duty to be there, as a matter of example, at the post of danger. It was announced in the New Times before I left London that General Byng had reviewed the troops on St. Peter's Plain, and that they were in fine condition for coping with the Radicals, at the coming meeting, on the 16th August. I travelled from Birmingham to Manchester. There was a general expectation of an attack from the military, and some of the leaders were anxious to arm themselves, and there was a proposition afoot that fifteen thousand men should be there armed with pikes as a precautionary measure, but it was vetoed by some one of the leaders. About eleven o'clock in the morning the people began to assemble at the cottage where Mr. Henry Hunt had taken up his residence. At twelve Mr. Hunt, myself, and others entered the barouche that was to convey us to the place of meeting. We had not proceeded far when we were met by a committee of women from the Women's Reform Committee, one of whom bore a standard with the figure of a woman holding a flag in her hand, surmounted by a cap of liberty. She was requested to take a seat on the box of the carriage, which she did, and sat waving her flag and her handkerchief till we arrived at the hustings, when she took her stand at the corner of the hustings in front. Bodies of men were seen everywhere marching in military order with music, and colors flying, and carrying mottoes inscribed on them such as 'No Corn Laws', 'Liberty or Death' 'Taxation without Representation is Tyranny', 'We will have Liberty', etc., etc. Such cheering was never before heard! Women from the age of 16 to 80 years were seen with their caps in their hands waving and cheering, and their hair consequently dishevelled, the whole scene exceeding the powers of description. In passing through the streets the crowds were very great, and word was brought to Mr. Hunt that there were 300,000 people at and about the place of meeting. As the carriage moved along and reached the shops and warehouses of Mr. Johnson, of Smedley, three times three were given, also at the Police Court and at the Exchange. We arrived at the place of destination about one o'clock. Mr. Hunt expressed his disapprobation of the hustings as arranged, and feared that there would be some accident happen, they not appearing to be very secure. After some hesitation he ascended, and the proposition being made that he should be chairman, he was made so by acclamation. There were five women upon the hustings; four of them took a stand in the bottom of the waggons that formed the hustings, the other, who was Mary Fildes, I believe, was elevated on one corner of the front with her banner in her hand and resting on a large chain. A most singular and interesting situation for a woman at such a meeting; Joan of Arc could not have been more interesting. Mr. Hunt had just begun his speech by thanking the people for the favor conferred on him, and made some ironical remarks on the conduct of the magistrates, when a cart or waggon, which evidently took its start from that part of the field where the police and magistrates were assembled in a house, was driven through the middle of the field, to the great annoyance and danger of the people assembled, who quietly made way for it to pass. The waggon had no sooner made its way through, when the Yeoman Cavalry made its appearance from the side on which the waggon had gone out. The meeting at the entrance of the cavalry and from the commencement was most orderly. The appearance of the women on the platform made the occasion particularly interesting, and everyone present wore bright and happy faces; but as the waggon drove out the cavalry made their appearance, and charged upon the defenceless people with the utmost fury, riding down everyone who could not get out of the way, and cutting down men, women, and children, commencing their premeditated attack with the most insatiable thirst for blood and destruction! The police, too, were as expert in applying their clubs to the heads and shoulders of the people as the cavalry their sabres. The brutality of the police equalled in ferocity the blood-thirstiness of the soldiers. On the first appearance of the cavalry I was standing by Mary Fildes, but I found her above everything like fear. I turned to cheer the other four women, and found them too in good spirits. Many people were rushing on the hustings, and many others getting off, and an opening between the two waggons enabled them to pass down through. After many others had done so, and just as Mr. Hunt was arrested, I passed down through the aperture and had a very narrow escape of my life in so doing, for the pressure of the crowd was so great that, just as I jumped down, the two waggons came together with a crash; and I lost my hat by its being jammed off my head, between the two waggons, in such a manner that I could not extricate it. I was no sooner under the hustings than I found the horses' feet up close to me; but the hustings being cleared, they moved around and followed the crowd who were driven from the hustings, and I then walked out without a hat and was seized by the police. Their first question was, 'Who are you? What business have you here?' I told them that if they thought proper to take me in charge I would soon let them know who I was and how I came there. 'Damn you!' says one; 'let him go about his business'; and I lost no time in doing so. And I found no further interruption except a few blows from their truncheons. I, being a perfect stranger in that city, made to the nearest houses, which I believe were called Hall's Buildings, Windmill Row. Here I found a number of people sheltered. The place formed a little inlet from St. Peter's Plain, but no thoroughfare. All houses were close shut, and on no account would people open them, until there was one woman who looked out of window, and seeing me, a well-dressed man without a hat, supporting a woman who had received a severe contusion on the breast, she was moved with sympathy, and under the idea that I was a doctor and could assist her, she came down and let us in, when there was a rush of about a dozen persons, mostly young people of both sexes. I could not move from the house till six in the evening, when the husband came home from his work. On his arrival I commissioned him to purchase me a hat, which he had great difficulty in doing, as all shops were closed. He at last succeeded, and then I got him to pilot me through the town to the 'Star' Inn, where I had slept the night before, and left my portmanteau. On coming to the inn and finding it surrounded by the cavalry who had done all the mischief in the morning, I thought it prudent not to enter. I then made my way to Mr. Wroe's house, as he was the only man I knew in Manchester, and on consulting with him I concluded that I could do no good in Manchester, but might do much good in London by an early publication of what I had witnessed. I resolved to leave by the first mail, but my portmanteau was still in the enemies' quarters. A person in Mr. Wroe's house undertook to bring me to a coach stand, and having got into a coach, I ordered the man to drive me to the 'Star' Inn, to the door of which we had great difficulty in getting owing to the pressure of so many mounted yeomanry. I got out boldly, and told the coachman to wait, and went into the travellers' room. I made sure of being known, as we had driven past the inn in the morning in the open barouche, and were seen by all the servants, who did not fail to hiss a little as their house was the rendezvous for the enemy, a circumstance I did not know when I went there. On calling the waiter he was quite sullen, saying they had kept me a bed at a great inconvenience to other customers. I pacified him by telling him to charge for it, but I had to ring again and again before the bill and the portmanteau were brought, and all the time I thought there was something brewing for me. At last a different waiter came, and then my things were soon brought and bill settled. Having pleased the waiter beyond his expectations, I slipped on a great coat and a pair of white gaiters, and he ushered me to the coach with a great deal of ceremony, and the yeomanry in front were requested to make way for one whom they had been sent to kill in the morning. While I had been waiting so long for my bill, etc., my coach had to move on to make way for another, and so I was shown to the wrong coach and drove off to the 'Bridgewater Arms', from whence the mail coach started. I had just got out and paid the man when there was a hue and cry after me by the first coachman I had hired, and unknowingly left behind at the 'Star' door. My first impression was that the police had scent of me, but I soon found my mistake, paid the man, and all was right. At three in the morning the coach left, and great was the terror of the coachman, guard, and passengers that it would be stopped by the Reformers before it got to Stockport. I had nothing to fear on this head, but was not free of apprehension that one of my fellow-travellers was a police officer in disguise set to watch me, or to keep at my heels at any rate. He was despatched from Manchester as an express agent to London, either to the Government or to some mercantile house. There were four of us in the mail, two were friends of the master of the 'Bridgewater Arms', and had been there on a visit, and appeared to be coach-masters themselves living somewhere between Macclesfield and Derby. Those two worthies were well filled with wine, but