Old Wives’ Tales and the 1825 Stroudwater Riots
There are two sides to every coin
Still waters run deep
Let those who are without sin cast the first stone
A new baptism and a washing away of sins
A good deep draught of Adam’s Ale
‘We took him by his dishonest hand,
We kissed both cheek and chin,
We wandered to the waterside
And we gently pushed him in.’
LTC ROLT 1944
‘There is something indescribably forlorn about these abandoned waterways; like old ruined houses or silent mills, they are haunted by the bygone life and toil which has left its deathless, eloquent mark upon them. Just as in old houses the worn steps are the memorial of many vanished feet, so on the canals it is the grooves worn by the towing-lines in the rotting lock beams or the crumbling brickwork of bridges that bring the past to life.
Most beautiful and most tragic of all is the old Thames and Severn Canal, climbing up the Golden Valley between great hills that wear their beechwoods like a mane.’
The Mill Pond
When you sit by the mute, still, mill race,
With swallows swooping low over a surface
Like glass, it’s easy to miss the water’s whispers.
I don’t mean the oozing and splashes,
The swish of the fish or the wind in the rushes,
I mean the tales of long ago when weir
And sluice meant a spuming spate of power,
A circuit of cog, belt, loom and jenny,
A revolution of the water wheels,
A pandemonium of 5 valley hammer-noise.
I laughed then in the face of precocious steam,
Bade weavers leave their homes to come to me,
Sprung cycles of boom and workhouse bust,
Told workmen to form combinations,
Threw weavers who undercut them into the waters,
Felt the red coats’ horses’ hooves pound the ground,
Forced spinners to emigrate to New South Wales
Or lodge in hulks on their way to Botany Bay,
Saw coal black gold shift on cut and railway,
Fought a forlorn battle with chimney’s steam,
Felt weed-dank choke my wooden-wheels,
Then knew my time was past.
So shed a mournful tear and took my vow of silence.
The Tow Path
When the wind blows cold in winter,
When the sun sets steep behind the Severn,
When the herons keep their unremitting watch,
And roosting cries cut the twilight sky,
It’s hard to see the outlines of striking weavers
Making their way along the canal to Chalford,
Laden with the beams of looms of erstwhile friends,
Ducking the strike-breakers in a carnival
Of Skimmington rough music censure
Of those who had broken community custom
(A ‘tumultuous and riotous assembly’ to the law).
It’s hard to catch the delighted cries and laughter,
And the pleas for mercy from the men who were marked.
The reeds and rushes keep their secrets,
The soughing of the wind masks all of that;
And the ghosts make their way unheeded,
Right next to you on the tow path.
Writ in Water
John Keats died four years before the Stroudwater Riots.
His epitaph reads:
‘Here lies One Whose Name was writ in Water.’
Here lie the Tales of some of those whose Names
were writ in water in Stroudwater in 1825
William Fletcher
Of the parish of Minchinhampton,
‘Violently assaulted and ducked’
‘Now in a very weak state and not expected to live’.
William Clark
‘At the parish of Woodchester’
‘Violently assaulted and ducked’.
William Lamburn
‘Of the parish of Stroud’
Thrown ‘into a pond … and at the peril of his life …
Therein for a long space of time’.
George Teakle
‘At the parish of Woodchester’
Ducked.
William Saunders
‘At the parish of Stroud’
‘Violently assaulted’ and ducked.
John Cooke
‘At Chalford’
Thrown ‘into the canal there
to the imminent danger of his life’.
George Adlum
Weaver ‘at Chalford in the parish of Bisley’
Violently assaulted, dragged to the canal
Thrown ‘into the water
to the imminent danger of his life’.
Here lie the Names of some of Those
Sent to Horsley Gaol and Northleach House of Correction
Who writ others’ Names in water in Stroudwater in 1825
Or were indicted for Riot & Assault
George Fletcher aged 28
Riot and assault
3 months Horsley
Luke Robins aged 41
Who ducked William Fletcher,
3 months Horsley
Thomas Osbourne aged 28
Who ducked William Clark,
Also riot and assault
2 years Northleach
William Fitting aged 34 & Peter Workman
Riot
3 months Horsley
William Pickford aged 20
Riot and assault
12 months Northleach
Isaac Nutt aged 24
Riot and assault
12 months Northleach
Joseph Mint aged 19
Riot and assault
12 months Northleach
Joseph Hawkins aged 20
Assault
Verdict not recorded
George Heskins aged 35
Riot and assault
9 months Northleach
Richard Preene
Riot and assault
6 months Northleach
Thomas Weir
Riot and assault
3 months Horsley
The 1825 Stroudwater Riots
The Bicentenary
A Reflection and a Speculation
John Loosley’s 1993 booklet The Stroudwater Riots of 1825 contains a judicious selection of historical records presented, pretty well, without judgmental comment, so that the reader can reach their own conclusion about causation, guilt, responsibility etc. I revisited the booklet this summer, some fifteen years after my last read, as initial preparation for this year’s bicentenary and a re-reading has prompted some of the following reflections and speculation.
The first chapter starts thus: ‘The background to the unrest of 1825 shows that the riots were not a sudden storm in an otherwise peaceful landscape’; the text then explores the impact of mechanisation (Spinning Jennies and looms in mills) ‘since Nathaniel Watts had first introduced the flying shuttle at Wallbridge Mill, Stroud, in the 1790s.’
The author then looks at examples of direct action in the immediately preceding generations: the food riots of 1766, the weavers in 1756 and 1803 (“Some evil disposed person … destroyed three cloths … in the rack grounds of … Rodborough and … nine more … in … Woodchester”; a reward of over £600 was offered; a penitent Joseph Stephens was hanged.).
We might add the threatening letter at Uley in 1795; the fear of the likes of Lord Berkeley that economic grievances could become politicised (‘God Save Great Thomas Paine!’). Please see https://radicalstroud.co.uk/class-conflict-in-uley-1795/ and
https://radicalstroud.co.uk/god-save-great-thomas-paine/ for further details and context.
There was also a tradition of proto-Luddism in the Stroudwater area and the cloth districts of west Wiltshire. This threatening letter from 1802 gives a flavour of that melancholy time: “Wee hear in Formed that you got Sheer in mee sheens and if You Don’t Pull them Down in a Forght Nights Time Wee will pull them Down for you … And Bee four Almighty God we will pull down all the Mills that heave Heany Shearing mee Shjens in.” This link also gives a flavour of the time in Wiltshire:
https://radicalstroud.co.uk/thomas-helliker-the-trowbridge-martyr/
What we don’t know and possibly never will is how many of the local lower orders were ‘politicised’ by the republican ideas of Tome Paine’s The Rights of Man; all we can do is try to rescue them ‘from the enormous condescension of posterity’. But it’s true to say that the generations that experienced war, industrialisation, enclosure, poverty and exploitation were constantly creating a sense of alarm in successive governments in London: this is the ‘Was the United Kingdom close to Revolution 1815-48?’ debate (see this link https://radicalstroud.co.uk/peterloo-and-revolution/).
We can see, therefore, that there are both local and national contexts to the weavers’ action in Stroudwater in 1825 – but there is also an international one: the prosperity of the region (Stroud scarlet cloth for uniforms for example) was tied not just to the aggrandisement of the East India Company but also to the martial nature of the spreading British Empire, and Great Power wars, particularly with republican and Napoleonic France from 1793-1815. Napoleon may have met his Waterloo at Waterloo but peace also brought poverty to the nation in 1815. But before we leave the international links to our locality (so-called ‘glocal’ history), here is a list of colonial conflicts at the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries (wars that boosted demand for uniforms and cloth): the West Indies, the Kandyan Wars, Australia, Ireland, Sierra Leone, the Ashanti Wars, Turkey, Cape Colony, the Persian Gulf, America, Borneo, and Java.
Well, that sets that scene. Now back to 1825: and first of all, the Combination Acts. And here we immediately see what a false dichotomy it is to separate ‘politics’ and ‘economics’: ‘political economy’ would be a better term to use. Why? Well, the Combination Acts of 1799-1800 illegalised trade unions and collective bargaining (as even AI says on a perfunctory search). The act was passed ‘in response to fears of worker unrest and political revolution’ … QED. Political Economy.
The so-called ‘Liberal Tories’ of the 1820s (as opposed to the ‘Repressive Tories’ 1815-20) repealed the Combination Acts in 1824 after some assiduous campaigning by Francis Place and Joseph Hume. But the working-class did not meekly accept the dictates of the new emerging capitalism, however, and a wave of strikes followed. In consequence, a new act was passed in 1825 that allowed trade unions the right to exist but illegalised action that would render them effective (striking!).
Right: now we are here in 1825, let’s start the Stroudwater narrative arc:
28.4.25 ‘in almost forty-eight hours all the shuttles were laid in the silent grave’. The Gloucester Journal 16th May 1825 commented: ‘The cessation from labour commenced on Friday 29th April and on the Monday following the weavers assembled in considerable numbers at Cainscross where they were met by several of the Manufacturers: but not coming to any satisfactory arrangement shuttles to the amount of several hundred were instantly collected’.
The Gloucester Journal 16th May 1825 continued thus: ‘Meetings of more than 3000 weavers were held on subsequent days on Break Heart and Stinchcombe Hills and on Monday last they congregated on Selsley Hill to the number of not less than 6000 … On each of these occasions several of their employers agreed to advance the prices but a number sufficient to satisfy the weavers not having yet consented to their terms another meeting was held on Wednesday last at Nympsfield when deputations of workmen from several parishes attended and it was strenuously urged that they should resume their labour for those Gentlemen inclined to accede to the new prices. The majority however obstinately resisted this reasonable proposition until the whole of the Manufacturers had expressed their compliance and the business consequently remains unsettled. But it is justly due to the weavers to add that their conduct throughout has been orderly and respectful to their superiors and they gained general approbation by their quiet and peaceable demeanour even when assembled in the greatest numbers.’
John Loosley commented that “The strike was enforced by … strong pickets visiting the weavers in their homes and demanding the surrender of their shuttles thus rendering them perforce idle and it lasted three months. Towards the end … strong action was taken against those who showed signs of weakening. The usual practice was to take the beam out of the offender’s loom and mounting him astride it, take him to the nearest Mill pond or canal and tumble him into it. So many suffered this way in Chalford (and violence was threatened) that the magistrates sent a Troop of Horse and read the Riot Act.’ (Apparently, the soldiers ‘were stationed between Blisse and Tayloe Mills and their horses were stabled by the Coffee tavern/the Company’s Arms.’ Weaving in the Stroud Valley during the 19th Century by A.Phelps)
A digression or two now before we return to the narrative arc: The carnivalesque placing of a miscreant backwards (often with rough music beating of pots and pans) was a signal feature of the ‘Skimmington’ whereby locals who transgressed community values were lampooned (as in Thomas Hardy’s The Mayor of Casterbridge). What was a tumultuous and riotous assembly from the point of view of the ruling class, could, in fact, contain structure and order, in a subversion of the theatre of traditional bewigged courts of law. Secondly, the atmosphere at Chalford appears to be very different from when ‘the most dangerous man in England’, that ‘radical fox’, Citizen John Thelwall, stayed at Chalford in the summer of 1797. He portrays an almost Edenic community:
‘… pleasant haunts! brakes, bourns,
- And populous hill, and dale, and pendant woods;
- And you, meandering streams, and you, ye cots
- And hamlets, that, with many a whiten’d front,
- Sprinkle the woody steep; or lowlier stoop,
- Thronging, gregarious, round the rustic spire …
- Nor, as yet,
- Towers from each peaceful dell the unwieldy pride
- Of Factory over-grown; where Opulence
- Dispeopling the neat cottage, crowds his walls
- …to the yoke
- Of unremitting Drudgery …
- Therefore I love Chalford, and ye vales
- Of Stroud, irriguous …’
Now back to the narrative arc: within days of the start of the strike, the membership of the Stroud Valley Weavers Union had rocketed from 400 to 5,000. This body was divided into committees with ‘Delegates’ who presented ‘Manufacturers’ with demands for a just price for their labour. On ‘rejection’, in the words of John Loosley, ‘almost all the weavers struck’, the next direct action being the collection of shuttles from the looms of the workshops of weavers who had carried on at their labours, and then after ‘threats’, ‘unfinished cloths were also forcibly taken … and after being triumphantly paraded about, were contemptuously thrown down on the premises of the Employers’.
‘The following account of specific acts of violence committed by the Weavers is extracted from the Depositions taken before the Magistrates’: 31.5.25 Edwin Perrin was one such ‘unfortunate’ suspected of working for the Marlings at too low a price. He was called on by some ’30 or 40 weavers’, and, when he was at Ham Mill, he faced the collective wrath of some 200 weavers.
On June 2nd, he was visited by some 500 weavers who took away his work and equipment while two hours later, 600-700 took over with a march to Ham Mill. One of Marling’s men ended up in the brook but the next marked man managed (with poetic (in)justice) to hide in the Counting House.
The next day, June 3rd: Vatch Mills witnessed the arrival of some 200, some of whom ‘held sticks over the heads of Mr Peter Wyatt and Mr George L Wyatt, and threatened to knock out their brains and to destroy the mill.’ The next day (4.6.25), P Wyatt was ‘assaulted by a mob’ in front of the Magistrates Office and members of the ‘mob’ also ducked a number of their opponents ‘in Mr Holbrow’s fish pond’. Around 3,000 also gathered at Vatch Mill and seized unfinished cloth woven below rates.
4.6.25 was a busy day: 29 special constables were sworn in (’chiefly clothiers’) while ‘Manufacturers presented a written request’ to Justices of the Peace for an address to the Home Secretary for ‘a body of Military to be stationed in the Neighbourhood to assist the Civil Power in protecting their property.’ The ‘Woollen Manufacturers’ who signed this representation were William Stanton & Sons (Stafford Mill), Robert P Pelly (Hyde Court) Harris Stephen & Co Willam Lewis (Brimscombe Mills) Henry Wyatt & Co (Vatch Mills) Geo. Lewis (Brimscombe Mills) Jos. Partdidge & Co (Bowbridge Mills) Wm. Jn. Wood Chas. Glover Wm. Marling & Son (Ham Mills).
The focus for the next stage in this formal procedure is Spillmans Court and the letter from the Justices of the Peace, Henry Burgh and Peter Hawker, to the Home Office. They state in their introduction that ‘the weavers are soon become so violent that we think it almost impossible to have an Offender lodged in safe custody without military assistance … Manufacturers consider all their property in most imminent danger.’
5.6.25 Orders sent for ‘a squadron of the 10th Hussars’ to be sent to Stroud. And here comes the next letter in this narrative: from T. Jones Graeme, Major 10th Royal Hussars, Bristol ‘…William Playne, Longfords Mill, Minchinhampton from Stroud visited on me this morning to report serious event outrages which had occurred near Stroud … I think it is my duty to make this communication to you, Sir, and to request that you should let me be furnished with instructions on the subject from His Royal Highness the Commander in Chief …’
‘Saint Monday’, June 6th, saw weavers who undercut ducked in ‘the Brook in Nailsworth bottom by a large mob’, while ‘at Stroud a mob of about 2,000 continued to duck persons in Mr Holbrow’s fish pond’. The Hussars arrived.
The next day, 7.6.25: ‘the mob was as great as on the preceding day and committed many acts of violence. Some acts of intimidation were also committed by Masons towards others of their trade who had not struck for wages.’
Bristol June 7th 1825
‘Sir … I received orders yesterday morning … to detach one squadron of the regiment under my command to Stroud which was immediately carried into effect. I suppose it arrived at Stroud by 8 o’clock last night.’ T. Jones Graeme, Major 10th Royal Hussars
June 8th 1825 J.C. Wallington, Captain commanding detachment Royal Hussars: ‘the squadron under my command was called out yesterday evening to disperse a mob collected in the town, which proceeded to acts of violence. We accomplished this object with some trouble including the slash of the sword only. We made prisoners of some of the most disorderly, no accident occurred. I despatched Lieutenant Dent with 20 men to Chalford … to protect a factory which the mob had threatened to destroy … This morning I have sent another party with the High Constable to execute warrants against some of the ringleaders. The town seems perfectly quiet today … The Clothiers met yesterday and agreed to give the weavers the increase of price they demanded. The Masons, Carpenters and Millwrights have also struck for more wages.’
10.6.25 “On the 10th of June a paper was vended at Stroud signed ‘The True British Weavers’ purporting to be a relation of events that had lately occurred in the Neighbourhood respecting the Weavers and the Clothiers – the paper had no Printer’s name on it – the vendor of the paper (Henry Beeseley) was apprehended and committed to prison as a vagrant.” (G.R.O.)
13.6.25 The Gloucester Journal
‘JOHN RUDGE weaver OBADIAN GARDINER weaver ENOCH WEAR weaver NATHAN PEARSE weaver ENOCH STEPHENS weaver JAMES BAXTER jun weaver JOHN TURK weaver SAMUEL GARDINER weaver JOHN STEPHENS weaver JOSEPH HUNT weaver THOMAS HUNT weaver THOMAS STEPHENS jun weaver JAMES CROOK weaver AMOS HUNT weaver JOHN BARTLETT weaver JANO CORNISH weaver WILLIAM POULSON weaver
The above persons are charged upon Oath with having on Thursday 2nd June and on several successive days riotously and tumultuously assembled together at Chalford in the Parish of Bisley and Minchinhampton in this county and in Company with many others at present unknown committed acts of violence whereby several Individuals were much injured and the Peace of the Neighbourhood greatly disturbed.’
June 15th: Henry Burgh’s letter to the Home Secretary portrays the scene: “on Tuesday the 7th large quantities of weavers, masons and others assembled and proceeded to many acts of violence, which obliged me to read the Proclamation against tumultuous assemblies.” The assembly did not disperse, however, “and having thrown stones at the Military as well as those who had come forward to assist the Civil Power,” the troops were “requested” to “disperse” the assembly “which was effectively done in a short time in as humane manner as possible.” Several were arrested and some “committed to Gloucester Gaol.”
He went on to say that he had printed a notice “to convince the People that the Combination Laws are not repealed and I have put it into execution against several Weavers and Masons for intimidating Workmen. The county is now quiet …” He adds that appeals for help, sent by the weavers to Wiltshire, the districts around Wotton-under-Edge, Dursley and Uley, have received no support.
18.7.25 The Gloucester Journal reported on the trial of 21 men (‘mostly weavers’). The defence ‘contrasted the comfortable situation of the weavers many years ago … with the wretched circumstances under which these individuals now stood … and proceeded to draw an affecting picture of the state of poverty to which this meritorious class had been reduced … after their daily labour of perhaps sixteen or eighteen hours, they returned to their cottages in a state of misery and dejection, with a pittance insufficient to provide for those dependent upon them …’
To no avail, alas, … remember the Luddites they were told …remember some of their sentences of transportation and of capital punishment … ‘As it was’, the conduct of some of those before him ‘had on occasions been marked by acts of excessive violence; and it was his duty to tell them, that, had death ensued to any of those individuals who had been so severely ducked, it would have been deemed murder, and they would have been tried for their lives at the Assizes, and in all probability have suffered death upon the scaffold! But most fortunately for them, no such fatal termination had occurred.’
In consequence: Thos. Osbourne two years; Wm. Pickford, John Mint and Isaac Nutt one year; George Heskins nine months; Rd. Preen six months in the House of Correction at Northleach; Wm. Fitting, Peter Workman, Geo. Fletcher, Luke Robins, Thos. Weir three months in the House of Correction at Horsley and all to be kept to hard labour.’
31st August 1825
John Williams D.D. Minister of Stroud, Gloucestershire to the Home Secretary asking for clemency to be shown to William Fitting, serving three months imprisonment at Horsley with hard labour:
‘On the Saturday preceding the arrival of the Cavalry, there were about 2,000 weavers assembled in the Town, and a very large concourse of them, before the door of the Clerk of the Magistrates, demanding the release of prisoners … On enquiring, I found that the prisoners were dismissed respecting whom the tumult was made, as the aggression was on the part of the Master rather than the Men. But Fitting was there detained on a distinct affair, having been seen among certain disorderly persons at Ham Mill, in this Parish, but was not actually engaged in any mischief … but was present with others who were doing mischief. He is a young man of a weak constitution and his wife has lately been confined with her first child, whose health has been impaired from the mother’s feelings, for the situation of her husband. Fitting’s health has also been such as to render his discontinuance at the Tread-Mill advisable …’
Trinity Quarter Sessions 1825
WILLIAM PEGLER (40), ADAM GLASTONBURY (30) WILLIAM STEPHENS (30) Indicted for riot and assault by William Fletcher – discharged after being out on bail.
GEORGE FLETCHER (28) ditto – guilty 3 months at Horsley.
LUKE ROBINS (41) charged ‘with having, on the 6th day of June now instant, riotously and tumultuously assembled at the parish of Minchinhampton, with a great concourse of persons, and then and there violently assaulted and ducked one William Fletcher, who is now in a very weak state and not expected to live’ – 3 months at Horsley.
THOMAS OSBOURNE (28) ‘charged on the oath of William Clark, with having on the 6th day of June instant, at the parish of Woodchester, with divers other persons riotously and tumultuously assembled, and violently assaulted and ducked the said William Clark … guilty on 2 indictments for riots and assaults’ – 2 years.
WILLIAM FITTING & PETER WORKMAN (34) ‘guilty on indictment for riot on the prosecution of Thomas Marling’ – 3 months Horsley.
ABRAHAM SMITH (51) ‘charged on oaths of Thomas Marling and another, with having on the 2nd day of June instant, at the parish of Stroud, riotously and tumultuously assembled with a great concourse of persons … and threatened to do the said Thomas Marling some bodily injury … Indicted for riot on the prosecution of Thomas Marling – discharged.’
WILLIAM PICKFORD (20) ‘charged … with having, with sundry other persons, on the 4th day of June now instant, at Stroud aforesaid, riotously assembled and committed a violent assault upon … William Lamburn, by throwing him into a pond, and at the peril of his life continuing him therein for a long space of time:- And also charged him with having, on the 4th day of June instant, at the parish of Stroud, with sundry other persons, to the number of 3000 upwards, riotously assembled before the woollen factory of Messrs. Henry Wyatt, Peter Wyatt, and George Lingard Wyatt , and used threats to do the said George Lingard Wyatt some bodily harm, to the great terror and annoyance of His Majesty’s liege subjects’- 12 months Northleach.
CHARLES JAMES (22) ‘charged on the oath of Joseph Blackmore, with having, on the 7th day of June instant, (after proclamation had been made about an hour for all persons to disperse …) proceeded to a pond, in the parish of Stroud, and assisted in ducking a person therein, to the imminent peril of his life. Indicted for riot and assault … discharged.’
ISAAC NUTT (24) ‘charged on the oath of George Teakle, with having, on the 6th day of June now inst., at the parish of Woodchester, with a number of other persons, riotously and tumultuously assembled, and violently assaulted and ducked the said George Teakle’ Guilty of riot and assault – 12 months at Northleach.
JAMES ELLIOTT (18) ‘charged … with having assembled with divers other persons, in the town of Stroud, for the space of one hour upwards, after proclamation had been made for all persons to disperse … Indicted for riot and assault’ – discharged.
JOHN MINT (19) ‘charged … with having, on the 4th day of June inst., at the parish of Stroud, riotously and tumultuously assembled with a great concourse of persons and then and there violently assaulted the said William Saunders, by ducking him in a pond. Found guilty … for riot and assault ‘– 12 months at Northleach.
JOSEPH HAWKINS (20) ‘’charged … with having, on Thursday, the 2nd day of June inst. with divers other persons unknown, riotously and tumultuously assembled at Chalford, and did there aid, assist, and abet the rest of the crowd in violently assaulting one John Cooke, of the parish of Bisley, weaver, and throwing him into the canal there, to the imminent danger of his life, and to the great disturbance of the peace of the neighbourhood.’ (Verdict not recorded)
JOSEPH MAYO (20) charged … with having, on Monday last , the 6th day of June instant with divers other persons … riotously and tumultuously assembled together at Chalford, and then and there aided, abetted and assisted in violently assaulting one George Adlum, weaver, and afterwards dragging the said George Adlum to the canal and throwing him into the water, to the imminent danger of his life, and aiding and assisting the said mob to committing various acts tending to disturb the peace of the neighbourhood.’ – discharged.
GEORGE HESKINS (35) ‘charged … with having, on the 6th day of June instant, assembled in of Stroud, with a great concourse of persons and then and there assaulted Robert Horton.’ Guilty of riot and assault – 9 months.
RICHARD PREENE ‘found guilty … for riot and assault’ – 6 months at Northleach.
THOMAS WEARE ‘found guilty … for riot and assault’ – 3 months at Horsley.
JOHN CHANDLER ‘Indicted for riot and assault’ – discharged.
Here follows a first-person piece I wrote around 2012 on reading John’s booklet a second time. I wanted to create something compelling, foregrounding women (I used my daughters’ names), playing around with creative non-fiction and WG Sebaldian documentary fiction. I little thought that people would take it as true … I remember how nervous I was when I read this piece out at a history talk at Oakridge and well remember the relief and joy when John who was in the audience told me how much he liked the piece.
These are my memories of what I saw and did, together with others in the Stroudwater Valleys in 1825. I know I am supposed to show remorse but I cannot dissemble. I have no remorse.
My name is Alice Ayliffe Bingham and I am 25 years old.
It was after Eastertide, at the end of April, when we had enough of not having enough. Me and my sisters Charlotte, Sarah and Elisabeth and my mother are spinners. My brothers, Tom and Sam, and my father are weavers. We had been working ever longer time for ever cankered pennies all the year. Something needed doing.
So we laid our shuttles and looms to rest and joined the Stroud Valleys Weavers Union. I straightway joined 50 others at a congregation at Ham Mill. There was 700 of us the next day. We threw transgressors in the brook. We all joined the next assembly a few days later. 200 of us congregated at Vatch Mills. There were 3,000 of us by the following evening. We baptised more strike breakers and master clothiers’ men in Mr. Holbrow’s fish pond. I won’t name names but the same happened at Woodchester, Minchinhampton, Frogmarsh, Chalford and Bisley. It was all over Stroudwater.
The stone masons then joined in. They were angry about the Combination Acts. The carpenters and millwrights joined them too. So, the gentry swore in special constables. Then the Hussars rode in a couple of days later. When we re-congregated, they read the Riot Act. So we threw stones at them. They dispersed us with horse and swish of sabre. A friend was arrested for selling ‘The True British Weaver’, so more congregations followed: Break Heart Hill near Dursley, then 3,000 on Stinchcombe and then 6,000 on Selsley. If anyone broke the strike then we stuck them backwards on a horse and paraded them through the lanes while we all beat pots and pans in a cacophony of rejection. I think they stuck them on beams from looms in Chalford and then pushed them in the canal and brook. They read the Riot Act there too. We kept it going though, and followed up with another big congregation in Stroud at the end of August. We called for the release of our friends in prison.
This is my true and faithful account. I cannot dissemble. The Good Book tells us that we should get our bread by the sweat of our brow. We had the sweat but no bread. What could we do?
And here follows another first-person account written in the summer of 2025
What I did in 1825 in Stroudwater in the Summer
Call me Ishmael.
I’m an old man now but will try to tell you in this account my personal history in all those years gone by. But I will not be telling all and will not be revealing any names. Call me Ishmael.
I’m not proud of what I did back then as my family have always supported our fellow weavers. My father at the beginning of this century and my grand-father sometime towards the end of the last. But I’d a wife and five children and I needed a wage to bring in some sustenance and pay for a roof over our heads.
I’d been working thirteen hours a day and been in the pits of despair. I was too ashamed to attend church with the family as we look so ragged. Our bedding was shameful and wretched. Tattered, torn quilts to cover us all and straw below when my wife washed the threadbare sheets.
What follows now is what I wrote back then on pages I kept in our Bible. I can still just about read it with a candle.
It pulls at my heartstrings when I finish my labours for the day. My children crying for something to put in their mouths and the only treat we can afford them to take their little minds off the constant monotony of stale bread, mouldy cheese, greying bacon and milk is a few potatoes with a bit of flick or suet.
The children are constantly down with coughs and colds and fevers and my wife is ailing too. And she is with child. I go without food on occasions to aid her and the children but they are stinted and stunted in their growth, I think. So, when the master asked me if I could carry on at my loom through the summer of the tumult and the duckings and earn a steady pocket of coin, it was need not greed that enabled temptation to get the better of me.
But as I toiled at my labours, with my head going clickety clack with the loom, I would recite the Lord’s Prayer to keep me on the task in hand. But, then the line, “Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil’ echoed in my head all day and then at night too. Was it evil to feed my family? But was it evil to turn my back on lifelong friends?
I eventually arrived at the question: “Which of the two was the greater evil?” And I eventually reached the answer to that question in the dog days of August 1825.
I went to see he who shall remain anonymous to confess my sins. And said that I would duck myself three times to within an inch of my life as an act of penitence and contrition. This I duly did betwixt Chalford and Brimscombe at night under the watchful eye of the Combination. Each time, I recited in my submerged pounding mind, “I baptise thee in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit”. Afterwards, I had to endure a silence whene’er I came into the company of fellow weavers and families. As soon as I arrived all conversation would cease. This lasted a month. For a month I was Ishmael cast into the wilderness.
Once the month’s sentence had passed, I was welcomed back into the fraternity and community of my hamlet. Better poor together than working alone. And better in New South Wales than Bisley said my wife.
And so, we emigrated in 1839 I think it was. And I have never looked back until this day.
These are my recollections of the summer of 1825. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.
Call me Ishmael.
Here Follows a Short Discourse on the term ‘The Mob’
My memory of O Level History sees my ever so posh History teacher (I was so in thrall that my handwriting changed to an echo of his) telling is that the 18th century term ‘The Mob’ derived from In Perpetuum Mobile: constant movement, no structure, no hierarchy, no culture – a patrician view upon the lower orders: a mob. A worthless, inchoate rabble.
Next up, Edmund Burke, Bristol MP, inveterate opponent of the French Revolution, who coined the term ‘a swinish multitude’ to describe the lower orders: ‘Along with its natural protectors and guardians, learning will be cast into the mire, and trodden down under the hoofs of a swinish multitude … ‘
Reflections on the Revolution in France 1790
The great radical Thomas Spence replied with withering sarcasm with the title of his famous journal: Pig’s Meat: or Lessons for the Swinish Multitude: Published in weekly penny numbers, collected by the poor man’s advocate (an old veteran in the cause of freedom) in the course of his reading for more than twenty years. Intended to promote among the labouring part of mankind proper ideas of their situation, of their importance, and of their rights. And to convince them that their forlorn condition has not been entirely overlooked and forgotten, nor their just cause unpleaded, neither by their maker not by the best and most enlightened of men in all ages.
London: printed for T. Spence, at the hive of liberty, No. 8, Little-Turnstile, High Holborn
Now back to the House of Correction
Here Lie the Names of Men whose Names were Writ in the Surgeon’s Journal 1825-1827
(Men who had previously Writ Other Men’s Names in Water)
Northleach House of Correction Gloucestershire
GEORGE HESKINS WILLIAM PICKFORD RICHARD PREENE
ISAAC NUTT JOHN MINT THOMAS OSBOURNE
Constantly unwell with tooth ache, stomach pains, rheumatic pain, bowel complaints, incontinence, diarrhoea, and headaches.
Remedies included ‘a blister to the chest’, ‘cathartic medicine’ and ‘a sudorific’.
17 June 1826
Sent for last evening to Thomas Osbourne who was very weak and debilitated state arising I should imagine from long confinement and spare diet. I sent him a draught which he took at bedtime and he is much better today. I have ordered him half a pound of mutton for his dinner and to repeat his draft at bedtime.
9 July 1826
These men who have been confined for some length of time and sentenced to hard labour are extremely weak and languid. The diet in such cases does not appear sufficient and I am of the opinion that after long confinement (aided by depression of spirt, hard labour and low diet) the constitution of many of them may suffer materially and it is not improbable that chronic diseases may eventually ensue, which may prevent gaining their own livelihood for some time after their periods of confinement may expire.
27 Sept 1827
Several of the men complained of pain in their limbs all of which with one exception are unworthy of notice. The [Tread] mill is new to most of them and they will have pains in their lower extremities till they get accustomed to it.
Since the treadwheel has been erected the men have many of them bad colds and have complained of the work being too hard for them but they appear not to be pretty well reconciled to it. Those men who have been confined the greatest length of time are in much better health since the allowance of meat than they were before and express themselves grateful for it.’
The Gaol at Horsley 1791-1867
Priory Fields, Horsley
‘Every Prisoner, on commitment, is undressed and washed; a complete suit of County clothing is then substituted for their own, with two caps added, of black worsted, for the day, and a woollen one for the night … on the ground-floor, twelve working cells in each wing, of 7 feet by 6, and 9 feet high to the crown of the arch. On the first storey eight sleeping and four solitary cells to each wing; and on the second storey, twelve sleeping-cells, two solitary, and two for the refractory in both wings.
Each class of Prisoner is allowed a peck of coals per day, in cold weather. Their chief employment is cutting of logwood and firestick across the grain, for the use of dyers; and they have one third of their earnings …
The prisoners who work at the tread-wheel have half an hour for breakfast, and one hour for dinner, during this time they can take some air in the yard … Prisoners sentenced at the sessions are whipped here sometimes. A man comes from Tetbury to execute the sentence: the surgeon is always present …
The tread-wheel is the chief means of supplying hard labour; and breaking of stones is sometimes practised here as hard labour …’
Northleach House of Correction
The Treadmill
‘There were 5 classes of prisoner and the yard and cells were segregated according to class’: Class 1: the most “atrocious” males (who were subject to hard labour often without pay) Class 2: 1st time offenders Class 3 males unable to pay fines or sureties Class 4 women and girls Class 5 “vagrants in foul and filthy state”.
Cells were just 1.8 metres by 2.4 metres in dimension…
1823 saw the introduction of a hand winch for grinding corn – but as Magistrates sought ever exacting hard labour, along came the treadmill with steps 8 inches high. Prisoners had to climb for 16 minutes, followed by an 8-minute walk in the yard, before returning to the treadmill. The end of the prisoners’ daily work session would have resulted in men climbing between 10 and 12,000 feet a day.
First Conclusion
All of this happened in an age when Gloucestershire had one of the highest rates of transportation in the country and Stroudwater had one of the highest rates in Gloucestershire. So, after finishing making my notes from John’s book, I thought the sentences appeared to be quite lenient – especially if it were true that some of the ducked weavers feared for their lives.
Knowing that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, I contacted Steve Poole, formerly Professor of History at UWE and this is what he messaged me:
“Hi Stuart. Well, we’re still in the era of new penitentiary-style prison building in 1825, so longer sentences than those you’ve listed might have seemed exceptional. Of course, Paul’s Gloucestershire county prison was actually a much earlier (1790s) ‘new style’ prison than most so you might have expected longer sentences there than at old gaols elsewhere in the south west. But by and large, courts still regarded prisons as holding cells and they were simply not equipped to contain felons for lengthy sentences. The big innovation of the 1820s was the treadmill – pretty much every male prisoner would have been ordered to hard labour – not a principle that would work practicably on longer sentences (prisoners would probably die from exhaustion!) So I’m not sure that these would be regarded as particularly lenient. Did they not single out one or two scapegoats on capital charges and have them transported for 7 or 14 years to discourage the others?
Steve’s question at the end focuses our minds.
Why didn’t they?
Remember William Fletcher, ‘now in a very weak state and not expected to live’ after violent assault and a ducking? Luke Robins got 3 months at Horsley for that. And John Cooke, thrown ‘into the canal … to the imminent danger of his life’ by Joseph Hawkins (Verdict not recorded)?
I’ve just checked the transportation lists, wondering about Joseph Hawkins … nope.
So, no sentences of transportation.
My brother-in-law, a retired probation worker, suggested that there could have been a possibility that the local magistrates and justices of the peace took into account the possible implications of a severe sentence: provocation rather than deterrence sort of thing. Trevor also speculated on the possibility that there could have been covert political influence on sentencing from the government in London.
Or perhaps, as Steve messaged, the punishment fitted the crime and the prison system and with no capital charges for any offender then there would be no transportation and no scapegoats to deter others in the future.
With all this in mind, let’s revisit the description of the sentencing from The Gloucester Journal, 18th July 1825 in greater detail. ‘… The Learned Chairman, the Rev. Dr. Cooke, now proceeded to pass sentence, in an address to the prisoners, full of energy, argument, and feeling, and which, for the sake of the manufacturing class in general, we wish we could give at length to our readers. Their cases, he observed, had received the most mature and deliberate consideration from the whole Bench of Magistrates; and however anxious they might be to extend lenity to the prisoners, yet a sense of duty to the laws, to the public and to the prisoners themselves, called for a heavy visitation upon them. They had shown to what lengths they could go, in contravention of the laws and of the public peace; and by the sentence he was about to pronounce, the court was actuated, amongst other reasons, by an earnest wish to protect the prisoners against themselves. He then enlarged upon the grievous nature of the outrages which had marked their conduct – outrages which had become so alarming as to render it necessary to call in the aid of the military. But for this, probably they might have proceeded to still greater extremities, and have committed acts for which their lives might have become forfeited to the offended laws of the country.
He brought to their recollection the combination, which had been entered into by the weavers in 1803 … after that, arose the combination then well known by the name of Luddites … Most of these occurrences had originated with similar beginnings to the present, but had assumed such alarming aspects, as to call for the active interference of the Government. Special Commissions … eight rioters at Manchester, two at Chester, and eighteen in Yorkshire, paid with their lives … besides others whom it was found necessary to banish from their native land, to spend their days in exile and ignominy. As in these instances, the prisoners, in this case, unless checked by the heavy hand of the law, might have proceeded in their mad career till it had terminated in murder, or some other capital offence. As it was, their conduct had on occasions been marked by acts of excessive violence; and it was his duty to tell them, that, had death ensued to any one of those individuals who had been so severely ducked, it would have been deemed murder, and they would have been tried for their lives at the Assizes, and in all probability have suffered death upon the scaffold! But most fortunately for them, no such fatal termination had occurred. The Learned Chairman feelingly exhorted them to bear in mind the narrow escape they had, and made some pertinent and impressive observations upon the relative duties of employers and workmen. He pointed out to them the ruin which must fall upon themselves and their families, should such scenes be persisted in or renewed …’
Transportation – a Google Search
Transportation was often a punishment given to people found guilty of theft – 80 per cent of transported convicts were guilty of theft. Most were repeat offenders.
Transportation was also a punishment given to protesters. Some of the Luddites, Chartists, Rebecca Rioters, Irish campaigners, and, of course, the Tolpuddle Martyrs were transported. Only 15 per cent of transported convicts were women. Many judges used transportation as an alternative to the death penalty and a way to relieve overcrowded prisons. Sentences were for seven years, 14 years, or life.
Only 1.2 per cent of transported convicts were Welsh. Around 69 per cent were English, 25 per were Irish and 5 per cent were Scottish.
Final Conclusion
John Loosley: ‘There was trouble again at Chalford in 1828 and at Dunkirk and Longfords in 1834. Nationally this period of labour history reached its climax in the early 1830s with Robert Owen’s Grand National Consolidated Trades Union. Notice that his principle of uniting all trades under one banner was briefly foreshadowed in Stroud when other trades struck at the height of the demonstrations.’ (My italics)
A consequential thought: if the Stroudwater Riots had happened some ten years later after the Captain Swing agricultural riots of 1830 and the riots that accompanied the passage of the Great Reform Act 1830-32 and, of course, the Tolpuddle Martyrs of 1834 … would the sentences have been different?
A re-read of Jennifer Tann’s Wool and Water added strength to that food for thought. Here we are in 1829 in Stroud: “The Stroud magistrates were nearly all clothiers and were sufficiently alarmed to attract the attention of the Home Office which sent a spy, one Frances Fagin, a Bow Street runner, to inveigle himself into one of the weaver’s lodges and report back. He observed a theatrical ceremony of induction for new members involving swords, masks, turbans and skulls and an oath of loyalty and secrecy to the union. Timothy Exell and other leaders were quietly warned of the danger of transgressing the Conspiracy Act … and were warned to abandon secrecy and oath taking.”
It was this Act, adds Tann, that led to the transportation of the Tolpuddle Martyrs five short years later …
PS
Remember George Heskins? I found him in gaol again in 1833. In Horsley.
George HESKINS aged 48 Weaver Rogue and Vagabond 3 months
What do you read into that?
Stroudwater 1825
An unmarked Radical Heritage;
But your sixth sense can secretly sense it:
Create Theatres of Memory in your mind,
Invoke Stroud’s Spirit of Place
Then invite Spectators to their Seats.
Radical Stroud is grateful for the support of UNITE 007 Gloucester Branch in putting on this and associated events, exhibitions, research, leaflets and more discursive or creative writing. So grateful. Past and Present conjoined.