son had somewhere observed," that cases might arise where even powerful circumstances would not carry the weight of conviction against the strong course of probability." In this instance, he conceived the strong course of probability was opposed to many of the statements that had been made. The yeomanry were said to have cut down women and children. He did not believe it. He would not believe that a yeoman or any other manno, not even the infamous Carlile himself could be guilty of such an act. The petition was then brought up and read. It sat forth : "That for several years past a great proportion of the labouring classes in the district where the petitioners reside have been suffering very severe privations, arising partly from the want of employment, and partly from the inadequacy of their wages to afford them a comfortable subsistence, evils which they have attributed in a principal degree to the great pressure of taxation consequent upon the inadequate representation of the Commons of Great Britain and Ireland in the House; that the same classes have therefore an earnest desire that a reform in the representation of the people may speedily take place; that the political bias of the labouring classes having, as it appears to the petitioners, been rendered more decisive by their personal sufferings, they have, to a great extent, publicly expressed their opinion, that annual parlia of the yeomanry carrying their swords to be sharpened; but he must say, that he was far from being convinced by any thing that had fallen from him, that their swords were improperly sharpened. He admitted that they were sharpened; but it struck him that it would have been a more extraordinary circumstance if they were not sharpened. Because, if he rightly understood the papers in his hand, it appeared, not merely from the statement of the magistrates, and from the evidence given before them, but from the declaration of the grand jury of Chester, that meetings were held at which persons attended armed with pikes and pistols-weapons no doubt proper for the purposes of reform [Hear, hear!]. Could it be supposed that an immense multitude would assemble, armed, for any good purpose? When men met together to petition for their rights, was it necessary that they should carry a pike and a pistol? Was it wonderful that the commander of a military force, when called on to attend such a meeting, should ask his men, "In what state are your arms?" and should direct them to come properly prepared? The gallant general had laid a great deal of stress on what was said at the inquest at Oldham. He must, however, tell the gallant general, that he was very much disposed to disbelieve many of the persons who gave evidence, even on their oath, because several of them were present at the meeting, and had partaken largely of that stream of sediments and universal suffrage are necestion, impiety and blasphemy, which sary, in order sufficiently to guarantee the flowed through the country, and which purity, the independence, and the intetaught men to treat our Saviour as an grity of the House of Commons; that into impostor. Would men who propagated the consideration of this point the petior who cherished such doctrines be tioners do not enter, but they state to the bound by the obligation of an oath? House, that within the last two or three Assuredly not. Men who avowed a years numerous public meetings, having hatred to the magistrates, who were op-in view the forwarding of this object, posed to all order, who were desirous to pull down the constitution-such men had an interest in giving evidence of the description to which the gallant general had alluded. Without this explanation, it would be extraordinary if he refused to give credit to the evidence of many of those persons, on oath. In the last session an hon. gentleman (Mr. Bennet), whose philanthropy no man could doubt, brought a case of grievance before the House, which was very proper for in-effectual mode of obtaining radical requiry. It was answered by his majesty's ministers; and in the course of the dis-ment, and also, to consider the propriety cussion the hon. gentleman said, Dr. John have been held in Manchester and the neighbouring towns, all of which, except where an interference by, or by order of, the magistracy has taken place, have been conducted from their commencement to their termination in an orderly and peaceable manner; that in the latter part of the month of July last, a meeting was announced, by public advertisement, to be held on the 9th day of August, to take into consideration the most speedy and form in the Commons House of Parlia of the unrepresented inhabitants of Man 'chester electing a person to represent 'them in parliament, and the adopting Major Cartwright's bill;' which meeting having, in consequence of the purpose for which it was called together, been publicly declared by the magistrates acting in and for the division of Manchester to be illegal, was immediately given up by its projectors, and a new notice issued for a meeting to be held on the 16th of August, in order to consider of the propriety of adopting the most legal and effectual means of obtaining a reform in the Commons House of Parliament;' that for several days before the 16th of August this notice was publicly and widely circulated; that as no intimation whatever was given, or, as the petitioners presumed, could legally be given by the magistrates, that the intended meeting was contrary to law, on the day appointed very numerous bodies of persons from most of the circumjacent towns and villages entered Manchester, walking with considerable regularity in parties of from three to six or eight abreast, accompanied by many women and children, and having along with them bands of music, and also various flags bearing different mottoes or inscriptions, and some of them surmounted with caps of liberty; that all these parties proceeded peaceably by different routes to the place of meeting, viz. the area near St. Peter's church, where, at about a quarter past one o'clock, the chair was taken by Mr. Hunt; that within ten or fifteen minutes after his arrival, and before he had entered upon the question for the consideration of which the meeting was called together, the corps of Manchester yeomanry, acting as the petitioners believe, under the order of the magistrates, or of some of them, rode impetuously into the immense crowd, many of whom were trampled upon by the horses, or cut by the sabres of the men, and surrounded the hustings, where eight or ten persons, including the chairman of the meeting, and several of those who were most active in calling it together, were, under a warrant issued immediately before by the magistrates, who were then assembled in an adjacent house, taken into the custody of the civil power; that the corps of Manchester yeomanry, together with the regiment of Cheshire yeomanry, and a body of the fifteenth hussars, both of which had by this time come upon the field, did then charge upon the people in all directions, and to a great distance from the place of meeting, in consequence of which eight persons have lost their lives, and not less than four or five hundred of his majesty's loyal, though suffering subjects, including all ages, from old men and women of seventy-five to young boys and girls of fourteen, were grievously crushed, trampled upon, bruised, maimed, or sabred; that had the only object of the magistrates been to take into custody the persons against whom legal process had been issued for any real or supposed offence by them committed, such object might easily have been obtained without the intervention of any military force, and without injury to any of his majesty's subjects; that the petitioners understand and believe, and indeed many of them are by personal observation enabled positively to assert, that no act whatever, giving to the meeting the character of a tumultuous and riotous assembly had at the period of this violent incursion of the cavalry been committed; that in the absence of any breach of the public peace, or of any act having a direct, manifest, and unquestionable tendency thereto, it does not appear to the petitioners that the large discretionary powers given to the magistrates by the statute of 1 Geo. 1, c. 5, commonly called the Riot act, can legally be called into action; that, admitting, however the right of the magistrates, in the exercise of their best discretion, to make proclamation commanding the meeting to disperse, the petitioners are induced to believe that at the meeting of the 16th of August no such proclamation was made; because they un. derstand that at none of the inquests held on the bodies of persons who lost their lives upon the occasion was any proof of its being made given; and because neither themselves, nor any person with whom they have conversed upon the subject, ever heard it; that even if the rumour of the reading of the Riot act should turn out to be true, the petitioners have still no hesitation in asserting, that it was not read according to the spirit and intention of the statute, that means were not taken to give due publicity to the circumstance of its having been read, or to induce the people peaceably to depart without incurring its penalties; and further, that not one third of the time allowed by law for the dispersion of an assembly had elapsed between the opening of the business of the meeting and the period at which it was forcibly dissolved by the cavalry; that the petitioners, in common with an immense majority of the country at large, and, as they fondly hope, of the House, are fully convinced that transactions evincing such a total disregard for the safety of an immense multitude of their fellow citizens, involving the infliction of so much severe personal injury, so much loss of life, and constituting such a complete infraction of the inalienable right of Englishmen to assemble, in order to petition for the redress of grievances, real or supposed, peremptorily and imperiously require the most rigid, extensive, and impartial investigation; that, accordingly, with a view thereto, and to obtain justice for the sufferers, at the last assizes for the county of Lancaster bills of indictment were presented against certain individuals, who were identified as having inflicted severe wounds upon the people in the course of the dispersion of the meeting; that, notwithstanding the positive testimony by which these indictments were supported, the grand jury did, for some reason unknown to the petitioners, and of which they can form no conception, think proper to return the said bills Ignoramus;' that application was afterwards made to the magistrates acting in and for the division of Manchester, by or on behalf of persons who were wounded on the 16th of August, for warrants against certain individuals on charges of cutting and maiming, such application comprehending not only those persons against whom indictments had been presented at Lancaster, but others whose cases had not previously come before any court of justice, and that the said magistrates positively refused to hear the evidence upon which this application was founded, or to grant the warrants, notwithstanding they were informed that the cases which had been presented at Lancaster were supported by additional evidence, whilst the testimony as to the others was distinct, positive, and complete; that on the 7th day of September, one of the persons who had been wounded on the 16th of August, named John Lees, died at Oldham, and that in the course of the inquest held on the occasion, the reception of evidence necessary, as the petitioners conceive, to the full elucidation of the case, was repeatedly refused by the coroner, who did afterwards, in a manner totally unprecedented, and which was calculated, as the petitioners believe, and intended to obstruct the course of public justice, adjourn the proceedings of the said in. quest (without assigning any reason for his conduct) to a distant period; that the petitioners regret the necessity which has obliged them to call the attention of the House to matters cognizable by the established courts of law, but that all the avenues of public justice having been hitherto found so unaccountably closed, they can only look to the House for a full investigation of the affair; that the petitioners feel it necessary to remind the House, that on the 9th of February 1818, a petition from certain of the inhabitants of Manchester was presented to the then House of Commons, setting forth various arbitrary, illegal, and unconstitutional acts, which the petitioners pledged themselves (if so permitted) to prove by evidence at the bar, to have been exercised by the magistrates of that district in the early part of the preceding year; that the House of Commons not only refused to inquire into the truth of the allegations of the said petition, but in conjunction with the other branches of the legislature passed a bill, giving impunity, and even full indemnity to the persons by whom the illegal acts were stated to have been committed, although not one single statement contained in the said petition was ever disproved or shaken; that the impu nity and protection then granted to acts contrary to the law of the land, and subversive of individual liberty, have, as the petitioners apprehend naturally emboldened the magistrates, or at least those amongst them by whom the proceedings of the 16th of August were conceived, advised, and directed, to commit that more flagrant violation of the rights and liberties of Englishmen, and that more alarming outrage on the lives of his majesty's subjects, of which the petitioners have now felt it their duty to complain; that the petitioners, appealing to their uniform respect and obedience to the constitutional laws under which they live, in proof of their own constant loyalty, are anxious that the dignified supremacy of the law should be fully and effectually maintained; that its protective powers should be extended equally to the poor as to the rich; and that any breach of it, by whomsoever, or under whatever pretence committed, should be duly yet temperately punished; that the petitioners deeply lament the fact too notorious to admit of denial, that the labouring part of their fellow townsmen and neighbours have upon many recent occasions been treated by the magistrates of that district in a manner utterly unwarrantable and illegal; that, in proof of this statement, the petitioners would inform the House, that on or about the 16th of August last many persons were taken into custody on charges of a political complexion, and that for a period of nearly eleven weeks those persons were detained in prison, whilst they were ultimately discharged from custody on the 30th of October last, not only without trial, but without any bills of indictment, or even articles of the peace having ever been presented against them; that as the poverty of these unfortunate victims of capricious tyranny, prevents them from seeking legal redress, the petitioners conceive that unless the House interfere to procure them justice the protection of the law will be virtually withdrawn from them, whilst, to assert the practical equality of the enactments of law, its administration here remaining unchanged, will only be adding the cruelty of insult to the injustice of oppression; having therefore a deep sense of the importance of the circumstances which they have herein stated, knowing their momentous consequence with reference to the future liberties of Englishmen, anxious for the speedy rendering of strict and impartial justice, and that the magistrates and soldiery, if guilty, may be punished, if innocent absolved from blame, the petitioners do most earnestly request and intreat, that the House will be pleased to institute a prompt, public, impartial, and full inquiry into the transactions of the 16th of August, and those which have resulted therefrom.' On the motion, that it be laid on the table, Mr. Bootle Wilbraham said, he was desirous of expressing his firm conviction, that the statements made by the hon. gentleman and the gallant general were not at all likely to be proved. He was convinced that the statement he had made on a former evening was the just one. The speech of the hon. gentleman was calculated to make an impression on the House which the petition itself did not warrant. He here begged to make an observation respecting the sharpening of the swords. About the middle of July an order was given for sharpening them, and the swords which were sharpened in (VOL. XLI.) the end of July and the beginning of August belonged to those members of the corps who had forgotten to send in their weapons originally, for no order was given subsequent to the first. Mr. Bennet, in moving, that the petition be printed, said, the hon. gentleman who had recently spoken was rather too harsh in his censure on all the persons who had been examined before the coroner. Of the facts, he (Mr. B.) certainly had no personal knowledge; but he would pause much before he condemned all the persons who attended at the meeting of the 16th of August, as being tainted with the doctrines of Paine, and converted to the principles of infidelity and blasphemy. He, for one, thought those sweeping censures did a great deal of harm. They tended to widen the unfortunate breach which existed between parliament and the people. Whatever the opinions of gentlemen might be with respect to individual guilt, they ought not to cast a general slander on large bodies of men, about whom they knew nothing. He would tell the hon. gentleman who had uttered this censure, that there were amongst those who gave evidence, persons of sober, calm, and religious habits. One of them had come up to town on a journey of philanthropy, to propose to the House those measures for the protection of children in factories, which were carried last year. ried last year. He knew that individual, and his object was, to protect not only him, but all those persons who had given evidence, from the charge that had been made against them; because it was most unfair to make those general accusations in the absence of all proof. Mr. Mansfield said, he had not meant to make so sweeping an assertion as was attributed to him. He felt, however, that he had a right to make a strong assertion, because one of those persons who gave evidence against the magistrates, admitted that he had himself marched a large party from Leeds to that meeting. The petition was then ordered to be printed. PETITION OF MR. HUNT COMPLAINING OF MISREPRESENTATION OF HIS CONDUCT.] Mr. Alderman Wood said, he had been requested to present a peti tion which he had previously read, and which contained nothing disrespectful towards the House. It complained of (2 B) The petition was then brought up, and read. It purported to be the petition of Henry Hunt, esq. of Middleton Cottage, Hants and sat forth, : the Manchester magistrates of the ju- | ragraphs: You will meet on Monday ries of the officers-and more pointedly next, my friends, and by your steady, and strongly of his majesty's ministers. firm, and temperate deportment you will Attached to the petition there had origi- convince all your enemies you feel that nally been five affidavits respecting the you have an important and an imperious intention of the petitioner to institute public duty to perform, and that you will proceedings in the court of King's-bench, not suffer any private consideration on which he had been prevented from doing earth to deter you from exerting every on the ground of his not being a profes- nerve to carry your praise-worthy and sional man; but as the forms of the patriotic intentions into effect; the eyes House did not allow such documents to of all England, nay, of all Europe, are be presented, he had removed them. fixed upon you, and every friend of real After what he had said, the House would reform, and of rational liberty, is trembnot be surprised when he told them that lingly alive to the result of your meeting the petitioner's name was Henry Hunt. on Monday next; our enemies will seek He stated generally the nature of the every opportunity, by the means of their transactions at Manchester, declared that sanguinary agents, to excite a riot, that the papers laid on the table of the House they may have a pretence for spilling our were entirely false, and prayed that he blood, reckless of the lawful and certain might be called to the bar to prove his retaliation that would ultimately fall on allegations, which he confidently pledged their heads; every friend of real and efhimself to do, not by his own testimony fectual reform is offering up to Heaven a alone, but by the testimony of nume- devout prayer, that you may follow the rous respectable characters, totally un- example of your brethren of the metropoconnected with the reformers. lis, and by your steady, patient, persevering, and peaceable conduct on that day, frustrate their hellish and bloody purpose; come then, my friends, to the meeting on Monday, armed with no other weapon but that of a self-approving conscience; determined not to suffer yourselves to be irritated, or excited by any means whatsoever to commit any breach of the public peace; our opponents have not attempted to show that our reasoning is fallacious, or that our conclusions are incorrect, by any argument but the threat of violence, and to put us down by the force of the sword, the bayonet and the cannon; they assert that your leaders do nothing but mislead and deceive you, although they well know that the eternal principles of truth and justice are too deeply engraven on your hearts; and that you are at length become (unfortunately for them) too well acquainted with your own rights, ever again to suffer any man, or any faction to mislead you; we hereby invite the boroughreeve, or any of the nine wise magistrates who signed the proclamation declaring the meeting to have been held on Monday last illegal, and threatening at the same time all those who abstained from going to the said meeting; we invite them to come amongst us on Monday next; if we are wrong, it is their duty, as men, as magistrates, and as christians, to endeavour to set us right by argument, by reason, and by the mild "That the petitioner having been invited to preside as chairman at a public meeting proposed to be held at Manchester on the 16th day of August last, for the purpose as expressed by the requisitionists, and by the advertisements and placards published for calling the same, of taking into consideration the most legal and effectual means of obtaining a reform of the Commons House of parliament; and the petitioner approving of such intention, and considering the objects to be perfectly legal and constitutional, as well as necessary, without any hesitation accepted, and attended the same as an act of public duty towards his distressed and suffering fellow countrymen; that on the petitioner's arrival in Lancashire on finding that considerable irritation had been excited among the people by an interference of the magistrates to prevent a previous meeting which had been announced, the petitioner with a view to tranquillize the public mind, secure the public peace, and exhibit the true objects of the meeting beyond the possibility of successful misrepresentation wrote, and caused to be printed and circulated, an address to the inhabitants of Manchester and its neighbourhood, of which the following are the principal pa |