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Popular Politics and Provincial Radicalism: Newcastle Upon Tyne, 1769–1785

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 July 2014

Thomas R. Knox
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Extract

In his lively reassessment of extra-parliamentary politics early in the reign of George III, John Brewer advances a conclusion of potentially great significance. Where Sir Lewis Namier and Ian Christie see in Wilkism little more than a political May dance without important effect, Brewer finds a “focussed radicalism” embodying fundamental change in the nature of traditional English politics. Where George Rudé carefully delimits the geographical, social, and political range of Wilkite influence, Brewer argues that “focussed radicalism” was a truly national phenomenon personified in Wilkes and parent to the popular sensibility that underlay later anti-aristocratic and reform politics.

Brewer appears fully as unconventional in his attitude toward what constitutes proper evidence as in the conclusion he builds upon that evidence. Namier and Christie rest their cases on the seemingly solid foundation of election analysis. But Brewer rejects this evidence as inherently unsatisfactory. The “formal, institutional yardstick” of polls, we are told, cannot help measure the influence or extent of radical political opinion. Instead, he concentrates on non-electoral evidence, relying, above all, on the fragile and fleeting indications of support for Wilkes that are to be found in provincial newspapers, petitions, and public gatherings during the years 1768-1771.

Type
Research Article
Information
Albion , Volume 11 , Issue 3 , Fall 1979 , pp. 224 - 241
Copyright
Copyright © North American Conference on British Studies 1979

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References

1 For Brewer's argument, see Party Ideology and Popular Politics at the Accession of George III (Cambridge, 1976), chs. 1, 9, 10-13.Google Scholar

2 Brewer makes scattered reference to Newcastle, pp. 150, 175, 177, 178 (as does Rudé, George, Wilkes and Liberty (Oxford, 1962), pp. 103–104, 105, 129, 147, 173–74, 211Google Scholar). For Namier's analysis of the Newcastle elections, see The Structure of Politics at the Accession of George III (2nd edn; Macmillan, 1965), pp. 95–9Google Scholar, and (with John Brooke) The History of Parliament: The House of Commons, 1754-1790, 3 vols. (H.M.S.O., 1964), I: 350–51Google Scholar and other relevant entries. Christie deals with the earliest of these elections in “The Wilkites and the General Election of 1774,” in Myth and Reality (Macmillan, 1970), pp. 244–60Google Scholar. He refers briefly to the election of 1777 in Wilkes, , Wyvill, and Reform (Macmillan, 1962), p. 120Google Scholar, and considers that of 1780 in The End of North 's Ministry 1780-1782 (Macmillan, 1958), pp. 142–45Google Scholar. (Paul Langford. reaffirming the views of Namier and Christie, cites Newcastle in his evaluation of Brewer's, work, English Historical Review, 92 (July 1977): 617–22.Google Scholar)

3 To avoid what otherwise would be a very large number of footnotes, this paper does not cite specific sources except in cases of direct quotation. The most important of these items are the freemen list, poll books, town directories, and newspapers held by the Newcastle Central Library; the Common Council Book available at the Tyne and Wear Archives Department (Newcastle): correspondence and election materials to be found at the Northumberland Record Office (Gosforth); and the Newcastle petition of 1769 which survives in the Public Record Office (55/5/2).

4 Letter, George Grieve to the Supporters of the Bill of Rights, 21 January 1772, printed in the Newcastle Journal, 4 July 1772.

5 See below pp. 229-31.

6 Newcastle Chronicle, 9 July 1774, 16 July 1774.

7 See below pp. 231-32.

8 Handbill, 29 September 1770 (Northumberland Record Office, M17/38).

9 The Proceedings of the Stewards of the Several Companies …, respecting an Enquiry into the Rights, by which any Roads over the Town-Moor, &c. are enjoyed (Newcastle, 1771).Google Scholar

10 Even if one accepts this assumption of Namier and Christie, it goes little way toward explaining electoral behavior or the correlations between petitioning and polling discussed below, pp. 235-36. Namier, for example, notes accurately that members of the butchers' company and members of the various companies of building tradesmen formed the core of the opposition vote. (He fails to observe that they were also disproportionately represented among petitioners.) The butchers' heavy presence in the opposition he ascribes to a special interest in the Moor. But he does not specify the nature of that interest, and, given the provisions of the Moor Act, it is far from clear what that interest would have been. He admits that he cannot explain the presence of building tradesmen in the opposition.

11 Letter, Matthew Ridley, Esq. to J. E. Blackett, 8 May 1773 (Northumberland Record Office, ZBL 229).

12 Letter, Thomas Saint to—Angus, 7 August 1774 (Northumberland Record Office, M17/38).

13 Newcastle Chronicle, 3 September 1774.

14 Ibid., 8 October 1774.

15 Ibid., 28 January 1775.

16 Ibid., 13 May 1775. In November the Chronicle printed Wilkes' valedictory as Lord Mayor, a speech strongly emphasizing the defense of London's privileges against the House of Lords and the ministry. Within a few weeks Newcastle's Philosophical Society had debated and resolved negatively the question, “whether corporations are an advantage either to the places incorporated themselves, or the kingdom in general?”

17 Newcastle Journal, 28 January 1775.

18 The final poll was: Blackett, 1433; Ridley, 1411; Phipps, 794; and Delaval, 677. The “magisterial” candidates together won 66% of the 4315 votes cast. 2166 persons polled with 6% cross-voting and less than 1% plumping.

19 The final poll was Trevelyan, 1161 (52%), and Bowes, 1070 (48%).

20 The final poll was Ridley, 1409; Bowes, 1136; and Delaval, 1086. 2247 persons polled with 38% plumping.

21 1359 electors have been identified as petitioners or eligible non-petitioners in 1769.

22 These companies comprised 40% of the 1774 electorate, but 57% of those who petitioned in 1769. (By contrast, seven other companies represented the same percentage of the electorate, but only 25% of those who petitioned.) The opposition won 45% of the overall vote in these ten companies (including new freemen and non-resident electors), while receiving only 25% of that in the seven companies underrepresented among the petitioners. Bowes carried eight of the ten companies in 1777.

New freemen cast 1610 votes in 1774. Phipps and Delaval received 56% of those cast by members of the butchers' company and the building tradesmen's companies; they received 31% of those cast by members of other companies. This support came more heavily from resident electors than from non-resident electors. Thus, 46% of the votes cast by new freemen living in Newcastle went to the opposition.

23 Samples indicate that Phipps and Delaval won 45% of the votes of resident craftsmen and 51% of the votes of resident tradesmen. The comparable figures for Bowes three years later were 57% and 59%. (Publicans appear in substantial numbers in town directories. But they are peculiarly difficult to identify as voters. Aside from the presence of a few in the radical leadership, however, there is little to suggest that they gave significant support to the opposition.) These samples are based largely on the Newcastle Directory of 1778 and the polls. The identifications rest in part on evidence concerning individuals and in part on discernible associations between specific companies and particular classes of occupations. The groupings themselves reflect a modified version of those employed by Nossiter, T. J., Influence, Opinion and Political Idioms in Reformed England: Case Studies from the Nonrheast, 1832-74 (New York, 1975)Google Scholar. In some cases, the membership of whole companies has been omitted because neither individual evidence nor occupation patterns exist. Despite the enviable and unavoidable precision of numbers, the percentages should be viewed as suggestive rather than conclusive.

24 Christie, , End of North's Ministry, p. 143.Google Scholar

25 Namier, and Brooke, , The History of Parliament, 1:351Google Scholar. Christie, , End of North's Ministry, p. 143.Google Scholar

26 This percentage is based on the following voting patterns.

The 584 votes constitute 66.77% of the total Bowes received from persons who had polled in 1777 and 51.47% of his overall poll in 1780.

27 These percentages are based on the following voting patterns.

These figures account for 78% of all voters in 1780. Only the last four patterns of voting are inescapably inconsistent.