Fanny wore a light travelling cloak over a simple brown dress, a relic from her days as a sewing instructor. In the half-light of morning there was little to distinguish her from the other women milling in the procession who were garbed in what was undoubtedly their best attire, their Sunday clothes.
An older man spied Fanny and said, “women in the centre columns, step lively now.”
Fanny decided to walk alongside a respectable-looking matron who was holding her young son by the hand. In answer to Fanny’s civil enquiries, she said her husband was a weaver, and although he kept at his loom from first light ‘til dark, he could not earn enough to feed their family. She had great expectations of the day to come, “for when they see so many of us poor folk together in one place, they must listen.”
The women were told to move to the front of the column, four abreast, and Fanny accepted her new companion’s invitation to stay with the party, “for there is safety in numbers, miss, so you may as well walk with us.”
Fanny saw young men carrying large staffs with banners being dispatched, with much bustling, to their various places at the head of their different divisions. The flags bore slogans such as “No Corn Laws” and “Universal Suffrage.”
Shortly after Fanny and the ladies formed their rows, there came the rattle of a drum and a cry to move “On to Manchester,” which was answered with scattered shouts of triumph. The front ranks stepped forward, the rest followed, the birds sang in the trees and the morning was still fresh and cool.
The procession marched in good order, with little talking and laughing amongst the women and even less among the men, as the sun rose higher in the sky. With the better light, Fanny then observed, with some consternation, some red caps dangling upon the poles of the foremost marchers—she knew the red cap to be the symbol of Jacobinism, an emblem of the French Revolution, and she wondered at the folly of those men for displaying a symbol so well calculated to alarm the authorities and inflame public opinion against the workers. It was as much as saying they wanted to tear the king off his throne.
She began to heartily regret her presence among them. Fortunately, the entire procession paused outside of the city to muster at a large commons; there was some talk of resting and waiting for another group of marchers from another village to join up with theirs.
Fanny was already weary from walking, but this interval gave her an opportunity to slip away, and murmuring the excuse that she must search for her brothers, she hastened forward alone, hoping to find the meeting-grounds which she knew were in the vicinity of St. Peter’s Church, within the town.
* * * * * * *
Manchester, August 16, 1819, 10:00 am
William Gibson descended from his room into the common-room at the Star Tavern, in hopes of obtaining some breakfast before setting out for St. Peter’s Field. He had intended, by now, to be on his way to Huntingdon and Fanny. But he needed to witness and record the immense meeting in Manchester, first proposed for the 9th of that month.
He had used the week’s delay to examine local mills and factories. The town of Manchester had grown prodigiously in size and very rapidly, as families moved from the country in search of wages. The large red brick mills and factories were seldom silent. The clanging bells summoned the ragged multitudes—men, women and children—to their posts shortly after dawn, and the same bells released them late at night, not to liberty and fresh air but to crowded, narrow streets, in smoke-blackened brick tenements.
There still existed a large open field in the midst of town where the local radicals were accustomed to hold their public meetings. Gibson had even walked about the field, defined on three sides by row-houses and on the north by Peter Street. The space was vast enough to accommodate many thousands of people—the organizers were boasting that 100,000 would be in attendance on Monday.
For the rest of the time, Mr. Gibson sat in his modest lodgings and wrote and re-wrote a long letter to Fanny, explaining himself, begging her forgiveness, and concluding with the humble request that he might call upon her at Huntingdon. He had taken the letter to the post office yesterday.
Today was the day for the great gathering, and after its conclusion he would travel to Huntingdon.
Having paid for his room and a mug of weak tea, he turned to find some place to sit, but most of the chairs were already occupied, for a meeting was in progress. He gulped down the tea and put on his hat and had almost reached the door, when he heard, “And some of my men are gathering up all the stones and bricks they can find from the field and taking them away.” He paused in the entryway, and listened:
“Where is Hunt?”
“No one has seen him yet.”
“Mr. Philips has ridden back from Stockport, he says he saw thousands of people on the march, in military fashion, and some are carrying large sticks which could easily be converted into pikes—”
“And he wet his breeches at the sight, no doubt. Every time a horse passes wind, he thinks there’s an insurrection in the offing.”
“You laugh, but the Stockport rabble include the same lawless crew who beat two constables nearly to death last week. We are sitting on a powder keg.”
“Nevertheless, we cannot arrest them today until someone has broken the law.”
“Sirs, we have reports that there is already a substantial gathering at St. Peter’s.”
“We had better go now and see for ourselves, and get up to Mr. Buxton’s house.”
Chairs scraped along the floor, the hubbub moved his way.
“I
