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A Utopian Tory Revolutionary at Cambridge: The Political Ideas and Schemes of James Bernard, 1834–1839*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Gregory Claeys
Gregory Claeys
Affiliation:
Jesus College, Cambridge
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Extract

Agricultural distress following the Napoleonic wars evoked various responses from those classes whose interests were most immediately bound up with the land. Such factors as decreasing market prices and hence wages, a falling standard of living, and rising indebtedness incited, on the one hand, the disciples of Captain Swing to attempt to restore to the agricutural labourer his dispossessed inheritance, or at least to register protest at its loss. For the landowners and farmers, on the other hand, constitutional means of redress were clearly more acceptable, and between 1815 and 1845 there were several attempts to develop a protectionist organization of farmers’ associations, led, particularly in the early years, by George Webb Hall, and in the latter often associated with Lord Chandos.

Type
Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 25 , Issue 3 , September 1982 , pp. 583 - 603
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1982

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References

1 See Spring, D. and Crosby, J. L., ‘George Webb Hall and the Agricultural Association’, Journal of British Studies, ii (1962), 115–31;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Spring, D., ‘Lord Chandos and the farmers’, Huntington Library Quarterly, xxxiii (1970), 257–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 There are brief discussions of Bernard in Schoyen, A. R., The Chartist challenge: a portrait of George Julian Hartley (1958), pp. 17–21; A. Plummer, Bronterre: a political biography of Bronterre O’Brien, 1804–64 (1971), pp. 80–2;Google ScholarProthero, I., ‘Chartism in London’, Past and Present, xliv (August 1969), 93–4;Google ScholarWeisser, H., British labour movements and Europe, 1815–49 (1972), pp. 88–9.Google Scholar

3 Hill, R. L., Toryism and the people, 1832–46 (1929), p. 256.Google Scholar

4 Register of King’s College, Cambridge, 1797–1923 (1929), p. 8; Eton College Lists, 1791–1850 (1864), p. 32; Records of the Honourable Society of Lincoln’s Inn, ii, Admissions 1800–1893 (1896), 27; Gentlemen’s Magazine, xi (1839), p. 218.

5 Theory of the constitution, iii.

6 Ibid. pp. 14–16, 21–8, 38.

7 Ibid. p. 42.

8 Ibid. p. 35.

9 Ibid. p. 189.

10 Ibid. pp. 272–3.

11 Ibid. p. 317.

12 Ibid. p. 323. On Bernard’s own property, see B.L. Add. MS 27819, fo. 41. The best recent discussion of the circumstances surrounding the bullion problem can be found in Hilton, B., Cash, corn, commerce: the economic policies of the lory governments, 1815–30 (1977), especially chapters 2 and 7.Google Scholar

13 Ibid. pp. 311—15. Thomas Attwood wrote on 13 April 1821 that ‘Gooch told me this morning that he was quite convinced that Peel’s Bill was intended to operate a total transfer of the landed rental of the kingdom into the hands of the fundholders’, quoted in Wakefield, C. M., Life of Thomas Attwood (1885), p. 81.Google Scholar

14 Ibid. pp. 434–5.

15 Attwood also believed that agriculture was the foundation of trade. See The remedy: or, thoughts on the present distresses, pp. 38–40, in Selected economic writings of Thomas Attwood, ed. F. W. Fetter (1964). The connexions between Attwood’s political and economic views are analysed in Briggs', A.‘Thomas Attwood and the economic background of the Birmingham Political Union’, Cambridge Historical Journal, IX (1948), 190–216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 Theory of the constitution, pp. 198–9. Nor was this idea so strange, either; Rousseau, for one, had proposed it as a means of solving Poland’s political problems. See ‘Considerations on the government of Poland’, Political writings, ed. F. Watkins (1953), pp- 257–67.

17 Theory of the constitution, pp. 202–3.

18 Ibid. pp. 510–11, 195–6, 506–9, 140.

19 British Farmer’s Magazine, ix (1835), 349.Google Scholar

20 Pioneer, no. 28 (15 March 1834), 242–3.

21 For Cobbett’s opinions see the Crisis, iv, no. 1(12 April 1834), 4. J. E. Smith’s praises can be found in the subsequent issue (no. 2, 19 April 1834), 11.

22 Crisis, iv, no. 16 (26 July 1834), 123–4.

23 Ibid., iv, no. 17 (2 August 1834), 129–31; Official gazette of the trade unions, no. 8 (26 July 1834), 70–2.

24 Crisis, iv, no. 17 (2 August 1834), 130.

25 Ibid., iv, no. 17 (2 August 1834), 131, 135; no. 19 (16 August 1834), 147.

26 Poor Man’s Guardian, iii, no. 166 (9 August 1834), 209–11; no. 168 (23 August 1834), 226.Google Scholar

27 Theory of the constitution, pp. 481, 312.

28 For a general illustration of the partial dissolution of the ‘ producers vs. parasites’ dichotomy during the 1815–50 period see Hollis, P. (ed.), Class and conflict in nineteenth century England (1973), PP 3–79.Google Scholar

29 Cambridge and Hertford Independent Press, 8 April 1837.

30 Agricultural and Industrial Magazine, 1, no. 2 (November 1834), 18.

31 See Cayley, E. S., On commercial economy (1830), pp. 89–162.Google Scholar

32 Agricultural and Industrial Magazine, 1, 392.

33 Ibid. 1, 286.

34 Ibid.; New Moral World, 1, no. 5 (29 November 1834), 38–9; Agricultural and Industrial Magazine, 1, 199.

36 Agricultural and Industrial Magazine, 11 (1835), 18–20; See Bernard’s Appeal to the conservatives on the imminent danger to which the nation is exposed from the democratic propensities of the house of commons; shewing the false position which they at present occupy, and pointing out the true ground for them to take in defence of the monarchy, and the institutions of the country, from revolutionary innovations; in a letter addressed to the duke of Wellington, pp. 8–17.

36 Appeal, p. 4.

37 There is no mention of Bernard in Owen’s New Moral World between March 1835 and March 1836, and only three references to him in 1836 and four in 1837. O’Brien contributed to every issue of Bernard’s London Mercury from no. 14 (18 December 1836) onwards, until no. 48 (13 August 1837).

38 New Moral World, 1, no. 13 (24 January 1835), 103–4.

39 Ibid. 1, no. 15 (7 February 1835), 118–20; no. 16 (14 February 1835), 126–8; no. 17 (21 February 1835), 135–6; no. 19 (7 March 1835), 150–2; no. 20 (14 March 1835), 158–60; no. 22 (28 March 1835), 174–6.

40 See the brief comments in the New Moral World, 11, no. 84 (14 June 1836), 253, Oliver, W. H. has argued that the interest of the G.N.C.T.U. leaders in agriculture may have come from Bernard. See his ‘Organisations and ideas behind the efforts to achieve a general union of the working classes in England in the early 1830s’, D.Phil. Diss., Oxford, 1954.Google Scholar For Owen’s comments on Bernard see Crisis, iv, no. 17 (2 August 1834), 129–31,Google Scholar and the New Moral World, 1, no. 11 (10 January 1835). 87.Google Scholar

41 New Moral World, 1, no. 48 (26 September 1835), 380;Google Scholar iv, no. 170 (27 January 1838), no; 1, no. 19 (7 March 1835), 145–7 (first constitution); 1, no. 30 (25 May 1835), 236 (revised constitution). On the mixture of aristocratic and democratic principles see New Moral World, x, no. 3 (17 July 1841), 20–1; x, no. 18 (30 October 1841). 141.Google Scholar

42 Crisis, iv, no. 13 (5 July 1834), 97;Google ScholarShepherd, 1, no. 16 (13 December 1834), 126–7;Google Scholar no. 17 (20 December 1834), 131–2; no. 43 (20 June 1835), 344; iii, no. 2 (8 July 1837), 10; no. 3 (is July 1837), 19; no. 4 (22 July 1837), 25–7, 1, no. 37 (9 May 1835), 295. On Smith generally see Smith, W. Anderson, ‘Shepherd’ Smith the universalist: the story of a mind (1892), and J. Saville, ‘J. E. Smith and the Owenite Movement, 1833–4’, in Robert Owen, prophet of the poor, ed. S. Pollard and J. Salt (1971), pp. 115–44.Google Scholar

43 Shepherd, 1, no. 16 (13 December 1834), 121; no. 17 (20 December 1834), 129–30; no. 43 (20 June 1835), 344; iii, no. 2 (8July 1837), 10; no. 3 (15 July 1837), 19; no. 4 (22 July 1837), 25–7; 1, no. 37 (19 May 1835), 295.Google Scholar

44 O’Brien appears to have been especially interested in Gray’s The social system (1831). See his comments on Gray in the National Reformer and Manx Weekly Review of Home and Foreign, n.s. no. 4 (24 October 1846), 9–10. O'Brien, 's opinion of Attwood can be found in the Poor Man's Guardian, iv, no. 224 (19 September 1835), 672–3.Google Scholar

45 Poor Man's Guardian, iv, no. 216 (25 July 1835), 608–10.Google Scholar

46 Ibid., iv, no. 223 (12 September 1835), 663–5, 669–70; no. 224 (19 September 1835), 671–4, 676–7. O’Brien had begun another periodical in January 1837, but this lasted only three months, having achieved a circulation of only 4,000 weekly (Bronterre's Motional Reformer, no. 11, 18 March 1837, 84).Google Scholar

47 Farmer's Magazine, iv (1836), 8–16; v (1836), 3–6; Bernard to Owen, 17 May 1836 (Letter 795, Owen Collection, Co-operative Union Library, Manchester).Google Scholar

48 British Farmer's Magazine, n.s. ii (1838), 226–7.Google Scholar On Chandos’ refusal to join the C.A.S. see D. Spring, ‘Lord Chandos and the farmers’, 270–2; on the agricultural report see the Quarterly Journal of Agriculture, vii (1836–7), 368–403.Google Scholar

49 Cambridge and Hertford Independent Press, 8 April 1837; London Mercury, no. 28 (26 March 1837), 220; no. 30 (9 April 1837), 233.

50 B.L. Add. MS 27819, fos. 41–3, 54; London Dispatch, no. 48 (13 August 1837), 282.

51 London Dispatch, no. 11 (27 November 1836), 84; A. R. Schoyen, Chartist challenge, p. 17; London Mercury, no. 28 (26 March 1837), 217; no. 30 (9 April 1837), 236; A. Plummer, Bronterre, pp. 81–2; Working Men's Association Gazette, no. 2 (1 June 1839), 20.Google Scholar

52 Heatherington had edited the Poor Man's Guardian before O’Brien. Their last collaboration was on Hetherington's Twopenny Dispatch, and People's Police Register, to which O'Brien contributed during August and September 1836. Many of the issues of this are no longer extant, however, and I have drawn some information about and from it from Lovett's file of newspaper clippings in the Lovett Collection, Birmingham Central Reference Library.

53 London Dispatch, no. 29 (2 April 1837), 225; no. 30 (9 April 1837), 236; no. 38 (4june 1837), 301; no. 48 (13 August 1837), 382.Google Scholar

54 Lovett Collection, fos. 59–76; London Mercury, no. 29 (2 April 1837), 228; no. 35 (14 May 1837). 273 276.

55 London Mercury, no. 37 (28 May 1837), 289, 297;Google ScholarNew Moral World, iii, no. 136 (10 June 1837), 249–50;Google Scholar A. R. Schoyen, Chartist challenge, pp. 20–1; New Moral World, iii, no. 147 (19 August 1837), 350.Google Scholar

56 New Moral World, iv, no. 170 (27 January 1838), 106–10; no. 171 (3 February 1838), 116–18; no. 172 (10 February 1838), 125–6; no. 173 (17 February 1838), 133; no. 175 (3 March 1838), 149–50.Google Scholar

57 British Farmer's Magazine, n.s. ii (1838), 150–1, 180–97, 224–36.Google Scholar

58 See, for example, C. Bray, An essay on the union of agriculture and manufactures (1844), or O’Connor's A practical guide to the management of small farms (1843). For an early instance of O'Brien, 's agrarianism see Bronterre's National Reformer, no. 1 (7 January 1837), 3–5.Google Scholar

59 R. L. Hill, Toryism, pp. 53–4, 11 • On the role of Chandos and other landed aristocrats in this split, see Kebbe, T. E., A history of toryism (1885, new edn, 1972), p. 264.Google Scholar Peel as well, ‘seemed to think there would be an entirely new [political] combination, of which the currency question would be the basis’ (Croker to Hertford, 25 March 1833, The correspondence and diaries of John Winston Croker, ed. Jennings, L. (1885), 11, 205; quoted in B. Hilton, Cash, com, commerce, p. 271).Google Scholar

60 Bernard did in fact attend at least one meeting in the midlands, with Oastler, Stephens, Owen and others. See New Moral World, iii, no. 135 (27 May 1837), 243; Bernard to Owen, 10 May 1837, Owen Collection 886. But there is no evidence that he sought significantly to expand his support in this region, or that he had extensive contact with the anti-poor law and factory reformers there.Google Scholar

61 R. L. Hill, Toryism, p. 10.

62 Bernard used this phrase to described a meeting of his followers. See the Cambridge and Hertford Independent Press (18 July 1835).

63 Thurnall, for instance, as president of the Cambridgeshire and Isle of Ely Fanners’ Association, claimed that ‘ I am a Tory, but I think the landed interest of this country has not a more decided, determined, and dangerous enemy than Sir Robert Peel; from all such Tories the Lord deliver us…’ (Cambridge and Hertford Independent Press, 14 May 1836).

64 Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, xxxv (January-June 1834), 339, 352–3.Google Scholar

65 Theory of the constitution, p. 514. On Oastler's apocalyptic pronouncements see Driver, C., Tory radical: the life of Richard Oastler (1946), p. 136.Google Scholar