On a minor note, the book does a proper job of explaining just how this incident got its name, which is something that's always baffled me. This, in general, is an analysis of a notorious incident, in which the British Government of 1819 put down a peaceful protest with a fair amount of violence, though mercifully the deaths and badly wounded were fairly small in numbers, by the standards of Europe. The author does a fairly good job, I think, of explaining how the events came about, but more importantly, the series of blunders and miscommunications that resulted in the massacre. The inevitable conclusion is that it was completely unnecessary to do what the government did. The book is very hostile to George IV; not without reason, I think. ( )

Peterloo - an unflinching portrait of Manchester's bloody massacre

2019 will mark the 200th anniversary since the Peterloo massacre, for which Manchester has been planning for quite some time. There are books planned, a monument to be unveiled, a film, and the website is already up and running. For those of us in the ‘know’ this is an important date for us to remember.

As a historian, who was able to study the Peterloo Massacre as part of my A level on British History. As a historian of Manchester, Peterloo is another example of radical Manchester, betrayed by those in power and covered up and forgotten especially by some of those with a conservative bent.

Two years earlier in 1817, The Blanketeers March set off from St Peter’s Field in the February to bring to the Prince Regent’s attention the dire situation of the textile workers across Lancashire. They were unable to raise this matter with a local Member of Parliament as Manchester did not have a representative. Whereas Rotten Boroughs such as Old Sarem had two elected Members of Parliament, for an area in Wiltshire that was just fields and a hill.

Most of the Rotten Boroughs were around Wiltshire, Cornwall and Hampshire and under the control of a family or one particular family. Old Sarum was under the control of the Pitt family, the elder Pitt having been the member for that constituency. Whereas many of the fast-growing towns such as Manchester had no representation.

On Monday 16th August 1819, 60,000 people gathered at St Peter’s Field to gather and campaign for Parliamentary reform, and a campaign against the privilege of wealth and land ownership. Many had come to hear the radical Henry Hunt, by the end of the day of 15 people would be dead and over 600 were injured.

The local magistrates (landowners) were observing from a far panicked and sent in the local Yeomanry to break up the meeting because of the shear size of it. On horseback, they cut through the crowds like a knife through hot butter, as well as chasing many across the city and into the slums cutting them down.

Jacqueline Riding has researched and written this book so well, slowly building up the background to the day so that the reader can understand what Manchester and the textile towns were like. The wretchedness, squalid living conditions of the weavers. What Riding does do is show that there was a sense of inevitability about Peterloo.

It must be remembered that those who held power, were worried about in the recent past, there had been the French Revolution, the Napoleonic Wars to name but a few. Conditions for a revolution abounded, along with an economic depression and the bloated Prince Regent represented everything that was wrong with the powers that be.

While some may do down Peterloo, as it does not compare with what was happening abroad, but to them I would challenge, the working people of Lancashire did not care about what was happening in France. Peterloo is about British People being held down by their “social betters” so they could protect their wealth, and status as the working man AND woman was expendable.

Jacqueline Riding brings out an unflinching portrait of Manchester's bloody massacre to others it was a pinprick, to Manchester another example of entitled conservative historians doing down the working class once again. This is an excellent book that anyone interested in the history of Britain needs to read that not everything was happy and shiny about the Regency period, especially if you were poor.

An excellent history, by an excellent historian, readable and full of interesting facts, one cannot help but learn from it. ( )