A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering in the Old Days: Showing the State of Political Parties and Party Warfare at the Hustings and in the House of Commons from the Stuarts to Queen VictoriaGrego, Joseph
History
A History of Parliamentary Elections and Electioneering in the Old Days: Showing the State of Political Parties and Party Warfare at the Hustings and in the House of Commons from the Stuarts to Queen Victoria
Grego, Joseph
Great Britain -- Politics and government; Great Britain. Parliament -- Election
The concluding stage in the progress of the address and the cavalcade
of carriages which attended it, was marked by the appearance of the
satirical engraving entitled the “Sequel to the Battle of Temple Bar,”
1769, of which a reduced fac-simile is given. The spot represented
is the front of St. James’s Palace, facing St. James’s Street. The
remnants of the procession of merchants charged with the address in
support of the ministry in power are escaping down Pall Mall, the
carriages, with broken windows, being followed by galling volleys of
stones and dirt on the part of the mob, while a hearse exhibiting
inflammatory placards is accorded an enthusiastic reception. The
spectators gathered at the St. James’s Coffee House and around the
palace are encouraging the hostile demonstration; the courtiers are
surveying the tumult from the gateway and windows of St. James’s
Palace. A person mounted on the tower, and assumed to be intended
for Lord Bute, is pointing to the weathercock, exclaiming, “High
north wind,” _i.e._ a Scotch wind. The Guards are making attacks
upon individuals; a gentleman is being surrounded; the violence
of the soldiers is watched by a clergyman, evidently intended for
Parson Horne, whose eye was upon those who infringed the rights of
the subjects or unlawfully maltreated any of the people. A burlesque
funeral procession diversified the proceedings, headed by a mounted
mute, wearing a crape weeper, with mourning staff, the hearse drawn by
two wretched screws, one black and one white; the coachman is equally
odd--the person who drove was declared to have been a frolicsome
lordling, it is said young Earl Mountmorres. The body of this vehicle
displays a flaring placard--the presentment of an Irish chairman
striking with a bludgeon a person who is knocked down and defenceless;
this moving picture, inscribed “Brentford,” represents the fate of Mr.
Clarke, whose fractured skull, caused by the brutal attack of Proctor’s
hired ruffians, ended in his death. Similar placards, “St. George’s
Fields” and “Scot Victory,” are posted on the hearse to remind the
ministers that the odium of the massacre of the people at St. George’s
Fields, and the deliberate assassination of William Allen (May 10,
1768), by a grenadier of the Scottish Regiment, were not forgotten; a
coloured picture of this episode was displayed on the other side of
the hearse. A diversion is attempted at the entrance to the palace
gates, where the figure of a short nobleman is distinguishable by the
star on his coat; he is using his broken official staff like a sword.
This personage, who actually seized one of the rioters, and who is
intended for Earl Talbot, lord steward of the household, is bareheaded,
his wig having been displaced in the scuffle with the people, and,
finally, a knock on the head cooled his courage; the Guards are coming
to his support. Further details of the ending of this vexed question
of the address are given in the political intelligence of the time.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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