When the 1803 subscription was launched the conditions were favourable, but the same cannot be said of this time. From the recommencement of the war in the spring of 1803, trade, at the best, had run an unsteady course. During the intervening period the Napoleonic decrees and the British Orders in Council had come into operation, and had created friction between this country and the United States, which, constantly growing more intense, led to retaliatory measures on the other side of the Atlantic, and in 1812 to war with England. Only in 1809 and in the early part of 1810 was there an active trade during the period, and this burst of activity followed upon a terrible period of distress in 1808, when, with the district in a state of insurrection, a petition signed by 50,000 persons was presented from Manchester, and another from Bolton signed by 30,000, praying that peace negotiations might be opened. The succeeding trade boom is partly to be explained by a frenzy of speculative shipments to South America, and when it came to an end it was followed by a hurricane of bankruptcies which swept over England and Scotland, reached Ireland, and caused anxious concern in the United States. The situation, bad though it was in 1808, was even worse in the latter part of 1810 and in 1811 and during the greater part of 1812. In 1811, the Luddite risings began in the hosiery districts of Nottingham, Derby, and Leicester, and early in 1812 extended to Yorkshire, Lancashire, and Cheshire. In April of the latter year Manchester was in a state of rebellion. In one riot an attack was made upon the Exchange; in another, a few days later, upon the Shudehill market; and, on both occasions, it was considered necessary to call out the military to deal with the rioters. In the Shudehill riot, however, force was supplemented by the fixing of a maximum price for potatoes, which had to be sold in small quantities.[461] [Footnote 461: _Transactions, Manchester Statistical Society_, 1917.] It was in such circumstances, not to mention the drain of a war which had continued almost uninterruptedly for nearly twenty years, that Crompton’s petition was prepared and presented, and a grant of £5000 made to him. In view of the sums granted to others who had conferred benefits on the nation by their ingenuity, this amount was certainly paltry, but perhaps it should be placed to the credit of those concerned that his appeal received the attention it did. The parliamentary proceedings extended from 5th March to 25th June. French states that Crompton proceeded to London in February, but, as his letters show, he was already there in the previous month.[462] It was not until 5th March that the matter came before the House of Commons, when the Chancellor of the Exchequer, by command of the Prince Regent, acquainted the House that His Royal Highness, having been informed of the contents of Crompton’s petition, recommended it to the consideration of the House.