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The Tolpuddle Martyrs
Throughout history tales of brave,
courageous people being executed for their beliefs,
usually religious ones, are well known, but the men who
became known as the Tolpuddle Martyrs are not in this
league!
Tolpuddle is a village near
Dorchester in Dorset where in 1833 - 4 a great wave of
Trade Union activity took place and a lodge of the
Friendly Society of Agricultural Labourers was
established. Entry into the union involved a payment of
a shilling (5p), and swearing before a picture of a
skeleton never to tell anyone the union's secrets.
 Lord
Melbourne was Prime Minister at this time and he was
bitterly opposed to the Trade Union Movement, so when
six English farm labourers were sentenced in March 1834
to 7 years transportation to a penal colony in Australia
for Trade Union activities, Lord Melbourne did not
dispute the sentence.
The labourers were arrested
ostensibly for administrating unlawful oaths, but the
real reason was because they were trying to protest at
their already meagre wages. The labourers at Tolpuddle
lived in meagre poverty on just 7 shillings a week and wanted an increase to 10
shillings, but instead the wages were cut to 6 shillings
a week.
The Whig government had become
alarmed at the working class discontent in the country
at this time. The government and the landowners, led by James Frampton, were determined to squash the union and to
control increasing outbreaks of dissent.
Six of the Tolpuddle labourers were arrested: George and
James Loveless, James Brine, James Hammett, Thomas
Stansfield and his son John. It was George Loveless who
had established the Friendly Society of Agricultural
Workers in Tolpuddle.
At their
trial the judge and jury were hostile, and the six were
sentenced to 7 years transportation to Australia. After
the trial many public protest meetings were held and
there was uproar throughout the country at this
sentence, so the prisoners were hastily transported to
Australia without delay.
The
people were incensed at this treatment and after 250,000
people signed a petition and a procession of 30,000
people marched down Whitehall in support of the
labourers, the sentences were remitted. After some
delay, the the six were given a free passage home from
Australia.
When
finally home and free, some of the 'martyrs' settled on
farms in England and four emigrated to Canada.
 The tree
under which the 'martyrs' met is now very old and
reduced to a stump, but it has become a place of pilgrimage
in Tolpuddle, where it is known as the 'Martyrs Tree'. A
commemorative seat and shelter was erected in 1934 on
the green by the wealthy London draper Sir Ernest
Debenham.
The story
of the Tolpuddle Martyrs is perhaps the best known case
in the early history of the Trade Unions.
Useful Information:
Tolpuddle
Martyrs Rally - third week in July
The
annual working class festival to commemorate the memory
of the struggle of the Tolpuddle Martyrs is held on the
third weekend of every July in the Dorset village of
Tolpuddle. International speakers join with workers'
representatives, and progressive musicians and artists
to make it an occasion to remember.
Shire Hall, Dorchester
Built in 1797, this Grade I Listed Building was
designed by London architect Thomas Hardwick. It retains the courtroom where the Tolpuddle Martyrs
were sentenced to transportation to Australia for their
part in the early trade union movement in 1834. It
appears today as it did at that time. Under the court
are the cells in which prisoners were kept while waiting
for their appearance in court
Famous for the trial of the Tolpuddle Martyrs and
Judge Jeffreys' Bloody Assize.
Experience four centuries of gruesome crime and
punishment in a setting little changed over the
years.
Stand in the dock and sit in the dimly-lit cells
where prisoners waited for their appearance before the
judge
Tolpuddle
Martyrs Museum - http://www.tolpuddlemartyrs.org.uk
©
EPC
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