1820 as there is between a _drunken riotous Church-and-King-mob_ of 1791
to 96, pulling down and burning the property of Dr. Priestley at
Birmingham, poor Campbell of Bath, burning mills, wheat ricks, destroying
machinery, &c. &c., and the _peaceable, sober, rational, constitutional_,
assemblies of the people in 1816, 1817, 1818, and 1819, deliberately
petitioning the legislature to remove the burthens of the people, by
abolishing sinecure places, and unnecessary pensions, and praying for a
constitutional reform in the Commons' House of Parliament. My readers will
excuse the digression I have made; this subject cannot be too often dwelt
upon, but, as I shall have repeated opportunities of calling the attention
of my fellow countrymen to this particular point, I will now proceed to
the more immediate object of these memoirs.
I was now incessant in my application to every branch of the farming
business, and, as I have before intimated, I performed prodigies of labour
upon various occasions. My father had now taken another very large
adjoining farm of nearly a thousand acres, Chisenbury farm, and was
therefore become one of the largest farmers in England, yet we managed
this business with the greatest ease; and what others called very severe
labour, I practised as a relaxation from business, such as learning the
cavalry exercise, in which I had now become a considerable adept; in fact,
I bore the character of being one of the most active, and at the same time
one of the most powerful, young men in the county; and my feats of
activity and strength were proverbial. I would mix in the frolicks of a
country wake, or revel, as they were called in Wiltshire, and contend,
generally successfully, with the first proficients of the day, in
wrestling jumping in sacks, backsword, or single stick playing, and have
borne off many a prize. I once went to a Whitsuntide revel, with my friend
and partner, Jesse Caster of Upavon, and I believe we bore off every
prize--the gold-laced hat, the wrestling prize; the gold-laced hat, the
backsword prize; a pair of buckskin breeches, the prize for jumping or
running in sacks; the old cheese, the bowling prize; and eleven
half-crowns, the prize played for at cricket in the morning: indeed I and
Caster obtained every prize; and, as I gained the majority, of course I
had the choice of the fairest damsel in the village at the dance in the
evening. There was no exercise, no exertion, no labour that ever fatigued
me. I could and did often work all day and dance all night; and this, at
particular festive seasons of the year, I have followed for a week or ten
days together without ever taking off my clothes to go to bed. There was
no excess of labour, heat or cold, winter or summer, that ever hurt me. I
remember once going up stairs, about ten o'clock, with the rest of my
father's family, but, instead of going to bed, I dressed myself, descended
the window by a ladder, mounted my horse and rode to Upper Collingborn,
where I had been invited to a dance, a distance of ten miles, and having
danced till three o'clock in the morning I returned home, mounted the
ladder into the window, and had just changed my best for my working
clothes when my father called me, as the clock struck four, to get up,
upon which I was out the first of the family, time enough to remove the
ladder before any one saw it, so that the circumstance was never known to
any one.
The young parson of the parish was generally my companion on these
occasions, but as he was his own master, he went to and returned from the
dance at his leisure, in fact, he generally got too top heavy before the
evening was over to return home, and therefore usually slept out. I could
tell some of the most ridiculous stories and curious adventures that
happened to my young friend, when he was under the influence of Bacchus,
but as I shall have occasion to say a great deal of this personage
hereafter, I will pass it over for the present. But as, from my having
lived a very great part of my life in country places, I have spent a
considerable portion of my days in the society of clergymen, and as it is
one of my principal objects in giving a faithful history of my life, to be
particular in shewing my readers the sort of society that I kept, as well
as how I was enabled to form my opinion of mankind, I shall faithfully
delineate these characters, to the best of my judgment, always taking care
to lean on the charitable side, and to draw occasionally a veil over the
infirmities of human nature, as they were exemplified in the clergy of the
church of England. I understand that some of my readers have already
attributed to me a desire to lower the character of the clergymen of the
established church, and they instance my description of the character of
the Rev. T. Griffiths, the master of the free grammar school at Andover.
But, as a proof that I have not done him any injustice, I have had
confirmed, by the living testimony of many of my school-fellows, the truth
as well as the lenient description that I gave of his character. Mr.
Cotton of Edgerly, my tenant, and steward of my manor of Glastonbury, has
been to see me since be read the account, and he says it is a most
faithful picture as far as it goes; but he called to my recollection the
tyrant pedagogue having pulled off the ear of two boys, one in his
presence, and one in mine. John Butcher, whose father then lived at
Westcombe, was one of them, and he[11] has reminded me also of Griffiths
having taken a very thick heavy slate, and with both hands broken it over
the head of Dr. now Sir ---- Gibbs, of Bath, physician to the late Queen,
who very fortunately had a thicker scull than boys in general, or he would
in all probability have fractured it. It will therefore be seen that I did
in no way exceed the truth, and, so far from wishing to degrade the
clergy, I shall only reprobate those acts in which they degrade
themselves. I have known many excellent clergymen, Mr. Carrington to wit,
and I know many most worthy clergymen now; and I have also known some of
the most abandoned of human beings, who have been a disgrace to that holy
office. In due course I shall shortly detail the _moral character_ of two
clergymen of this diocese, as a specimen of human depravity, both of them
living under the nose of the bishop.
I will now proceed with my narrative. The price of corn was by this time
considerably enhanced, and in consequence of a new duty, malt had risen
from 2s. 6d. to 7s. 6d. a bushel. Labourers three years before could
purchase with a week's wages, two bushels of malt and a pound of hops,
enough to make a nice little cask of good wholesome beer, for them to
carry with them into the field, in grass mowing and harvest. That quantity
was now nearly doubled also in price. Three years before they could
purchase with their week's wages twelve quartern loaves; they could now
only purchase with their week's wages six quartern loaves instead of
twelve, the quartern loaf having now risen to one shilling. The labourers
that used before to be very well off, and consequently very well
satisfied, complained loudly of these hardships, and demanded higher
wages; the answer of the farmer was, "it is very true that we sell our
corn for a much higher price than we did, but we cannot afford to raise
the wages of the labourers, for we pay all the increase of price away in
taxes, and the increase in our rents, as well as in every other necessary
of life, our tea, salt, iron, leather, &c.; you must, therefore, have
patience, and wait for better times. Our rulers, and Mr. Pitt
particularly, says we may look forward with a confident hope that we shall
soon have better times for us all." Thus the poor man, from the very first
year of the war, began to feel the cruel effects of high prices, and he
was made to suffer this for many years without any rise in his wages.
Almost all the common necessaries of life were doubled, while he was told
to wait with patience from day to day, from week to week, from month to
month, and from year to year, still buoyed up with the false hope of
better times, which were eternally promised with matchless impudence by
the prime minister, who constantly boasted of the wealth and power of the
nation, which he was wasting, and which he lavished with an unsparing
hand, to carry on an unjust, an unnecessary, cruel, and vindictive war
against the people of France, because they had made a hold, a manly, and a
successful effort to throw off the galling yoke of one of the most
infamous and detestable tyrannies that ever disgraced the character of an
enlightened people. It was very true the landholders grew rich from the
great advance in the price of land, and the farmer grew rich from the
advance in the price of grain; but, alas! the labourer began to suffer,
and has continued to suffer; his privations have increased in the exact
proportion to the increase of taxation, from that day to this.
In the beginning of this year, (5th of April, 95,) the Prince of Wales was
married to his first cousin the Princess Caroline of Brunswick, a match
which was very much approved by John Bull, as she was young and beautiful,
possessing all those attractions which were likely to render the marriage
state happy; although there was something that John grumbled a little
about, as he had not only to pay the piper, by an additional yearly salary
for his Royal Highness, which was raised by the parliament to ONE HUNDRED
AND TWENTY FIVE THOUSAND POUNDS PER ANNUM, but he was likewise called upon
to _pay the Prince's debts_, which amounted to SIX HUNDRED AND NINETEEN
THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED AND SEVENTY POUNDS;--DEBTS on _securities_, THREE
HUNDRED THOUSAND, and _tradesmen's bills_, THREE HUNDRED AND NINETEEN
THOUSAND POUNDS, was the amount of the account laid before parliament.
John, however, was then in comparative prosperity, and the money was paid
with great good humour, in the hope that this wild prince would, now he
was married to an amiable and a lovely woman, become more rational, and
less debauched and extravagant. At this time also the trial of Mr.
Hastings was brought to a conclusion; this had been going on seven years
before the House of Lords, and he was now acquitted. There were
considerable riots and disturbances in various parts of the country, in
consequence of the high price of corn; wheat having now, for the first
time in the eighteenth century, risen as high as ten shillings a bushel.
The wages of the labourer in the parish of Enford still remained at six
shillings a week, which caused much grumbling and many complaints, as they
were become now tired of "waiting with patience for better times." The
country was considerably agitated too, by a report of a mutiny in the
Oxford Militia, who were quartered at Newhaven, in the neighbourhood of
Brighton. This also arose in consequence of the high price of provisions.
The privates of this regiment had seized a quantity of flour, and sold it
to their comrades and others, at a reasonable price. I remember that this
caused great alarm amongst the farmers, as they knew that without the aid
of the soldiers they would not be able to keep up the price of their
grain. The riot, however, was soon quelled, and those concerned in it were
tried by a court martial, many of them were severely flogged, and, to the
great joy of the yeomanry, two of them, COOK and PARISH, were shot. In the
carrying of this sentence into execution there were great doubts
entertained, by many of the officers, whether the other regiments of
militia and fencibles, which were in camp there, would not join the Oxford
regiment, and rescue their comrades. The greatest precautions were
therefore taken. The Prince's regiment, the 10th dragoons, was marched
from Hounslow and Windsor, where it was stationed to perform king's duty.
The men had ball cartridges served out to them, and they were drawn up in
the rear of the militia regiments, which were all flanked by the artillery
with lighted matches, ready to rake them if they made the least movement;
and the 10th light dragoons were supported by the Lancashire and Cinque
Port fencibles. But the sentence was executed without any resistance on
the 1st of June; the riot having occurred on the 17th of May.
I mention this circumstance, because it caused great agitation throughout
the country, and because I am enabled to speak of the particular facts
from the information which I receive from him who is now acting as my
servant, and who was present doing his duty as a corporal of the said 10th
regiment of dragoons, in which regiment he was a warrant officer for many
years; and I find his information as to these matters most valuable to me.
Gracious God! what scenes has he been an eye-witness of! This persecuted
man was promoted to the 18th regiment of dragoons, commanded by Col.
CHARLES STEWART, the brother of Lord Castlereagh; from thence he was
removed, or rather removed himself, and was made adjutant to the
Somersetshire volunteers, which were commanded by HILEY ADDINGTON, the
brother of Lord Sidmouth. But, having detected his commanding officer, and
exposed his peculations, he was dismissed without a court martial, and by
unheard-of persecutions driven to that extremity which sent him here. He
has indeed a tale unfolded to me, enough to harrow up the soul of any one
who has not the heart of a savage. I now know what were the feelings of
the British soldiers, even at that epoch. Having arrived at that period of
life which may fairly be called manhood, I felt an interest in all the
political occurrences of the day, and had by means of the society of our
worthy curate, Mr. Carrington, been enabled pretty clearly to judge of the
views of the different political parties and factions in the country. I
was a most decided advocate for the general measures of the government,
although I abhorred some of the tyrannical acts of the ministers. I was an
enthusiastic admirer of our beautiful constitution, the history of which I
read at that time with great avidity, believing that it was in all its
material points carried practically into effect, notwithstanding my friend
and tutor had so strenuously endeavoured to convince me that it was only
the theory that deserved any admiration.
About this time a great many public meetings were held, and a clamour for
peace was very general throughout the country; and when the king went to
open the parliament he was grossly insulted, hissed, hooted, groaned at,
and pelted, and one of the glasses of the state carriage was broken,
supposed to have been done with a ball from an air-gun. Five hundred of
the Tenth Dragoons escorted his Majesty from Windsor to Piccadilly, where
the whole regiment of the Fifteenth Dragoons was assembled to conduct the
King to the House of Peers to open the Parliament. After the Fifteenth had
relieved the Tenth, it returned from Piccadilly, and halted at
Knightsbridge barracks, which were then first occupied by it: the men had
orders to remain in readiness the whole night with their horses standing
saddled, and they themselves sleeping in the stable with them. That was
the first time the King had ever been escorted by more than a serjeant's
guard, and I think we may set it fairly down that from that time the laws
of England have been passed under the protection and the influence of the
military. This enabled Mr. Pitt to execute measures hostile to the
liberties of the people. Two bills were immediately passed; one to prevent
seditious meetings, and the other called Lord Grenville's gagging bill.
The British minister was, in fact, become the ruler of the destinies of
Europe; he had contrived, by means of British gold, to procure in France
the committal of the most atrocious and bloody deeds that human nature is
capable of, and this was inhumanly effected in order to delude mankind
with the idea that any change in the form of any government, however bad
and tyrannical, must always be followed by such deeds. In this he was too
successful; for, by these means alone, he was enabled to alarm the timid,
disgust the more rational, and prevail upon the great mass of his
suffering countrymen to submit to these arbitrary acts, and to endure
their present ills, however galling, rather than run the risk of greater
by a change. This was the policy of the British ministry, and I sincerely
believe that all the atrocities that had been committed in Paris, all the
blood that had been spilt, all the massacres that had been perpetrated,
were hired and paid for by British gold, drawn from the pockets of the
gulled and besotted people, for the purpose, as they were made to believe,
of preventing the commission of similar atrocities in our own country. In
fact, the labour, the industry, and the talent of the people, the
industrious and hard-working people of England, were now heavily taxed to
subsidize every despot of the continent; and the wealth of the nation,
drawn from the sweat of the poor man's brow, was squandered with a lavish
hand, to hire and to pay every assassin and every cut throat by trade in
Europe, to enable them to prolong the war against the liberties of France,
and thereby to prevent a reform and redress of grievances at home. In the
mean time the National Convention of France were boasting of their
victories; it was asserted that they had gained twenty-seven pitched
battles, taken one hundred and sixteen strong places, ninety-one thousand
prisoners, and three thousand eight hundred pieces of cannon. During this
year the son of Lewis the Sixteenth died in prison, and on the
twenty-eighth of July, the army of emigrants which landed at Quiberon bay
was totally destroyed. A most curious circumstance also happened: Hanover
made peace with France, so that our amiable allies, the good people of
Hanover, made peace with the King of England's most deadly enemy. It was
also in this year that Stanislaus, King of Poland resigned his crown, and
his kingdom was partitioned among his rapacious neighbours, Austria,
Prussia, and Russia.
This year was a very turbulent one for Great Britain, there being riots in
many parts of the kingdom in consequence of the high price of bread, the
quartern loaf of which continued above a shilling, during the whole year.
At Salisbury symptoms of rioting broke out one market day; some of the
farmers, attending the market, were hustled and insulted; some of the
sacks of corn were also cut by the rioters, and the corn let about the
marketplace; and the Cornet of the Everley troop of cavalry, Mr. William
Dyke, of Syrencot[12], near Amesbury, one of the largest farmers in the
west of England, who attended the market at Salisbury with his corn, was
insulted and ill-used by the people. The windows of his carriage were
broken, and the vehicle was otherwise injured, as he was escaping out of
the town towards his home in the afternoon. The antipathy of the people
was directed towards him particularly, because he had been very
instrumental in causing the _little bushel_, of the Winchester measure, of
eight gallons, to be introduced generally in the county of Wilts, instead
of the old bushel, which contained nine gallons, and in some instances ten
gallons. My father's district contained full ten gallons, and when the
little bushel was established, four of our bushels made exactly five of
the Winchester measure such was the aversion of my father, as well as of
myself, to the, new regulation, that when the law was enforced to compel
every one to use it, even then we ever afterwards, to this day, put 5
bushels into each sack, so that they were always of the same size and
weight as they were before the measure was altered. However, Mr. Dyke, our
cornet, was singled out, on account of his being the ring-leader, in what
the poor called a conspiracy to lessen the size of the bushel, and at the
same time to keep up the price of corn. The mob, as they pelted his
carriage with brick bats, as his horses galloped, or rather fled, through
the town, intimated that if he came the next week they would serve him
still worse. This was a great offence, and which was not to be borne. To
pelt 'Squire Dyke, the gallant cornet of the Everly troop, was such a
heinous and daring outrage, that it could not, consistently with our
honour, be suffered to pass with impunity, and every one in the
neighbourhood was made to tremble for the fate of the rioters. Every
member of the troop, and I of course, among the rest, received a formal
summons to be in readiness to join on the following Tuesday, to march to
Salisbury, to quell any riot that might take place; and, at all events, to
guard our gallant commander Mr. Dyke, while he went to the market to sell
his corn; for it was very properly considered, that, in case the cornet of
a troop of yeomanry was allowed to be deterred from attending the market
to sell his grain, no farmer would in future be able to attend without
being in danger, not only of losing his corn, but of having his head
broken into the bargain.
The thing got wind and was the general topic of conversation all over that
part of the county. The rioters had publicly intimated their intention of
assembling on the next market day at Salisbury, and compelling the farmers
to sell their corn at a moderate price, or abide by the consequences; and
it was blazoned all over the country that the Everly troop had received
orders and meant to march to Salisbury on that day, to join the Salisbury
troop, for the purpose of chastising the temerity of the disorderly
multitude. The bloody conflict that was anticipated caused many a manly
heart to palpitate, and many a rosy cheek to lose its blooming colour and
to be overspread with a pale sallow hue. The mighty battles that had
caused such a sensation throughout the whole of the civilized world, the
terrors that had been created by the combats which had been fought by
_Moreau_, by _Jourdan_, by _Wurmser_, and all the other great generals
upon the continent, were entirely forgotten, or thought but little of, in
the vicinity of Amesbury and Everly. Nothing was talked of, or meditated
upon, but the expected dreadful battle of Salisbury: the quivering and
almost bloodless lip of every one who ventured to speak upon the subject,
showed visible signs of terror and dismay; every face, indeed, seemed to
give "dreadful note of preparation." This was my first campaign; and, as
it was the only opportunity I ever had of distinguishing myself in the
active service of my country in this way as a soldier, and as a volunteer
yeomanry cavalry man too, I must entreat the indulgence and particular
attention of the gentle reader, while I give a faithful narrative, an
unvarnished tale, of the whole affair. This being the solitary instance in
which I was called into the field of battle while I was in the service, I
must entreat those who do me the honour to read my Memoirs, to extend
their forgiveness to me if I should prove somewhat tedious; but to my fair
readers, my female friends, I will promise before hand, that there shall
be no over-strained description of the bloody work of war, &c.: I will
faithfully relate the particulars as they actually occurred, without fear
or favour; being willing to take my share of the honour as well as the
odium of the fate of war.