From Sheffield to Raleigh: a Radical Publishing Network in the Age of Revolution DALY, Michael James Available from Sheffield Hallam University Research Archive (SHURA) at: http://shura.shu.ac.uk/4075/ This document is the author deposited version. You are advised to consult the publisher's version if you wish to cite from it. Published version DALY, Michael James (2011). From Sheffield to Raleigh: a Radical Publishing Network in the Age of Revolution. Doctoral, Sheffield Hallam University. Repository use policy Copyright © and Moral Rights for the papers on this site are retained by the individual authors and/or other copyright owners. Users may download and/or print one copy of any article(s) in SHURA to facilitate their private study or for non- commercial research. You may not engage in further distribution of the material or use it for any profit-making activities or any commercial gain. Sheffield Hallam University Research Archive http://shura.shu.ac.uk From Sheffield to Raleigh: A Radical Publishing Network in the Age of Revolution Michael James Daly A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Sheffield Hallam University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy October 2011 Abstract From Sheffield to Raleigh: A Radical Publishing Network in the Age of Revolution Michael James Daly Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Sheffield Hallam University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy The launch of the Sheffield Society for Constitutional Information in 1791 is recognised by historians as one of the earliest and most radical expressions of organised working class calls for parliamentary reform in England. Research for this thesis has shown that Joseph Gales, the Sheffield publisher, was active in supporting the reform movement through his newspaper the Sheffield Register, with the help of his wife Winifred, a novelist, and his assistant, the poet James Montgomery, until the flight of the Galeses to America in 1794-95. However, existing historical scholarship has not explored the archival material in depth to reveal the detailed content of their radical journalism and publishing in the key years 1791-94. There is also a pronounced gap, despite the presence of a significant archive, in the later activities of the Galeses in North America, and of Montgomery in Sheffield in 1794-97. This thesis will seek to fill this gap in historical knowledge by showing in more detail the content and depth of their radical journalism and writings, their links with national and international reformers, and how their later claims of moderation are contradicted by the newly available data. This will be achieved by exploring the letters, poems, and editorials, of the Sheffield Register, the Sheffield Iris, and the Raleigh Register newspapers, the ―Recollections,‖ letters and novels of Winifred Gales, and the poems and prose writings of James Montgomery. There will also be a consideration of their place in the rise of a middling-sort class awareness, transatlantic radicalism, the role of feminist autobiographical diaries, and the boosterist activities of the Galeses in North Carolina. This work is dedicated with love to my wife Anne and to my children Morgan, Jackson, Calvin and Grace CONTENTS Page Acknowledgements Abbreviations Introduction 1 1. ―Recollections" of radical Sheffield, the Gales diary 42 2. Winifred Gales, 1761-1839, a literary woman 86 3. The Sheffield Register, 1791-94 106 4. America and the Raleigh Register, 1795-1832 168 5. James Montgomery and the Sheffield Iris, 1794-97 201 Conclusion 258 Bibliography Appendix Acknowledgements I would like to acknowledge the Evangelical Library, London, for their bursary, which began this journey in 2005, the invaluable help of Doug Hindmarch of the Sheffield City Archives in loaning me the microfilms of the Sheffield Register and Sheffield Iris newspapers, and the British Library newspapers division for digitizing them. The University of North Carolina for digitizing the Gales diary ―Recollections,‖ and the North Carolina State Archives for unearthing the photograph of a lost portrait of Joseph Gales. The Sheffield Hallam University Graduate School for funding my research trip to North Carolina in April 2009, and my supervisors, Dr. Emma Major (initially), Dr. Sue McPherson (English), and my Director of Studies, Dr. Antony Taylor (History). My friend Peter Brown for his judicious help at key moments in clarifying my thinking; but most of all my wife Anne for her constant support, not least in allowing me to spend our summers in Spain working on my laptop. Soli Deo Gloria! Abbreviations Iris Sheffield Iris LCS London Corresponding Society RR Raleigh Register SCI Society for Constitutional Information SR Sheffield Register SSCI Sheffield Society for Constitutional Information INTRODUCTION The 1790s in London and the provinces were a time of great political unrest following the French Revolution, with growing calls for increased parliamentary representation, including provincial towns like Sheffield, which were without proper representation. There was an upsurge in Constitutional societies outside the capital along the lines of the London Corresponding Society (LCS), which gathered support for petitions for reform to parliament and caused the Pitt government to be apprehensive about a possible mass insurrection. In Sheffield the brief flowering of the Constitutional society (SSCI) in the 1790s, encouraged by local newspaper man Joseph Gales, his wife Winifred, their assistant James Montgomery, and orator Henry Redhead Yorke, was soon quashed by the Government and local interests ─ Gales fled the country and Yorke was imprisoned during which incarceration he (again) changed sides politically.1 As Donald Read says, ―Sheffield was the strongest centre of English provincial radicalism in the 1790s.‖2 However, whilst recognising the importance of the Galeses and Montgomery, the content of their work has not been explored in depth by scholars.3 My research will show, in detail that the Gales/Montgomery publishing operation was an important regional source of reform support that was also linked to key national and international figures and groups active in the reform movement. These three important figures will thus be raised from the obscurity into which they have sunk and will be shown to be key individuals in the transatlantic radical reform publishing movement in the 1790s. To achieve this, my research will bring together detailed material from Sheffield and Raleigh (North Carolina), to reveal the extent of the radicalism of these three in much greater depth and sophistication. This includes the handwritten ―Recollections‖4 of 1 J. G. Alger, ―Henry Redhead Yorke (1772-1813)," rev. Peter Spence, in Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, accessed September 8, 2009, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/30241. 2 Donald Read, The English Provinces c.1760-1960: a Study in Influence (London: Arnold, 1964), 46. 3 For example, E. P. Thompson, The Making of the English Working Class, 2nd ed. (London: Penguin, 2002), 144, 150n, 166, only briefly mentions Gales, even calling him ―John,‖ 197. 4 Winifred Gales, ―Recollections,‖ Gales-Seaton Papers 2652, Southern Historical Collection, University of North Carolina; see appendix, picture 1. 1 Winifred Gales; her letters to the Unitarian leader and scholar the Rev. Jared Sparks;5 and her two novels, The History of Lady Emma Melcombe, and Her Family,6 and, Matilda Berkely, or, Family Anecdotes.7 Political letters, poetry and editorials from the Sheffield Register (SR), Sheffield Iris (Iris), and the Raleigh Register (RR) newspapers. James Montgomery‘s, The History of a Church and a Warming-Pan; 8The Whisperer, or Hints and Speculations, by Gabriel Silvertongue, Gent.; 9Prison Amusements, and Other Trifles: Principally written during Nine Months of Confinement in the Castle of York, by Paul Positive;10 his reform poems and hymns published in their newspapers; and the seven volume Memoirs of the life and writings of James Montgomery by John Holland and James Everett.11 As Emma Macleod has noted, this recovery of primary source material is in line with the recent rapid increase in the release of print and electronic publishing collections from the period.12 The Galeses have variously been interpreted as assiduous publishers, civic and community leaders in Sheffield, publishing entrepreneurs, provincial literati in the UK and the US, and as successful migrants who ‗boosted‘ local civic society in North Carolina and the public profile of the burgeoning new town of Raleigh. This thesis is an attempt to reclaim and reappraise the material evidence of their activities in these twin situations, returns to the literary survivals of their work, and locates them in their contemporary context. It also seeks to peel away later accretions of piety and Victorian 5 Correspondence between Winifred Gales and Rev. Jared Sparks, Gales Papers, 1794-1864, PC. 146, Southern Collection, North Carolina State Archives, Raleigh. 6 Winifred Gales, The History of Lady Emma Melcombe, and Her Family, by a Female, in Three Volumes (London: G. G. J. and J. Robinson, 1787). 7 Winifred Gales, Matilda Berkely, or, Family Anecdotes (Raleigh: J. Gales, 1804). 8 James Montgomery, The History of a Church and a Warming-Pan (London: H. D. Symonds, 1793). 9 James Montgomery, The Whisperer; or, Tales and Speculations. By Gabriel Silvertongue (London: J. Johnson, 1798). 10 James Montgomery, Prison Amusements, and Other Trifles: Principally written during Nine Months of Confinement