Peterloo Massacre1819, struggle for universal suffrage in Britain

BBC Radio 4

I met Murder on the way -
He had a mask like Castlereagh -
Very smooth he looked, yet grim;
Seven blood-hounds followed him…
Percy Bysshe Shelley - The Mask of Anarchy

On this day in 1819, The Peterloo Massacre

Melvyn Bragg's In Our Time.

BBC.IN

British Museum

This handkerchief commemorates the Peterloo Massacre, which occurred ‪#‎onthisday‬ in 1819 http://ow.ly/Qz2dk

More than 60,000 people from Manchester and the surrounding area had gathered at St Peter’s Field in the city to demand the right to vote. Local magistrates ordered the arrest of the main speakers and the dispersal of the crowd. 18 people were killed and several hundred were injured. In the months that followed, prints, poems and a range of everyday objects such as plaques, jugs, bowls and handkerchiefs were produced in memory of the massacre. The Peterloo Handkerchief is a powerful reminder of this event and, more generally, of people’s long struggle for universal suffrage in Britain.