# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Jones, John Gale

​JONES, JOHN GALE (1769–1838), democratic politician, was admitted at Merchant Taylors' School in 1783, and was then described as born on 16 Oct. 1769. By profession he was a surgeon and apothecary, having been trained by William North, a member of the College of Surgeons practising at Chelsea. About 1798 he published ‘Observations on the Tussis Convulsiva, or Hoopping-cough, as read at the Lyceum Medicum ​ Londinense,’ but it is doubtful whether he was fully qualified. Charles Roach Smith says that his public advocacy of democratic doctrines ruined his professional prospects (Retrospections, ii. 89–90). He was a member of the London Corresponding Society, spoke with great effect at the British and Westminster forums, and publicly professed his sympathy with the progress of the French revolution. In Gillray's caricature of the great meeting held at Copenhagen Fields on 13 Nov. 1795 against the bill for the protection of the king's person, Jones is depicted on the hustings to the left; and at the other meetings of that body he was one of the chief declaimers. In 1796 he published the first and only part of his ‘Sketch of a Political Tour through Rochester, Chatham, Maidstone, and Gravesend,’ and on 11 March in that year he, and a speaker called Binns, delivered lectures, as delegates from the London Corresponding Society, in Birmingham, but the meeting was broken up. Next year (9 April 1797) Jones was tried at Warwick before Justice Grose, and, although defended by Romilly and Vaughan, was convicted upon one count, the seditious expression ‘that he was sent to know whether the people of Birmingham would submit to the Treason and Sedition Bills’ (Sun, 10 April 1797). Early in 1810 Yorke insisted on the exclusion of strangers from the House of Commons during the debates on the expedition to Walcheren. After a debate on this proceeding in the British forum, the result condemning Yorke was announced outside the building in a placard drawn up by Jones. Yorke brought the matter before the House of Commons as a breach of privilege (19 Feb. 1810), and Jones was ordered to attend the house. He acknowledged the authorship, was voted guilty, and committed to Newgate, where he remained until 21 June, when the House of Commons rose. He resolutely declined to recognise the legality of his restraint or to petition for his release, and was, it is said, only got out at last by a stratagem. During his imprisonment, Burdett, Romilly, and Sir James Hall made motions for his release, but they were all unsuccessful, although in Romilly's case the majority was only 160 to 112. A letter which Burdett wrote on Jones's treatment led to his committal to Newgate. In this same year (26 Nov. 1810) Jones was sentenced to twelve months' imprisonment, and ordered to provide sureties to keep the peace for three years for a libel on Lord Castlereagh, ‘which went to charge a publick character with having abused his authority to the oppression of an individual.’ The rumour that he was ill-treated in this prison was found, on the investigation of Coleridge and Daniel Stuart, to be groundless (Abuse of Prisons, 1811, and Gent. Mag. 1838, pt. ii. 127). At the Westminster elections of 1818 and 1820 he exerted himself very zealously, but took little further part in politics. He died at Somers Town on 4 April 1838. His portrait was engraved and published by P. Brown, of 4 Crown Street, Soho, on 14 March 1798.
Writings by Jones not already noticed were: 1. ‘Speech at Westminster Forum on 9, 16, 23, and 30 Dec. 1794’ [in favour of parliamentary reform], 1795. 2. ‘Substance of Speech at the Ciceronian School, Globe Tavern, Fleet Street, 2 March 1795’ [in favour of Fox], 1795. 3. ‘Account of Proceedings of London Corresponding Society, near Copenhagen House, 26 Oct. 1795, including speeches of Citizens Binns, Thelwall, Jones.’ 4. ‘Oration at the Great Room in Brewer Street on General Washington,’ 1796; new edition, with alterations, in 1825, when Jones wrote to Canning asking for his subscription to the reprint (Stapleton, Corresp. of Canning, i. 349–50). 5. Farewell oration, including a short narrative of his arrest and imprisonment in the Birmingham dungeon, 1798. 6. ‘Invocation to Edward Quin of the Society of the Eccentrics,’ 1803. It was a poetical invocation, descriptive of a coterie, mostly of newspaper writers, meeting in a tavern. 7. ‘Galerio and Nerissa’ [anon.], 1804, a romantic tale, with some slight poems. 8. ‘Five Letters to George Tierney,’ 1806. 9. ‘Westminster Election. Proceedings at Meeting held at the Crown and Anchor, Strand, 1 June 1818, to secure the Election of Henry Hunt, with the Speech at length of Gale Jones.’ 10. ‘Speech at the British Forum’ [on the justice of prosecuting Carlile for continuing to publish works of Paine], 1819. 11. Substance of speeches at the British forum [on the same question], 1819.
[Robinson's Merchant Taylors' Registers, ii. 151; Gent. Mag. 1810, 1838, pt. i. 218–19; Le Marchant's Earl Spencer, pp. 128–30; Lord Colchester's Diary, ii. 235–63; Hansard for 1810; Annual Reg. 1795, 1796, 1797, 1810; Memoirs of Romilly, ii. 305–33; Griffiths's Newgate, ii. 61–2; Wright's Caricatures of Gillray, p. 69; Smith's Portraits, pp. 1735–6; information from Coll. of Surgeons per J. B. Bailey.]
W. P. C.