The Sun.
London, England, 1862-09-09 00:00:00

THI: DISTRESS IN LANCASHIRE.

The Central Executive Relief Committee at Man-
chester held a meeting yesterday, the Earl of Elles-
mere in the chair. Among the noblemen and gen-
tlemen present were Lord Egerton of 'Patton, Lord
E. Howard, Sir J. K. Shuttleworth, Col. Wilson
Patten, Major E. Leigh, Mr. M'Clure, the Mayor
of Manchester, Messrs. H. Mason, E. Ashworth,
W. Roberts, W. Eckersley, M. Ross, F. J. Stern,
G. L. Ashworth, T. R. Hutchinson, W. Rathbone,
jun., H. B. Farnall, A. W. Heywood, J. Worrall,
and J. R. Kay.

The draught of a circular addressed by the com-
mittee to Boards of Guardians was discussed and
approved. The draught of a letter to the various
local relief committees, suggesting the best plan for
efficiently working the several districts, was also
read, and, after some discussion, it was resolved
that it eb.ould be printed and placed iu the Lands ot
the executive committee for further consideration
next week. Tne Mayor of Manchester laid on the
table a telegram he had received from Victoria
(Australia), announcing that the sum of £5,500 had
been subscribed in that colony for the relief of the
distress in Lancashire. The hon. secretary was
requested to write as early as the name and address
of the correspondent can be ascertained to acknow-
ledge the communication, and to express the grate-
ful thanks of the committee for the liberal subscrip-
tion, and their gratification at this proof of the sym
pathy of one of the most promising of her Ma-
jesty's colonies with the distress and embarrass-
ments of this district. A protest fre,Th the Roman
Catholic priests of Ashton was red relative to the
constitution of the new local rCiief committee of that
town. A letter from 1.11( Town. clerk of Manches-
ter was read stating
that on the 2d inst. a nume-
rous meeting of the officers and employes of the cor-
poration was held, and the following resolution
passed i—
" That this meeting, deeply sympathising with the dis-
tress now prevailing, ani being of opinion that all persons
ought, to the extent of their abilities, to assist in its allevi.
ation, determine to contribute weekly in aid of the fund for
the relief of the distress in the manufacturing districts."
The Town-clerk further said that the resolution had since
been generally approved and that the members of the police
force, the men in the employ of the gas committee, the sca-
vengers and lamplighters, and, in fact, the whole of the
working men in every department of the corporation, had
agreed to contribute weekly. The first weekly contribution
amounts to £22 6s. The Town-clerk concluded by hoping
that weekly contributions will be given by the employes in
every warehouse and workshop in the city and elsewhere,
as penny and halfpenny subscriptions on a large scale
would amount to a considerable sum weekly, and would be
missed by none.
The hon. secretary read a letter from Mr. Gibbs, the hon.
secretary of the Lord Mayor's fund, in which he called the
attention of the Manchester executive to an expression used
by the Mayor of Manchester to the effect that the London
committee had been egregiously imposed u on. The hon.
secretary stated that, in reply to the letter, he informed
Mr. Gibbs that the Manchester committee could only bo
responsible for its resolutions, and that at meetings, where
representatives of the press attended, the remarks of any
gentleman might be taken down, for which the committee
could not be responsible. The hon. secretary, in his letter,
went on to say to Mr. Gibbs that the information on which
the Mayor of Manchester's remarks were founded was ob-
t tined from private sources, and he was not inclined to
withdraw any portion of what ho had said ; also that the
committee were acquainted with one case where the Lord
Mayor's committee had made a grant which could hardly
be justified. Finally, the hon. secretary had furnished Mr.
Gibbs with a list of places to which the Lord Mayor's com-
mittee had forwarded £3,000 up to the end of August, and
to which the Manchester committee had refused aid on ac-
count of the smallness of the local subscriptions as com-
pared with the wealth of the district, or from there being
no satisfactory means of distributing the money when for-

warded.
The hon. secretary read a letter from the secretary of
the St. Pancras's parish relief committee, stating that an
effort was about to be made there, and that the funds
would be forwarded for distribution through the medium of
the Manchester central committee. A subscription of £3O
had been received from a benefit performance at the Queen's
Theatre, Manchester.
Grants were made of £lOO to Dunkinfield, £350 to Wigan,
£250 to Oldham, and £3O to Heaton Mersey. The grant to
Oldham was accompanied by an intimation that the com-
mittee would desire to bring under the immediate and most
serious consideration of the local relief committee the im-
portance of organising forms of work suited to the age,
strength, sex, and capacity of the recipients of relief. In
making the grant to Heaton Mersey the committee called
attention to the smallness of the rate of relief given by the
guardians at that place. A grant to Hurst was postponed,
with an intimation that there would be a personal commu-
nication as to the amalgamation of the two local com-
mittees existing there. Grants to Ribchester, Shuttleworth,
and Rambottom were also postponed, on the ground of
there being no local subscriptions.
An analysis of the accounts of 24 unions, usually engaged
in the cotton trade, was laid before the committee by Mr.
Farnall, in which the increase of pauperism and the in-
creasa in out-door relief were distinctly stated. It would
appear from this analysis that in those unions there was an
increase of 98,111 recipients of relief as compared with the
corresponding week last year, and that the amount of out
relief in those unions per week now amounted to £7,922
ss. ld., whereas it amounted only to £2,160 16s. W. in the
corresponding week of last year. It was further stated that
in 12 of the principal townships in the cotton districts the
local relief committees were aiding close upon 100,000
, pew US,