The Sun.
London, England, 1842-07-29 00:00:00

to him, that, on that repeal taking place, he would' take
from England the goods he now procures from France
'and Germany ; for here he could pay for them in Ame-
rican produce, while there he could not. Chartist meet-
ings are held in the market-place every evening. There
seem to be here three descriptions of Chartists ;—first,
honourable and considerate men of all classes in society,
from the large manufacturer to the lowest workman, who
think the Charter the fittest instrument of national im-
provement, who zealously defend it, but who
help the progress of any other cause which
seems to them likely to improte the condition
of the people—these are increasing in number ;
second, zealous and honest, but misinformed noisy men,
whose attachment to the Charter is little but bigotry,
and whose obstruction of all other efforts is doing nothing
but mischief to themselves; lastly, every public move-
ment drags after it the refuse of society. The men who
would cry with Lord George Gordon, " No Popery;" at
Birmingham, "Church and King;" and at Nottingham
or Bristol, "Reform;" who would be rick-burners in
Sussex, and Luddites in Yorkshire—these men now find
the cry for the Charter the most convenient cover for
emir dishonest purposes. It is to be feared that con-
tinued distress----lhe hunger which makes men mad, and
the constant influence of bad example—are driving or
seducing some of the well-disposed into this desperate
class, and that the term "spread of Chartism," means to
too great au extent, the spread of this dangerous and un-
happy spirit. But what can we say strong enough of the
system which keeps up such a state of things ? If all
went right, there would be no influences on which a
man's happiness materially depends which would ordi-
narily he so much out of his daily sight and touch as
those of a political kind. Just as the organic functions
of saimal life are performed without consciousness, so
sitould the rightful duties of the Government take effect
uu the people, without their being driven to the necessity
of daily, unceasing, harassing, and dangerous agitation.
While .the stomach, or heart, or brain of a man are
healthily fultillino% their proper purposes, he feels
them not; but when they become diseased, he is ren-
dered painfully, conscious of their existence. So it is
with Government; and a corstant state of necessary po-
litical excitement is ample proof that something is radi-
cally wrong. At Nottingham everybody is indignant at
the silly or wicked assertion of Mr. Gaily Knight.
" Worse and worse worse and worse ! worse and worse!"
is the universal cry. Very lately a number of gentlemen
met for the purpose of commencing a subscription for the
relief of the distressed operatives, and hoped to obtain
1,000/. in aid of it from the Manufacturers' Relief Corn- 1
mittee. They found, however, that the number of per-
swis to be relieved was so great that all they could hope
to raise, dispensed with the utmost parsimony, would, nut
last more than three or four weeks. This seemed more
like tantalizing the people than relieving them, and the
attempt was given up. There are numerous benevolent
societies attached to the different places of worship in
Nottingham. Many of these have given written state-
ments of their belief that distress is nut only severe with-
out former example in that town, but is rapidly
increasing. Many instances occur of almost total desti-
tution of furniture, and a new class of brokers has sprung
up, who deal in the miserable remnants of the conve-
niences and comforts of better days. Deaths, and it is
feared nut a few, have occurred from starvation. The
.Magistrates have suppressed the practice of large bands
of men going begging in the town, but these bands have
. .

_
inr.v betaken themselves to the country, and lay farm-
houses under contribution. The feeling of the people is,
t!lnt God gives plenty, and man starvation. The
:,!,,,ker was much struck with the remark made by the
of a working man, that it was grievous to see what

1-ntv God in hip goodness had spread over the fields,
they, and thousands more, could not iouchl it.
AI my are becoming exasperated, not only with the pre-
scut Government, but with all government; oppression
making them mad. It is grievous, too, to be told that
distress has commonly fallen most heavily on those who
were industrious and provident in better days. It takes
lunch suffering- to break down their praiseworthy feel-
ings of independence ; besides which, as they then
trut,:d only to their own industry for a livelihood, now
that fails them their whole stay is gone. Asiio the
coining winter nobody would speak of it without a
shudder. At the whole of these places the object he
pursued was to induce their local friends to procure a
clear, strong, and immediate expression of public opi-
nion, in order that the success already attained in prin-
ciple might be pushed into act before the approach of
terrible winter.—(Cheers.) He said to them, that
whatever the Conference might have done as a means of
public instruction, it could do nothing towards actual
reveal or suspension of those laws, but as a machine
transmitting the pressure from without—the pressure
must come from the people themselves.—(Hear, hear.)
If they could find no stronger mode of expressing their
opinions and feelings, he urged them to memorialise

:Members of Parliaiient to stop- the supplies; for even if
that stoppage could not be accomplished, yet. such a me-
morial would, perhaps, be the strongest form in which
they could express themselves.—(Hear, hear.) At
Hinckley I am told they will not hear a Chartist. Their
4.;estitution is too advanced for them to listen to any
-plans but those of immediate relief. At Leicester and
.._Loughborough a few, who call themselves Chartists, but
who are too noisy and too unreasonable to do anything
to the cause they espouse, but injure it, prevent the
bidding of public meetings, except at the risk of great
disturbance. With full- knowledge, therefore, of the
sentiments of the mass of the people in those places, it is
perhaps very likely no stronger expression will be given;
aid this Sir R. Peel may, perhaps, interpret as a sign of
their acquiescence. He will woefully deceive himself.—
(Hear.) Two branches of a public sentiment, hostile in
the highest degree to the principles of his Government,
hold each other in check simply as to the noise they
make. Still they not only exist, but under that very
silence. they are fermenting and ripenine, for re-
sults which will make him tremble.—(Loud cheers.)
lif this, its in other cases, just when he has dressed his
spieeelies, and with his dangerous facility of putting
sieglefacts for large conclusions, be has gained his de-
bates, and stopped for a moment the mouths of his op-
poneets, a state of things in this neighbourhood will
burst upon him which will upset all, and show him up
once more as a Minister of mere words.—(Cheers.) Mr.
Chapman concluded his important and impressive speech
amidst much applause.
The Rev. Mr. BONNER, of Bilston, said, that before he
came to London he had thought that in this metropolis
was concentrated all that was patriotic, and noble, and
good.. ; but his experience, short as it was, convinced him
that it also contained much that was foul, base, and de-
grading. He had attended two meetings in London,
which were assembled to hear the statements of the De-
legates respecting the distress of the country and its
principal cause ; and he never saw in his life such con-
duct as was adopted by those who interrupted the meet-
ings. But he thought he could see in the countenances
of those men the channels through which ran the secret
service money of the Government.—(Cheers.) He did
not believe that, they injured. the cause of the League,
:eel they certainly did not serve that of the Chartists.—
( Hear, hear.) He had seen in the Morning Chronicle
an assertion that it was false to say that the unemployed
men in Bilston were seizing food by force. But he had
ceiyed communications from Bilston, which he would
read to the .meeting, and which showed that the men
were seizing provisions by force, and obtaining money
by force, and he expected that he would shortly have to
ei_ennaunicate to the Conference the announcement of a
still more fearful state of things. The Rev. Gentleman
then read the following letters, which produced a deep
impression on the meeting. He begged to say that he
had not solicited this information, and that the letters
wo_Te written to him without any previous communication
with his friends upon the subject
Bilston, July 23, 1842.
" My dear Sir,—Things are much in the same state
here, only we begin to thing we have nothing to hope
fur from any steps that have been or can be adopted now
to relieve us, and are disposed to sit down quiet and wait
events. On Wednesday the men employed in breaking
stones at the Union-house set off in procession after their
day's work, through Wolverhampton, Bilston, and Wil-
lcuhall; their object was to show the rate-payers who
were so employed, and thus give an opportunity to dis-
cover any impostors. About 350 started, but a thunder
storm dispersed some, yet at last 200 reached the Swan
Bank, opposite my house; they were peaceable and or-
derly, but a poorer body of men need not be seen con-
vince our rulers that, as a nation, we are going down,
and that our artizans and labourers will shortly lose all
their old English character. In the evening bodies of
from 10 to 20 visited the shopkeepers, and for the fast
time demanded relief. The notice for a drop of the M-
liers' wages expires next Saturday, and I am old they
will not submit; the consequence will be this end of the
• county will require military as well as the Potteries, thus
increasing the evil to the middle classes. More furnaces.
are to be " blown out," and a further reduction has taken
place in the price of iron this week. All will not, how-
ever, procure trade and employment for the people, while
we refuse to take in payment for our manufactures what
the farmer has to pay with, and what we want most,
cheap food." Should the colliers of both ends of Staf-
fordshire and those in Shropshire stand out for
their wages, the iron works and potteries must
stand for coals, and then we shall have a fear-
ful increase to the number of the unemployed.
The Chartists have called a meeting by placards on the
walls throughout the district, the meeting to be held at
Swan Village, West Bromwich (a very central point), on
Monday next. A Mr. O'Neil is to address them, and they
are to deliberate what steps they shall adopt to prevent
their " being ground into the dust ;" and the placards
say further—" That by powerful resistance they (the
forgemen and miners) may obtain all that they Want"
The language used at their (the Chartists') room in
Stafford-street, I am told, was very strong, and a plan
for their future operations was promised to be disclosed
in a few days. There is a heaving of society that indi-
cates the working towards seine crisis, and 1 fear it will
not be long 'ere it overtakes us in one common ruin.
Our overseers are appealing this day to the Poor-law
Commissioners for further help to collect the rate, and
attend to the removal of the poor. In their memorial
they say that they do not expect to obtain from the
1,0001 still owing upon the rate granted on the 16th of
April last, more than 2013/., and that it will be as much
trouble to get that sum as it used to be to collect the
Whole rate. That during the last three weeks, from the
Ist of July to the 21st, seventy-one orders of removal
have been made out, and last night fourteen more were
made out, being sufficient work for the assistant over-
seer without expecting him to collect rates.
" Believe me to be, yours truly,
" ROBERT BEW.

WSPA PElt Rev. W. H. Bonner, London."
--Z
_.*-W “Bilston, ul 26, 1842. N,'\ ,o,tMy dear Sir—Events have made rapy id promress
Adwirds a crisis here, within the past ten days •
-andt' at
the present moment our town is quite a scene
of alarm.
We. have just 'had a body of men—near 500—from the
, neighbourhood, march into the town, who are now con-
, .;-:'
round to the houses and
,k, , suiting
or whether they shall go and stop all
whether they shall go
heliv:themseives,
this moment
h h
1... *it pita in the neighbourhood. I have
had agePtleman With me w..../.,° unak.,,l:"3eu through Wolver-
hampton, wilfenhau, and TT wow.. w-unt an q he reports