The Sun.
London, England, 1842-04-11 00:00:00

TORY OPPRESSION JN BATH.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE SUN.
Slit, —I take the oppOrtunity, through the medium of your
widely circulated paper, of exposing as heartless a proceeding
on the part of some of the Bath Conservatives, as ever was
conceived and perpetrated by man. It is of course well known
how signal was the defeat sustained by this party at the last
election, but it is probably not in the knowledge of any save
the inhabitants of this place, that on that occasion numerous
bands of navigators, from the neighbouring railway, were
hired for the express purpose of contending with the Liberals,
and of making themselves generally useful to the Blues, or
Conservatives, by whom they were fed and paid. On the day
of the nomination some fearful outrages were committed by
these men, who in large bodies endeavoured to disturb the pro-
ceedings of the day : in this they were defeated, and the re-
sult of the nomination was most decisively in favour of the
Liberal Candidates. In the evening of that day (28th June
last) one of the Liberal voters, in passing down Avon-street,
was savagely attacked, and almost murdered, by a party of these
men, who immediately afterwards retreated into a low public-
house close by, called the Pig and Whistle : the alarm having
been given, a party of the Liberals immediately came to the
rescue of the injured man, and finding out to what house his
landlordassailers
to turn had retreated,
themtreate outd,th : thiseyw h
went to
e d
troiftu,saend demanded of the
to
do,
at the same'
time denying that any of the Blues were there ; upon this the
Liberals burst open the door, but not being enabled to get at
uil
their opponents, who contrived to make their escape, left the
house, and as may have been expestertaetde,snoon aeh
t without eoxfprheasysiiin,gg
htheerierthaengdeirstubrybbanreeaekeinde
breaking most of the windowwseirne
the
apprehended,bd building;
A few days after this, fifteen of the Liberals, supposed to
pa
andhav taken e beenken presentbefore
the
on
Baththe
i‘ f aboveae occasion,
begun to demolish the Pig and Whistle. The case of the com-
plainantearefnl e
examination
nfautl
oyn investigated,
several
ag: _
e,trates came to
the conclusion that there were no grounds for supporting the
capital charge of felony for beginning to demolish, but coin-
and
days, after
the tient and
a most
mated the parties to take their trial for " a riot," at the then
next borough quarter sessions, at the same time taking bail for
their due appearance.
The prosecutor, not satisfied with this, proceeded to the County
Assizes in August last, and there presented a bill to the Grand
tJou rdye
m(
which
at that time
"beginning
tlish," ahne yo
fffoeunnetel found) fur
ht hies of aagnadi nw
ao
punishable with death. Upon the bill being found, these poor
fellows (most of them in the humblest circumstances) were
again taken into custody; some of them, after an expensive
application to a Judge in London, were admitted to bail ;
others, from their poverty, were unable to procure this advan-
tage, and were in consequence confined in gaol from last Au-
gust to the assizes which are just over. Upon the indictment
coming on for trial, a legal objection was taken on behalf of the
prisoners to its sufficiency—the objection ultimately prevailed.
Up goes another bill for the felony ("beginning to-demolish")
which the Grand Jury, upon the evidence alone of the prose-
cution, found. The men, twelve in number, were then put
upon their trial, and the case broke down in its infancy. It
appeared clear upon the evidence that the prisoners never had
any intention whatever of demolishing the house, and so the
Judge stated to the Jury, who, without calling upon the pri-
soners for their defence, immediately acquitted them.
Nothing could more plainly show the sense in which the
Learned Judge viewed these proceedings, than his refusing to allow
the prosecutor a large portion of his expenses; which, how-
ever, will dJubtless be paid by the Conservative Association,
who are, beyond a doubt, at the bottom of the whole pro-
ceedings. I am, Sir, yours, &e.
A HATER OF OPPRESSION.
Bath, 6th March, 1842. '