The Gordon Riots Revisited
Authors: Rogers Nicholas 
Published: July 2012

The 1780 protests against the Catholic Relief Act were the most violent and
controversial disturbances of the eighteenth century and have predictably given rise to
several historical interpretations. Early studies sought to emphasize the political
immaturity and deep sectarian prejudices of the common people and the anarchy and
degenerate character of the riots themselves. By contrast, George Rude, in his first
exploration of British crowds, insisted that the riots were more orderly and purposive
than historians had assumed. Set within the context of the emergent radical movement,
the riots, according to Rude, drew their inspiration from radical elements in London's
Protestant Association and from antiauthoritarian notions of the “Englishman's
birthright.” Directed initially against Catholic chapels and schools, the disturbances
developed into a social protest against the rich and propertied.
This essay adopts a different approach. Like Rude, it endorses the view that the
riots seldom deviated from the cue of the Protestant Association. Despite the
drunkeness and almost festive air which accompanied the disturbances, the riots
constituted a disciplined reprisal against the Catholic community and a Parliament that
refused to bow before popular pressure. Indeed, the pattern of violence reveals that
rioters acted discriminately, directing their anger at Catholic chapels, houses, and
schools and at the property of those sympathetic to Catholic relief. Only with the sacking
of the gaols and distilleries did the disturbances deviate from their original objective and,
even then, the degree of looting and lawlessness can be easily exaggerated.
At the same time, the Gordon riots cannot be categorically viewed as a social
protest against the rich. Although the targets of the crowd included a disproportionate
number of prominent Catholics and parliamentary supporters of the Relief Act, the
prime aim of the rioters was to immobilize the Catholic community and to intimidate
Parliament. To be sure, elements of social protest did accompany the disturbances. In
the carnivalesque freedom of the occasion participants sometimes showed a sardonic
disrespect for rank. Moreover, the opening of the gaols, initially to rescue imprisoned
rioters, denoted an almost Brechtian contempt for the prison system and the law in
general. In the final phases of the riot, however, the social hostilities of the crowd were
essentially local and concrete, directed against crimps, debtors' lockups, and toll bridges.
That is, they addressed the customary oppressions of the poor, not a generalised form of
social levelling.
Nor were the riots closely associated with radical politics. Although some London
radicals sympathised with the protesters in the initial stages of the disturbances, others,
influenced by Enlightenment ideas, clearly did not. In fact, many were deeply troubled
by the riots, fearing their excesses would prejudice popular movements in general.
Basically the protests against the Catholic Relief Bill cut across traditional political
alignments. Ideologically the Protestant Association was remarkably protean, drawing
support from proministerial, but evangelical, conservatives as well as from radicals
troubled by ministerial incursions upon liberty in Britain and America. Ultimately the
anti-Catholic protests of 1780 pitted a cosmopolitan social elite against a more
traditional rank and file fuelled by an evangelical fear of an incipient Catholic revival. In
sum, the Gordon riots drew upon populist, nationalist sentiments that did not square
with conventional political alignments. It remained to be seen how these forces could be
accomodated in contemporary political discourse.