"Ireland from One or Two Neglected Points of View"

Yesterday, for the first time since I started publishing reprints of out-of-print books in 2005, I faced a dilemma about whether it was right to publish a book at all. In the end, I decided that it was, but with a kind of health warning like the ones that are found on packets of cigarettes. The book in question is called Ireland from One or Two Neglected Points of View and it was first published by Hatchards of Piccadilly in 1888, price ‘one shilling and sixpence.’

On the cover of the copy that I have, which I picked up in a box of ‘hard to sell’ books in a secondhand bookshop in Norfolk, it says that the book was written by "the Author of Hints to Country Bumpkins, etc." Written on the front cover in ink is the name of that author, H. (Henry) Strickland Constable, of Wassand Hall. Wassand is in Sigglesthorne parish, near Hornsea Mere, in the East Riding of Yorkshire.

I'm interested in Irish history but when I started to read the book I discovered that it was possibly one of the most vilely racist pieces of literature that I've ever come across - and I've read Mein Kampf (well, sort of, I read the first few chapters) and quite a few works by minor and very forgettable British fascists. This book, however, appears to have been written by someone who was completely insane. To put it briefly, it is a racist attack on the Irish, or as the author sometimes refers to them "Celts," with, unsurprisingly, a little bit of anti-Semitism thrown in. Oh, and he doesn't much like the French either. I've seen things like this before, but it's the virulence of the hatred in this book that is really shocking which is why I seriously doubt the author’s sanity.

Allowing him to be mad is a cop-out, though. Unfortunately, Henry Constable had done some "research," and is keen to demonstrate that he was not alone in his opinions. He quotes some very reputable sources, such as Thomas Carlyle ("the Celts of Connemara are white, not black; but it is not the colour of the skin that determines the savagery of the man"), the Spectator and Charles Kingsley, who says "But I was haunted by the human chimpanzees I saw along that hundred miles of horrible country. I don't believe they are our fault. I believe, on the contrary, that they are happier and better for being under our rule. But to see white chimpanzees is dreadful; if they were black, one would not feel it so much."

It feels quite painful even to copy that last statement. The “horrible landscape" by the way, is the Sligo of William Butler Yeats' poetry, of Lissadell and Innisfree. There are many more similar examples in the book and, naturally, Constable throws a chapter on Socialism in for good measure. I haven’t read the book, just skimmed through it, but it appears that it was intended mainly to be an attack on Gladstone and his policies in Ireland.

Henry Strickland Constable eventually became a Baronet. This is a description of Wassand Hall from Bulmer's Directory of Yorkshire,  1892:

 "Wassand, is a distinct manor and estate containing about 400 acres, situated two miles south-west from Hornsea. It anciently belonged to the Abbey of Meaux, and about the beginning of the sixteenth century it was in the possession of St. Mary's Abbey, York. In 1530, it was purchased by Dame Joan, widow of Sir William Constable, of Caythorpe, Knt., and is now the property of Henry Strickland Constable, Esq.

  "Wassand Hall, the seat of this gentleman, is a fine mansion in the Italian style, erected in 1813, by the Rev. Charles Constable. It stands in a well wooded park, at the west end of Hornsea mere. The lawns, pleasure grounds, and gardens are of considerable extent, and all tastefully laid out.

          "The remote ancestor of the Constables was Roaldus, Constable of Richmond. The Wassand branch are descended from William Constable, Esq., of Caythorpe, youngest son of Sir Robert Constable, Knt., of Flamborough. Henry Strickland Constable, Esq., the present owner of the estate, is the third son of the late Sir George Strickland, Bart., who in 1865, assumed the name of Cholmley, by Mary, daughter of the late Rev. Charles Constable, of Wassand. He married in 1860, Cornelia Ann, daughter of the late Colonel Dumaresq, and has besides other issue, a son and heir, Captain Frederick Charles Strickland Constable, J.P.

          "The family has held a distinguished position in the county from a very early period. From a list compiled by Mr. Hockney, it appears that between the years 1206 and 1701, the Constable family furnished 28 High Sheriffs to the county."

But to return to my problem, I decided that the book should be republished. There is still a great deal of ignorance about the level and violence of anti-Irish racism at least amongst the British upper classes. The book will mainly be of interest to academics but I think it's important for people to know what was thought about other races, however uncomfortable it is for us to read now. It is not rational or morally right, but it is was the mentality of at least some in the late nineteenth century.

So to continue my dilemma, I had to find a cover illustration for the CD on which I was republishing the book as a facsimile. I was not short of examples of appalling cartoons of Irishmen depicted as apes, or gurning monsters. If you click the link below, you’ll go to an excellent online article by Gwen Sharp, and see some mainly American examples, but it's not for the faint hearted. http://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2008/10/06/negative-stereotypes-of-the-irish/

Punch magazine seem to be particularly keen on this kind of thing and there are many examples of their jollity at portraying Irish people as fools or animals. But I've decided to leave the cover illustration as a simple map of Ireland rather than reprint any of them.

No doubt Henry Constable was “100% Anglo Saxon with perhaps just a dash of Viking,” as Tony Hancock so memorably puts it in The Blood Donor, or perhaps his ancestors immigrated after the Norman Conquest, like so many of the aristocracy. No doubt the Constables had a pleasant life in their fine mansion “in the Italian style” with their pleasure gardens and lawns, as part of the local Yorkshire squirearchy and magistracy, sentencing local people for poaching and suchlike activities. We can only speculate as to how the name Constable should be pronounced.

http://www.bibliopolis.co.uk/catalog/i260.html 

'A Kind of Paradise': The Origins of the Public Library in Britain

Writers have always been keen on libraries. There is an almost religious feel to the two quotations, written centuries apart, that I have chosen to illustrate this: Marcus Tullius Cicero (d. 43BC)  wrote: "To add a library to a house is to give that house a soul" and Jorge Luis Borges (d. 1986) famously described a library as a "kind of Paradise." 

I don't remember a time when I didn't go to the library. I grew up in a house where there were only a few books, perhaps four or five. In fact, my parents called magazine "books." But they took me to the local public library when I was very small and for that I am extremely grateful. Most of us take free access to education for granted and the public library service is part of that. We are, perhaps, about to enter a time when we can no longer do so. If that is the case, we will be turning back the clock to a time when education was considered to be a privilege and not a right.

In the early 19th century, there was a heated political debate amongst writers and thinkers in Britain about the education of the poor.  Although it was believed that the labouring-classes could benefit from religious education in particular, even liberal and philanthropic writers, such as Hannah More, worried about the effects of learning on the poor. An anonymous writer in John Bull, for example wrote: "We over-educate the poor and what do they say? That they are superior to the drudgery of cotton-spinning... or other menial offices." (30 October, 1825). William Cobbett believed that Sunday Schools were to be discouraged because they made "scholars of those whose business it is to delve." (Political Register, 14 May, 1803).

There was a genuine dilemma here. Poverty and ignorance were recognized as causes of tremendous social discord during the late-18th and early-19th centuries. Labourers were rioting, arson attacks on farmers and clergymen were not infrequent, the ruling classes were concerned about consumption of alcohol amongst the poor and general standards of behaviour were thought to be in decline. Even the Black Acts, the notorious legislation which enabled magistrates to transport people to the Colonies for relatively minor crimes such as poaching and petty theft, had not deterred some people from crime. The Houses of Industry or Workhouses continued to be the last resort for paupers, but they had not provided a solution to the "problem" of the poor.

Some philanthropists began to recognise that a low level of education might be beneficial to society in general. However, even those whom we now think of as being relatively enlightened were aware of the dangers of what they saw as over-educating the working classes. Patrick Colquhoun, in an essay proposing a new system of education for the labouring people of England, published in 1806, wrote: “Utopian schemes for an extensive diffusion of knowledge would be injurious and absurd.  A right bias to their minds, and a sufficient education to enable them to preserve, and to estimate properly, the religious and moral instruction they receive, is all that is, or ought ever to be, in contemplation. To go beyond this point would be to confound the ranks of society upon which the general happiness of the lower orders, no less than those that are more elevated, depends; since by indiscriminate education those destined for laborious occupations would become discontented and unhappy..."

By the mid-19th century, the argument for a basic general education had largely been won. In 1849, William Ewart MP, introduced a Public Libraries Act, but there was considerable hostility, particularly from the Conservative Party, who felt that ratepayers should not have to pay for a service that would mainly be used by the working classes. The Public Libraries Act became law in 1850. William Ewart wanted all boroughs to have the power to finance public libraries, but the legislation only applied to boroughs with populations of over 10,000. Borough Councils also had to obtain the consent of two-thirds of local ratepayers, no more than a halfpenny in the pound could be levied and the money raised could not be used to purchase books.

Despite this, Ewart’s Act was the beginning of a golden age of public education with the library service as the jewel in its crown. At the beginning of the 21^st century there were over 3500 public libraries in England, providing all kinds of services, from local studies to Baby Bounce & Rhyme groups. The Museums, Libraries & Archives Council (itself to be abolished by Culture Minister, Jeremy Hunt) reported in 2010 that “satisfaction among [public library] service users is high with 92% of respondents to the CIPFA Public Library Users Survey (PLUS) saying that overall their library was 'good' or 'very good'.” [http://www.mla.gov.uk/what/research/sector_statistics]

Things look rather bleak for public libraries in England at the moment. One wonders, in the face of such evidence of success and ‘consumer satisfaction,’ what exactly the government’s rationale for the closure of public libraries is. It would be absurd, wouldn't it, to suggest that there are people in our government who are so cynical as to believe that a good education is unnecessary for McJobs and supermarket shelf-stacking?

William Ewart was a Liberal MP. It would be a profound betrayal of its roots if that party (albeit in coalition with the Tories) were to preside over the beginning of the end of the public library service.

William Cobbett defends the labourers of Little Massingham, Norfolk, 1823

Whilst transcribing Rev. Ronald McLeod's parish history Massingham Parva Past & Present (1882), I came across some information about social unrest amongst the labourers of the parish in 1823. Being partial, Rev. McLeod regarded the labourers as little more than criminals, stirred up by outside agitators. He concludes that "the time of disaffection was the moment of prosperity for the working class - the year in which they were in a position to purchase more meat and comforts than in any other." Another words, they'd never had it so good.

There was more to it than that, though. Enough for William Cobbett to come to the defence of the labourers of Little Massingham in his inimitable style:

From Cobbett's Weekly Political Register, 5th June 1824:

"To Parson Brereton,

of Little Massingham, in the County of Norfolk.

"On his pamphlet, which contains, like the book of Parson Malthus, an attack upon the labourers, who are paupers only because they are oppressed with taxes.

"Parson,

"Your book, or pamphlet, is no more than a sort of hash of a part of the disgusting, bloody-and-raw and half-cooked mess of your brother Parson, Malthus.  Mr. Copeland has given you a complete answer; and I should not have noticed your book, had it not afforded me a fair opportunity to give a blow to a Parson; to one of that tribe, from whom I have received so many blows, and whom the whole nation begins now to see in their true light.

"Parson, your object is to prevent parish relief being given. This is your object. You and the rest of the parsons have been pushed a good deal by the rating of your tithes! This has set your wits to work; and those wits seldom travel out of the direct path of your interests. The taxes, necessary for the purposes of the parsons, have robbed, and do rob, the labourers so much, that they must get from the parish, or starve. You dare not push them to the latter.  You would not like open rebellion. Therefore, you hate the labourers. You cannot tell why; but you hate them. I will tell you why: they cause deductions from the amount of your tithes. That is the true and only cause of your hatred towards them. Your scheme would make them half-naked, like the Irish.  You forget, but you must have them shut up in their houses from sunset to sunrise, and, besides this, have a bayonet and a red coat ready at every corner of the street! You are puzzled, Parson; but, you will be a great deal more than puzzled by-and-by. You smell danger; but, I am convinced, that you have not the scent so strong as you ought to have it.

"Parson, why ought not poor labourers to be relieved? A very large sum has been voted, partly out of the taxes laid on the labourers, to relieve the poor clergy; and why should not something be given to the poor labourers?  You talk of idle labourers. Are they more idle, Parson, than non-resident parsons are?  You, Parson, have two livings yourself, I fancy, and can you take care of the souls of the people in both these parishes?

"But, Parson, I have not time now to deal with you in a proper manner.  I promise to do it shortly. I will take the side of the labourers; and if I do not place the parsons in a proper light, may I have to endure their blessings! I will show a little more plainly than you have, what it is that makes paupers: I will show, as clearly as day-light, that it is the church parsons, and the church parsons only, that have been the cause of the paupers."

Capel Lofft: A Suffolk Humanitarian

I have to admit that the subject I'm writing about today is a hero of mine. I have a print of a portrait of Capel Lofft (1751-1824) looking over me as I write. It is a portrait of a young man dressed in barrister's robes and he looks what I imagine he was: kind, intelligent and idealistic. Lofft was from a wealthy Suffolk family and, at one time, was the owner of both Stanton Hall and Troston Hall. Unlike many East Anglian landowning families, however, there was also a strong intellectual background. His uncle, Edward Capell, is credited as being the scholar who discovered one of Shakespeare's 'lost' plays, Edward III.

Capel Lofft could have spent his life as a privileged dilettante. He was educated at Eton & Cambridge and mixed with an artistic and literary crowd. He certainly wrote a great deal of fairly bad poetry - something which won him the lifelong emnity of Charles Lamb, who was miffed because Lofft published his dodgy odes under the soubriquet "C.L."

But Capel Lofft was a man with ideals and a conscience. The causes he chose to take up are relevant today: slavery, hunting, the death penalty and the restriction of civil liberties. He was closely involved, as a young barrister with "Somersett's Case," in 1772, which ended in a legal ruling that was the beginning of the end of slavery in England with Lord Mansfield's ruling that “the state of slavery is of such a nature, that it is incapable of being introduced on any reasons, moral or political…. It is so odious, that nothing can be suffered to support it..."

In middle age, Lofft became a magistrate in Suffolk. Years later, John Glyde wrote in The Suffolk Garland (1866): “As a Magistrate, the well-known Mr. Capel Lofft was indefatigable in the performance of his duties,” but somehow he became involved in a case which led to his dismissal from the Suffolk bench. In October 1799, a 22-year-old serving woman, Sarah Lloyd from Hadleigh, let her boyfriend, Joseph Clark, into the house of her employer. Property was stolen and a fire was started, although no serious damage was done. Lloyd and Clark were arrested and charged. Sarah Lloyd was found guilty of stealing goods to the value of forty pounds and sentenced to death. Clark was acquitted. Sarah Lloyd may not have been of average intelligence. She is described in contemporay reports as “deluded” or simple and child-like. Horrified at the death sentence, Lofft took up her case. He managed to persuade William Pearson, the Sheriff of Ipswich, to grant a stay of execution and appealed to the Home Secretary, the Duke of Portland, for a reprieve. The Times declared that Lloyd’s crime was of “unequalled… atrociousness” and the Duke of Portland refused the petition. Lofft accompanied Sarah Lloyd to the scaffold in Bury St. Edmunds. It was raining and he gave her an umbrella and helped her to hold it over her head. Lofft was distraught after the execution had taken place, apparently making frantic attempts to revive her. Sir Nash Grose, the judge in her original trial was furious, describing Lofft’s conduct as “improper interference.” This, along with the fact that he had made a speech that explicitly attacked the Tory government, led to his being struck off the magistrate’s list.

Capel Lofft's life didn't end very happily. He was mocked and derided for many of his views, which would be regarded as quite reasonable today. He ended his life in self-imposed exile in Italy. He died at Montcalieri, near Turin, in 1824 and was buried in the Protestant church of St. Germain, in Piedmont. Sarah Lloyd's memorial is closer to home and can be seen in the old churchyard in Bury.