Roscoe Circle
The Roscoe circle was a loosely-defined group of reformers in Liverpool at the end of the 18th century, around William Roscoe (1753–1831), a banker, politician and abolitionist. The group had cultural interests and drew mostly on English Dissenters. Defining the group Thomas Stewart Traill, in his memoir of Roscoe, called the circle a "small private literary society". The issue arises whether this group's interests also involved Roscoe's radical politics. Sutton argues that their interests were also political and medical; that this circle fits into a larger pattern of societies; and that in the Liverpool dissenting and Unitarian context, the Roscoe circle was rooted in the ministry of Henry Winder earlier in the century. There were links to Warrington Academy, through its education of dissenting ministers, and of the Lunar Society of Birmingham to Roscoe through Thomas Bentley. In its early days, the group of younger men around Roscoe opposed the Liverpool corporation. They were a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. With a population of in 2019, it is the 10th largest English district by population and its metropolitan area is the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, with a population of 2.24 million. On the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary, Liverpool historically lay within the ancient hundred of West Derby in the county of Lancashire. It became a borough in 1207, a city in 1880, and a county borough independent of the newly-created Lancashire County Council in 1889. Its growth as a major port was paralleled by the expansion of the city throughout the Industrial Revolution. Along with general cargo, freight, and raw materials such as coal and cotton, merchants were involved in the slave trade. In the 19th century, Liverpool was a major port of departure for English and Irish emigrants to North America. It was also home to both the Cunard and White Star Lines, and was the port of registry of the ocean li ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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East India Company
The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia), and later with East Asia. The company seized control of large parts of the Indian subcontinent, colonised parts of Southeast Asia and Hong Kong. At its peak, the company was the largest corporation in the world. The EIC had its own armed forces in the form of the company's three Presidency armies, totalling about 260,000 soldiers, twice the size of the British army at the time. The operations of the company had a profound effect on the global balance of trade, almost single-handedly reversing the trend of eastward drain of Western bullion, seen since Roman times. Originally chartered as the "Governor and Company of Merchants of London Trading into the East-Indies", the company rose to account for half of the world's trade duri ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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John Yates (minister)
John Yates (1755 – 1826) was an English Unitarian minister, for over 30 years at the Paradise Street Chapel in Liverpool. He was an abolitionist, a supporter of radical causes, and a member of the Roscoe circle of progressives. Life He was born in Bolton, the only child of John Yates, a schoolmaster. He was educated at Bolton Grammar School, and from 1772 at Warrington Academy. In 1777 Yates became the minister of the Kaye Street Chapel, Liverpool. With his friend William Shepherd, who tutored his children, Yates was active in Liverpool's radical politics. He preached against the Atlantic slave trade in 1788, offending some of his congregation. He took part in the private meetings of the "Friends of Freedom" from 1789, a group including William Roscoe and William Rathbone IV. Yates and his congregation moved to the Paradise Street Chapel in 1791. Yates was active on the committee of The Lyceum. He was one of the supporters of Manchester College. He died on 10 November ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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William Smyth (historian)
William Smyth (1765 in Liverpool – 24 June 1849 in Norwich) was an English poet and historian, who became Regius Professor at Cambridge in 1807. Life The son of merchant-banker Thomas Smyth, he was born in Liverpool. After attending a day school in the town, he went to Eton College, where he remained three years. On leaving Eton he read with a tutor at Bury, Lancashire, and in January 1783 he entered Peterhouse, Cambridge., graduating eighth wrangler in 1787. In the same year, he was elected to the fellowship vacated by John Wilson. He proceeded to the M.A. in 1790, and returned to Liverpool, but in 1793, after the declaration of war with France, his father's bank failed, and it became necessary for him to earn his living. Through Edward Morris, a college friend, Smyth was chosen in 1793 by Richard Brinsley Sheridan as tutor to his elder son Thomas. He lived with his pupil at Wanstead, at Bognor, and at Cambridge, and saw much of Sheridan himself; but the relationsh ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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William Shepherd (minister)
William Shepherd (11 October 1768 – 21 July 1847) was an English dissenting minister and politician, known also as a poet and writer. Life He was born in Liverpool on 11 October 1768. His father, a tradesman, took an active part in local politics, and was a freeman; he died in 1772. His mother, Elizabeth (died 1787), was daughter of Benjamin Mather, dissenting minister at Over Darwen. Under the supervision of his uncle, Tatlock Mather (died 1785), minister of a presbyterian (Unitarian) congregation at Rainford, near Prescot, William was successively educated: at Holden's academy near Rainford from 1776 to 1782; by Philip Holland from 1782 to 1785; at Daventry Academy from 1785 to 1788 under Thomas Belsham; and at New College, Hackney, from 1788 to 1790 under Belsham, Andrew Kippis, and Richard Price. On the completion of his academic course in 1790 he became tutor to the sons of the Rev. John Yates, including the future Unitarian minister James Yates, the merchant and mem ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Edward Rushton
Edward Rushton (1756–1814) was a British poet, writer and bookseller from Liverpool, England. He worked as a sailor aboard a slave ship as a young man, and became an abolitionist as a result. After losing his own vision, he opened a school for the blind, the oldest such school in continuous operation in the world. Early life Edward Rushton was born in Liverpool, Lancashire, England on 13 November 1756. He was enrolled at the Liverpool Free School from the age of 6 until the age of 9. He left school and at the age of 11 he became an apprentice with Messrs. Watt and Gregson, a firm that traded in the West Indies. Life at sea Rushton quickly became an experienced sailor. For example, at age 16, he took the helm of a ship which the captain and crew were about to abandon and guided them safely back to Liverpool. Because of this event, he was promoted from his apprenticeship to the position of second mate. In addition, at the age of 17 he survived the sinking of a slave ship he wa ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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William Rathbone IV
William Rathbone IV (10 June 1757 – 11 February 1809) was an English ship-owner and merchant involved in the organisation of American trade with Liverpool, England. He was a political radical, supporting the abolition of the slave trade and universal suffrage. He was a member of the noted Rathbone family. Slave trade Rathbone was a committed opponent to slavery and a founding member of the Liverpool Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade created in 1788, a society originating in London the year before. As a Liverpool merchant he benefited from the sale of timber for use in slave ships and imported goods, such as cotton, made with slave labour. Political views Rathbone was considered a political radical because he supported the abolition of slavery, universal suffrage, free trade, and he was opposed to the 1793 war with France. He was called the "hoary traitor".The Liverpool Abolitionists by F. E. Sanderson Originally a member of the Society of Friends, he felt compelled ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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James Currie (physician)
James Currie FRS (31 May 1756 in Dumfriesshire, Scotland – 31 August 1805 in Sidmouth) was a Scottish physician, best known for his anthology and biography of Robert Burns and his medical reports on the use of water in the treatment of fever. A watercolour portrait by Horace Hone (1756–1825) is in the National Galleries of Scotland. His early attempt to set up a merchanting business in Virginia was a failure and he returned to Scotland. After qualifying as a medical doctor he established a successful practice in Liverpool, England and after a few years was able to purchase a small estate in Dumfriesshire. He became a Fellow of the London Medical Society and was a founder member of the Liverpool Literary Society. He was an early advocate of the abolition of slavery and wrote several political letters and pamphlets, including one to William Pitt, which made him a number of enemies. Throughout his life he was dogged by illness and in 1804 he became seriously unwell. In an e ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Lucy Aikin
Lucy Aikin (6 November 1781 – 29 January 1864) was an English historical writer, biographer and correspondent. She also published under pseudonyms such as Mary Godolphin. Her literary-minded family included her aunt Anna Laetitia Barbauld, a writer of poetry, essays and children's books. Early life Aikin was born at Warrington, then Lancashire, in 1781. She was the fourth child of a physician, John Aikin (1747–1822), and his wife, Martha Jennings (died 1830). Theirs was a literary family of prominent Unitarians. Lucy's father was also a historian, and her grandfather, likewise called John Aikin (1713–1780), was a Unitarian scholar and theological tutor, closely associated with Warrington Academy. Lucy's aunt was Anna Laetitia Barbauld, a prominent children's writer, while her brother Arthur Aikin (1773–1854) was a chemist, mineralogist and scientific writer, and their brother Charles Rochemont (1775–1847) was adopted by Barbauld and became a doctor and chemist. Anoth ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Priestley Riots
The Priestley Riots (also known as the Birmingham Riots of 1791) took place from 14 July to 17 July 1791 in Birmingham, England; the rioters' main targets were religious dissenters, most notably the politically and theologically controversial Joseph Priestley. Both local and national issues stirred the passions of the rioters, from disagreements over public library book purchases, to controversies over Dissenters' attempts to gain full civil rights and their support of the French Revolution. The riots started with an attack on the Royal Hotel, Birmingham—the site of a banquet organised in sympathy with the French Revolution. Then, beginning with Priestley's church and home, the rioters attacked or burned four Dissenting chapels, twenty-seven houses, and several businesses. Many of them became intoxicated by liquor that they found while looting, or with which they were bribed to stop burning homes. A small core could not be bribed, however, and remained sober. The rioters bur ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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William Petty, 2nd Earl Of Shelburne
William Petty Fitzmaurice, 1st Marquess of Lansdowne, (2 May 17377 May 1805; known as the Earl of Shelburne between 1761 and 1784, by which title he is generally known to history), was an Irish-born British Whig statesman who was the first home secretary in 1782 and then prime minister from 1782 to 1783 during the final months of the American War of Independence. He succeeded in securing peace with America and this feat remains his most notable legacy. Lord Shelburne was born in Dublin and spent his formative years in Ireland. After attending Oxford University he served in the British Army during the Seven Years' War. As a reward for his conduct at the Battle of Kloster Kampen, Shelburne was appointed an aide-de-camp to George III. He became involved in politics, becoming a member of parliament in 1760. After his father's death in 1761, he inherited his title and entered the House of Lords. In 1766, Shelburne was appointed as Southern Secretary, a position which he held fo ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Abolition Of Slavery
Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people. The British abolitionist movement started in the late 18th century when English and American Quakers began to question the morality of slavery. James Oglethorpe was among the first to articulate the Enlightenment case against slavery, banning it in the Province of Georgia on humanitarian grounds, and arguing against it in Parliament, and eventually encouraging his friends Granville Sharp and Hannah More to vigorously pursue the cause. Soon after Oglethorpe's death in 1785, Sharp and More united with William Wilberforce and others in forming the Clapham Sect. The Somersett case in 1772, in which a fugitive slave was freed with the judgement that slavery did not exist under English common law, helped launch the British movement to abolish slavery. Th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |