Richard Carlile
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Richard Carlile (8 December 1790 – 10 February 1843) was an important agitator for the establishment of
universal suffrage Universal suffrage (also called universal franchise, general suffrage, and common suffrage of the common man) gives the right to vote to all adult citizens, regardless of wealth, income, gender, social status, race, ethnicity, or political stanc ...
and
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in the United Kingdom.


Early life

Born in Ashburton, Devon, he was the son of a shoemaker who died in 1794; leaving Richard's mother struggling to support her three children on the income from running a small shop. At the age of six he went for free education to the local
Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...
school, then at the age of twelve he left school for a seven-year apprenticeship to a
tinsmith A tinsmith is a person who makes and repairs things made of tin or other light metals. The profession may sometimes also be known as a tinner, tinker, tinman, or tinplate worker; whitesmith may also refer to this profession, though the same w ...
in
Plymouth Plymouth () is a port city and unitary authority in South West England. It is located on the south coast of Devon, approximately south-west of Exeter and south-west of London. It is bordered by Cornwall to the west and south-west. Plymouth ...
.


Personal life

In 1813 he married, and shortly afterwards the couple moved to
Holborn Holborn ( or ) is a district in central London, which covers the south-eastern part of the London Borough of Camden and a part ( St Andrew Holborn Below the Bars) of the Ward of Farringdon Without in the City of London. The area has its roots ...
Hill in London where he found work as a tinsmith. Jane Carlile gave birth to five children, three of whom survived. Some time after 1829, Carlile met Eliza Sharples and she became his common law wife. Together they had at least four children.


Politics and publishing

His interest in politics was kindled first by economic conditions in the winter of 1816 when Carlile was put on short-time work by his employer creating serious problems for the family: "I shared the general distress of 1816 and it was this that opened my eyes." He began attending political meetings where speakers like Henry Hunt complained that only three men in a hundred had the vote, and was also influenced by the publications of
William Cobbett William Cobbett (9 March 1763 – 18 June 1835) was an English pamphleteer, journalist, politician, and farmer born in Farnham, Surrey. He was one of an agrarian faction seeking to reform Parliament, abolish "rotten boroughs", restrain foreign ...
. As a way of making a living he sold the writings of parliamentary reformers such as
Tom Paine Thomas Paine (born Thomas Pain; – In the contemporary record as noted by Conway, Paine's birth date is given as January 29, 1736–37. Common practice was to use a dash or a slash to separate the old-style year from the new-style year. In th ...
on the streets of London, often walking "thirty miles for a profit of eighteen pence". In April 1817 he formed a publishing business with the printer William Sherwin and rented a shop in
Fleet Street Fleet Street is a major street mostly in the City of London. It runs west to east from Temple Bar at the boundary with the City of Westminster to Ludgate Circus at the site of the London Wall and the River Fleet from which the street was na ...
. To make political texts such as Paine's books ''
The Rights of Man ''Rights of Man'' (1791), a book by Thomas Paine, including 31 articles, posits that popular political revolution is permissible when a government does not safeguard the natural rights of its people. Using these points as a base it defends the ...
'' and the '' Principles of Government'' available to the poor he split them into sections which he sold as small pamphlets, similarly publishing ''
The Age of Reason ''The Age of Reason; Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology'' is a work by English and American political activist Thomas Paine, arguing for the philosophical position of deism. It follows in the tradition of 18th-century Briti ...
'' and ''
Principles of Nature ''Principles of Nature'', also known as ''The Principles of Nature, or A Development of the Moral Causes of Happiness and Misery among the Human Species'', was a work written in 1801 by Elihu Palmer. The work was similar to Thomas Paine's writings, ...
''. He issued unauthorized copies of Southey's ''
Wat Tyler Wat Tyler (c. 1320/4 January 1341 – 15 June 1381) was a leader of the 1381 Peasants' Revolt in England. He led a group of rebels from Canterbury to London to oppose the institution of a poll tax and to demand economic and social reforms. Wh ...
'' and after the radical
William Hone William Hone (3 June 1780 – 8 November 1842) was an English writer, satirist and bookseller. His victorious court battle against government censorship in 1817 marked a turning point in the fight for British press freedom. Biography Ho ...
's arrest in May, he reissued the parody of parts of the ''
Book of Common Prayer The ''Book of Common Prayer'' (BCP) is the name given to a number of related prayer books used in the Anglican Communion and by other Christian churches historically related to Anglicanism. The original book, published in 1549 in the reign ...
'' for which Hone was to be tried, then was himself arrested in August and held without charge until Hone was acquitted in December. He took on distributing the banned Radical weekly ''
The Black Dwarf ''The Black Dwarf'' (1817–1824) was a satirical radical journal of early 19th century Britain. It was published by Thomas Jonathan Wooler, starting in January 1817 as an eight-page newspaper, then later becoming a 32-page pamphlet. It was pric ...
'' at a time when the government was prosecuting publishers: "The Habeas Corpus Act being suspended ... all was terror and alarm, but I take credit to myself in defeating the effect of these two Acts upon the Press... Of imprisonment I made sure, but I felt inclined to court it than to shrink from it". Carlile then brought out a radical journal, ''Sherwin's Political Register'', which reported political meetings and included extracts from books and poems by supporters of the reform movement such as
Percy Bysshe Shelley Percy Bysshe Shelley ( ; 4 August 17928 July 1822) was one of the major English Romantic poets. A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not achieve fame during his lifetime, but recognition of his achie ...
and
Lord Byron George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron (22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824), known simply as Lord Byron, was an English romantic poet and Peerage of the United Kingdom, peer. He was one of the leading figures of the Romantic movement, and h ...
. The popularity of this helped to soon bring his profit from his publishing venture to £50 a week.


Peterloo and ''The Republican''

Carlile was one of the scheduled main speakers at the reform meeting on 16 August 1819 at St. Peter's Fields in
Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...
. Just as Henry Hunt was about to speak, the crowd was attacked by the yeomanry in what became known as the
Peterloo massacre The Peterloo Massacre took place at St Peter's Field, Manchester, Lancashire, England, on Monday 16 August 1819. Fifteen people died when cavalry charged into a crowd of around 60,000 people who had gathered to demand the reform of parliament ...
. Carlile escaped and was hidden by radical friends before he caught the mail coach to London and published his eyewitness account, giving the first full report of what had happened, in ''Sherwin's Weekly Political Register'' of 18 August 1819. His placards proclaimed "Horrid Massacres at Manchester". The government responded by closing ''Sherwin's Political Register'', confiscating the stock of newspapers and pamphlets. Carlile changed the name to ''The Republican'' and in its issue of 27 August 1819 demanded that "The massacre... should be the daily theme of the Press until the murderers are brought to justice.... Every man in Manchester who avows his opinions on the necessity of reform, should never go unarmed – retaliation has become a duty, and revenge an act of justice." Carlile was prosecuted for
blasphemy Blasphemy is a speech crime and religious crime usually defined as an utterance that shows contempt, disrespects or insults a deity, an object considered sacred or something considered inviolable. Some religions regard blasphemy as a religiou ...
, blasphemous libel and
sedition Sedition is overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that tends toward rebellion against the established order. Sedition often includes subversion of a constitution and incitement of discontent toward, or insurrection against, estab ...
for publishing material that might encourage people to hate the government in his newspaper, and for publishing
Tom Paine Thomas Paine (born Thomas Pain; – In the contemporary record as noted by Conway, Paine's birth date is given as January 29, 1736–37. Common practice was to use a dash or a slash to separate the old-style year from the new-style year. In th ...
's ''Common Sense'', ''The Rights of Man'' and the ''Age of Reason'' (which criticised the
Church of England The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...
). In October 1819 he was found guilty of
blasphemy Blasphemy is a speech crime and religious crime usually defined as an utterance that shows contempt, disrespects or insults a deity, an object considered sacred or something considered inviolable. Some religions regard blasphemy as a religiou ...
and
seditious libel Sedition and seditious libel were criminal offences under English common law, and are still criminal offences in Canada. Sedition is overt conduct, such as speech and organization, that is deemed by the legal authority to tend toward insurrection ...
and sentenced to three years in Dorchester
Gaol A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correct ...
with a fine of £1,500. When he refused to pay the fine, his premises in
Fleet Street Fleet Street is a major street mostly in the City of London. It runs west to east from Temple Bar at the boundary with the City of Westminster to Ludgate Circus at the site of the London Wall and the River Fleet from which the street was na ...
were raided and his stock was confiscated. While he was in jail he continued to write articles for ''The Republican'' which was now published by Carlile's wife, Jane, and thanks to the publicity it now outsold pro-government newspapers such as ''
The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (fou ...
''. To curb newspapers the government had raised the ½d tax on newspapers, first imposed in 1712, to 3½d in 1797, then 4d in 1815. From December 1819 it set a minimum price of 7d, with further restrictions. At a time when workers earned less than 10 shillings (120d.) a week this made it hard for them to afford radical newspapers, and publishers tried various strategies to evade the tax. Groups would pool their resources in reading societies and subscription societies to purchase a book or journal in common, and frequently read it aloud to one another as was the case with
James Wilson James Wilson may refer to: Politicians and government officials Canada *James Wilson (Upper Canada politician) (1770–1847), English-born farmer and political figure in Upper Canada * James Crocket Wilson (1841–1899), Canadian MP from Quebe ...
. By 1821, Carlile was a declared
atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...
(having previously been a
Deist Deism ( or ; derived from the Latin '' deus'', meaning "god") is the philosophical position and rationalistic theology that generally rejects revelation as a source of divine knowledge, and asserts that empirical reason and observation ...
) and published his ''Address to Men of Science'', in favour of materialism and education. In the same year Jane Carlile was in turn sentenced to two years imprisonment for seditious libel, and her place as publisher was taken by Richard Carlile's sister, Mary. Within six months she was imprisoned for the same offence. The process was repeated with eight of his shop workers, including
Susannah Wright Susannah Wright (1792 - unknown) was an English woman imprisoned on charges of Blasphemous libel Blasphemous libel was originally an offence under the common law of England. Today, it is an offence under the common law of Northern Ireland, but ...
, and over 150 men and women were sent to prison for selling ''The Republican''. Carlile's sentence ended in 1823 but he was immediately arrested and returned to prison for not paying his £1,500 fine, so the process continued until he was eventually released on 25 November 1825. In the next edition of ''The Republican'' he expressed the hope that his long confinement would result in the freedom to publish radical political ideas. An example of the support he received from around the country is the £1.5.1 sent to him in Dorchester jail by forty working men in the West Yorkshire village of
Hunslet Hunslet () is an inner-city area in south Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. It is southeast of the city centre and has an industrial past. It is situated in the Hunslet and Riverside ward of Leeds City Council and Leeds Central parliamentar ...
, accompanied by a noble letter on behalf of those "few Friends to Truth and Justice". He then published further journals, ''The Lion'' which campaigned against child labour and ''The Promptor''. He argued that "equality between the sexes" should be the objective of all reformers, and in 1826 published ''Every Woman's Book'' advocating birth control and the sexual emancipation of women. Cobbett denounced this book as "so filthy, so disgusting, so beastly, as to shock even the lewdest men and women". Carlile was an advocate of the
Christ myth theory The Christ myth theory, also known as the Jesus myth theory, Jesus mythicism, or the Jesus ahistoricity theory, is the view that "the story of Jesus is a piece of mythology", possessing no "substantial claims to historical fact". Alternative ...
. He did not believe that
Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
existed. He debated Unitarian minister John Relly Beard in ''The Republican'', 1826.


The Devil's Chaplain

He joined up with the radical and sceptical clergyman Robert Taylor and set out on an "infidel home missionary tour" which reached
Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...
on Thursday 21 May 1829 and caused a considerable upset to the University of Cambridge where a young
Charles Darwin Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended fr ...
was a second-year student. At their meeting in
Bolton Bolton (, locally ) is a large town in Greater Manchester in North West England, formerly a part of Lancashire. A former mill town, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish people, Flemish weavers settled in the area i ...
, Lancashire, Carlile met Eliza Sharples, who was to become his long term mistress. Carlile then opened a ramshackle building on the south bank of the
River Thames The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the The Isis, River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the Longest rivers of the United Kingdom, se ...
, the
Blackfriars Rotunda The Blackfriars Rotunda was a building in Southwark, near the southern end of Blackfriars Bridge across the River Thames in London, that existed from 1787 to 1958 in various forms. It initially housed the collection of the Leverian Museum after it ...
, and in widespread public unrest in July 1830 this became a gathering place for
republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...
s and
atheist Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...
s. Taylor staged infidel melodramas, preaching outrageous sermons which got him dubbed "The Devil's Chaplain". Thousands of copies of these sermons were circulated in a seditious publication, ''The Devil's Pulpit''.


Jailed again

In 1831 he was jailed, under the charge of seditious libel, given two and a half years for writing an article in support of agricultural labourers campaigning against wage cuts and advising the strikers to regard themselves as being at war with the government. He left prison deeply in debt, and government fines had taken from him the finances needed to publish newspapers. His political and social opinions never altered, but his philosophy underwent a change in the 1830s. In 1837 H. Robinson published the results of his later thinking in the book ''Extraordinary Conversion and Public Declaration of Richard Carlile of London to Christianity''. In 1834, he was tried for creating a public nuisance, when he displayed two effigies in the windows of his shop at 62 Fleet Street, one in blue representing a broker titled "Temporal broker" and another dressed as a bishop titled "Spiritual broker". A large group of people were often gathered there, impeding traffic and causing quarrels. He was found guilty, but judgment was respited. After living for some years in extreme poverty in
Enfield Enfield may refer to: Places Australia * Enfield, New South Wales * Enfield, South Australia ** Electoral district of Enfield, a state electoral district in South Australia, corresponding to the suburb ** Enfield High School (South Australia) ...
, Carlile returned to Fleet Street in 1842, dying there the following year. He donated his body for medical research. Large numbers of people attended his funeral in
Kensal Green Cemetery Kensal Green Cemetery is a cemetery in the Kensal Green area of Queens Park in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, England. Inspired by Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, it was founded by the barrister George Frederick ...
on Sunday 26 February 1843, where his sons protested at the Christian burial rite being administered in the common grave he was being buried in – citing that he "passed his life in opposition to all priestcraft."


Writings

* ''The Deist; or, Moral Philosopher: Being an Impartial Inquiry After Moral and Theological Truths'' (1819) *''A Letter to the Society for the Suppression of Vice: On Their Malignant Efforts to Prevent a Free Enquiry After Truth and Reason'' (1819) *''An Address to Men of Science: Calling Upon Them to Stand Forward and Vindicate the Truth from the Foul Grasp and Persecution of Superstition'' (1821) *''Life of Thomas Paine: Written Purposely to Bind With His Writings'' (1822) *''The Character of the Jew Books: Being a Defence of the Natural Innocence of Man, against Kings and Priests, or Tyrants and Impostors'' (1822) *''Every Woman's Book or What is Love?'' (1826)


Notes


References

* *
Adrian Desmond Adrian John Desmond (born 1947) is an English writer on the history of science and author of books about Charles Darwin. Life He studied physiology at London University and went on to study history of science and vertebrate palaeontology at Unive ...
and James Moore, ''Darwin'' (London: Michael Joseph, the Penguin Group, 1991). * * * Michael Laccohee Bush, The Friends and Following of Richard Carlile: a Study of Infidel Republicanism in Early Nineteenth-Century Britain, Twopenny Press, 2016


External links


Richard Carlile (Parliamentary reform)Richard Carlile – Famous QuotationsManual of Freemasonry
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Carlile, Richard 1790 births 1843 deaths 19th-century atheists 19th-century British newspaper publishers (people) 19th-century English criminals 19th-century English writers 19th-century male writers Atheist feminists British atheism activists British birth control activists British male criminals Christ myth theory proponents English activists English atheists English feminist writers English male non-fiction writers English prisoners and detainees English reformers Freethought writers Male feminists People convicted of blasphemy People from Ashburton, Devon Prisoners and detainees of England and Wales Rationalists Tinsmiths