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Samuel Bamford
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Samuel Bamford, was born on 28th February 1788 in
Middleton. Samuel's father, Daniel,
was a handloom weaver of muslin, part-time schoolteacher, and a
composer of religious songs. Daniel and his wife Hannah, the
daughter of a local shoemaker, were both staunch
Methodists.
In the early 1790s, Daniel Bamford began reading
Tom Paine. After reading Rights
of Man and Age of Reason, Bamford abandoned
Methodism and formed a small
group of radicals who held regular meetings in Middleton. This
created conflict in Middleton and Bamford and his small group of
followers suffered considerable abuse from local people.
In 1794 the Bamford family moved to
Manchester where Daniel became the manager of a cotton
factory. Soon after arriving in Manchester, Samuel's mother and
his two brothers died of |
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smallpox. Samuel began attending Manchester Grammar Free School
but after his father remarried he was sent back to Middleton to
live with his uncle.
At the age of fourteen Samuel returned to Manchester and
obtained a job sweeping the floor of a local warehouse. This was
followed by work as a labourer on a farm near Prestwich. In
1805, now aged seventeen, Samuel walked to South Shields and
found employment on a coal ship. Life as a sailor also failed to
satisfy Samuel and he returned to Manchester and found menial
work in a local warehouse. Samuel Bamford continued to educate
himself and during this time he read Milton, Shakespeare and
Robert Burns. He also became interested in the books of radicals
such as Tom Paine and William Cobbett.
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Samuel Bamford married in 1812 and soon
afterwards he purchased two looms and set himself and his wife
up as weavers. Bamford combined this work with writing poetry
and selling books. None of these activities were very successful
and the Bamfords suffered a considerable amount of poverty.
Bamford became interested in John Cartwright and his campaign
for parliamentary reform. In 1816 Bamford formed a Middleton
branch of the Hampden Reform Club, an organisation started by
Cartwright in 1812. Bamford now became very active in the
campaign for universal suffrage and organised several
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meetings on parliamentary reform in local towns
and villages. The authorities heard about
Bamford's meetings and in March 1817 he was
arrested and charged with treason. He was tried
in London but he was acquitted on the grounds of
insufficient evidence. |
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On 16th August 1819, Samuel Bamford arranged for
a large number of people from Middleton to
attend the meeting at St. Peter's Field.
Bamford's account of the Peterloo Massacre
became one of the most important sources of
evidence for historians of the event. After the
massacre several men, including Bamford, were
arrested and charged with "assembling with
unlawful banners at an unlawful meeting for the
purpose of inciting discontent". Henry Hunt was
found guilty and was sent to prison for
two years and six months whereas Samuel
Bradford, Joseph Johnson and Joseph Healey were
each sentenced to only one year in Lincoln Prison.
After
his release from prison Bamford ceased to be active in
the campaign for parliamentary reform. He returned to
handloom weaving but competition from local factories
meant trade was poor and he attempted to supplement his
income with selling poetry. In 1826 Bamford found work
as the Manchester correspondent for a London newspaper.
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Bamford refused to join the Chartists and in the
1840's he upset local radicals by serving as a
special constable at Middleton. He was also
critical of his formal political friends in his
autobiographical works: Passage in the Life
of a Radical (1843) and Early Days
(1849). Samuel Bamford died on 13th April 1872
in Harpurhey, Lancashire.
A memorial obelisk to Sam Bamford stands in the
graveyard of
Middleton Parish Church.
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