loaf of bread was weighed. Loaf followed loaf. Now performing as a cross between the preacher that he was and the auctioneer he could have been, Thomas announced the weight of each loaf. The scales revealed the truth of his hypothesis. Bakers were found to be cheating their customers by not using enough flour. In some instances, 4lb loaves were little over 3lb. Whenever Thomas announced a large discrepancy, the audience roared and cheered. He added: ‘The names of the dealers and their prices were all published, and great excitement was caused in the trade, but the magistrates were with us and enforced numerous fines – not only for the omission to weigh the loaves, but also for adulteration. An analyst was employed, and a number of fines were inflicted for adulteration.’
There may have been justice in the attacks on the Whigs by many members of the Corn League, such as Thomas, who liked to point out their folly, disunion and incompetence. 5 Indeed, he was not averse to attacking the Whigs as if they were Tories. Meanwhile, he fell foul of the law by failing to pay stamp duty on the
Cheap Bread Herald
for an issue which had included a paragraph referring to the French Revolution of 1848. As this was deemed as general news and the Stamp Duty Act specified that only papers and periodicals which did not carry general news were exempt from stamp duty, Thomas received an urgent summons calling him to London to face the Court of the Exchequer.
From London’s Euston Station he walked south. Everywhere there were signs of dash and style: swift carriages with coachmen in top hats, phaetons, barouches, broughams, waggonettes, gigs, four-wheeled chaises and four-in-hands jostled beside horse-drawn buses 6 and hackney cabs. London, choking with traffic, poverty and riches, seemed to have more people and horse-drawn vehicles than anywhere else in the world. Behind the grandeur were tenements, open sewers, pickpockets, thugs, beggars, drunks, prostitutes and abandoned children running wild. Thomas could smell the Thames before he saw it. It also exuded the dank mists of winter, which, combined with the products from smoking chimneys, created murky smog.
In Kingsway he turned left into Fleet Street, where on the corner of Whitefriars Street, since it had moved from Manchester in 1843, was the office and nerve centre of the National Anti-Corn League. It was significant that it was in Fleet Street, the home of newspapers, as it was the first political lobby group to use modern media methods to further its cause – an example Thomas followed. From Fleet Street he walked to his appointment with the solicitor of the Inland Revenue at Somerset House in the Strand on the Thames. Buttoning up his waistcoat and holding himself tall, he walked along the Strand then turned left past the gatehouse into the paved courtyard to the eighteenth-century royal palace on the river front. Men with bundles of papers under their arms hurried down narrow, gloomy cream corridors. The old rooms were now divided into offices filled with members of the legal profession and Inland Revenue. Thomas defended himself: ‘He took in my letter, presented it to the Board, and came out, stating that the Board, seeing that the objects I had in view were of a benevolent character, agreed to withdraw the summons on payment by me of a sovereign, which would not cover the expenses incurred. He told me that I was at perfect liberty to say what I liked in my paper about Whigs or Tories. I might denounce them all if I liked, but if I touched the revenue they would touch me.’
On his return walk to the station Thomas saw the graceful pale curve of Regent Street, with its domes, balustrades and shops, and Piccadilly. This sortie to London reinforced his resolve. Galvanised by his near-prosecution by the Inland Revenue, Thomas was soon on a rostrum again making ‘an energetic speech’ to help send a petition to parliament protesting against the use of grain in the
There may have been justice in the attacks on the Whigs by many members of the Corn League, such as Thomas, who liked to point out their folly, disunion and incompetence. 5 Indeed, he was not averse to attacking the Whigs as if they were Tories. Meanwhile, he fell foul of the law by failing to pay stamp duty on the
Cheap Bread Herald
for an issue which had included a paragraph referring to the French Revolution of 1848. As this was deemed as general news and the Stamp Duty Act specified that only papers and periodicals which did not carry general news were exempt from stamp duty, Thomas received an urgent summons calling him to London to face the Court of the Exchequer.
From London’s Euston Station he walked south. Everywhere there were signs of dash and style: swift carriages with coachmen in top hats, phaetons, barouches, broughams, waggonettes, gigs, four-wheeled chaises and four-in-hands jostled beside horse-drawn buses 6 and hackney cabs. London, choking with traffic, poverty and riches, seemed to have more people and horse-drawn vehicles than anywhere else in the world. Behind the grandeur were tenements, open sewers, pickpockets, thugs, beggars, drunks, prostitutes and abandoned children running wild. Thomas could smell the Thames before he saw it. It also exuded the dank mists of winter, which, combined with the products from smoking chimneys, created murky smog.
In Kingsway he turned left into Fleet Street, where on the corner of Whitefriars Street, since it had moved from Manchester in 1843, was the office and nerve centre of the National Anti-Corn League. It was significant that it was in Fleet Street, the home of newspapers, as it was the first political lobby group to use modern media methods to further its cause – an example Thomas followed. From Fleet Street he walked to his appointment with the solicitor of the Inland Revenue at Somerset House in the Strand on the Thames. Buttoning up his waistcoat and holding himself tall, he walked along the Strand then turned left past the gatehouse into the paved courtyard to the eighteenth-century royal palace on the river front. Men with bundles of papers under their arms hurried down narrow, gloomy cream corridors. The old rooms were now divided into offices filled with members of the legal profession and Inland Revenue. Thomas defended himself: ‘He took in my letter, presented it to the Board, and came out, stating that the Board, seeing that the objects I had in view were of a benevolent character, agreed to withdraw the summons on payment by me of a sovereign, which would not cover the expenses incurred. He told me that I was at perfect liberty to say what I liked in my paper about Whigs or Tories. I might denounce them all if I liked, but if I touched the revenue they would touch me.’
On his return walk to the station Thomas saw the graceful pale curve of Regent Street, with its domes, balustrades and shops, and Piccadilly. This sortie to London reinforced his resolve. Galvanised by his near-prosecution by the Inland Revenue, Thomas was soon on a rostrum again making ‘an energetic speech’ to help send a petition to parliament protesting against the use of grain in the
Similar Books
