256. Maggie losing it

Reformers were on the move. Elizabeth Fry was notable as a woman speaking out in a man’s world, campaigning for prison reform, especially for women prisoners. But there were many others, notably the Utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham, who found a strange way of having his body dealt with after death. A slightly ghoulish way. But whatever clarion voices campaigned for reform outside Parliament, real change could only come from inside, and specifically from Ministers. And this led to a strange phenomenon: some first steps towards essential reforms being taken by a man whose reputation was as anything but a reformer. He was the new Home Secretary, and he was taking a highly innovative approach to public opinion, one much closer to politicians’ attitudes in our own times. That’s Robert Peel storming back onto the scene. Illustration: The reformer and champion of women prisoners, Elizabeth Fry, by Samuel Drummond, ca. 1815. National Portrait Gallery 118. Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

10 Jul 202214min

That poor, saintly William Wilberforce. He’d spoken with such courage and dedication for the slaves for so long. And yet now, with a more radical movement emerging championing the poor and oppressed in Britain itself, he found himself the target of hostile attack. Aging and with his health going, He withdrew from public life in 1825. Meanwhile, Canning was back in government, serving under Lord Liverpool, who was endeavouring to deal with the difficulties of the time. Above all, they were caused by the growing hardship suffered by the poor, and this episode looks briefly at some of the economic factors that were making things worse. That just added fuel to the fire of the Radicals, who were demanding action to improve the lives of British workers, whose poverty could hardly be justified in the nation with biggest economy per capita in the world. Essentially, that would determine the battle lines in politics for the next two decades: parliamentary reform, to give the underprivileged a greater voice, and the end of the Corn Laws, which served great landowners well but kept food prices high. Illustration: William Cobbett, by John Raphael Smith, engraved 1812. Note the portrait behind him of John Hampden, the great leader of the resistance to Charles I in the seventeenth century, also an icon for the American rebels in the eighteenth. National Portrait Gallery 6870 Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

3 Jul 202214min

A scandalous episode: first the king trying to divorce his wife and a major domestic row developing between them, all conducted in public, with armed guards and slammed doors to exclude the Queen from her husband's coronation. Wonderful proof that the Royal family’s gift for generating bad publicity, and entertaining the population with it, is nothing new. Next, a repressive government is met by an attempt at armed revolt, leading to public executions enjoyed by a crowd of thousands. And finally, driven by overwork and mental illness, a much-maligned giant of the political world puts an end to it all. Three scandals in one episode. Who could ask for more? Illustration: The Trial of Queen Caroline 1820, by Sir George Hayter, 1820-1823. National Portrait Gallery 999 Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

26 Jun 202214min

Popular belief, back in the nineteenth century and also today, was that the British Empire in India may have been flawed and imperfect, but it set out to benefit the native peoples. In this episode, we take a look at that belief, and find that actually it did a great deal of damage, that the benefit it might have produced was already being pursued by local figures who might have got a lot further left to their own devices, and that it deliberately sacrificed Indian economic interests for the sake of British ones. Nowhere was that truer than in the cotton industry. Illustration: Man's Indian Calico robe from the late seventeenth century. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York: http://metmuseum.org/Collections/search-the-collections/140005504 Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

19 Jun 202214min

Pete, Dave and Bobby are the subjects of this episode. But Pete’s a place not a person. It’s St Peter’s Field near Manchester, site of one of those epoch-shattering, and epoch-shaming, events that would mark British politics for the next decade or more. Dave is another in the series of remarkable economists that started with Adam Smith. Apparently, he was also rather a nice guy. As for Bobby, he was a new breed of politician, from a new class to produce leaders for Britain, and someone we’ll be hearing a lot more about in future episodes. Illustration: Engraving depicting the Peterloo Massacre, by Richard Carlile. Public domain. Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

12 Jun 202214min

The Congress of Vienna set up peace in Europe for decades. Indeed, it prevented any kind of general war across the whole of the Continent for nearly a century, until the First World War broke out in 1914. But it wasn’t quite as straightforward as the outcome might suggest. The power of Russia, with 600,000 troops now occupying many parts of Europe, led to a quick rehabilitation of the former enemy, France. And some very clever diplomatic work, by the remarkable trio of the French Foreign Ministers of France, Talleyrand, Austria, Metternich, and Britain, Castlereagh, proved necessary to put the Russian bear back in his box. The other aspect of the Congress is that what it ushered in was a Peace of Kings. Ideas thrown up by the French Revolution, of the rights of man, of popular sovereignty, of equality between citizens, were decidedly out of fashion. Which was going to prove problematic in a Britain facing harsh conditions and growing discontent. Illustration: The Russian Bear inspired fear in the west: Tsar Alexander I published by Colnaghi & Co on 2 May 1814. National Portrait Gallery D15858 Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

5 Jun 202214min

Napoleon makes his second bid for power, and comes unstuck, as Wellington and Blücher prove too much for him at Waterloo. It’s a victory the Brits like to celebrate as a great triumph for the country, up on a par with Trafalgar ten years earlier. The truth, though, is that even within Wellington’s army, there were more Germans than Brits. And, when you add in Blücher’s Prussians, Napoleon’s defeat owed far more to German soldiery than to British. Though Wellington’s generalship, alongside Blücher’s, was a crucial factor. The Iron Duke stood firm. Just as the old man Blücher kept his word and came to his aid, personally leading his troops, despite his advanced age and his injuries. Between them, they finished Napoleon's rule. Illustration: A British infantry square withstanding cavalry attack. Elizabeth Thompson, The 28th Regiment at Quatre Bras. This work is in the public domain including in the United States, because it was published (or registered with the U.S. Copyright Office) before January 1, 1927. Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

29 Mai 202214min

It was peace at last. For the first time, apart from one short break, for a generation. Peace, however, requires managing, just like war does. That management took the form of a new approach to the relations between European states, with the old concept of a Balance of Power giving way to the new one of a Concert of Nations. The innovation meant that nations would find a way to settle their differences by diplomatic rather than military means, instead of lining up in two hostile camps, of slightly varying composition down the decades, with only fear of each other to keep the peace. After all, that Balance of Power approach hadn’t worked too well. Remember how many wars we’ve talked about as we worked out way through the eighteenth century? To give the new thinking a secure foundation, the victorious allies set up the Congress of Vienna, where a minister from the United Kingdom would play a key role: the Foreign Secretary, Viscount Castlereagh would draft most of the documents, just as he drafted the terms imposed on defeated France. Which, in passing, meant he had no time for the simultaneous negotiations of a peace treaty with the United States, ending the War of 1812. Perhaps explaining why the British representatives at that second set of discussions were perhaps outmanoeuvred. And then, just to spoil the moment, France, and above all its deposed Emperor, showed the world that they didn’t take their defeat as conclusive. Illustration: Frontispiece of the Final Declaration of the Congress of Vienna (public domain). Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License

22 Mai 202214min