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Forgotten Heroes: The 1820 Radical War |
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One astonishing fact about the 1820 Rising, accepted by many historians today, is that the government, through the agency and double-dealing of spies, actually incited the rising in the first place. Why would a government, gripped by the fear of a popular revolution amongst its populace, incite a general strike in the very epicentre of radicalism? To answer this question, we must unearth the roots of the 1820 Rising, and of radical politics in general.
In Scotland, the Presbyterian Church, although often repressive in policing the moral fortitude of its flock, had passionately defended certain ‘rights’ amongst the ‘common people’ since the time of the Reformation – the first and foremost of these being the right the read the bible in one’s own language, without the interference of Latinate priests. Consequently, throughout the 18th century and into the early-19th century, Scotland had one of the highest levels of literacy anywhere in Europe, and indeed the world – a much higher rate than in neighbouring England, or even in revolutionary France.
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As the economic situation worsened for many workers in Scotland, not only were they receptive to new, ‘radical’ solutions to their problems, but they could read for themselves the works of Robert Burns singing the merits of the common man, or read the pamphlets of Tom Paine, such as the famous ‘Rights of Man’ (1791-92) which popularised the notions of universal suffrage (for men) and republicanism as never before.
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