GORDON
650
GORDON
the House Lord George demanded an immediate vote,
while his followers were pressing into the lobbies and
maltreating all members whom they regarded as hos-
tile to the repeal. The motion was postponed, how-
ever, and when evening fell attacks were made on the
best known embassy chapels, the Sardinian chapel,
near Lincoln's Inn Fields, and the Bavarian chapel in
Warwick Street. The method of attack was more or
less the same on all occasions. First the windows
were broken, then the doors forced, the house sacked
and the furniture thrown out and burned in the street,
thereby setting fire to the whole building. Warwick
Street chapel was eventually saved by soldiers, who
also arrested some bystanders. Two or three of these
upon examination "appeared to be Catholics, but of
excellent characters", against whom "as no material
circumstances appeared, it was thought they would
get off" ("Public Advertiser". 6 June, 17S0). The
undisputed master of the situation. All shops were
closed, money was exacted from passers by, and every
one put on the blue cockade, and chalked No Popery
on his door. The Catholics suffered much, but un-
popular Protestants suffered no less. The house of
Lord Chief Justice Mansfield was sacked and burned,
so were those of the justices, and even of the witnesses
who had given evidence against the rioters. The
prisons of Newgate and Clerkenwell were fired, and all
the prisoners released. Next day the same fate befell
the prisons of the King's Bench, the Fleet, and the
Marshalsea. In other prisons, as the Poultry, all
prisoners were discharged to prevent further disturb-
ance. The large distillery in Holborn of Mr. Langdale,
a Catholic, was burned, and all the stores of spirits
wasted or drunk. The bridges across the Thames
were seized ; the Bank of England was twice attacked,
and only saved by soldiers. On Wednesday night
Gordon Klrtxs — B
Contemporary Print of Ale:
prisoners, presumably mere spectators, were remand- ed for trial to Newgate, whence they "got off " on the following Tuesday without any further investigations. Some disingenuous Protestants, however, have pre- tended that the burningof the chapels was really due to Catholics (cf. "Barnaby Rvidge", Ixxvii, end).
By Saturday morning there was a lull. On Sunday afternoon, however, there was a recrudescence of \'io- lence, the temporary repairs at the embassy chapels were torn down and burned, Moorfields chapel house was sacked, and several neighbouring houses gutted, and their furniture burned. Worse would have fol- lowed but for the timely arrival of the soldiers. Ne.xt day, Monday, the Privy Council met at St. James's ; but so "little was the Government moved by the many mis- fortunes of the Catholics, so little did it foresee the future, that no adequate measures were adopted to suppress disorder, though in the city the blue cockades were asserting their power with ever growing boldness. On Tuesday, (i June, Parliament again met; and again the mob pressed in, preventing the progress of busi- ness, and handling roughly all who displeased them. Lord North liimself, the" prime minister, only es- caped that evening Ijy putting his coach-horses to the gallop, having lo.st his hat in the fray, which was thereupon torn up, and the pieces distributed as trophies among the crowd. The mob was henceforth
1 OF Newgate Prison
der Hogg, British Museum
thirty-six different conflagrations might be counted from London Bridge. Fortunately the air was still, and the flames did not spread, or the consequences would have been terrible, for the mob had injured the fire-pumps and thrown the hoses into the burning buildings.
The delay in dealing with the mob violence was due to many causes. There had never been a tumult of this nature before, and there was no special force to cope with it. The police of the city in those days con- sisted but of a few dozen watchmen and constables. Of the magistrates some were infatuated for the Prot- estant Association, some were cowards, nearly all were of opinion that the Riot Act must be read an hour be- fore the military could be called upon to interfere. At last King George himself (it had been thought pru- dent for him to retire from the royal apartments to more protected buildings in the rear of St. James's) summoned a council on Wednesday evening and active measures were ordered, and carried out that very night. Infantry and cavalry attacked the crowd wherever it made liead, firing into their ranks, and charging them with sword and bayonet. Though the darkness and intricacies of the .streets enabled the rioters to maintain themselves for a while, no serious resistance was, or could be, offered. By Thursday evening all organized disturbance was over, but
