Newcastle upon Tyne

Economic and social profile

Situated on the north bank of the river Tyne, ten miles from the North sea, Newcastle was a sizeable port that developed as a service and commercial centre for the surrounding industrial region. Although a substantial minority of male workers were employed in traditional heavy industries, such as shipbuilding, metal manufacture and engineering, the employment structure was dominated by service and commercial interests such as transport and retailing. Working-class voters accounted for 23.5 per cent of Newcastle’s electorate by 1865, a fairly standard percentage for an industrial city at this time.3PP 1866 (170), lvii. 49; T.J. Nossiter, Influence, opinion and political idioms in reformed England: case studies from the North-east, 1832-74 (1975), 166. Shipping, both coastal and overseas, expanded rapidly in this period: between 1834 and 1844, an annual average of 477,815 tons was exported, which by 1854 had risen to 3,000,000 tons. Coal was the main export, and because of the significant deposits of raw materials in the local area, imports, which were mainly consumer goods, were significantly lower in number. The Tyneside industries of construction, brickworks, coal mining, pottery, glass and lead were also represented in the Newcastle economy. The railways first reached Newcastle in 1838 with the opening of the Newcastle and Carlisle Railway and the network rapidly expanded to the coast and coal fields. The High Level rail bridge, designed by Robert Stephenson, opened in 1849.4O. Lendrum, ‘An integrated elite: Newcastle’s economic development 1840-1914’, in R. Colls and B. Lancaster (eds.), Newcastle upon Tyne: a modern history (2001), 27-46; S. Middlebrook, Newcastle upon Tyne: its growth and achievement (1968), 182-95.

Electoral history

Before 1832, the representation of Newcastle was vested in the heads of the region’s dominant families, whose wealth was founded upon the town’s commerce and industry. Freeman creations, of which there were 1,776 between 1818 and 1831, ensured that the enormous expense of mustering non-resident voters deterred any prospects of a contest, and in the pre-Reform era, elections were essentially a compromise between the local Whig and Tory factions.5HP Commons, 1820-32, ii. 788. The disenfranchisement of approximately 2,000 non-resident freemen by the 1832 Reform Act, however, coupled with the decline of family influences after 1836, ensured that all but two of the elections in this period were contested.6PP 1831-2 (112), xxxvi. 577. The freeman franchise continued to slowly decline after 1832. In 1842, the freeman franchise accounted for 36 per cent of the electorate; by 1851 it accounted for 31 per cent. PP 1844 (11), xxxviii. 434; PP 1852 (8), xliii. 319. See also Nossiter, Influence, opinion and political idioms, 108. Municipal reform in 1835 meant that the struggle for local political control in Newcastle was often focused on the town council, the main concern being to limit the influence of the old unreformed Tory corporation party over the politics of the reformed parliamentary borough.7M. Taylor, The decline of British Radicalism, 1847-60 (1995), 67. The Whigs dominated the reformed town council, though the change was more apparent than real, with witnesses confirming to the 1859 select committee on municipal reform chaired by Earl Grey that the ‘new party’ soon became the ‘old party’.8Nossiter, Influence, opinion and political idioms, 156; PP 1859, sess. 2 (56), viii. 269. Though after 1847 the parliamentary representation of the borough was dominated by Whigs, or Liberals as they increasingly became known, the popular political culture of Newcastle must not be overlooked. Large meetings of disaffected workers were frequently held on Town Moor and Sandhill, the Chartist movement enjoyed considerable support and longevity in the region, and the long-standing solidarity between Irish-born migrants and Tyneside Radicals produced an effective movement that, by the end of the period, had a significant impact upon local politics.

At the first election of the post-Reform, Charles Attwood, president of the Northern Political Union and brother of Thomas Attwood, MP for Birmingham 1832-9, challenged the two sitting members, Sir Mathew White Ridley and John Hodgson. A Whig and a pro-Reform Conservative respectively, both were the heads of wealthy families who held extensive investments in the local coal industry. A strong candidate, Ridley was in favour of retrenchment and the abolition of window and house tax, though his equivocation on the repeal of the corn laws brought criticism from his constituents. Hodgson was less popular, and drew approbation for his refusal to back the abolition of slavery, though he enjoyed the support of the numerous freemen created prior to March 1831 by the unreformed Tory corporation.9Newcastle Courant, 15 Dec. 1832. Proposed by John Fife, a surgeon and Radical who was instrumental in the local Reform movement, Attwood issued an address calling for household suffrage, the ballot, triennial parliaments and abolition of the corn laws. Attempting to sidestep any accusations of extremism, he also gave his qualified support to Ridley and saved his vitriol for Hodgson, arguing that the latter’s principles would ‘bring mortification and opprobrium on the electors’.10Ibid. However, labelling Attwood’s remarks as ‘personal, libellous and inflamatory’, Hodgson enjoyed a significant level of Whig support, and shared 1,241 split votes with Ridley. In addition to 358 plumpers, this helped him to finish comfortably in second place.11Ibid; W.W. Bean, The Parliamentary representation of the six northern counties of England (1890), 573. Ridley, who received 165 plumpers, decisively topped the poll. Securing 299 plump votes and 706 split votes with Ridley, Attwood fell short, and attacked those who split their votes between Ridley and Hodgson as ‘false reformers whose apostate voices have determined the victory in favour of corruption and mock reform’.12Bean, Parliamentary representation; P. Cadogan, Early Radical Newcastle (1975), 98.

Despite Attwood’s defeat, local Radicals brought forward James Aytoun, an Edinburgh-based lawyer, to oppose Ridley and Hodgson at the unexpected 1835 general election. With Ridley refusing to pledge himself against Peel’s administration, local Whigs, under the nominal leadership of the earl of Durham, brought forward William Ord, MP for Morpeth, 1802-32, who subsequently published an election address that made explicit his ‘utter distrust’ of the Conservative government.13Newcastle Courant, 10 Jan. 1835. Praising Durham and Ord, Aytoun backed triennial parliaments, the ballot, and repeal of the corn laws, and promised to oppose Ridley and Hodgson with ‘the utmost of my power’, calling them ‘Whigs of the highest conservative school’.14Newcastle Courant, 27 Dec. 1834. The local Radicals, however, were far from united. Fife, who nominated Aytoun, had left the Northern Political Union, believing that there was now adequate parliamentary representation, and had further alienated Attwood by supporting the Poor Law Amendment Act.15Cadogan, Radical Newcastle, 96-8. Enjoying a broad range of support, Ord, who received 259 plumpers, comfortably topped the poll while Ridley, despite his declining popularity due to his inexorable drift towards the Conservatives whom he effectively joined in February 1835, managed to secure second place, with only 44 plump votes. Aytoun, gaining 22 plumpers, fared slightly worse than Attwood had three years earlier, and finished bottom of the poll. Losing the Whig votes that secured his previous return, Hodgson, who received 284 plump votes, was effectively defeated by Ord.16Bean, Parliamentary representation, 573.

Hodgson, however, was not out of parliament for long, and his return at the 1836 by-election, caused by the death of Ridley, suggests the continued importance of the freeman franchise in the early part of this period. With the Irish church issue dominating the campaign, Hodgson refused to pledge his support for Melbourne’s government, and made clear his opposition to appropriation.17Newcastle Courant, 30 July 1836. Realising that bringing forward more than one candidate to oppose Hodgson was impracticable, local Radicals, who initially wished to invite Aytoun, acquiesced to Whig demands for a more moderate, yet pro-appropriation candidate. The choice, Captain Christopher Blackett, was a surprising one: he had previously represented Beeralston as a Tory during the duke of Wellington’s administration before joining the Whigs over parliamentary reform.18The Times, 30 July 1836. After a short canvass of just one day, Hodgson, who received 949 freemen votes, marginally topped the poll. With Hodgson receiving 69 per cent of the freemen vote, but only 37 per cent of the £10 householder vote, the benefit of the freeman franchise to the Conservatives was clear.19Bean, Parliamentary representation, 574.

The freeman effect was also evident at the 1837 general election. Aware of where his key support lay, Hodgson Hinde (as he was now known) defended the rights of freemen in municipal affairs, opposed municipal reform in Ireland and attacked the poor law. Sensitive to the high degree of single votes he had received in previous elections, Hodgson Hinde also brought forward John Coulson, a freeman of Newcastle, as a second Conservative. Dr. Thomas Headlam, the mayor of Newcastle and Durham’s political agent attacked Hodgson Hinde for what he felt was a cynical move, and in response brought forward Charles Bigge to stand alongside Ord in the Liberal interest. Despite the bitter exchanges between Hodgson Hinde and the mayor, the campaign was reported as being noticeably more subdued than previous contests, and the absence of Ord and Coulson, both due to family illnesses, coupled with the late appearance of Bigge, left a vacuum at the heart of the campaign.20Newcastle Courant, 26 July 1837. The entry of the London-based Radical Augustus Beaumont, however, did inject some colour into the proceedings. A close friend of Feargus O’Connor and veteran of the July revolution in Paris in 1830, Beaumont was brought to the constituency by Thomas Doubleday and Robert Blakey, two local intellectuals and manufacturers, who had taken over leadership of Tyneside Radicalism after Fife confirmed his allegiance to the Whig town council.21Nossiter, Influence, opinion and political idioms, 151-2. However, directing his opposition chiefly at Ord and Bigge, Beaumont’s campaign was a disaster, and he finished bottom. Gaining 1,223 votes from the £10 householders, Ord topped the poll. Bigge, despite receiving 900 votes from the householders, only finished third. The strength of the freemen electors, who cast 65 per cent of their votes for the Conservative candidates, was critical, and Hodgson Hinde, who gained 116 plumpers, easily secured the second place.22Bean, Parliamentary representation, 574.

Although crushed at the polls, Beaumont maintained his radical profile in Newcastle and in October 1837 launched the Northern Liberator. Edited by Doubleday and Blakey, it became the best-selling journal on Tyneside, with a circulation of 4,000, and instigated the renaissance of the Northern Political Union, which on 1 January 1838 staged a mass demonstration in opposition to the new poor law.23Nossiter, Influence, opinion and political idioms, 152-3. An even larger meeting was held on 28 June, when 80,000 people gathered on Town Moor to hear Feargus O’Connor champion the Charter, following which the Northern Political Union assumed leadership of Chartism on Tyneside.24J. Allen, Joseph Cowen and popular Radicalism on Tyneside, 1829-1900 (2007), 29-31. Another great Chartist demonstration was held in the city on 30 July 1839, when the Northern Political Union called for a general strike to take place on 12 August 1839, but there was only a feeble demonstration that afternoon, and the Union was replaced at the end of 1840 by the Newcastle branch of the National Charter Association.25M. Chase, Chartism: a new history (2007), 102-4.

At the 1841 general election, local Chartists invited James Bronterre O’Brien to stand, but after initially accepting the request, he did not campaign, and although he was proposed and seconded, no poll was demanded.26Northern Star, 18 June 1841, 19 June 1841; Newcastle Courant, 2 July 1841. Consequently, despite a number of interventions by local Chartists at the hustings, Ord, who called for the repeal of the corn laws, and Hodgson Hinde, who continued his denunciations of the poor law, were re-elected unopposed.27Chase, Chartism; Newcastle Courant, 2 July 1841.

The 1847 general election at Newcastle was a turning point in local politics in two ways. Firstly, it was the last time that two of the region’s dominant families contested the seat. Secondly, it was the beginning of two decades of dominance by the Liberal town council over parliamentary elections. With the popular William Ord once again seeking re-election, Dr. Headlam, the leader of the Newcastle Liberals, invited his nephew, the London-based lawyer Thomas Emerson Headlam, to be the second Liberal candidate. A supporter of free trade and the extension of education to all classes, Headlam heavily criticised Hodgson Hinde’s parliamentary record, only for the Conservative candidate to withdraw from the contest.28Daily News, 7 July 1847; Newcastle Courant, 9 July 1847, 16 July 1847. After a prolonged search, local Conservatives brought forward Hodgson Hinde’s nephew, Richard Hodgson, who had previously represented Berwick-upon-Tweed, 1837-47, and voted against repeal of the corn laws. Accused by Hodgson of equivocating on the abolition of church rates, Headlam endured a challenging nomination, witnessed by over 9,000 people on the Sandhill.29Newcastle Courant, 30 July 1847. Local Liberal unity was strong, however, and Headlam received 1,895 split votes with Ord. With Hodgson securing only 224 split votes with Ord, and 106 split votes with Headlam, his 1,350 plumpers were insufficient to prevent his defeat.30Bean, Parliamentary representation, 574. Piqued by failure, the Hodgsons abandoned their interest in the constituency after 1847, and after 50 years in the Commons, Ord retired when parliament dissolved in 1852.31Nossiter, Influence, opinion and political idioms, 108.

With the Conservative leadership of the town in flux, the 1852 general election witnessed the beginnings of internecine feuds within Newcastle Liberalism.32N. McCord and A.E. Carrick, ‘Northumberland in the general election of 1852’, Northern History, 1 (1966), 102. The struggle over nominees centred on the town council, where a number of aldermen and councillors wished to bring forward different candidates to run separately from Headlam in the Liberal interest. Upon Ord announcing his retirement, Sir John Fife, who since leaving the Northern Political Union had twice served as mayor, invited Christopher Blackett’s son John to stand. A young man who had inherited his family’s coal estates in the region, Blackett was an advanced Liberal, and supported the ballot, shorter parliaments, and the abolition of the church rates and game laws.33Newcastle Courant, 9 July 1852. Alderman Potter, however, resented Fife’s actions, and brought forward William Henry Watson, Liberal member for Kinsale, 1841-7. Although Potter admitted his nominee had not been a ‘thick and thin’ supporter of the late Russell administration, Watson, who supported free trade, religious freedom and the abolition of the income tax, reassured the electorate that he was a ‘consistent Liberal’ and ‘shall not support Lord Derby’s administration’.34Ibid. Local Conservatives, however, impressed by Watson’s hope to be ‘the independent member for this town’ decided to back him. Supportive of Blackett, Watson directed his opposition towards Headlam, claiming that the latter was the candidate of ‘a mere coterie’.35Ibid. Headlam, whose campaign focused on alleviating the burdens of ship owners, dismissed such accusations as ‘petty and trifling’ and called for ‘fidelity and attachment’ to the ‘great Liberal party in this town’.36Ibid. With Watson receiving 962 single votes, and Blackett and Headlam gaining 1,780 split votes, it is clear that Liberal supporters backed the latter two candidates, leaving Watson, even with Conservative support, at the bottom of the poll.37Newcastle-upon-Tyne Poll Book, 1852; Bean, Parliamentary representation, 574.

The retirement of Blackett, due to ill-health, triggered a by-election in February 1856. On the same day that Blackett’s intentions were made public, George Ridley, eldest son of Sir Matthew White Ridley, announced his intention to stand in the Liberal interest. The Conservatives again declining to bring forward a candidate, local Chartists brought forward Richard Hart. In the mid-1850s, Newcastle was one of the few places which still had a viable Chartist membership and notable links to other radical groups.38Allen, Joseph Cowen, 44. Backed by the Newcastle Foreign Affairs Committee, Hart attacked Palmerston for ‘giving Poland to Russia’, and dismissed Ridley’s ‘hereditary claims’ on the constituency.39Newcastle Courant, 8 Feb. 1856. However, an outsider to the constituency, Hart’s candidature quickly became seen as a ‘farce’,40Morning Chronicle, 1 Feb. 1856. and highlighting what he felt was the collusion of the town council in bringing forward Ridley before Blackett’s intentions were made public, the Chartist stated that ‘to go to the poll under such disadvantage would be madness’.41Newcastle Courant, 8 Feb. 1856. Ridley was therefore returned unopposed, as a supporter of administrative reform and Palmerston’s foreign policy.

At the 1857 general election the Newcastle Foreign Affairs Committee brought forward Peter Carstairs to oppose Headlam and Ridley. The Committee members were loyal followers of David Urquhart, a notable critic of British foreign policy who had been revered amongst Newcastle Radicals since his tour of the region in 1838,42M. Taylor, ‘Urquhart, David (1805-77)’, Oxf. DNB, www.oxforddnb.com. and were often found on the Sandhill on Sundays, calling for Palmerston’s ‘head in a box of sawdust’.43Newcastle Courant, 11 Sep. 1885. A retired merchant who had made his fortune in India, Carstairs attacked the government over its bombardment of Canton, and called for a £5 borough franchise and the abolition of the Maynooth grant.44Newcastle Courant, 27 Mar. 1857. Although Carstairs gained the support of the Northern Daily Express, who criticised Headlam for being ‘a dupe of Palmerston’, he failed to capture the full backing of local Radicals.45Taylor, Decline of British Radicalism, 283. Joseph Cowen, an emerging figure in Tyneside Radicalism, who later served as MP for Newcastle, 1873-1886, noted that none of the candidates had ‘the confidence of the democrats of Newcastle’, and a meeting of Catholic electors decided to back Ridley and Headlam, citing the fact that Carstairs’ proposer, councillor Dr. Bruce, was a member of the Protestant Alliance.46Newcastle Courant, 27 Mar. 1857. Ridley and Headlam, who gave their unqualified support to Palmerston, thus enjoyed united support from Liberal electors, and received 1,930 split votes. Carstairs, who only secured 350 split votes with Ridley and 165 split votes with Headlam, relied on 1,158 plumpers to gain a respectable tally, but he was still soundly defeated, reflecting the ability of the Liberal town council’s candidates to comfortably repel a Radical challenge.47Bean, Parliamentary representation, 574.

In December 1857 Joseph Cowen launched the Northern Reform Union in an attempt to promote manhood suffrage, and when a petition was presented to parliament in February 1859, it was estimated that more than half the adult population of Northumberland and Durham officially backed the campaign.48J. Hugman, ‘Print and preach: the entrepreneurial spirit of nineteenth-century Newcastle’, in Colls and Lancaster, Newcastle upon Tyne, 126. At the 1859 general election, Cowen attempted to harness this support by bringing forward Peter Taylor, an ardent republican and radical activist, to oppose Ridley and Headlam, but Taylor’s lack of local standing and his secularist affiliations operated against him. Exposing the fractured nature of Tyneside Radicalism, Carstairs’ supporters intimated that he would be put forward to oppose the ‘Blaydon atheists’ of the Northern Reform Union,49N. Todd, The militant democracy: Joseph Cowen and Victorian Radicalism (1991), 46-7. and when the Conservatives proposed the candidacy of Henry Haymen, a number of Taylor’s promised votes were withdrawn due to fears of splitting the Liberal vote, suggesting that the candidates of the Liberal town council still commanded support within local Radicalism.50Newcastle Courant, 22 Apr. 1859. Although neither Carstairs nor Haymen proceeded to the poll, Taylor endured a disastrous campaign, and was heavily beaten by the incumbents. At the declaration, he closed with a couplet from Bonny Dundee: ‘Tremble, false Whigs; though triumphant you be/ You’ve not seen the last of our cause – nor of me’.51Newcastle Courant, 6 May 1859.

Headlam’s appointment by Palmerston as judge-advocate general in April 1859 necessitated a by-election. The local Liberals did not anticipate a contest, but the Conservatives brought forward William Cuthbert, their first candidate for 12 years. Hodgson Hinde, who returned to the constituency to speak on behalf of Cuthbert, accused Headlam of hypocrisy for voting against Palmerston’s conspiracy to murder bill, 19 Feb. 1858, only to accept his offer of a government post.52Newcastle Courant, 24 June 1859. Headlam, who enjoyed the continued support of the town council, dismissed the attack, arguing that as Lord John Russell and Gladstone had opposed the bill, it was wrong to call him an inconsistent Liberal.53Newcastle Courant, 1 July 1859. With Cowen announcing that, although he opposed Headlam ‘on principle’, Taylor would not be brought forward, nomination day was reported to be devoid of excitement, and Cuthbert, who stated his support for franchise reform but opposed the ballot, made little impact, leaving Headlam to poll nearly double the votes of his challenger.54Ibid.

A further by-election ensued in 1860 when Ridley left parliament due to his appointment as a copyhold commissioner. The Liberal town council’s candidate, the 25-year-old Somerset Beaumont, whose family owned extensive estates and lead mines in the region, was a staunch supporter of Palmerston’s government, particularly its foreign policy.55Newcastle Courant, 23 Nov. 1860. Standing again in the Radical interest, Carstairs questioned the validity of such a young candidate, and, at the nomination, his proposer asked the crowd whether the constituency could be ‘entrusted to the guardianship of a boy?’56Newcastle Courant, 7 Dec, 1860. Yet, as was the case in the previous two general elections, divisions with local Radicalism merely served to entrench the electoral dominance of the town council. Cowen’s Northern Political Union, which had originally brought Taylor forward again only for him to withdraw, remained cool towards Carstairs, and Beaumont, who received 77 per cent of the freeman vote and 55 per cent of the householder vote, was comfortably returned.57Newcastle-upon-Tyne Poll Book, 1860.

It was not until the general election of 1865 that Tyneside Radicalism united around a single candidate. Joseph Cowen’s acquisition of the Newcastle Chronicle at the end of 1859 was undoubtedly a key turning point. The newspaper was the apex of the region’s sophisticated print culture, and through its sustained promotion of radical ideals, Cowen was able to ‘drip-feed’ his ideas on a daily basis to the local population.58Hugman, ‘Print and preach’, 127. The Chronicle was also a ‘bona fide Irish journal’, and thus played a pivotal role in ensuring that, although Irish residents were overwhelmingly Roman Catholic, local Radicalism, which also contained a significant Nonconformist element, remained cohesive in the 1860s.59Allen, Joseph Cowen, 94. At the 1865 election, Cowen’s father, also Joseph, came forward as the Liberal candidate. Best known for his chairmanship of the River Tyne Commission, Cowen senior was extremely popular, and his independent streak and Radical sympathies, which included an ongoing call for improved Anglo-Irish relations, were well known. Cowen was an immensely strong candidate, and calling for a reduction in taxation, and stressing both his local credentials and his familiarity with the committee rooms of parliament, he was comfortably returned at the top of the poll.60Newcastle Courant, 14 July 1865. Beaumont, who was attacked over his parliamentary attendance, was effectively beaten by Cowen, while Headlam, despite being criticised over his neglect of his constituents, successfully defended his seat.61Newcastle Courant, 7 July 1865.

Cowen and Headlam were comfortably re-elected at the 1868 general election, and following the former’s death in 1873, there was little surprise when Joseph Cowen junior, who had become the embodiment of Tyneside Radicalism, was elected Liberal MP for the borough at the ensuing by-election of the same year. While it has been suggested that towns such as Newcastle, where the effect of the lowering of the borough franchise was not as dramatic as elsewhere, ‘remained havens for independent MPs after 1867’, there is little doubt that Cowen’s local credentials, in addition to his independence, secured his continued electoral success.62Taylor, Decline of British Radicalism, 83. However, his insistence on maintaining his independence from the party machinery was a major factor in causing the troubled relationship with the Newcastle Liberal Association, formed in 1874, that became a defining characteristic of local political life until Cowen’s retirement in 1886. Devoid of Cowen’s charismatic presence after 1886, the resident Irish lost one of their most vocal champions and the Liberals struggled to find a suitable replacement. Subsequently, by the turn of the century, Newcastle, one of the few constituencies that retained its double-member status, was represented by two Conservatives. This was only temporary though, and in 1906 the borough elected its first Labour member, Walter Hudson, who represented the constituency until its abolition in 1918. A fruitful constituency for the study of the Liberal/Radical alliance, nineteenth-century Newcastle has provided a number of case studies for popular politics, most notably in Eugenio Biagini’s Liberty, Retrenchment and Reform: popular Liberalism in the Age of Gladstone, 1860-1880 (1992) and Joan Allen’s Joseph Cowen and Popular Radicalism on Tyneside, 1829-1900 (2007).