I
believe it had occupied the serious thoughts of all descriptions of
persons, long before its introduction to the notice of that legislature,
whose interference alone could be of real service. As a person in some
degree connected with the suffering county, though a stranger not only
to this House in general, but to almost every individual whose attention
I presume to solicit, I must claim some portion of your Lordships'
indulgence, whilst I offer a few observations on a question in which I
confess myself deeply interested.
To enter into any detail of the riots would be superfluous: the House is
already aware that every outrage short of actual bloodshed has been
perpetrated, and that the proprietors of the frames obnoxious to the
rioters, and all persons supposed to be connected with them, have been
liable to insult and violence. During the short time I recently passed
in Nottinghamshire, not twelve hours elapsed without some fresh act of
violence; and on the day I left the county I was informed that forty
frames had been broken the preceding evening, as usual, without
resistance and without detection.
Such was then the state of that county, and such I have reason to
believe it to be at this moment. But whilst these outrages must be
admitted to exist to an alarming extent, it cannot be denied that they
have arisen from circumstances of the most unparalleled distress: the
perseverance of these miserable men in their proceedings tends to prove
that nothing but absolute want could have driven a large, and once
honest and industrious, body of the people, into the commission of
excesses so hazardous to themselves, their families, and the community.
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