Anarchoblogs

From the 5 August 1843 Monmouthshire Merlin:

Rebeccaism.

(From our own Reporter.)

Swansea, August 1, 1843. The town presents a most animated appearance: the usually quiet inhabitants are all on the qui vive: gay military uniforms enliven the streets; grave officials from Downing street are seen chatting in little clusters; the inns are all crowded; bold Dragoons are going round with their billets, and the enlivening military bugle is heard at intervals. Another troop of the 4^th Dragoons have arrived, and are to remain for some time. A force of artillery is hourly expected; and indeed, the report is credited in well-informed circles, that ere long there will be nearly a thousand soldiers in Carmarthenshire and Glamorganshire. The service is not uninteresting or unexciting in these picturesque districts at present; but when winter comes on, if Rebecca do not go off her evil ways, it will be worse than private-still hunting in Ireland.

Mr. Maule, solicitor to the Treasury, and his assistant, are at the Mackworth Arms: he is without Jock Campbell this time, who did the Crown business with him in 1839, at Monmouth.

A meeting of the magistrates has this evening taken place at the Mackworth Arms, at which were present, Mr. Talbot, M.P., Mr. L.W. Dillwyn, Mr. Dl. Llewelyn, Mr. Vivian, M.P., Dr. Hewson, Mr. T.E. Thomas, Mr. John Grove, Rev. J. Collins, Rev. S. Davies, Colonel Jones, and others. Colonel Love and Captain Napier were, we understand, at the conference.

One of the most important and startling events of the week is the seizure of a case of arms: the case contained 12 rifles, and a quantity of bullets, copper caps, &c. This dangerous and alarming consignment was directed to Mr. Griffith Vaughan, landlord of the Pontardulais Inn, Carmarthenshire, one of the persons now out on bail, charged with a participation in the pulling down of the Bwlgoed gate, and the charge against whom is to be heard to-morrow. The Government had intimation of the nature of the importation at the port of Swansea, and “stopt the supplies.”

It is currently bruited abroad that Sir James Graham has written a letter, couched in anything but complimentary terms, to the authorities, for not remanding, instead of liberating on bail, the parties brought before them last week.

This great statesman, who wears the robe of office turned inside out, has no just grounds for blaming magistrates who acted constitutionally. The right hon. baronet may, perhaps, like the Castlereagh doctrine of a “vigour beyond the law.”

That very disinterested demagogue, Feargus O’Connor, is said to be here, from Merthyr, and it is also said that the men employed in the copper works will “strike” at the forthcoming reduction in wages of 12½ per cent. When I compare the wages of these men, say an average of £1 per week, and in some instances, from £2 to £3, with the starving stipend of the colliers, which is from 4 to 5 shilliings per week, with 2 shillings for a boy, I think the copper men are unreasonable; and in the present stagnant state of trade, I deem it probable that the master smelters will not regret the turn-out, should it come, as it is well known to every person conversant with the trade, that they are absolutely losing by every ton of copper now made.

I hear this evening with extreme regret, that instead of setting at once about a redress of grievances in Carmarthenshire, a rate of 3d in the pound is about to be enforced for a rural police. I shall not write about the expediency of the latter measure, but I am quite sure that heavy wrongs promptly call for the former.

Scores of the small farmers and the suffering peasantry are in a deplorable state–

“Need and oppression stare within their eyes,
 Contempt and beggary hang upon their backs;
 The world is not their friend, nor the world’s law.”