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The Cato Street Conspiracy
Plotting, counter-intelligence and the revolutionary tradition in Britain and Ireland
-
Edited by:
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2020
About this book
On 23 February 1820 a group of radicals were arrested in Cato Street off the Edgware Road in London. They were within sixty minutes of setting out to assassinate the British cabinet. Five of the conspirators were subsequently executed and another five were transported for life to Australia.
The plotters were a mixture of English, Scots and Irish tradesmen, and one was a black Jamaican. They were motivated by a desire to avenge the ‘Peterloo’ massacre and intended to declare a republic, which they believed would encourage popular risings in London and across Britain.
This volume of essays uses contemporary reports by Home Office spies and informers to assess the seriousness of the conspiracy. It traces the practical and intellectual origins of the plotters’ willingness to use violence; describes the links between Irish and British radicals who were willing to take up arms; makes a contribution to early black history in Britain; examines the European context to events, and follows the lives and careers of those plotters exiled to Australia.
A significant contribution to our understanding of a particularly turbulent period of British history, these well-written essays will find an appreciative audience among undergraduates, graduate students and scholars of British and Irish history and literature, black history, and the related fields of intelligence history and Strategic Studies.
The plotters were a mixture of English, Scots and Irish tradesmen, and one was a black Jamaican. They were motivated by a desire to avenge the ‘Peterloo’ massacre and intended to declare a republic, which they believed would encourage popular risings in London and across Britain.
This volume of essays uses contemporary reports by Home Office spies and informers to assess the seriousness of the conspiracy. It traces the practical and intellectual origins of the plotters’ willingness to use violence; describes the links between Irish and British radicals who were willing to take up arms; makes a contribution to early black history in Britain; examines the European context to events, and follows the lives and careers of those plotters exiled to Australia.
A significant contribution to our understanding of a particularly turbulent period of British history, these well-written essays will find an appreciative audience among undergraduates, graduate students and scholars of British and Irish history and literature, black history, and the related fields of intelligence history and Strategic Studies.
Author / Editor information
Contributor: Jason McElligott
Jason McElligott is Acting Executive Director of the Trinity Long Room Hub, Trinity College Dublin
Topics
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Front matter
i -
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Contents
v -
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List of figures
vii -
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Notes on contributors
viii -
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Abbreviations
xi -
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Introduction ‘We only have to be lucky once’
1 -
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1 When did they know? The cabinet, informers and Cato Street
18 -
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2 Joining up the dots
34 -
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3 The men they couldn’t hang
49 -
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4 Cato Street in international perspective
64 -
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5 Cato Street and the Caribbean
81 -
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6 Cato Street and the Spencean politics of transnational insurrection
101 -
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7 State witnesses and spies in Irish political trials, 1794–1803
118 -
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8 The shadow of the Pikeman
135 -
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9 The fate of the transported Cato Street conspirators
153 -
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10 Scripted by whom?
169 -
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Afterword
186 -
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Index
193
Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
September 13, 2023
eBook ISBN:
9781526144997
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook ISBN:
9781526144997
Keywords for this book
London; Radicalism; Black History; Informers; Revolution; Insurrection; Peterloo; Slavery; Ireland
Audience(s) for this book
For a non-specialist adult audience
