Richard Carlile 8 December 1790 - 10 February 1843.
Hello. It's Bob Forder again.
Richard Carlile was born in Ashburton, Devon, the son of a shoemaker.
He received an elementary schooling and was apprenticed as a tinsmith in Plymouth.
By 1813 he was living in Gosport, Hampshire,
where he married Jane Cousins. Soon afterwards he moved to London to
work as a tinsmith, but 1816 was a year of economic
depression and he found himself with little employment.
He began attending political meetings and read Thomas Paine, who he had been
taught to burn in effigy as a child. To make a living he began to sell the
writings of reformers, particularly Paine, and weekly newspapers such as the banned Black Dwarf.
Then he started publishing and selling his own journal.
All dangerous stuff at a time of repression, fear of France and fear of revolution.
In particular Carlile published all Paine's works, he became his hero.
He kept Paine's ideas alive.
Carlisle made something of a name for
himself as a radical and a reformer. On the 16th August 1819 the events
now known as Peterloo occurred in Manchester.
Carlile had been invited. He attended, and he was on the hustings when the
yeomanry intervened. In the aftermath he managed to avoid arrest.
He returned to London and wrote his eyewitness account of what had occurred.
Soon afterwards he published his famous print depicting the events,
and dedicated the print to Henry Hunt, the main speaker of meeting
and to the female reformers of Manchester.
When in Manchester Carlile was greatly impressed by the role of women at Peterloo.
They had turned out in their thousands,
many dressed in white.
Carlile was horrified that amongst the casualties there was a disproportionate
number of women. In his prints Carlyle (shown on the
extreme left of the platform) is shown, symbolically, next to Mary Fildes,
Chairwoman of the Manchester Female Reform Society.
Also, if you look closely, you can see a woman being sabred.
Note also the banner carrying the legend "universal suffrage" not "universal manhood suffrage".
Carlile's activities were all too much for the authorities, so he was prosecuted for
blasphemy, blasphemous libel and sedition. He was found guilty at what he called
his "mock trial" and he was sentenced to three years in Dorchester Jail, with a
fine of £1500, a fortune by the standards of the time. In fact he served 7years
because he refused to pay the fine, as a result his premises were raided and his
stock was confiscated. On the other hand his cell was light and airy,
and remarkably he continued to edit
his journal, The Republican, from jail which was now published by his wife, Jane,
back on Fleet Street. The Republican sold well
and Carlile produced 12 volumes while in prison.
Carlile's religious beliefs evolved at this time and he decided he was an
atheist, rather than he a deist, like his hero Thomas Paine.
In 1820 Jane was in turn tried for seditious libel, and she was sentenced to 2 years.
She spent this time with her husband and
their infant son, who they named Thomas Paine Carlile.
While in prison Jane gave birth to a daughter, Hypatia.
Jane's place on Fleet Streets had been taken by Richard's sister, Mary, who in turn
received a 6 months sentence.
She was interned at Dorchester, where she shared the same cell as Richard and Jane.
8 of Carlile's shop workers were also prosecuted and more than 150 men and women
were sent to Newgate Jail, in London, for selling The Republican.
Despite all, Fleet Street book sales continued. To make the authorities task more difficult
books were sold from behind a screen. On the customer side was a clockface
bearing the names of the books, with a hand could be pointe at the relevant title,
whereupon the hidden shop man pushed the book through a hole in the screen,
thus avoiding identification. Carlile called this "selling books by clockwork".
By 1825 it was beginning to dawn on the authorities that their actions were
merely creating a bigger demand for Carlisle's publications.
Suddenly and unexpectedly he was unconditionally released.
His first action was to take on the lease of a larger shop at 62 Fleet Street
and expand his publishing business. This shop was externally provocatively decorated,
and this caused various ructions and rioting outside.
The shop is still there today,
and that's what it looks like now.
If Carlile's status as a controversialist was in any doubt
he resolved that in 1826, by publishing his own Every Woman's Book, the first
book in English to advocate birth control, provide contraceptive advice and,
wait for it, advocated free love!
Here is a frontispiece from an early edition.
Carlile was saying to horrified Christians: Don't accuse me of indecency
when there are stories like this in the Bible.
Of course, the thing that's missing in this illustration is the fig leaf.
For Carlile, contraception served two purposes, not only did it prevent conception,
but it also liberated sexual pleasure.
I quote "See what an evil arises from bastard children, from deserted children,
from half-starved and diseased children, and even where the parents are most industrious
and most virtuous, from a half-starved, naked and badly housed family,
from families crowded into one room..."
Carlile was appalled by the practice of abortion and infanticide which were
common at the time in British towns and cities.
Shockingly, Carlisle also claimed Christians sexual morality was a
constraint on female emancipation reducing women to subservience.
He accused Christian marriage of placing women under a form of "legalized slavery".
Carlile saw love making as a healthy pursuit, both physically and mentally, and
challenge still more taboos by claiming women found it as pleasurable and
satisfying as men.
He even went so far as to advocate the establishment of "Temples of Venus", where
they young could receive instruction in sexual technique from the experienced.
Carlile must have been disappointed by the
reaction of some to his book, though perhaps he shouldn't have been surprised.
Many female followers turned against him, including Mary Fildes. She objected
to Carlile's implied contention that the ills of society were due to the
behavior of the working class, rather than the greed of the rich.
William Cobbett branded Carlile 'the grand pornographer and pimp',
who plan to lure into prostitution the maidenhood ofEngland.
Despite all, "Every Woman's Book" went through many editions
and evolved with Carlisle's own thoughts.
After his release Carlile did not restrict himself to publishing and writing,
but went on a number of provincial lecture tours between the years 1825 and 1829.
There were four expeditions altogether: Two in 1827, lasting 8 months in total,
One in 1828, 6 months, and another in 1829, another 6 months.
Remember: there were no railways then. He had to travel by turnpike road.
Although these tours have mixed success,
they did establish a national network of reformers. He was always well received
in Portsmouth and Manchester in particular, although he had substantial
support in many other industrial towns in the North and Midlands.
Carlile was not a particularly good or forceful speaker. In 1829 he teamed up with the "Devil's Chaplain",
the self-styled Reverend Robert Taylor, and they launched their "infidel mission".
Taylor was a Cambridge-educated former Anglican Minister, who had served a prison
sentence for blasphemy. His oratorical skills greatly exceeded Carlisle's, hence
their joint enterprise was a considerable success,
Sadly, the duration of Carlile's tours may help explain his falling out of love
with Jane, despite her extraordinary devotion, loyalty and sacrifices.
It seems he first met Eliza Sharples in 1827, when he visited Bolton.
In 1831 Eliza moved to London, and went on to supplant Jane as Carlile's "moral wife".
Eliza emerged as a formidable character and campaigner in her own right.
She was a good platform speaker, whoe edited her own feminist journal "Isis".
In 1930 Carlile opened the Blackfriars Rotunda, just down the road from 61 Fleet Street.
This was a substantial building with two lecture theatres,
one of which could accommodate up to 1500. The Rotunda became the centre
of reformers and radicals activities in London at a time of mounting discontent.
In 1831 Carlile was incarcerated again, this time in London , for an
article defending agricultural workers and the rural sabotage movement,
known as the "Swing Riots", after their mythical leader "Captain Swing".
After his release, Carlile lived on another 10 years, but his moment had passed
So, what were his achievements? What is his legacy?
First and foremost perhaps, he republished all the mighty Paine's works,
and helped keep his ideas alive.
Second, he was a champion of press freedom and freedom of speech.
This has always been, and remains, a central secularist concern.
Third, he was a feminist, before the term had ever been heard of.
He was a feminist and champion of the rights of women. From this time on,
female emancipation has been a secularist theme. it's about equal rights for all.
Fourth, he was a pioneer birth controller, and again we can identify a consistent
and continuing secularist theme. The right of all, particularly women,
to control their fertility.
Fifth, he was, perhaps, the first to champion the idea
of a national, radical secularist movement.
Thus he paved the way for the foundation of the National Secular Society some 40 years later.
There is only one relatively modern biography of Carlile,
which was written by an American, Joel Weiner in 1983, and entitled
"Radicalism and Free Thought in 19th century Britain". This is very difficult to find.
However Michael Bush's "The Friends and Following of Richard Carlile",
published in 2016, is more easily obtained, and there are copies available on ABE books,
as are copies of another book by Bush, entitled "What is Love?", which deals primarily
with Carlile's work as a birth controller.
Again, thank you for listening.
If you want to contact me about this or any other aspect of secularist and NSS history
my email address is r.w.forder@btinternet.com