The Charles Dickens Letters Project

 To GEORGE SCOTT,1 20 JUNE 1848

Extract in American Art Association, New York, catalogue of Collection of William F. Gable of Altoona, Part 1, 5-6 Nov 1923. Address: 1 Devonshire Terrace, Regents Park.

I once thought of Italy this year, but I shall not come there now.2 Well! Maybe next year will be more propitious. In the meantime, the Italians and Austrians3 don’t seem to be quite such good friends as you thought them on the first of last month.4There is great talk now and then of the Chartists5 here, but I believe three-fourths of it to be got up by the Government for their own easy purposes. Boys get on lamp-posts and say “Hooroar for the Marsellays”6and 800 Life Guards7 immediately bivouac in the Millbank Penitentiary,8 and all the world says that if it hadn’t been for them and the Duke of Wellington,9 the country would have gone to pieces.10

• 1. George Scott, artist, resident in Rome: see Pilgrim Letters 4, pp. 293-4 and nn.
• 2. CD did not visit Italy again until Oct 53: he had thought as early as March 47 of a visit, but in 1848 Maclise’s indecision and political upheavals decided him against it (see Pilgrim Letters 5, pp. 42, 254).
• 3. In March, Milan had expelled the Austrians and proclaimed the provisional government of Lombardy. Piedmont (the Kingdom of Sardinia) had then, unprovoked, invaded Austrian territory in support of Milan. The Piedmontese defeated the Austrians at Goito (30 May) and The Times in June reported their advances; in July, however, the Piedmontese suffered a crushing defeat at Custozza.
• 4. There had been indications, to which Scott presumably referred, that Austria, distracted by widespread internal upheavals, might treat with the Milanese and recognise an autonomous Lombard republic. The continued military activity of Piedmont in May and June made a negotiated settlement unlikely. After the battle of Custozza, Piedmont sued for peace and Austria reoccupied Lombardy.
• 5. After the fiasco of the National Chartist Convention, 10 Apr (see To Tracey, 8 Apr 48: Pilgrim Letters 5, p. 273 nn) and the arrest of Ernest Jones and others on charges of sedition, the “physical force” Chartists and Young Ireland supporters, who demanded repeal of the Act of Union, made common cause. Prompted by the guilty verdict on John Mitchel (1815-75; Dictionary of National Biography), proprietor of the United Irishman, meetings and marches were held in London, beginning 29 May (The Times, 30, 31 May). Government and police action meant the failure of a demonstration called for Whit Monday, 12 June: at Bishop Bonner’s Fields, near Victoria Park, Bethnal Green, not more than 200, apart from police and spectators, turned up, and at other sites, few or no demonstrators appeared (The Times, 13 June).
• 6. The Times noted the “rabble auditory”, who “true to the real principles which had brought them together”, threw stones and broke windows and the “small knots of lads...ready to assist in any demonstration” (31 May, 13 June). The revolution in France and the flight of Louis Phillipe in February had given new force to the Marseillaise as a revolutionary watchword. In April, the Chartist Convention, imitating the newly created French National Assembly, had dissolved itself to become the English “National Assembly”: at a meeting to elect delegates for Westminster and Marylebone, one candidate’s seconder was “a man with the tricolor” (The Times, 15 May, 22 April).
• 7. With the Royal Horse Guards, the Life Guards form the household cavalry, based in London. On 31 May a body of Life Guards “flitted like spectres across the scene” during an evening demonstration at Clerkenwell Green (The Times, 1 June), while on 12 June, when the great demonstration had been called, troops, including the Life Guards and Royal Horse Guards, were posted at Bethnal Green, Clerkenwell, and Croydon (The Times, 13 June).
• 8. Spelt “Penetentiary” in source. The Millbank Penitentiary, built 1812-21 on the north bank of the Thames; demolished 1890: the Tate Gallery now occupies the site.
• 9. In the House of Lords, Wellington (who was in opposition) urged that either the meetings be forbidden or the organisers be subject to seizure of property for damage done (The Times, 3 June). The government’s action to ban the “forceful demonstration” of 12 June by placards posted up on the Saturday (The Times, 12 June) may have been credited by some to Wellington’s demands.
• 10. The Times, commenting upon the disturbances, essentially treats them lightly, mocking at the leaders and their lack of purpose: the demonstration of 12 June had ended “not in smoke, but in rain....Let them agitate for the Charter if they please, but not make it the stalking-horse of an impotent and ridiculous rebellion” (13 June).