George Markham Tweddell

Sunday, November 25, 2012

Tweddell in Horsfall Turner's Yorkshire Bibliographer 1890

The following PDF article, from the Tweddell family collection, is an interview with George Markham Tweddell and his wife - Elizabeth Tweddell aka Florence Cleveland by S. Horsfall Turner in 1890, editor of the book Yorkshire Genealogist with which is Incorporated Yorkshire Bibliographer Volume 11 - published in Bradford. The full book is also now available to read on line here http://archive.org/stream/yorkshirenotesa00turngoog#page/n8/mode/1up

The full history of the Tweddell's can be read here on the Tweddell History site http://www.tweddellhistory.co.uk/index.html

George Markham Tweddell would have been about 66 when the interview was conducted in 1889, having been born in 1823. The Tweddell's were living at Rose Cottage (The Town House) in Bridge Street Stokesley and the interview provided a lot of useful background information on the couple and their work.

Horsfall gives a good account of George's early life and education, through to his employment as an apprentice printers, editor, poet, Oddfellow and author. Along the way he includes some great good wood cuts of the Cleveland area, poems by both George and his wife Elizabeth and his connections with literary friends such as Ebenezer Elliot.

To download the file - click the arrow which takes you to Google Drive

When it opens - click the black arrow screen left to download to your computer.or for some - Click File and then click download in the menu and the tick Save.

Here are the woodcuts that are in the article but the right way up!

Roseberry Topping, Great Ayton

The Cleveland Coast

Mount Grace Priory

Kirklevington Castle Hill

Danby Church (St Hilda) of which the Rev J.C. Atkinson, author of Cleveland Ancient and Modern and Cleveland Dialect etc. was vicar, and this replaced an ancient chapel. The earthworks at Castleton and the ruins at Danby are worth visiting. (This note accompanied the woodcut).

The Bruces held this Lordship and the Latimers built the castle, which is still partly inhabited by a farmer. It passed by sale from the Earl of Danby to Lord Downe.

Saltburn by the Sea

Whorlton Castle Gatehouse is a fine example of Richard 11's period. It bears the arms of grey, Darcy and Meynill. The view of the surrounding countryside is very extensive. Under a canopy bearing the Meynill and Roos arms is the alter tomb of Nicholas de Meynill 1843 (it is believed), and placed upon the tomb is an oaken effigy of an earlier Meynill,cross-legged, with hawberk and hooded mail. Such oaken effigies arescarce in England, and this is one of the earliest. Our readers may have seen the specimen at Thornhill Church.

Whorlton Church Monument.

Zetland Hotel Saltburn

Kilton Castle remains are very scanty. They are in the upper Skinningrove valley and are all the remains of the stronghold of the Thwengs. In 1535, a 'sea man' was captured in Skinningrove and kept many weeks on raw fish but he escaped to the sea. Vistors to Hull Trinity House Museum will remember seeing relics there of another 'sea man'.

Kilton Castle

Yarm Railway

Guisborough Church - the burial place of the Bruces'

Brandsburton Church

Captain Cook's Monument on Easby Moor, erected 1827 by Robert Campion of Whitby, is a great landmark.

Marske Hall, near Saltburn, belongs to the Earl Zetland. It was built (temp. Chas 1) by sir Wm Pennyman.

Saturday, November 17, 2012

Rudby School, Hutton Rudby. John Jackson, William Sanderson

Paul Tweddell, as a former School Inspector and educationalist, was particularly interested in his ancestor - George Markham Tweddell's ideas on education back in the 19thC. GMT's ideas are scattered throughout his work and he placed great hope for mankind and civilisation through the development of wider education and communications. He may well have been disappointed given the recent investigation into the practice of the modern media and the disarray of the education system but this poem GMT’s views on education wouldn't be out of place in Paulo Freire’s book Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1972) where Freire talks about the ‘Banking Concept of education’ in which the student receives, memorises and repeats ‘deposits of knowledge’ rather than develops a ‘critical consciousness and spirit of enquiry’.

Education.
To educate does not mean pumping in
Knowledge, even to cramming in the brain;
But, by judicious efforts, so to train
The virgin mind, that it must surely win
Wisdom from all it reads or hears or sees; 5
So that it may educe by its own powers
True thoughts and actions: for such gifts are ours,
If we but knew their use. Like industrious bees,
We can cull honey from the plants poisonous
To others. God has freely given to all 10
The power of thinking, and erects no wall
To fence this blessing from us, which to us
Should be the highest prized of all things given
To us on earth to wing our souls for heaven.
George Markham Tweddell
[Rhymes in M/S, notional p. 66]

GMT's Own Education - William Sanderson
Paul Tweddell writes in the first draft of his forthcoming genealogical study of the Tweddell family "Poor lives, but full of honour"

" At the time George reached the age of 11 in 1834, an endowed grammar school was set up in Stokesley. Preston school, named after the person who had granted the original bequest in 1805. But rather than enthusiastically offering a place to a child of obvious intellectual ability, the school authorities turned George's application down. The reason can now only be speculation, but could it be that the conservative governors noted the fierce independence he was to shown later life!...

Instead of the academic curriculum of the grammar school, George was given a functional education offered at the local National school. By good fortune he came in contact with an Inspirational teacher, William Sanderson (c.1796-1864) who held the post of head teacher at the National Board School. Like George's informal education from his mother given in fields around the town, Sanderson expanded the school's teaching by taking the boy on long walks in the countryside during fine evenings or at his fire in winter. During their discussions the boy's knowledge of science, philosophy and history was built up and he was given a life-long love of literature. particularly for poetry. It is likely that his future radical views were also developed at the school.

In the 1820s, Sanderson had left his native Hutton Rudby (three miles west of Stokesley) to set up a private school in Whitby. During the 1832 Reform Parliament election he had voted for the radical, but unsuccessful candidate (Sanderson’s choice inevitably being widely known, there being no secret ballot at this time) and, in revenge, another failed candidate persuaded the parents to withdraw their children thus forcing the closure of the school. Taking up the Stokesley vacancy, Sanderson soon recognised George’s abilities. Sanderson’s account of his treatment in Whitby was an powerful influence on his student’s adoption of radical-leaning politics, although the boy may have already had a predilection in this way as his grandfather, John Tweddell (1770-1850), had supported the Liberal candidate in the 1805 election. A few years later, hearing Peter Bussey, the Chartist missionary who used Stokesley as a base for his work in spring 1839 when George was 17, could have reinforced these opinions, although there is no documentary evidence for this.

In 1836, at the earliest opportunity and much to his disappointment, George was taken away from school and joined his mother as an assistant at his grandfather’s shop and by 1841 William Braithwaite (c.1810-1873)"

In 2009, Paul Tweddell showed me where William sanderson was buried - at All Saints Church on the Rudby side of Hutton Rudby nr Stokesley North Yorkshire.

Thanks to local Hutton Rudby historian Alice Barrigan we now know that Rudby School was situated near All Saints on the left in this photo from Alice Barrigan's website http://northyorkshirehistory.blogspot.co.uk/

Rudby School is the white building on the left of this photo, now a private dwelling next to All Saints Church, called, I think Rose Cottage.

Here is a poem which GMT wrote as a tribute to William Sanderson

Education
A Tribute to the Memory of my good Schoolmaster—
William Sanderson.

I do not know one holier work on earth
Than that of training up the rising race
In health alike of body and of mind.
It is the safest polity for States;
The truest proof of love parents can give, 5
The noblest outcome of philanthropy;
And without it Religion would become
But Superstition to bind all in chains
To every sort of hateful tyranny.
Some six-score years have now pass’d o’er the world 10
Since a true poet sang in noble strains:—
“Delightful task! to rear the tender thought,
To teach the young idea how to shoot,
To pour the fresh instruction o’er the mind,
To breathe the enlivening spirit, and to fix 15
The generous purpose in the glowing breast!”[1]
A noble thought, utter’d in words of fire
Which Ignorance can ne’er extinguish, though
We yet have feeble intellect which fain
For this would ridicule dear Thomson’s name. 20
The car of Progress has run swiftly on
Since so he sang, and his melodious lyre
Silenced on earth, but its sweet echoes still
Stir human hearts, though we are only now
Just rising to the level of his thoughts: 25
For your true Poet is not one who can
Merely bedeck in decent verse what all
His fellows feel or know: but it is his
To lead the van in bravely marching on
From height to height, despite all earthly foes; 30
And those who ridicule the Teacher’s art,
Or look on it as drudgery, have ne’er,
Whate’er their bookcram, gain’d the mental light
Required of all true Teachers: unto them
’T would be indeed as hard a task as that 35
Which Jupiter enjoin’d on Sisyphus.

I had three Schoolmasters: but the former two ne’er gain’d
The least affection from the boys they sought
To teach in their own harsh mistaken way,
And to us all their deaths had been relief, 40
Instead of causing one to shed a tear.
In looking back upon the years I spent
Under their tyranny, which I forgive,
But never can forget, I cannot yield
Those days with that bright halo that endears 45
Our boyhood to us in declining years.[2]
But I shall treasure, to my dying day,
The love I bore to William Sanderson.
He was my last Schoolmaster, and my best,
Yea worth a thousand of the other two,[3]— 50
For he unlike to them, knew how to teach.
He had all learning at his fingers’ ends;
And best of all, was skill’d in teaching too.
A man may be in scholarship most rife,
Yet quite unfit to teach a tithe he knows. 55
Oh! that I longer could have profited
By my good Mentor! More that fifty years
Of varied trials I have waded through,
Since the necessity of earning bread
Forced me to leave him, when my anxious mind 60
Was just beginning to show healthy growth
Under his culture. But I never ceased
To love him whilst he lived, and since his death
None could have treasured more his memory.
“God rest his soul!” I can devoutly say; 65
For he was fitted whilst on earth for heaven:
Not by a bigot’s creed, or cant too oft
Mistaken for true piety; but a life
Of Christian virtue. Too mild to wrestle
In competition for a living here 70
With brutal men, his purse through life was poor;
But he had riches they can ne’er possess

Euclid, Algebra, and the languages,
Hebrew, Greek, Latin, like our mother-tongue,
Were truly his. Had I remain’d with him 75
I too would have been a scholar deeply read
In lore which has been seal’d to me for aye.
How he delighted to encourage all
My boyish studies of antiquity
And of the maxims which should govern States 80
To make the peoples happy! Meekest man
I ever knew childlike simplicity
Wedded to wisdom gave the lie in him
To those who fancy knowledge puffeth up
With vile conceit those who have made it theirs. 85
Oh, much I owe to him, to be repaid
Only with gratitude! My evening hours
Were spent in his congenial company
After the studies of the school were done.
If fine, we wander’d forth in frost or sheen 90
Along the pleasant footpaths; if confined
By weather to his parlour, he to me
Read Greek and Latin Classics, Englishing
Each sentence as he read, as easily
As I could converse in my mother-tongue. 95
This was my baptism to communion
With the wise sages both of Greece and Rome,
Homer and Virgil both have seem’d to me
As friends I knew since then; Demosthenes
And Cicero through him spoke just to me 100
As plainly as to those who had of yore
Listen’d unto their marvellous eloquence,
And this most mild of men was stricken down
When he was rising in prosperity;
Robb’d of his bread, and exiled the town 105
Where he was teaching as few other could,
By Whitby Tories, because he quietly
Voted for Moorsholm when that post became
A parliamentary borough. Not the man
To canvass or make speeches, or i’ the press 110
To rouse the people with a Cobbett’s pen,
Or hate those who might not think like himself,

Yet he felt bound to be to conscience true,
And simply gave his vote. It was enough—
The ballot then affording such no shield, 115
But being call’d un-English, cowardly,
And something that must lead to ruin, by
The cravens who all used it in their clubs.
Methinks I see their shuddering souls when they
First met him in that Spirit Land where all 120
Our sins on earth are plainly seen as though
An open book contain’d the register.
’T is this, and such as this, which forms the Hell
Which blundering bigots would persuade mankind
Is sulphurous fire which ever burns 125
To torture with far greater pains than man
Or woman ever felt on earth—pangs which
When millions of years had o’er them pass’d
Would be no nearer to their end than when
They first began—God’s thoughtless erring ones. 130
And there are simple folks still hold this creed,
Most gloomy and blasphemous as it is,
Making our Heavenly Father more unkind
To his poor children than the basest man
Who ever practised horrid cruelties. 135
One master as to mine, teaching true wisdom
Calmly all his years; living its precepts;
Content with simplest necessities when
He could obtain them; but aspiring not
Even when forced to bear ills none should know 140
In any State call’d civilised; does more
For helping on the progress of our race
Than many brawlers; and I thank my God
That I in early life had such a friend
And teacher as good William Sanderson. 145

His life was one of spotless purity:
He had compassion for all living things,
And anger never raged in his calm mind.
In all my march through life, I never met
A man more Christlike, no forms or creeds 150
Held his as a professor before men,
And he never mix’d in their assemblies.
He made his heart the temple of the Lord,
And there he offer’d up incense more sweet
Than from a priestly censor rose. 155
Though in the flesh we never more can meet,
His spirit often seems to visit me
In a divine communion of soul;
And I look forward with a fervent faith
To meeting him again to part no more, 160
Where all our souls are purified like him
From those deep failings which prevent our earth
From being but a counterpart of heaven.
Blank verse [in M/S], pp. 71-79.
[1] From the Scottish poet, James Thompson (1700-1748), in ‘Spring’ from ‘The
Seasons’ (1726). “Six-score years” this would make the date of GMT’s poem
about 1846. [see:
<www.luminarium.org/eightlit/thomson/bio.php>
[2] Alternative to this line:
“Our boyhood to us as death dreweth near”[3] One of these will have been Richard
Baker, mentioned in Pigot’s Yorkshire Directory for 1829.

..................................................................

Before William Sanderson, Rudby school was headed by John Jackson of whom GMT also wrote in his Yorkshire Miscellany and North of England Tractates and yet again in his book The Bards and Authors of Cleveland and south Yorkshire 1872.

Tweddell wrote -

" John Jackson, who for six and twenty years ws master of Rudby School, was so much esteemed as a classical and mathematical teacher that sons of the principal inhabitants of Stokesley used to travel daily to and from his academy to avail themselves of his instruction. Many of the sundials still existing in Cleveland are of his manufacture, that at Rudby church being one. He was born about the year 1743 and died May 27th 1808, in the sixty fifth year of his age, leaving a widow named Ann, who survived him until dec 27th 1815, when she died at the age of 67.

John Jackson wrote the following poem The Cleveland Fox Chase, in 1785 although it wasn't published until 1846 by George Markham Tweddell in his Yorkshire Miscellany series and later the North of England Tractates. The 63 mile fox chase which went past the famed Roseberry Topping near Great Ayton, may not agree with our modern sensibilities towards fox hunting but this historic poem by the master of Rudby school was also set to music by him "and for many years enjoyed considerable popularity in the district, on account of the 'then well known incidents of the remarkable hunt it chronicles" says Tweddell in 1846. The version from the Tractates is in the pdf file here. Further information on the Cleveland foxhunt can be found in Roseberry Topping p66 published by the Great Ayton Community Archeology Project

John Jackson - The Cleveland Fox Chase - published in 1846 in Tweddell's Yorkshire Miscellany and later Tweddell's North of England Tractates (from which this pdf contains). The pdf is on Google drive and can be downloaded.

To download the file - click the arrow which takes you to Google Drive

When it opens - click the black arrow screen left to download to your computer.or for some - Click File and then click download in the menu and the tick Save.

Monday, November 5, 2012

Tweddell's North of England Illustrated Annual - Extracts

From Paul Tweddell's collection of materials relating to George Markham Tweddell -

This PDF file (downloadable via Google Drive) contain extract pages from Tweddell's North of England Illustrated Annual - 1879 -80

These extracts contain poems by the following -

Mrs G. Tweddell - aka Elizabeth Tweddell or Florence Cleveland- In Memorium / Saint Hilda's Bells (A Whitby Legend)/ Introduction to a Christmas Pantomimeof "Robinson Crusoe"
Jabez Cole - Sonnet Written in Ingleby-Greenhow Church Yard / The Marble Monument.
T.P. Williamson - "Suffered Under Pontius Pilate" /
Henry Wade - Come Where Sing The Little Rills.
William Henry Charlton - Old English Romance of Havelok the Dane (extract) and full poem NOW" AND "OF OLD"

Note - GMT wrote about Jabez Cole in his book The Bards and Authors of Cleveland and South Durham 1872.

The following essays or short stories appear in these pages -

John Reed Appleton FSA by Peter Proletarius (One of Tweddell's pen names) (an extract).
North of England Notes - George Markham Tweddell - the essay discusses the
History of the Dunmow Flitch of Bacon Custom by Mr Williams Andrews of Hull FRHS (more on this custom below) /
A Portrait of the late Matthew Greathead, the Centenarian Freemason from High Coniscliffe on the banks of the Tees Nr Darlington. /
Patent Safety Detaching Hook invented by Mr William Walker, mining engineer of Saltburn by the Sea. / North Yorkshire Miners Association.
History of the Craft of Freemasonry in Cumberland and Westmoreland by bro. WF Lamonby PM, P. Prov. G. Reg. /
American Newspapers and English Journals /
Literary Reminiscences and Gleanings Mr Proctor /
History of the Darlington and Barnard Castle Railway - Mr Atkinson of the Teesdale Mercury.
White Star Line of Steamers - Official Guide /
The Tragedy of Antigona - Theatre Royal, Newcastle / ...............

.................................

Inscription on "The Wainstones," Broughton Bank - Peter Proletarius (ie Tweddell)
Old Gregory's Ghost - Or How Mr Playfair spent Christmas Eve at Buffing Hall - Oliver Louis Tweddell (Extract)
Title pages to The Story of Count Ulaski - Miss Elizabeth Colling aka Eta Mawr of Hurworth on Tees

John Appleton Reed was written about in Tweddell's Bards and Authors of Cleveland and South Durham 1972 and Eta Mawr (Elizabeth Collings)was earmarked for the proposed second volume of Bards and Authors - the second volume never appeared although the notes towards would have been lost in the Stokesley floods of the 1930's when many of Tweddells notes, in the cellar of Rose Cottage (The Townhouse) were sadly destroyed posthumously.

Here are the extracts - Pdf of Tweddell's North of England Illustrated Annual 1879 / 80

To download the file - click the arrow which takes you to Google Drive

When it opens - click the black arrow screen left to download to your computer. or for some - Click File and then click download in the menu and the tick Save.

More information on some of the material -

The History of the Dunmow Flitch of Bacon Custom

In 2010 before Paul Tweddell passed away he was preparing the third volume of George Markham Tweddell's collected poems for publication. We had collected them from his many published poems in magazines and Newspapers and in his books along and also from unpublished manuscript books.Just when we thought we had them all another volume appeared donated by another relative - volume three and available on posts on this site. Paul suspected there might be more poems yet still and asked relatives to look thorough any material they may have. So far nothing more has come to light but he was certainly far more prolific than we had imagined. It was at this time I came across of another Tweddell poem that we hadn't got in our collection - Dunmow Priory and Flitch. I couldn't find the poem on line but sent Paul some information about the custom. The other day I created this post and found a review of William Andrews book on Dunmow in Tweddell's Illustrated Annual and assumed it was book review instead of a poem. Today I was researching another aspect of Tweddell's work and I came across William Andrews book available as a free download or viewable on line - here http://ia600406.us.archive.org/17/items/historyofdunmowf00andriala/historyofdunmowf00andriala.pdf

To my surprise the long lost Tweddell poem is in this book along with one by his wife - Elizabeth Tweddell aka Florence Cleveland. Both poems have now been added to this post below along with some graphics from the book illustrating the Dunmow custom.

THE HISTORY OF THE DUNMOW FLITCH TRIALS

"A common claim of the origin of the Dunmow Flitch dates back to 1104 and the Augustinian Priory of Little Dunmow, founded by Lady Juga Baynard. Lord of the Manor Reginald Fitzwalter and his wife dressed themselves as humble folk and begged blessing of the Prior a year and a day after marriage.

The Prior, impressed by their devotion bestowed upon them a Flitch of Bacon (a side of bacon). Upon revealing his true identity, Fitzwalter gave his land to the Priory on the condition a Flitch should be awarded to any couple who could claim they were similarly devoted.

By the 14th century, the Dunmow Flitch Trials had achieved far-reaching notoriety. The author William Langland, who lived on the Welsh borders, mentions it in his 1362 book 'The Vision of Piers Plowman' in a manner that implies general knowledge of the custom among his readers." Read More here http://www.dunmowflitchtrials.co.uk/history/

Elizabeth Tweddell's poem

Where is Little Dunmow? http://www.dunmowflitchtrials.co.uk/location/

Little Dunmow - Priory Lodge

In North of England Notes by George Markham Tweddell p 18 in the pdf he mentions the Illustrated London News - here's a sample of the publication - but first some added pages and graphics from William Andrew's book -

From Tweddell's Bards and Authors of Cleveland and South Durham 1872

Sunday, November 4, 2012

Stokesley News and Cleveland Reporter

Asa Briggs - "There was no gloomier year in the nineteenth century than 1842" "Yet in November of that year George Markham Tweddell burst into print with his monthly newspaper The Stokesley News and Cleveland Reporter priced 2d." Writes Stokesley local historian Daphne Franks in her brilliant pamphlet Printing and Publishing in Stokesley - published 1984.

Here are some mast heads and pieces from George Markham Tweddell's radical Stokesley based newspaper about 1842 as supplied by Paul Tweddell from his Tweddell archives..the Stokesley News and Cleveland Reporter. The story of his newspaper and the rival newspaper can be found here http://www.tweddellhistory.co.uk/chapter3.html. .

Basically - George Markham Tweddell was apprenticed to Stokesley printer William Braithwaite at 30, The High Street (now a paper shop). Braithwaite had the reputation of supporting promising young employees and George met and became friends with John Walker Ord author of The History and Antiquities of Cleveland (1838) which was printed by William Briathwaite.

"In 1841 when 18 George sought approval from his master to set up a newspaper and his master agreed, in spite of the obviously radical tone George proposed ('to give the ordinary people of Cleveland a newspaper that would reflect their more liberal opinions rather than those of the landowning classes'). The first copy of the Cleveland News and Stokesley Reporter appeared on the 1st of November 1842 being printed on Braithwaite's presses. The newspaper supported causes such as the Anti-Cornlaw league, the abolition of slavery etc.

Unfortunately, by the time a third edition of his newspaper was being planned, representatives of the local propertied class visited Braithwaite to persuade him to stop broadcasting George's criticism of the Tory government, of which they were firm supporters. They demanded Braithwaite withdrew the use of his printing press and the licence to publish from the premises. As a result the printer dismissed George (probably on the legal grounds of "bringing his master into disrepute"). Within a month, remarkably, George had managed to acquire a new license and access to a new press (although from whom is not known) to produce the third edition on time. For George, the contents for the editorial for this edition were obvious and he castigated his former employer, claiming Braithwaite was trying to 'crush our little periodical', and that 'our printer is a good easy man, afraid that our generous principles of peace on earth and goodwill toward men should be mistaken for his own'. " Paul Tweddell http://www.tweddellhistory.co.uk/chapter3.html

And from A Poet's View of George Markham Tweddell by Paul Tweddell and Trev Teasdel

http://georgemarkhamtweddell.blogspot.co.uk/2011/04/poets-view-of-george-markham-tweddell.html

"Between 1842 and 1845 GMT produced his radical newspaper, The Stokesley News and Cleveland Reporter, GMT reacted to the conservative backlash of his time (see the next section for details) by writing an editorial in language that echoes Shelley’s invective in the Masks of Anarchy and predates Marx’s introduction to the Communist Manifesto, 'A Spectre is Haunting Europe', by 6 years: "

The editorial ran - To Out Subscribers and the Public

“Notwithstanding the base attempt to crush our little periodical, by the vilest and most ungenerous means, yet we again pay our monthly visit to our subscribers, to amuse and instruct…”

“When The Stokesley News, and Cleveland Reporter first made its appearance in the political and literary world, it was with a firm determination to lash every species of vice, with an unsparing hand; and to be the unflinching advocate of civil and religious liberty. Fearlessly to tear the mask from the sinister deeds of unprincipled legislators and trafficking politicians, of every party……”

Copies of Tweddell's Stokesley News and Cleveland Reporter can be found in Teesside Archives

This is a list of the Tweddell Archives that can be found in Teesside Archives http://georgemarkhamtweddell.blogspot.co.uk/p/archives.html

As a consequence the Tories set up a rival conservative paper set up in response - The Cleveland Repertory and Stokesley Advertiser

In contrast to GMT's editorial, the editorial of the rival paper Cleveland Repertory and Stokesley Advertiser of May 1843 read -

" We are Conservatives. we would preserve the constitution of England and every part of it inviolate. We would protect it against the subtle and insidious attacks of disguised foes, shield it against open assaults of avowed and decided enemies. this who would upset, injure, deface or weaken it either by severance deduction or by the importation of principles foreign to its nature, whatever name this might adapt - or whatever shape assume - whether they profess friendship or confess enmity - we shall treat equally as traitors."

There are pdf's of Cleveland Repertory and Stokesley Advertiser on line here in pdf form Here

and Here2

Earlier Paper Wars in Stokesley

This war between the Conservatives and Tweddell's radical paper in 1942 / 3 mirrors an earlier conflict in Stokesely in the 1820's, originally researched and published by Labour historian Professor Malcolm Chase of Leeds University and published in The Bulletin of the Cleveland and Teesside Local History Society 1984 - No 47 pp 29-36.

Before Paul Tweddell passed away, he alerted me to an article by Alice Barrigan on the Jakesbarn site which he found quite interesting. Jakesbarn site has closed down but I understand now, from Paul's wife Sandra, that Alice is intending to reload the article to her new site here http://northyorkshirehistory.blogspot.co.uk/

Alice Barrigan tells us in her article Radicalism in Stokesley in the 1820's that on Monday 2 June 1822 employer Thomas Mease gave a speech at a Wesleyan Methodist Missionary meeting attacking Robert Armstrong - a radical bookseller. This began the first Stokesley Paper War (the second occurring in the 1840's when the Conservatives tried to shut down Tweddell's radical newspaper).

Under pressure Mease published his speech and commented "I was exceedingly amused, Sir, by the way in which the birth-day of Paine was lately kept in this Town,"

The principal objects embraced by their vain, but anxious wishes, it is probable, were, the subversion of Christianity and Monarchy, and the substitution of a Republican government, together with what they strangely reckon a scientific morality. Now, to think of such a Tea-sipping assembly of pompous literati, so tenacious of the dignity of human nature, and meditating purposes so vast, is almost enough to produce a smile of contempt in pouting melancholy herself before she is aware.

'The Missionary; or Stokesley & Cleveland Illuminator' - Armstrong

'The Extinguisher'.

The war of words between Mease and Armstrong in Stokesley was a small part of the great conflict then raging between the forces of conservatism in religion and politics and an increasingly vocal radical movement calling for political reform and open religious debate. At this time, more than thirty years before Darwin, those who believed in the literal truth of the words of the Bible were already finding their view of the world increasingly challenged by the work of German scholars of the scriptures, developments in medicine and discoveries in geology.

Ill-feeling between the factions of freethought and religious orthodoxy may have been brewing for some time in Stokesley.