Claiming the Streets

Paul O'Leary

Description

Street processions were a defining feature of life in the Victorian town. They were diverse in character and took place regularly throughout the year in all towns. They provided opportunities for men and women to display themselves in public, carrying banners and flags and accompanied by musical bands. Much of the history of nineteenth-century Wales has been written around political demonstrations and revolt, but this book examines how urban communities in Victorian Wales created inclusive civic identities by using the streets for peaceful processions.

Sujets

• Histoire
• South Wales
• Great Britain
• History
• Europe

Informations

• Publié par: University of Wales Press
• Date de parution: 15 octobre 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781783162758
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 4 Mo

Extrait

Claiming the Streets

Processions and Urban Culture in South Wales,c.1830–1880

Paul O’Leary

University of Wales Press

C L A I M I N G T H E S T R E E T S

Claiming the Streets Processions and Urban Culture in South Wales,c.1830–1880

PA U L O ’ L E A R Y

C A R D I F F U N I V E R S I T Y O F WA L E S P R E S S 2 0 1 2

© Paul O’Leary, 2012

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any material form (including photocopying or storing it in any medium by electronic means and whether or not transiently or incidentally to some other use of this publication) without the written permission of the copyright owner. Applications for the copyright owner’s written permission to reproduce any part of this publication should be addressed to the University of Wales Press, 10 Columbus Walk, Brigantine Place, Cardiff CF10 4UP.

www.uwp.co.uk

British Library CIP Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978-0-7083-2172-0 e-ISBN 978-0-7083-2542-1

The right of Paul O’Leary to be identiîed as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 79 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Typeset by Mark Heslington Ltd, Scarborough, North Yorkshire Printed by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham, Wiltshire

List of Illustrations and Tables Preface

Contents

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 Introduction 1 1 Street Processions and Ritual in the Victorian Town 9 2 Town and Region: the Urban Context 26 3 Protest, Processions and Stability 51 4 Ordering the Streets: Friendly Society Processions 79 5 Sobering the Streets: Temperance and Teetotal Processions 101 6 Sacralising the Streets: Religion and Urban Space 123 7 Diversity on the Streets: Corpus Christi and the Salvation Army in the 1870s 144

Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index

163 177 217 237

List of Illustrations and Tables

Fig. 1:coming of age procession of the third marquis of Bute at The Cardiff.Illustrated London News, 26 September 1868. By permission of the National Library of Wales.

Fig. 2: Sunday School processionists, Cardiff.Illustrated London News, 26 September 1868. By permission of the National Library of Wales.

Fig. 3: A funeral procession at Bedwellty, Monmouthshire.Illustrated London News, 1 July 1865. By permission of the National Library of Wales.

Fig. 4: Victoria Hall and Assembly Rooms, Newport.Illustrated London News, 1 February 1868. By permission of the National Library of Wales. Table 2.1: Population of the Main Coastal Towns in South Wales, 1831–81 Table 2.2: Population of the Main Industrial Settlements in South Wales, 1831–81 Table 4.1: Registered Friendly Societies in 1840 and 1876 in Glamorgan and Monmouthshire

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Preface

he origins of this book lie in an interest in how some Irish migrants celebrated St Patrick’s Day by holding ‘respectable’ processions res T ults of that research were published in my earlier book,Immigration through the streets of towns in nineteenth-century south Wales. The and Integration: the Irish in Wales, 1798–1922It seemed to me (2000). then that a study of processions had the potential to unlock some of the processes by which individuals and groups come to feel at home in strange places and how new identities were inscribed in public spaces. At root, it seemed, this was about a process of integration in urban life and about exploring ways in which such involvement could be displayed to the wider populace. My interest in the annual Corpus Christi procession at Cardiff, which is discussed below, also grew out of a concern with examining the history of the Irish and how they entrenched a minority religion – Catholi- cism – in public life. At the same time as developing this interest in how Irish migrants and their descendants used public space, it became clear to me that the theme was one which went beyond this particular group. Developing this idea further and turning it into a coherent research project in its own right took place in collaboration with Neil Evans, one of the most experienced urban historians of Wales. Together we submitted a bid to the (now defunct) Board of Celtic Studies of the University of Wales to employ a researcher for a year to collate primary material on processions in south Wales during the periodc.1830–1914. Following the success of that bid we were able to employ Dr Mike Benbough-Jackson, whose unerring eye for relevant material allowed us to compile a database that laid the basis for additional research once the funding had come to an end. His researches raised additional questions to those we had antici- pated, and I should like to record my thanks to him here for his stimulating contribution to the project. This book is the îrst major outcome of that project, and the intention is to follow it with a co-authored volume on how the processional culture of south Wales changed in the period c.1875–1914. In writing this book I have been particularly indebted to Neil Evans for his collaboration on the broader project of which this work is a part, and for extremely fruitful discussions of the key themes discussed here. I have

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C L A I M I N G T H E S T R E E T S

also drawn on position papers written for the joint project that sought to clarify the general questions we would be addressing. His extensive knowledge of the wider urban historiography has been invaluable, and this book would have been poorer without his ready advice and counsel. Our projected co-authored book on the period between 1875 and 1914 will open up the theme of how processional culture developed in south Wales at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries. It is anticipated that that book will also point towards develop- ments in the use of public space in the region between the two World Wars. Other people have been generous in sharing sources with me. Emeritus Professor Ieuan Gwynedd Jones provided me with a copy of the third edition of Samuel Lewis’s two-volumeA Topographical Dictionary of Wales(1848). This is one of the many kindnesses of his that I have bene- îted from over the years and it is a pleasure to record my thanks to him once again. I am grateful to Bill Jones, Keith Snell and Steven Thompson for providing me with valuable references. I am also indebted to Richard Ireland for alerting me to some important legal cases relating to Salvation Army processions and for leading an historian with no legal expertise to the sources for them. The anonymous publisher’s reader made many valu- able suggestions, not all of which I have been able to act on. I am also grateful to Matthew Cragoe and Chris Williams for agreeing to let me re-publish some material on the Volunteer movement that appeared in the book they edited,Wales at War: Society, Politics and Religion in the Nine- teenth and Twentieth Centuries(Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2007). Similarly, I am also grateful to Aled Jones and Huw Pryce, editors of theWelsh History Review, for permission to include some material on Corpus Christi processions at Cardiff from an article that appeared in that journal in 2008.

This book was înished during a period of study leave from the Depart- ment of History and Welsh History at Aberystwyth University, and I should like to thank my colleagues for making possible this leave of absence. I should also like to express my gratitude to Aberystwyth University for providing a subvention in aid of publication from the Hughes Parry Fund. Sarah Lewis and her colleagues at the University of Wales Press have been unfailingly helpful in smoothing the process of getting this book to press and I am grateful to them for their assistance. Jasmine Donahaye’s careful copy-editing improved the clarity of the text and I am grateful to her for her labours. Jennifer Lane has been more important to the production of this book than she realises and I wish to record my thanks for her consistent support over many years.

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