Scotland's Unsung Heroes

 

Peter McDouall (1814 – 1854) was a significant figure in Chartism. Imprisoned twice, dying at a relatively young age, it is not an exaggeration to say that McDouall gave his life for Chartism. The Chartist newspaper, the Northern Star said of McDouall ‘When he came among you, he had good property in Scotland, a profession and a practice, which realised him several hundred pounds annually, besides a large sum of accumulated money in the bank. All of which has been spent long ago in the advocacy of the rights of the people.’

Peter McDouall was born in Newton Stewart, and served as an apprentice to the local surgeon before going on to study at Glasgow and Edinburgh. He subsequently moved to  Burnley practice and then to Ramsbottom. He came to Chartism radicalised by his exposure to the bleak factory conditions becoming involved in the Chartist movement as a delegate for Ashton under Lyne, a militant Chartist centre with which McDouall was to be closely associated for the rest of his life.

McDouall was a foremost advocate of physical force and, later, of the ‘sacred month’, the Grand National Holiday (or General Strike). He was a proponent  for the arming the people, in defence of their constitutional rights.

He also became a staunch advocate of the power of the ordinary worker. He explained:

‘The Trades are equal to the middle class in talent, far more powerful in means and much more united in action’ and again ‘The agitation for the Charter has afforded one of the greatest examples in modern history of the real might of the labourers. In the conflict millions have appeared on the stage and the mind of the masses has burst from its shell and begun to flourish and expand.’

In August, he was sentenced at Chester to twelve months’ imprisonment for sedition. On his release he married the daughter of a warder at Chester Castle, where he had served his sentence.

McDouall spoke at many  meetings around Scotland. Supporters of moderate persuasion  refused to sponsor McDouall’s meetings where he would denounce any alliance with the middle class. McDouall, however, reined in his revolutionary rhetoric.  McDouall understood the need to avoid riots and premature uprisings which culminated in defeat and demoralisation.

This did not mean that he had renounced the use of force if the authorities resorted to violence in an attempt to crush Chartism.

McDouall sought to turn to the newly-forming trade unions and win them over. However, some Chartists saw the trade unions not as possible allies but as rivals.

McDouall was also an opponent of the British Empire.

‘Let all who have possessions in India, or all who profit by what you call ‘our Indian possessions’ be off to India, and fight a thousand battles for them as they like…but let them not mock our degradation by asking us, working people to fight alongside them, either for our ‘possessions’ in India, or anywhere else, seeing that we do not possess a single acre of ground, or any other description of property in our own country, much less colonies, or ‘possessions’ in any other, having been robbed of everything we ever earned by the middle and upper classes… On the contrary, we have an interest in prospective loss or ruin of all such ‘possessions’, seeing they are but instruments of power in the hands of our domestic oppressors.’

 As the principal supporter of the general strike movement the government offered a £100 reward for his apprehension, but he escaped to France, where he lived for two years returning to Britain without prosecution during 1844 to resume his life as an activist.

In 1848 he spoke at Glasgow, and then in Edinburgh, where there were shouts of ‘Vive la Republique’ and ‘Bread and Revolution’ after the meeting.

He then again unsuccessfully contested the parliamentary seat of Carlisle.

Charged with yet another insurrectionist conspiracy he ended up doing two years’ hard-labour gaol for his part in the abortive Ashton-under-Lyne rising. His family suffered badly during his incarceration, and a daughter, aged 10, died. After his release McDouall took his family and emigrated to Australia in 1854, but died soon after arriving.