Editing Samuel Bamford (section)

==Radicalism==
Bamford's radical political beliefs led him to be heavily involved in resistance to the British government and to witness to several important historical events relating to working-class advocacy and public defiance.

===Arrests for treason===
In 1817 he was remanded in jail to the New Bailey Prison in [[Salford]] on suspicion of high treason, on account of his political activities. From there he was taken to London and examined before the Privy Council, presided over by [[Henry Addington, 1st Viscount Sidmouth|Lord Sidmouth]] as Home Secretary. After promising future good behaviour, Bamford was released and allowed to return to his cottage at Middleton with his wife Jemima.<ref>T. A. Lockett (1968): ''Three Lives: Samuel Bamford, Alfred Darbyshire, Ellen Wilkinson'', London: University of London Press; pp. 9–10.</ref>

In August 1819, he led a group from Middleton to St Peter's Fields for a meeting that pressed for parliamentary reform and repeal of the [[Corn Laws]]. There they witnessed the [[Peterloo Massacre]], and Bamford was arrested and charged with treason. Although there was no evidence shown that either he or any of his group had been involved in the violence, he was found guilty of inciting a riot and sentenced to a year in [[Lincoln (HM Prison)|Lincoln prison]].

The massacre had a deep impact on Bamford, convincing him that state power always succeeded against radical militancy. He came to be seen as a voice for radical reform, but opposed to activism involving physical force.<ref name="ODNB" /> Bamford responded to the claim that his political group had used violence to pursue their reforming ends, in ''Passages in the Life of a Radical and Early Days'' (1840–1844), "It was not until we became infested by spies, incendiaries, and their dupes – distracting, misleading, and betraying – that physical force was mentioned amongst us. After that our moral power waned, and what we gained by the accession of demagogues, we lost by their criminal violence, and the estrangement of real friends."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Bamford |first=Samuel |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ycTUAAAAMAAJ |title=Passages in the Life of a Radical and Early Days |date=1893 |publisher=Unwin |language=en}}</ref>

===Poetry and other writings===
Bamford was the author of poetry mostly in standard English, but of those in dialect, several that showed sympathy with the conditions of the working classes became widely popular.<ref>Brian Hollingworth, ed. (1977) ''Songs of the People''. Manchester: Manchester University Press; p. 151.</ref> Around 1840 he also became associated with the [[The Sun Inn Group|Sun Inn Group]], a collective of fellow working class poets who met regularly at the Sun Inn on Long Millgate in Manchester, where his status as a Peterloo veteran made him an inspiration for younger peers.<ref name=":10">{{Cite book |last1=Dyos |first1=Harold James |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Hdtvi4I39IEC |title=The Victorian City: Images and Realities |last2=Wolff |first2=Michael |date=1999 |publisher=Taylor & Francis |isbn=978-0-415-19324-5 |language=en}}</ref> This was also when he authored ''Passages in the Life of a Radical'' (1840–1844), his authoritative history of the condition of the working classes in the years after the [[Battle of Waterloo]].

In 1850, he published ''Tawk o'Seawth Lankeshur, by Samhul Beamfort,'' which, following the first one written in standard English, even adds a second title page and publishing information in local dialect. It begins:

<poem>{{lang|en|Good lorjus days whot wofo times ar' these,
Pot bos ar scant, and dear ar seawl an cheese,
Eawr Gotum guides us seely sheep dun rob,
Oytch public trust is cheyng'd into a job;
Leys, taxes, customs, meyn our plucks to throb.}}<ref>Samuel Bamford, ''[https://books.google.com/books?id=T08YcA3BFnEC&dq=1850%3A%20Tawk%20o%27Seawth%20Lankeshur%2C%20by%20Samuel%20Beamfort&pg=PA1 Dialect of South Lancashire: or, Tim Bobbin's Tummus and Meary.]'' Manchester, p. 3.</ref></poem>

Continuing his interest in dialect, he also compiled ''The Dialect of South Lancashire'' in 1854.

===Death and legacy===
In the 1871 England Census, taken the year before Bamford's death, he is recorded as living at 109 Hall Street, [[Harpurhey]], as a widower, with a widowed housekeeper, Elizabeth Hilton.<ref>Class: ''RG10''; Piece: ''4065''; Folio: ''169''; Page: ''20''; GSU roll: ''846347.'' Ancestry.com. ''1871 England Census'' [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004. ''Census Returns of England and Wales, 1871''. Kew, Surrey, England: The National Archives of the UK (TNA): Public Record Office (PRO), 1871.</ref>

[[Image:SamBamfordPlaque.jpg|thumb|right|Plaque marking where the Middleton contingent gathered before being led by Bamford to [[Peterloo Massacre|St Peter's Fields]]]]
[[Image:Samuel Bamford Obelisk Portrait.jpg|thumb|right|Relief of Samuel Bamford on the obelisk in Middleton Cemetery]]
Bamford died in Harpurhey on the 13th of April 1872 at the age of 84 and was given a public funeral in Middleton on the 20th, attended by several thousand people.<ref>''Manchester, England, Church of England Deaths and Burials, 1813–1985'' [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013. ''Anglican Parish Registers''. Manchester, England: Manchester Libraries, Information and Archives.</ref> A memorial obelisk unveiled in Middleton Cemetery in 1877 reads in part, "Bamford was a reformer when to be so was unsafe, and he suffered for his faith."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Samuel Bamford Memorial |work=National Recording Project |publisher=Public Monument and Sculpture Association |url=http://pmsa.cch.kcl.ac.uk/MR/MR-ROC19.htm |accessdate=2008-02-15 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716184014/http://pmsa.cch.kcl.ac.uk/MR/MR-ROC19.htm |archivedate=2011-07-16}}</ref>

In 2000 ''The Diaries of Samuel Bamford'' were released, edited by [[Robert Poole (historian)|Robert Poole]] and a critical Martin Hewitt, according to whom "Bamford's career, not least its virulent anti-Chartism, have tainted him with reformism, and left him to be invoked as an example of the weaknesses and limitations of early nineteenth-century working-class political assertion."<ref>Martin Hewitt, "Radicalism and the Victorian Working Class: The Case of Samuel Bamford", ''The Historical Journal,'' Vol. 34, No. 4, 1991, pp. 873–892.</ref>

=== Influence on Literature ===
Samuel Bamford's ''Passages in the Life of a Radical'' (1839–41) is widely recognized not only as a historical account of working-class radicalism but also as an influential source for later literary works. [[George Eliot]] drew extensively on Bamford's writings while researching her 1866 novel ''[[Felix Holt, the Radical]]''. In her diary, Eliot noted reading passages from ''Passages in the Life of a Radical'' during the writing process. Bamford’s political views—his advocacy of lawful protest, rejection of violence, emphasis on education, and moral improvement—find clear parallels in the character of Felix Holt, whose political stance closely mirrors Bamford's brand of moderate radicalism.<ref name=":3">{{citation |author=Christopher Hobson |title=The Radicalism of Felix Holt: George Eliot and the pioneers of labor |date=1998 |periodical=Victorian Literature and Culture |pages=19–39 |location=United States of America |publisher=Cambridge University Press}}<!-- auto-translated from German by Module:CS1 translator --></ref>