The rioters, numbering about five hundred or…
November 1831 CE
Work on the Clifton Suspension Bridge had been halted and Isambard Kingdom Brunel had been sworn in as a special constable.
The mayor, Charles Pinney, has requested the assistance of the cavalry as a precaution and a troop of the 3rd Dragoon Guards and a squadron of the 14th Light Dragoons had been sent to Bristol under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Thomas Brereton.
Brereton had not wished to incite the crowd and even ordered the squadron from the 14th out of the city after they had successfully dispersed a crowd.
Seeing this as a victory, the riots had continued, and eventually Brereton had to call on the 3rd and 14th to restore order and he eventually led a charge with drawn swords through the mob in Queen Square.
Four rioters are killed and eighty-six wounded, although many more are believed to have perished in the fires set by the rioters.
Along with the commander of the 3rd Dragoons troop, Captain Warrington, Brereton will later be court-martialled for leniency, but Brereton will shoot himself before the conclusion of his trial.
Approximately one hundred of those involved will be tried in January 1832 by Chief Justice Tindal.
Four men will be hanged despite a petition of ten thousand Bristolian signatures, which had been given to King William IV.
The mayor, Pinney, will be tried for negligence but exonerated.
Regions
North Europe
View →Subregions
