DUDLEY LOCAL BOARD OF HEALTH ELECTION.
Isaac opposed all Civil Liberty!
Isaac opposed Repeal of the Corn Laws!
Isaac opposed Free Trade!
Isaac opposed Parliamentary Reform!
Isaac opposed and opposes the Press in the Board Rooms!
Isaac opposes Information and Knowledge as the basis of Local Legislation!
Isaac and his Friends opposed Economy in the Workhouse, when it was proved each Pauper cost 1s. 7½d. per week more than Birmingham and Wolverhampton; increasing the Rates £422 per year.
WOOD AND HOLLIER
Reduced this Extravagance;—What Isaac has been Isaac will be, if you Vote for his Nominees.
⁂ Vote for Hollier, Browne, Fereday, Smith, Wood, and England.
THE LOCAL BOARD OF HEALTH.
THE ELECTION.
Fellow Electors,
Doubtless it is advisable we should Elect Men to serve on this Board rather than One Man and so many Looking Glasses, or things to reflect his will and pleasure simply.
Look at the two Lists already submitted to you—First, and mark this—Mr. Isaac Badger proposes Messrs. J. R. Tilley, George Bagott, John Marsh, William Beddard, Sen., E. Whitfield, and W. Jacam, and no doubt he is sanguine enough to suppose you will do as you are told, and Elect his nominees. Of this select List you will be better able to form an opinion, when you have fully considered the extent to which any one of these Gentlemen has ever been mixed up in matters of real popular service—with how many of the People’s Institutions or Philanthropic Schemes of this country is any one of these persons identified—and how much, or how little, rather, you have any reason to expect from them in any matter of wide or general bearing on your interests. “Grapes cannot be gathered from thorns, nor figs from thistles?” so that, with all forbearance for the Gentlemen whose names have thus been dragged from their natural and proper retirement, your attention is now invited to the following List of WORTHY Candidates for your support and interest, viz:—The Rev. Doctor Browne, Mr. Richard Smith, Mr. Elliott Hollier, Mr. S. D. Fereday, Mr. W. C. Wood, Mr. George J. England.
These are, as you know, well-tried Men! These as you know, have been your consistent Friends and Advocates for years; not pandering (like others) in some Petty (or even Pig) question for favours and smiles, with the view of making that favour and those smiles, hereafter, the excuse for tyrannizing over you in large questions; but who have striven from time to time for your welfare and the general good—ever resting satisfied in the midst of their efforts that time would enable you to see that Truth is ever consistent with itself—Liberality of Sentiment ever an instinct that should be easily traced through the entire life, political or social, of those who lay claim to it. And now
1st.—Whose efforts have been the most determined to secure in this parish Comfortable Homes for the Poor? Who persuaded the Landlords, that whilst they were getting from 15 to 20 per cent. interest upon the miserable dens they call houses, it was politic they should pay the Local Rates?
2nd.—Who have been the consistent supporters of all Educational Schemes, by which the employer is secured an intelligent and moral servant, in the place of a mere tool, without thought or respect for himself; and in opposition to that other weakly theory that insists upon keeping the people ignorant, lest they should discover the ignorance of those called their “betters?”
3rd.—Who have (and without ostentation) supported schemes of Public Amusement and Relaxation? Those who believe that the “Great Unwashed” are often whiter and cleaner than those who sit in high places;—those who, as before stated, are anxious to promote the general good!
4th.—Who have, from first to last, advocated the exposure of all they do to fair criticism, and voted for the Admission of Reporters to Newspapers, in the very face of other gentlemen who desire a secrecy as strict as the Inquisition of old?
5th—Who is it—that can create any hope within you, that whatever of rottenness there may be, even in the rottenest end of Dudley, shall be cleansed in due time?—
The answer—you have already anticipated, is that which will determine you to Vote for the Rev. Dr. Browne, Messrs. Richard Smith, Elliott Hollier, S. D. Fereday, W. C. Wood, and G. J. England.
Be not deceived! These Gentlemen are recommended for your adoption because it is evident you may trace in their past conduct that openness and that independence which must ever constitute true manhood; that intelligent persistence in efforts for the general good, which is the best guarantee of any “Trusteeship” being wisely sustained; Who have displayed an indifference to be governed by any one man—or even by any doubtful hero—whose chief recommendation could be, that he “swears heartily,” and “foams” angrily when he finds any one near his august presence that deigns to think for himself.
Look to it well, you men of Dudley and the District, that you select only such men as can act for themselves, without first asking what Mr. So-and-so thinks. Depend upon it, that in this case, as in many others, “it is better to bear the ills we (are alleged to) have, than fly to others we know not of!”
“AREOPAGITICA.”
TO THE INTELLIGENT RATEPAYERS OF DUDLEY.
Gentlemen,
A “Wellwisher,” certainly not to the Town of Dudley, has thought proper to insult you by the publication of a scurrilous Handbill, reflecting upon the Gentlemen retiring during the present year from office in your Local Board of Health. A more disgraceful production, and one more calculated to serve purely party purposes at the expense of truth, it has seldom been my lot to read. The Gentlemen there alluded to have exercised no deception—have been guilty of no trickery. They have made no professions which have not been faithfully carried out in practice. As to recklessness and extravagance compare their amount of Assessment and Rates with those of the Gentlemen “Wellwisher” so magniloquently recommends to your notice; WHILST THE FORMER REPRESENT PROPERTY PAYING UPWARDS OF £650 PER RATE, THE LATTER, OR MR. BADGER’S NOMINEES, PAY ONLY £57—the best answer to any assertion as to their expending so much money of their own for the mere pleasure of spending yours.
“Wellwisher” then appeals to the Ratepayers of Freebodies, Netherton, Woodside, and Holly Hall, evidently wishing to excite a hostile feeling between the Ratepayers of the districts and the Town itself. He asks “what has been done to our streets and thoroughfares?” Why, kept in as good repair and as well attended to as during the supremacy of his friends upon the old Highway Board; but doubtless “Wellwisher” wishes sufficiently well to the Tradesmen and “Shopkeepers” as to desire them not only to keep in repair the “streets, roads, and thoroughfares,” but also to make them, for the benefit of those who have sold and bought land at a great profit, and built houses in these localities, a thing always refused by the Highway Board as well as the Board of Health.
Beyond this, why does not “Wellwisher” tell you what his immaculate saving friends are endeavouring to do at the present moment, viz.—to throw the expenses of the repairs of the roads generally upon the rates, and which if effected will go far to double the payments upon the Town itself. This has already in part been done,—the Turnpike Commissioners have refused to repair (which has always before been done by them) that part of the street leading to Wolverhampton, situate between St. James’s Church and the Turnpike Gate, and without any notice having been given to the Board or their Surveyor, consequently this part of your streets has not been attended to or cleansed for many weeks. If it be not for mere “deception and trickery,” why does “Wellwisher” wish you to suppose that the Rates levied by the Local Board of Health are something new, and that without its establishment such payments would not have been required, whilst it admits of easy proof that the Rates paid by you during the past three years, under the management of the Board, have been considerably less than those formerly levied by the Town Commissioners and Highway Board.
As to the salaries paid to the various officers, why does not “Wellwisher” [?] go back to the palmy days of the old Town Act Commissioners and Highway Board, and tell us of the payments made in secret in those times? why does he not refer to the appointment of the salary of the Clerk to the Guardians, which was fixed, in spite of the Poor Law Board, at a higher amount than they thought necessary? why does he not refer to the job as to the appointment of the Relieving Officer as Master of the Dudley Workhouse?—because, forsooth, he happened to be a relative of one of those who prates most and pays least. “The labourer is worthy of his hire,” but if their salaries be too high, let their work be ascertained and paid for accordingly; but far better a good round sum at once, which is known to all, than allow an officer to eke it out by summonses and expenses, obtained from poor people before the magistrates.
He talks about sewerage, and the probability of its being carried into effect, estimating its amount at an extravagant rate. Will “Wellwisher” have the hardihood to assert that drainage is not wanted, when it is a well-known fact that, with great natural facilities, Dudley is one of the worst seweraged towns in the whole kingdom; that there is not a drain in any street sufficient to take away the water from the various cellars and lower parts of the houses; and to this fact alone is it to be attributed its great and extraordinary mortality, the average duration of life here being only 19 years: or would he rather that these things should exist than that any attempt should be made to improve them. “Wellwisher” then pathetically alludes to the Poor Man’s Pigs, very probably not only having a great sympathy for them, but also for the mire in which they wallow; but will those whose feelings he wishes to excite, believe that very many of his professing friends actually signed a memorial to the Board, calling strongly for the removal of Pigs from the entire of the Town District, and which was objected to by some of those he so harshly anathematizes. Doubtless, too, he approves of some of those high in authority keeping pigs in such a condition that the filth from their styes should drain into his neighbour’s sitting or bed room. “Wellwisher” next endeavours to enlist the sympathies of others by allusion to the Rating of Tenements’ Act, falsely asserting that those who were in favour of its introduction were themselves exempt from any effect of its operation. “Let the galled jade wince!” Its promoters supported it from just and proper motives, and not from the wish that their smaller dwellings should be drained and cleansed at the expense of other people.
FELLOW RATEPAYERS.—“Wellwisher’s” publication is nothing more than an impudent attempt to set Town against Country, and Country against Town, in order to relieve the Country part of the District of their fair share of the Rates at the expense of the heavily taxed Ratepayers of the Town. It is a disgraceful attack upon individuals who have devoted much valuable time to serve the Town, and who had the “unblushing effrontery” to endeavour to do right,—who have not sought either to do their fellow ratepayers “Brown,” or “Badger” them, but to act independently and faithfully for their best interests, and which time alone will fully prove. If you still wish to have men to represent you, who are disposed to continue to act thus, do not be dictated to by Mr. Badger, but Vote for
R. SMITH, ESQ.
S. D. FEREDAY, ESQ.
REV. DR. BROWNE.
MR. ELLIOTT HOLLIER.
“ W. C. WOOD.
“ G. J. ENGLAND.
I am, Fellow Ratepayers,
YOUR WELLWISHER, AND ALSO A LOVER OF TRUTH.
Dudley, March 1856.
May 27th, 1856. After twelve days trial in London, William Palmer, Surgeon, of Rugeley, Staffordshire, was found guilty of poisoning his racing companion, Mr. J. P. Cook, at the Shrewsbury races. Palmer poisoned poor Cook with strychnine for the purpose of robbing him of a large sum of money which Cook had won at the races. Palmer was hanged at Stafford Gaol for this dastardly offence on June 14th following; the murderous wretch maintained the most callous indifference to all around him to the last. He was well known in Dudley.
May 29th, 1856. This day was kept as a general holiday throughout the country in commemoration of the Peace. Old Dudley Castle, which had “braved the Battle and the Breeze” for upwards of 800 years, was illuminated with a grand display of fireworks.
Died, August 19th, 1856, Thomas Badger, Esq., of the “Hill House,” Dudley. This genial, but blunt and frank old gentleman, was one of Dudley’s worthiest sons; his familiar figure daily moving in our midst, secured the esteem of all good people, and his quiet and unostentatious benevolence has gladdened the hearts of widows and orphans, when none were allowed to witness the tear of the giver. Mr. Badger (like a great many more of our Dudley worthies) began life in very humble circumstances, and rose step by step until he became Chief Magistrate of this Borough. He was for a lengthened period (along with his brother, Isaac Badger) very extensively engaged in the glass trade, the nail trade, the coal trade, and iron trades of this district, and it is not too much to say that Messrs. Badger Brothers at all times exercised the most potent influence upon the industries of Dudley and neighbourhood. As a large employer of labour, he was much respected by all his workpeople, and a cordial feeling always existed between the head of the firm and the numerous employes both in the ironworks and collieries. In religion he was a sound Churchman, and in politics he belonged to the Tory party, but Mr. Badger was not a rabid politician, for he had the honour of once being requested to stand as a Candidate for the Borough of Dudley, on Independent principles, but he declined the honour. He was a most shrewd and active Magistrate for many years, and as Mr. Badger lived through perilous times his decisions on the Bench were always tempered with a wonderful insight into the human character, accepting Mercy and Justice as his motto. His personal friendships created a halo of kindly feeling and generous sentiment amongst a large circle of personal friends and acquaintances, which will be long remembered in Dudley, and his death, at the ripe old age of 75 years, was universally regretted. A marble monument in St. Edmund’s Church records his numerous virtues.
Died, suddenly, August 23rd, 1856, Mr. Joseph Pitchfork, Master for 30 years of Baylies’s School, Tower Street. Mr. Pitchfork was a man of very deep and extensive intellectual acquirements, and a more kind-hearted and genial soul never lived. Through his assiduity and zeal, for he was a real lover of his work, his educational training in Baylies’s School has bequeathed to this town and locality some of the foremost and most eminent commercial men in our midst, and it is a source of great pleasure to the author of these lines to witness and observe in his walk in life so many evidences of the estimable teaching of the late Mr. Pitchfork. So soon as his lamentable death became known, the following letter was issued, and a public meeting was convened at Baylies’s School Room, expressing condolence and sympathy with Mrs. Pitchfork and her family. A Committee of upwards of 60 gentlemen, many of them old pupils, was formed “for the purpose of raising a fund in grateful recognition of his valuable services rendered to the cause of education.”
Saracen’s Head Inn, Dudley,
August 24th, 1856.
Dear Sir,
At a Meeting held this morning, at the above Inn, of a few Friends of the late Mr. Joseph Pitchfork, most of whom were educated by him in their youth, the following Resolutions were adopted:—
“That considering the very great and valuable services rendered to the cause of Education by the Deceased, who held the appointment of Master of Baylies’s School, in Dudley, for upwards of thirty years, it is desirable that a Subscription be entered into for presentation to his family, as a suitable Memorial of the gratitude of his Friends, Pupils, and Admirers, and in recognition of his eminent public services.”
“That Messrs. John Finch, John Castree, John H. Smith, James Worley, William Insull, Frederick Stokes, William Timmins, and Edmund Long, all of Dudley, do form themselves into a Committee for effecting the above purpose.”
“That a Meeting be held at the School Room, in Tower Street, on Friday next, the 29th instant, at Eight o’clock p.m., when arrangements will be made and Subscriptions received, and that Subscribers and Friends be respectfully requested to give their attendance on the occasion.”
Should you be prevented attending the Meeting, you or your Friends will oblige by paying or remitting Subscriptions to any Member of the Committee, or to myself at any time.
I am also requested to state that such Pupils and Friends as may be desirous of showing their respect to the Deceased’s memory, and of accompanying his body to the grave, will assemble at Baylies’s School, next Sunday morning at Ten a.m.
I am, dear sir,
Yours respectfully,
JOHN H. SMITH, Hon. Sec.
Kate’s Hill, Dudley.
A very successful appeal was made on this very worthy occasion, and the following friends assisted in the cause:—