Reminiscences of Charles Bradlaugh

by G. W. Foote

Mr. Bradlaugh, of course, did not in any sense sacrifice me. It would have been contemptible on my part to let him bear any responsibility for my own deliberate action, in which he was not at all implicated, and if I had not been tendered as a witness I should have tried to tender myself.

After half an hour's deliberation the jury found Mr. Bradlaugh not guilty. Standing up for the verdict, with pale set face, the grateful little "not" fell upon his ear, and his rigidity relaxed. Tears started to my eyes, and I saw the tears in his eyes as I squeezed his hand in speechless congratulation.

My own trial followed Mr. Bradlaugh's, and I was not found guilty. Three members of the jury held out against a verdict that would have disgraced a free country; and as the prosecution despaired of obtaining a verdict while Lord Coleridge presided at the trial, the Attorney-General was asked to allow the abandonment of proceedings. This he granted, the case was struck off the list, and I returned to my prison cell at Holloway.

Let me now go back to the crowning incident of that long struggle between Charles Bradlaugh and the House of Commons. On May 10, 1881, the House passed a resolution authorising the Sergeant-at-Arms to prevent Mr. Bradlaugh from entering. On June 20, the jury gave a verdict in Mr. Newdegate's favor for the £500 penalty and costs. A motion for a new trial failed, and Mr. Bradlaugh appealed to the country. Enthusiastic meetings were held in his behalf, and he prepared a fresh coup. It had to be something striking, and it was. On the morning of August 3 Palace Yard and Westminster Hall were thronged with his supporters. Every one was armed with a petition, which he had a legal right to take to the House of Commons. Mr. Bradlaugh himself drove up in a hansom cab, and entered the precincts of the House by the private door. He made his way to the door of the House itself and tried to enter by a sudden effort, but he was seized by fourteen officials and stalwart policemen, picked for the work, and thrust back through the private passage into Palace Yard. Not expecting such indignity, he contested every inch of the ground. Inspector Denning said he never thought that one man could have offered such resistance. The small muscles of both his arms were ruptured, and a subsequent attack of erysipelas put his life in jeopardy.

When he was finally thrust on to the pavement in Palace Yard his coat was torn and the rest of his garments were disarranged. His face was livid with the intense exertion when I saw him a minute afterwards. There he stood, a great mass of panting, valiant manhood, his features set like granite, and his eyes fixed upon the doorway before him. He seemed to see nothing but that doorway. I spoke to him, and he seemed not to hear. I believe a mighty struggle was going on within him, perhaps the greatest struggle of his life. He had suffered a frightful indignity, he must have been tempted to avenge it, and he had but to hold up his hand to bring around and behind him the myriads who stood outside the railings. The action would have been impolitic, but what a temptation he crushed down, and what an effort it necessitated. Never was his heroic nature more sorely tried. He justified his mastery of others by his mastery of himself. How small in comparison seemed the mob of his enemies! I never admired him more than at that moment. He was superb, sublime. They had wound their meshes about him, and the lion had burst them. One swift, daring stroke had frustrated all their plans. He who was to be quietly suppressed by resolutions of the House had cut the knot of their policy asunder, made himself the hero of the hour, and fixed the nation's eyes on his splendid audacity.

Reaction set in after that terrible struggle, and he accepted a chair that was brought him. Several members passed as he sat there. One of them was the coward, Frank Hugh O'Donnell. He had a lady on his arm, and he passed with her between himself and Mr. Bradlaugh, so that her dress trailed over the hero's feet. It was a wretched display of insolence and cowardice. But the lady must be exonerated. She looked annoyed, her cheeks reddened, and her eyelids fell. It is so hard for a woman to resist the attraction of courage, and the coward by her side must have suffered in her estimation.

There was a crowded meeting that evening at the Hall of Science, at which I had the honor of speaking, Mr. Bradlaugh's greeting was tremendous. Two days afterwards he was seriously ill.

During that great constitutional struggle I was present at many "Bradlaugh" meetings, and I never witnessed such enthusiasm as he excited. No man of my time had such a devoted following.

The last "Bradlaugh" demonstration I attended was on February 15, 1883, in Trafalgar-square. Seventy or eighty thousand people were present. There were four speakers, and three of them are dead, Joseph Arch being the sole survivor. Mr. Adams, of Northampton, lived to see his old friend take his seat and do good work in the House of Commons, became himself Mayor of Northampton, and died universally respected by his fellow-townsmen; William Sharman, a brave, true man, is buried at Preston; and Charles Bradlaugh sleeps his long sleep at Woking.

For another twelve months I attended no public meetings except the silent ones on the exercise ground of Holloway Gaol, But I saw Mr. Bradlaugh at several demonstrations on various subjects after my imprisonment, and I could perceive no abatement of his popularity. He had his enemies and detractors, but the spontaneous outburst of feeling at his death proved his hold on the popular heart.