ABSTRACT
October 21, 1795
IN THE FALL OF 1795, the government of William Pitt was under increasing pressure to change its policy with regard to the counter-revolutionary war with France. There was widespread public consensus, especially among the lower orders, that the famine which had swept through the country was integral to the economic hardships incurred by the war. Public protest, sometimes peaceful and sometimes violent, was mounting throughout the period leading up to George III’s speech from the throne scheduled for October 29, 1795. The speech was the subject of much scrutiny not only because the war with France was going badly and people were starving but also because the Ministry had received serious setbacks in its attempts to convict radicals associated with the London Corresponding Society. The acquittal of the radicals Thomas Hardy, John Horne Tooke, and John Thelwall was publicly embarrassing to the government and buoyed the forces of reform both in Parliament and in the streets. 1 In short, the Ministry was losing the propaganda war against reform and was desperate for a means to justify not only its foreign policy but also its incursion on the rights of dissident citizens.
