ABSTRACT
On Thursday, 17 April 1834, London’s stock market erupted in a turbulent session. The Bank of England’s changing policy on debt management contributed to the market’s swings that day, but so did popular contention. “The depression was accelerated,” reported the Morning Chronicle of 18 April,
by reports of disturbances having broken out in Merthyr Tydvil. This, however, we are assured on the best authority, is not the fact, the latest accounts from that place not alluding to any such circumstance. Fears are, however, entertained in the city that the occurrences at Oldham will lead to manifestations of feeling in other and more populous towns in the kingdom. The public notice which has been given of a General Meeting of the Trades Unions of the Metropolis and its vicinity next Monday, to present a Petition to the King for the remission of the sentence on the Dorchester Unionists, has also caused some apprehensions for the maintenance of tranquillity in the city. (MC 18 April 1834: 4)
