The wonderful historical drama, Gentleman Jack, is filmed in the part of Yorkshire where I live, featuring lots of places that I know well. It has therefore caught my imagination and led me to research many aspects of local history that I was previously unaware of. So, among many other things I have learned about the history of Calderdale, I now know much about the 1835 Halifax Election, which was covered in recent episodes.
This recent story was of particular interest to me because I am a local politician, elected last year as one of the councillors for the Skircoat Ward in Halifax. I’m a Labour councillor, and as such I am part of the ‘Labour Group’ of councillors. Labour has a majority of councillors on Calderdale Council, making Calderdale’s local government a ‘Labour Council’.
The Labour party was founded in 1900, having grown out of the trade union movement and socialist parties of the 19th century. These movements were popular in 19th Century Halifax, an area with many mill workers and miners. As seen in the television series, Anne Lister herself employed many miners.
The 1835 Halifax Election provided much drama for the television series, as it did indeed result in a riot. In an election with just three candidates for two parliamentary seats, the losing candidate was from the Radical Party, and he lost by just one vote.
In modern elections we are used to most adults being eligible to vote, and therefore having many thousands of electors (people who have registered to vote) in a parliamentary constituency. In the 2019 General Election the Halifax constituency had 70,413 electors. When I stood for election in Skircoat Ward (one of eight wards in the Halifax constituency) there were 9,606 electors in the ward. The number of electors in the 1835 Halifax election was tiny by comparison. Just 648 registered electors! At that time the population of the borough (the electoral area represented in parliament by 2 MPs) was over 20,000. However, voting was restricted to adult males who owned or rented property with £10 or more annual value. This was only about 1 out of every 5 adult males in the country. This preserved a hugely prejudicial system of government that disenfranchised the poor. In the borough of Halifax, with many poor factory workers and miners, there was a lot of ill-feeling about it.
In 1835 the electoral result of this system led to riots in the town. The Radical Party candidate lost by just one vote. At the time this was the parliamentary party that most represented the hopes of the poor, and the poor of Halifax understandably took this bitter blow to their hopes very badly; “The rejection of the latter gentleman, by a majority of one, gave such umbrage to the radical non-electors, that on the last day of the poll, (Wednesday, January 7th,) the town was at the mercy of a mob of not less than “500 ruffians,” armed with various weapons and missiles, who made a general attack upon the dwellings of those who had made themselves obnoxious to the popular cause.” (Quoted from White’s History, gazetteer and directory of the West Riding of Yorkshire 1837)
The 1835 Halifax election was afterwards known as “the window-breaking election”. My own ward of Skircoat features in the story: “Benjamin Wilson, the celebrated Halifax Chartist, wrote in his autobiography of how the Skircoat Green Band, which had been engaged by the Liberals, was attacked by a group of Tories in Bull Green. This was the flashpoint for a mob several thousand strong to gather and march through the streets, attacking the Tory headquarters and other premises belonging to prominent Tories, such as Christopher Rawson’s home at Hope Hall – hence the ‘window-breaking’ sobriquet.” (Quoted from the ‘Weaver to Web’ website)
Though she was a wealthy landowner, and therefore a Tory supporter, Anne Lister, aka Gentleman Jack, was also voteless. Until 1918 no woman in the UK was able to vote.
Though she was a wealthy landowner, therefore a Tory (Conservative) supporter, Anne Lister dod not vote in the 1835 Halifax election. Before 1918 no British woman could vote in parliamentary elections. Anne Lister, aka Gentleman Jack, was therefore voteless.
