Appeal to the Trade Societies of Bolton from the Bolton Working Men’s Association, 29 July 1839

Abstract

We now make to you an appeal, trusting that ere this, you have seen the necessity of losing no time in allying yourselves to the present movement of the working classes. What you have so sedulously for years, we have been also pursuing, but on a more extended scale; what you have devised for the benefit of your own particular trade we now ask for the whole Family of Man. There are numbers of your patriotic members who have joined our ranks in the struggle for freedom, and we greatly acknowledge our conviction (from experience) that we have scarcely an enemy amongst you. Yet, at a time so pregnant with good or evil, your Delegation of Adhesion in Bodies, — as has been done at Birmingham, Newcastle, Manchester, Oldham, Bury, and other places of importance — to the great principles we advocate, is absolutely necessary, the adoption of which can alone rid you of the vexations and tyrannical interference at the hands of your Petty Oppressors, or of unprincipled legislators: you must be aware that the newly projected measures of the Government are aimed at yourselves in common with us.