Article - H is for... Samuel Holberry (1814-1842) (Sheffield)

QUITE where Samuel Holberry sits in the annals of history is still open to some debate.

Undoubtedly he was a man of great liberal vision, a tireless campaigner for universal suffrage and a working class hero.

But this Chartist, of Eyre Street, city centre, was also someone who, in attempting to further his cause, sought to bring unparalleled terror to the streets of Sheffield.

Holberry was born in Nottinghamshire but moved here in 1835 after leaving the army and taking work as a distiller.

He had long held radical views but he became convinced working men must take up arms after various Chartist meetings were broken up in Sheffield by heavy-handed police.

On January 12 1840, Holberry led some 200 men in an attempt to seize control of the Town Hall in Waingate and spark a nationwide revolution.

That it would be bloody, he had no doubt. Gun shops were plundered, Holberry stockpiled hand grenades and spikes were laid across Snig Hill in a bid to cripple any troops rushing into town.

As it turned out, not a single shot was fired.

A Rotherham landlord infiltrated secret meetings and passed information to police who were able to round up the revolutionaries as they gathered.

Holberry was sentenced to four years in York Gaol where he died of consumption aged just 27.

Tellingly, more than 50,000 Sheffielders attended his funeral at the city’s General Cemetery, while a commemorative cascade today stands in the Peace Gardens.

from: http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/h-is-for-samuel-holberry-1814-1842-1-4481488

Book - Crime pays in 2012 (Sheffield)

BOMB attacks, uprisings and infanticide in Sheffield?

Eeeh, says Margaret Drinkall, it’s all good fun...

“I was up at 5.30am this morning,” enthuses the 65-year-old historian. “I couldn’t sleep. I’d got to a point researching my latest book where a chap who killed his mistress was facing trial. I wanted to know what happened. So, there I was, cup of tea, dressing gown, going through these 19th century newspapers.”

And what did happen?

“He was hanged,” she nods. “Fascinating. Even if no-one read my books and no publishers wanted them any more, I think I would carry on researching. I love it.”

No-one reading is perhaps not something she need worry about.

For, as Margaret’s 10th tome is released, the former Rotherham Council volunteer co-ordinator is fast establishing her name as South Yorkshire’s premier historical crime writer.

Her latest offering, Yorkshire Villains, Rogues, Rascals And Reprobates, is a whiz through 19th century crime committed in Yorkshire taking in everything from Ecclesall child murder to Chartist uprisings in Waingate, from the outrageous Spence Broughton to the Sheffield Outrages.

And, coming on the back of her previous books – including Sheffield Crimes and Sheffield Workhouse – it looks set to be her best-seller so far.

Perhaps little wonder.

Here the reader can learn about an 1840 armed uprising where a band of Sheffield workers planned to storm the town hall, murder watchmen and establish a Chartist stronghold. Or one can find out how, in 1861, Bridget O’Rourke, of Acorn Street, was woken by a parcel being flung into her bedroom window. It was a bomb - one of the earliest acts of the Sheffield Outrages.

There’s also highway robberies, counterfeiting and treason.

“I have no idea why people enjoy reading about these things,” says mother-of-two Margaret, of Meadow Street, Rotherham. “But I do know I’m one of those people. I suppose we’re attracted to the gruesome – and there’s not many places as gruesome as Victorian England.

“I remember being driven past Armley prison when I was a little girl and my aunt telling me it was where they hanged people. I was intrigued from then on.

“I went back recently to take photos for a book about Leeds crime and I was so excited. I felt like I imagine some women do when they go shopping.”

And for the future? There’s more history for Margaret, who achieved a master’s degree in the subject through the Open University in 2008.

She’s got another four books commissioned for 2012 – including a rather less gruesome Rotherham ‘then and now’ project – and after that she hopes to do more.

“It’s the best job,” she says. “It can be sad, of course, when you’re thinking, for example, of those women who felt they had to kill their babies because they were born out of wedlock but when you stumble on something exciting like that Chartist uprising, it really is a lot of...yes, fun.”

Yorkshire Villains, Rogues, Rascals and Reprobates, published by The History Press, is in bookshops now priced £9.99.

From: http://www.thestar.co.uk/community/the-diary/crime_pays_in_2012_1_4118581