The Gordon Riots

A new and controversial perspective on the causes, personalities and consequences of the most devastating urban riots in British history.

Introduction Ian Haywood and John Seed; Part I. The Political Moment of 1780: 1. The Gordon riots and the politics of war Nicholas Rogers; 2. The 1780 Protestant petitions and the culture of petitioning Mark Knights; 3. 'The fall of Romish Babylon anticipated': plebeian Dissenters and anti-popery in the Gordon riots John Seed; 4. Imperial disruptions: city, nation, and empire in the Gordon riots Dana Rabin; Part II. Representing the Unrepresentable: 5. 'A metropolis in flames and a nation in ruins': the Gordon riots as sublime spectacle Ian Haywood; 6. 'The worse than Negro barbarity of the populace': Ignatius Sancho witnesses the Gordon riots Brycchan Carey; 7. Thomas Holcroft and the Gordon riots: Romantic revisionings Miriam L. Wallace; Part III. The Aftermath: Politics, Social Order and Cultural Memory: 8. Re-negotiating the bloody code: the Gordon riots and the transformation of popular attitudes to the criminal justice system Tim Hitchcock; 9. 'For the safety of the city': the geography and social politics of public execution after the Gordon riots Matthew White; 10. 'Mad misrule': the Gordon riots and conservative memory Susan Matthews; Afterword; 11. George Gordon: a biographical reassessment Dominic Green; Select bibliography; Index.