Edmund Stallwood, son of Maria and William was born at Marlow in 1810. Their boy would grow up to be one of the more well known Chartists in England - something that would perhaps not have surprised them. As a boy he was hired by wealthy local landlord Sir William Clayton to assist on a game shoot at Harleyford. Clayton did not expect to pay the child more than a pittance to which Edmund had the temerity to object, naming a higher price which he thought fairer. Clayton said he could get a boy from the Workhouse easily enough if Edmund didn't want to do the job at a low price. Edmund retorted that Clayton probably could as his father like other taxpayers were made to pay to maintain those children so that such low wages could be paid to them by men like Sir William. He wasn't invited back to help with any more shoots!
Although his father William Stallwood is often listed simply as a "labourer" he also kept the Three Loggerheads beerhouse in Quoiting Square (later The Queen). This was very small premises then. Most landlords of similar premises needed to have additional jobs to survive. On a day to day basis it was thus usually their wives that ran the beer selling business. Though it was small in size William occupied sufficient property to be entitled to vote in elections. He voted for independent candidates rather than the conservative powers that be locally. So there is some sense of rebelliousness in Edmund's father but Edmund's mother Maria was also credited with the formation of her son's Chartist beliefs.
In 1830 Edmund married Mary Blackshaw. The couple settled in Hammersmith then Fulham in London before moving eventually to the Gillingham suburb of New Brompton, in Kent.
In 1836 as a newsagent and bookseller in Hammersmith, Edmund advertised that he would be ignoring the requirement to add tax stamps to the low cost working people's newspapers which he sold. This was illegal and saw Edmund fined. Upon refusing to pay Edmund was sent to the House of Correction for a spell instead. Obviously he was not deterred by a prison sentence. In 1842 he was one of the delegates at the Chartists' Convention in London.
Though he no longer lived in Marlow Edmund never lost touch with his hometown. To him townspeople sent financial contributions to the Chartist cause, and in 1841 Edmund returned to give a speech at the Baptist meeting rooms in Dean Street. Not this time on the subject of Chartism but of Temperance, a cause to which he was nearly as devoted as to Chartism. Edmund travelled up and down the country speaking up for both causes as well as campaigning for the abolition of the death penalty and the abolition of the custom of primogeniture.
On Chartism Edmund spoke to audiences of both working men and working women. He appeared in public halls, working men's clubs, temperance hotels, pubs and if nowhere else was available out in the open or under a tree.
Edmund wanted to establish Chartist newspapers in every corner of Britain. He himself became a journalist for the radical Northern Star newspaper. Though this was Northern based it had correspondents from other areas.
The paper took his side when he was accused of pocketing the takings from a fundraising ball, concert and raffle held by the Chelsea, Brompton and Kensington branch of Chartist supporters. When tracked down and challenged on this point Edmund was said to have submitted false accounts exaggerating the costs of expenses paid like the musicians wages to cover his theft. The local members of the society found him guilty after investigation and were angered when the Northern Star failed at first to make any report of it and then as only did so in a grudging way. This was not the only time Edmund faced suspicion as to his financial probity. The National Cooperative Benefit Society in 1849 appealed for members to stop sending money to him whilst his management of the Society was investigated. I am unsure as to the outcome as to that. While some distrust of Edmund clearly lingered he had no difficulty in obtaining further positions of trust in Chartist linked groups. The sheer busyness of his life may have been in part to blame for any poor quality accounting rather than dishonesty.
Mary died at New Brompton in 1861.
Edmund died in 1866. He was politically active to his death and was also a churchwarden and one of the singing teachers of the Gillingham church choir.
Written and researched by Charlotte Day.
Related Posts:
Swing riots in Marlow here
More on the Six Bells here
1847 election riots here
James Croxon here
More biographies of individuals on the blog are listed here
General posts about everyday life in old Great Marlow and Little Marlow here
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