From 1828 to 1847, the newspaper was edited by Archibald Prentice, a political radical and advocate of free trade.
[2] In 1835 the paper published a series of letters by Richard Cobden, and Prentice subsequently made it a mouthpiece for the Anti-Corn-Law League.
[1] In 1849, the paper merged with the Manchester Examiner, recently founded as a radical competitor after a falling-out between Prentice and Cobden,[citation needed] and became the Manchester Examiner and Times.
(The Examiner had been founded by the young Edward Watkin, whose father was noted for his involvement in the Anti-Corn-Law League.)
[3] The 3,973 issues of the Manchester Times, published between 1828 and 1900, are available to read in digitised form at the British Newspaper Archive.