Manchester and Salford Yeomanry
[2] After the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1815, many textile workers in the newly industrialised towns of northern England lost their jobs as a result of an economic slump connected to the reduced need for matériel.
At the same time, writers such as William Cobbett were denouncing the inequity of the electoral system, as evidenced by rotten boroughs.
Poor mill workers were a naturally sympathetic audience for a succession of radical organisers and speakers who spoke of electoral reform and alleviating poverty.
This fear spurred a petition with more than 100 signatures to "the Boroughreeves and Constables of Manchester and Salford" demanding a meeting to establish a yeomanry corps.
[1] Thomas Trafford, owner of substantial lands in Lancashire and Cheshire, was commissioned as the cavalry's first Major-Commandant on 23 August 1817.
Commissions in the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry Cavalry, signed by the Lord Lieutenant of the County Palatine of Lancaster.
[3] On 16 August 1819, Major Trafford and Lieutenant Colonel Guy L'Estrange, the overall military commander in Manchester, were sent notes by the chairman of the Lancashire and Cheshire Magistrates, local coalowner William Hulton, urging them to dispatch troops to a public meeting on voting reform being addressed by the orator Henry Hunt.
Trafford dispatched 116 officers and men of the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry who immediately drew their swords and galloped towards St Peter's Field.
One trooper, in a frantic attempt to catch up, knocked down a woman in Cooper Street, causing the death of her child when he was thrown from her arms;[5] two-year-old William Fildes was the first casualty of Peterloo.
Sixty cavalrymen of the Manchester and Salford Yeomanry, led by Captain Hugh Hornby Birley, a local factory owner, arrived at the house from where the magistrates were watching; some reports allege that they were drunk.
[8]The route towards the hustings between the special constables was narrow, and as the inexperienced horses were thrust further and further into the crowd they reared and plunged as people tried to get out of their way.
[9] On his arrival at the stand Nadin arrested Hunt, Johnson and a number of others including John Tyas, the reporter from The Times.
[10] According to Tyas the yeomanry's progress through the crowd had provoked a hail of bricks and stones, and caused them to lose "all command of temper".
[11] Their mission to execute the arrest warrant having been achieved, they then set about destroying the banners and flags carried by the crowd.
[11] From his vantage point William Hulton perceived the unfolding events as an assault on the yeomanry, and on L'Estrange's arrival at 1:50 pm, at the head of his hussars, he ordered them into the field to disperse the crowd with the words: "Good God, Sir, don't you see they are attacking the Yeomanry; disperse the meeting!
"[12] The 15th Hussars formed themselves into a line stretching across the eastern end of St Peter's Field, and charged into the crowd.
[13] At first the crowd had some difficulty in dispersing, as the main exit route into Peter Street was blocked by the 88th Infantry Regiment, standing with bayonets fixed.
One officer of the 15th Hussars was heard trying to restrain the by now out of control Manchester and Salford Yeomanry, who were "cutting at every one they could reach": "For shame!
