Background
Hunt was born on November 6, 1773 in Upavon, England.
politician agitator radical speaker
Hunt was born on November 6, 1773 in Upavon, England.
While following the vocation of a farmer Hunt made the acquaintance of John Horne Tooke, with whose advanced views he soon began to sympathize. At the general election of 1806 he came to the front in Wiltshire; he soon associated himself with William Cobbett, and in 1812 he was an unsuccessful candidate for Bristol. He was one of the speakers at the meeting held in Spa Fields, London, in November 1816; in 1818 he tried in vain to become member of parliament for Westminster, and in 1820 for Preston. In August 1819 Hunt presided over the great meeting in St Peter's Field, Manchester, which developed into a riot and was called the "Peterloo massacre. " He was arrested and was tried for conspiracy, being sentenced to imprisonment for two years and a half. In August 1830 he was elected member of parliament for Preston, but he lost his seat in 1833. While in parliament Hunt presented a petition in favour of women's rights, probably the first of this kind, and he moved for a repeal of the corn laws. He died on the 15th of February 1835.
Hunt was first drawn into radical politics during the Napoleonic Wars. He embraced a programme that included annual parliaments and universal suffrage, promoted openly and with none of the conspiratorial element of the old Jacobin clubs. The tactic he most favoured was that of 'mass pressure', which he felt, if given enough weight, could achieve reform without insurrection. Business interests notwithstanding, he still found time for practical politics, fighting battles over a whole range of issues, and always pushing for reform and accountability. As a consistent champion of the working classes, a term he used with increasing frequency, he opposed the Whigs, both old and new, and the Reform Act 1832, which he believed did not go far enough in the extension of the franchise. He gave speeches addressed to the "Working Classes and no other", urging them to press for full equal rights. In 1832 he presented the first petition in support of women's suffrage to Parliament. It was received however with much ribald laughter and antagonism. Also in that year, he petitioned parliament on behalf of the radical preacher John Ward, who had been imprisoned for blasphemy.
Member of Parliament (1830-1832)
