Polly's Pride

by Freda Lightfoot

  Manchester had seen many such demonstrations before, dating back to the dark days of Peterloo, and there wasn’t a man amongst them unaware of the outcome of that protest.

  Faced with the prospect of the coming clash, some of Joshua’s followers began to experience grave reservations about the wisdom of their actions, suffering severe pangs of nervousness and beginning to question why they’d chosen to come at all. One or two did leave, shame-facedly shuffling back to the safety of their firesides. Sensing their uncertainty, Joshua got up on his soap box at the corner of the street, using the full powers of his oratory to keep the rest with him. The last thing he wanted was to lose the army he had so painstakingly assembled.

  ‘There have been many organisations who have set out to change the social fabric of their day,’ he told them, lifting his voice above the hum of their disquiet, filling it with the depth of his fervour and passion for this movement in which he truly believed. ‘From straightforward Socialists to the Social Democratic Federation which was more Marxist than democratic; from an Independent Labour Party under Keir Hardy to the Clarion movement of Robert Blatchford. Great names that we in Manchester have been honoured to know.’

  Little by little their anxious murmuring faded away and he sensed in the hush of the crowd a growing interest and agreement with every word he spoke. He smiled to himself, intoxicated by his own powers.

  ‘Each one has promised to raise the awareness of the governing bodies, to bring action on our behalf - we the downtrodden workers and unemployed of Manchester. Each set out to gain concessions in housing and employment, and each played his part in bringing about changes in the economic conditions of his time. Now it is our turn!’

  ‘Aye, that’s the ticket.’

  ‘We’ll show ‘em, Josh.’

  His passion mounted as he reminded them that as recently as 1911 there had been industrial action at the docks and in the transport industries. ‘So aren’t we following in a fine tradition?’ He chose not to remind them that none of these movements had achieved as much as it would have liked, or how many men had been injured in the course of their efforts.

  Nor did he mention how there had been a backlash against such social agitation on the grounds that Socialism should be about education and building a worthwhile social culture, not an incitement to riot. So far as Joshua was concerned, none of these issues mattered. The NUWM, he resolved, would be different and achieve what its forerunners had not. This was the movement that would make a real mark on the state of the country and the history of Manchester. And on his own political career, of course.

  ‘Freedom and dignity for the working man!’ he yelled, and the crowd roared their approval back at him, as one surging forward, ready to do battle with all-comers if that was what it would take to win the day.

  The police were ready for them, denying the marchers access to Albert Square, halting their progress at the junction of London Road and Whitworth Street. With batons raised, they set out to force the men to retreat.

  ‘Don’t budge! Stand your ground!’ Joshua cried, and the marchers sat down in the road, refusing to move even when ordered to do so with the threat of arrest. It was then that the baton charges began. Fire hoses from Whitworth Street Station were brought into play and in the ensuing uproar tempers were lost and clogs thrown like bricks, causing several constables to nurse sore heads.

  When one bore down on young Tom Shackleton, baton raised, Matthew flung himself across the boy to protect him from the worst of the blows which rained down relentlessly upon them both. He could hear the boy’s screams, echoing endlessly in his head, followed by a terrible silence which, to Matthew, was infinitely worse. His brother Cecil had once gone silent and simply vanished from his side. And Cecil had died. His vision blurred. Matthew rubbed the blood-red mist from his eyes and reached again for the boy, struggling against a sickening weakness to lift him in his arms.

  ‘It’s all right, I’ve got you.’ He thrashed out at the copper with his foot as once again he came swinging towards them, kicking him where it hurt most. But the policeman was only winded and within seconds was back upon them with his baton. Matthew heard, rather than felt, the sickening crunch of splitting bone as his ankle took the full force of this latest blow, sending him sprawling to the ground. He struggled resolutely back to his feet, biting his lip against the agony that shot up his leg as he tried to put weight on it. His arms were still about young Tom, half dragging, half carrying him out of the carnage. He didn’t rest or pause for breath until he’d sheltered the boy safely in a shop doorway.

  ‘Stay there while I get help.’

  ‘You’re hurt too, Matt. Stop here. We’ll be safe for a bit.’ The boy had a point for it seemed there was no help to be had, not a sign of a friendly face anywhere, and it was now, his mission completed, that the full force of his own injury struck Matthew. He slumped to the ground feeling nauseous and disorientated. Yet nowhere could be safe, not in this mayhem. He must do something. Find help for the boy.

  ‘Don’t move,’ he cried above the din. ‘I’ll be back.’

  Joshua, too concerned with saving his own skin to be aware of any of this, was beginning to realise that his men had little hope of winning; that the forces ranged against them were too strong and too determined. Yet stubbornly they hung on, thousands of men filling the streets with pandemonium, more newcomers arriving at every minute. He’d not give up. He wouldn’t. Not while he had breath left in his body.

  Across the city, dressed in her Sunday coat and boots, Polly stepped out along Ancoats Lane with her head held high, the practised speech which had kept her awake half the night still going round in her head. She saw the milling groups of men marching towards the city and felt glad Matthew was not amongst them, although she recognised and admired the genuine conviction with which they were taking part in the cause. They believed they could make a difference to government thinking, and for all she knew they could be right. She could sense their excitement and resolution.

  ‘Good luck, boys,’ she called, and as one they turned and acknowledged her good wishes with a cheery wave, watching with appreciative eyes as she swung along the road. It was unusual to see a woman walking abroad in her figure, without a shawl swathed modestly around her and they enjoyed the spectacle for a moment before returning to the more serious task ahead.

  Polly lapsed back into thoughts of her own problems, feeling certain that if she could secure the lease of this shop, which was in a good central position in this part of Manchester, then she could really begin to make progress in her business and Matthew would see that she had been right. Perhaps then he would stop feeling threatened and they could learn to work together, sharing the struggles and hardships, and enjoying the success she was sure would follow.

  She found the shop and stood back to admire its wide window. In her mind’s eye she saw it filled with carpet rugs. Optimism mounted. The depression couldn’t last for ever, and this was surely the time, while rents were low, to look to the future.

  Exploring the dusty, dilapidated premises, she did not hear the hue and cry of men’s voices as they echoed far away in the city. The room behind the main shop could be their workshop, she decided, where the cutting and binding would take place. She discovered there was even space to store her hand cart in a shed in the yard. She’d need to keep that, in order to transport the stock. Polly was certain it would all be perfect. Everything now depended on whether she could afford to take it. She straightened her spine, smoothed back a stray curl, and prepared to talk terms with the landlord.

  Over in London Road, clashes between police and demonstrators had quickly degenerated into outright warfare. Clogs and bricks were flying, whistles blowing, blood flowed, gallons of water sprayed everywhere. Many arrests were made and men were being thrown into the Black Maria with ruthless regularity.

  Joshua was not amongst them. He’d backed away at the optimum moment, managing to escape the worst of the crush for he’d not liked this new turn of event
s. Besides, he reasoned, what good would it do the cause for one of its leaders to be arrested? In his heart, he knew it would do him no good at chapel either to be thrown in jail, but convinced himself this had little to do with his decision to make a tactical withdrawal. His men needed him, that was the truth of it. He was certainly no coward, unlike his brother who had been notable by his absence almost from the start.

  Joshua could see no sign of Matthew anywhere. Where was the man? Had he run away yet again?

  He was determined that his brother would not evade his responsibility to others this time. Hadn’t he been seeking just such an opportunity as this for years, in order to prove Matthew’s cowardice? Joshua considered the possibility that he was lying injured somewhere, but dismissed it. More likely he had found himself somewhere to lie up, as he had done while Cecil lay dying in that other battle long ago. In which case it was surely his responsibility to bring Matthew back to his colleagues, dragging him by the scruff of the neck if necessary.

  Then he saw his brother, sitting on the edge of the pavement, a dozen or so yards away.

  Matthew lifted his head and looked at him out of eyes that had seen too much. ‘Joshua, thank God! Did you see the way they fought?’

  With a jolt of irrational disappointment, he realised his brother must have been in the midst of the melee after all. Joshua said nothing. Nor did he take a step towards him.

  ‘Did you see how they hit out and struck even young boys, without a thought for the injuries they might sustain? I tried to stop them but. . .’Matthew’s voice thickened, faded to nothing. He was sickened by it, and by the painful memories the demonstration had resurrected. ‘Young Tom Shackleton is back there, holed up in a doorway. I only just got him out in time but he’s bleeding badly. He needs help. Fetch someone quickly, Josh. A doctor or ambulance. Hurry.’

  Perhaps it was the manner in which Matthew told him what he must do, or the sight of all the blood lost that day, that inflamed Joshua. Or perhaps the irritating but irrefutable fact that his brother had shown himself to be a hero, saving young Tom from almost certain death rather than retreating like a coward as Joshua had imagined. Whatever the reason, rage flooded through him and he refused to accept the evidence of his own eyes.

  He told himself there probably hadn’t been any real danger at all; that Matthew had sustained nothing more than a minor injury. How dare he sit nursing his head as if he were the only one suffering when others were being half killed in a pitched battle?

  In his mind’s eye it was Cecil and not Tom Shackleton who’d been left for dead in some unknown spot. Idealistic, young and eager, vowing to do his bit and come back a hero. Reliving all the pain of that time, Joshua once again suffered the agony of knowing his youngest brother would not return from war. It was as if, yet again, he lay dying, inch by inch, in some stinking field while this man here, this man who called himself a brother, left him there to rot.

  Matthew was indicating some supposed injury to his foot. ‘I’d carry the boy the rest of way meself, but I reckon me ankle’s broken. Some copper tripped me with his truncheon. You’ll have to help me up, Joshua, I can’t walk.’

  The modest use of the word ‘tripped’ brought a sneer to Joshua’s lips as his patience finally snapped and his mind finally lost its grip upon reality. I’d carry the boy myself, he’d admitted, only he’d been tripped. Something as simple as a cricked ankle and he’d leave his own brother to die. There, wasn’t that the truth he’d always suspected, the admission he’d sought?

  Afterwards, Joshua knew he could have done something to prevent what happened next. He saw the crowd lurch and shift, begin to swell and surge towards them. The movement brought him sharply back to the present, to the fact that it was Tom Shackleton lying injured, not Cecil at all. But still he did nothing.

  On Sundays, when as a lay preacher he recited his sermons in chapel, he often spoke against the creed of ‘an eye for an eye’, quoting liberally from the Sermon on the Mount: Matthew, Chapter Five, as a baby might recite a nursery rhyme. To Joshua it made about as much sense. He believed there were times when turning the other cheek was not appropriate. He did not love each of his neighbours, nor was he willing to give anyone the coat from his back should they ask for it. Joshua was an Old Testament man rather than a New. And he believed there were times when a man must take his punishment, times when revenge was justified.

  The last he saw of his brother was the top of his bright head as the crowd swamped him, and the last he heard a piercing cry as he called out the Irish woman’s name. Even then Joshua made no move to save him. But then who had helped Cecil when he had called out thus? This was a battle, and in a battle, wasn’t it every man for himself?

  Less than an hour later when Polly was walking home, bubbling with excitement at having agreed terms to take over the shop on Ancoats Lane, she met several straggling groups of men coming back from their march. She could not help but notice that the excitement had gone from them, to be replaced by dejection and despondency. Several were nursing cuts and bruises, one was being half supported by his comrades, his arm clearly broken.

  Amongst them she spied Joshua and waved to him. Though she felt a strong sympathy for the demonstrators, yet she was eager to tell someone about the shop, the wonderful deal she had struck with the landlord and how their future was growing rosier by the day.

  Surely her lovely husband would be proud of her now?

  She quickened her step. ‘Joshua, have you seen Matthew?’ But he did not reply to her question. Nor did he hurry to meet her. Instead he stopped dead in the middle of the street and as the other men melted swiftly away, she frowned with puzzlement.

  Why did he always have to make even the smallest request for help or information into a major event? Sighing with irritation, she skipped off the pavement and ran across the street towards him. It was only when she was a step or two away that she faltered, for it was then that she saw the blood. With a start, she looked up into his eyes and what she saw there drenched her in a new fear, so chilling she swayed on her feet, as if her own life blood were draining away.

  Matthew lay in the hospital bed, his face bleached almost as white as the pillows. It was small comfort to Polly to have heard the full story of her husband’s heroism from Tom Shackleton’s lips. The boy thought him a hero. Safely sheltered by the doorway, he had been in no danger when the crowd had surged by. Without doubt, Matthew had saved his life.

  Joshua had said only that it had been a terrible accident. Unforeseen. Tragic. Matthew got caught up in the crowd and had been dragged underfoot.

  Now Polly clung to his hand and prayed to every saint she could think of with a desperate fervour she had not felt in years. He did not move. He did not even open his eyes to acknowledge her presence. Yet he must know she was here, she was certain of it. He could surely feel her presence and her pain, as deeply as she felt his. She willed him to do so.

  How long she sat thus, Polly couldn’t have said. In her mind she was reliving every year, every month, every day of their life together. She remembered the loving days of their courtship, their simple wedding, the belief that nothing, not even the differences of religion, could divide them. She recalled the birth of each beloved child and the happy years that had followed of joyful family life.

  She was also regretting every wrong word, every foolish quarrel, every show of Irish temperament; wishing desperately she’d never thought to sell all their furniture in order to buy a stupid carpet; never sold that dratted sideboard; never hurt him in any way.

  If only she could turn back the clock.

  Polly knew why he had gone to the demonstration despite his promises not to do so. It had been in retaliation for their quarrel, to prove he was still a man, even though he had no job and no means of supporting his family. He needed to prove to himself, as well as to her, that he had some control over his own destiny. It was his way of retaining his dignity. Polly rested her forehead against his limp arm and wept silent, bitter tears.


  At last she lifted her head, struggling to pull herself together for this wouldn’t do. It wouldn’t do at all. She mustn’t weep. Didn’t he need her to be strong? She’d take him home and nurse him, make him well again. Wouldn’t she devote her life to his care?

  She smiled brightly at the still figure, wrapping her arms lovingly about him. ‘Come on, you daft galoot. Stop frightening the life out of me like this. Will you not open your eyes and give me one of your daft winks?’

  She became aware of hands on her shoulders, hands that dragged at her, attempting to draw her away. She tried to shake them off.

  ‘Mrs Pride. Come with me, Mrs Pride.’

  ‘No. I must be here when he wakes. I must be.’

  Again the grip tightened and Polly resisted it. ‘Mrs Pride. Come and have a cup of tea. It’ll do you good.’

  ‘No, no. Matthew might wake while I’m gone.’

  ‘My dear, your husband is not going to wake. I’m sorry to say that he has passed away. He is in a better place now, safe from all pain and trouble.’

  Polly stared at the woman, slowly registering her nurse’s cap perched on top of a tightly scraped-back bun. She was old and wrinkled with whiskers sprouting on her upper lip. What did this woman know about love, about Matthew? ‘No, you don’t understand,’ Polly carefully explained. ‘He always looks like this when he’s asleep. He’ll start to snore in a minute.’

  ‘I’m sorry, love, but he won’t. Come with me, Mrs Pride. Wouldn’t you like a nice cup of tea?

  ‘No! Leave me alone!’ Polly fought with all her might. She shouted and screamed to make the silly woman understand, but another nurse came and the pair of them dragged her away from her beloved Matthew. Polly knew then, deep in her heart, that it was over. She knew she had lost him.