Letter To Lord Russell
Because of his continuing role within the Chartist Movement, Home Secretary Russell dismissed Frost from his position as Justice of the Peace. In response, while at a Chartist Convention in Pontypool, Frost responded to Russell in a straighforward letter, containing the contemporary Chartist songs of Wales, which gave expression to the feelings and determination of the Welsh coal miners:
- Uphold those bold Comrades, who suffer for you,
- Who nobly stand foremost, demanding your due,
- Away with the timid-'tis treason to fear-
- To surrender or falter, when danger is near,
- For now that our leaders disdain to betray
- 'Tis base to desert them, or succour delay
- 'Tis time that the victims of labour and care
- Should for reap what is labour's fair share
- 'Tis time that these voice in the councils be heard
- The rather than pay for the law of the sword;
- All power is ours, with a will of our own
- We conquer, united-divided we groan.
- Come hail brothers, hail the shrill sound of the horn
- For ages deep wrongs have been hopelessly borne
- Despair shall no longer our spirits dismay
- Nor wither the arms when uprasised for the fray;
- The conflict for freedom is gathering nigh:
- We live to secure it, or gloriously die.
Nonetheless, while the desire amongst the Welsh to rebel was ever stronger, Frost himself still wished to postpone the date of an uprising. By the end of October, the Welsh Chartists were holding daily meetings in Monmouthshire in an attempt to force an armed rebellion. Records suggest that ultimately, finding himself unable to postpone the date of an organised uprising and longer and still doubting its success, Frost burst into tears. A thirty member conference ultimately fixed the date for 3 November.
Read more about this topic: John Frost (Chartist)
Famous quotes containing the words letter to, letter, lord and/or russell:
“This is my letter to the World
That never wrote to Me
The simple News that Nature told
With tender Majesty.”
—Emily Dickinson (18301886)
“Woe to the makers of literal translations, who by rendering every word weaken the meaning! It is indeed by so doing that we can say the letter kills and the spirit gives life.”
—Voltaire [François Marie Arouet] (16941778)
“Stand up and bless the Lord,
Ye children of His choice;
Stand up, and bless the Lord your God
With heart, and soul, and voice.”
—James Montgomery (17711854)
“There is Lowell, whos striving Parnassus to climb
With a whole bale of isms tied together with rhyme,
He might get on alone, spite of brambles and boulders,
But he cant with that bundle he has on his shoulders,
The top of the hill he will neer come nigh reaching
Till he learns the distinction twixt singing and preaching;”
—James Russell Lowell (18191891)