Ebenezer Elliott - The Corn Law Rhymes

The Corn Law Rhymes

Elliott married Frances (Fanny) Gartside in 1806, and they had thirteen children. He invested his wife's fortune in his father's share of the iron foundry, but the affairs of the family firm were then in a desperate condition, and money difficulties hastened his father's death. Elliott lost everything, and in 1816 he was declared bankrupt. In 1819 he obtained funds from his wife's sisters and began another business as an iron dealer in Sheffield. The business prospered, and by 1829 he had become a successful iron merchant and steel manufacturer.

He remained bitter about his earlier failure. He attributed his father's pecuniary losses and his own to the operation of the Corn Laws, and the demand to repeal them became the greatest issue in his life. When he was made bankrupt, he had been homeless and out of work; he had faced starvation and contemplated suicide. He knew what it was like to be impoverished and desperate and, as a result, he always identified with the poor. He became well known in Sheffield for his strident views demanding changes which would improve conditions both for the manufacturer and the worker. He formed the first society in England to call for reform of the Corn Laws: the Sheffield Mechanics' Anti-Bread Tax Society founded in 1830. Four years later, he was the prime mover in establishing the Sheffield Anti-Corn Law Society and he also set up the Sheffield Mechanics' Institute. He was very active in the Sheffield Political Union, and he campaigned vigorously for the 1832 Reform Act. He took an active part in the Chartist agitation, but withdrew his support when the agitation for the repeal of the corn laws was removed from the Chartist programme. Until the Chartist Movement advocated the use of violence, Elliott was one of the leaders of the Sheffield organisation. He was the Sheffield delegate to the Great Public Meeting in Westminster in 1838, and he chaired the meeting in Sheffield when the Charter was introduced to local people. The strength of his political convictions was reflected in the style and tenor of his verse, earning him the nickname " the Corn Law Rhymer", and making him internationally famous.

The Corn Law Rhymes, first published in 1831, had been preceded by the publication of the single long poem The Ranter in 1830. They were inspired by a fierce hatred of injustice, and are vigorous, simple and full of vivid description. The poems campaigned against the landowners in the government who stifled competition and kept the price of bread high. They were aggressive and sarcastic, attacking the status quo and demanding the repeal of the Corn Laws. They also drew attention to the dreadful conditions endured by working people, and ruthlessly contrasted their lot with the sleek and complacent gentry. In 1833-1835, Elliott also published The Splendid Village; Corn-Law Rhymes, and other Poems (3 vols.), which included The Village Patriarch (1829), The Ranter, an unsuccessful drama, Keronah, and other pieces.

His poems were published in the USA, and in Europe. The French magazine, Le Revue Des Deux Mondes, sent a journalist to Sheffield to interview him. The Corn Law Rhymes were initially thought to be written by an uneducated Sheffield mechanic, who had rejected conventional Romantic ideals for a new style of working class poetry aimed at changing the system. Elliott was described as "a red son of the furnace", and called " the Yorkshire Burns" or " the Burns of the manufacturing city ". The journalist was surprised when he found Elliott to be a mild man with a nervous temperament.

Asa Briggs called Elliott "the poet of economic revolution" while Elliott himself observed: "I claim to be a pioneer of the greatest, the most beneficial, the only crimeless Revolution, which man has yet seen. I also claim to be the poet of that Revolution - the Bard of Freetrade; and through the prosperity, wisdom and loving-kindness which Free-trade will ultimately bring, the Bard of Universal Peace."

He also contributed verses from time to time to Tails Magazine and to the Sheffield and Rotherham Independent. In 1837 his business failed and he again lost a great deal of money. This misfortune was also ascribed to the corn laws. He retired in 1841 with a small fortune and settled at Great Houghton, near Barnsley, where he lived quietly until his death in 1849 aged 68. He was buried in Darfield churchyard.