10th April 1848 Chartist protest for the vote on Kennington Common & the Royal Family
Today marks the 173rd anniversary of the Chartist protest for the vote on Kennington Common.
Interestingly there is a direct connection with 2021.
The photograph, the first ever photograph of a working-class protest in the UK, is held in the Royal collection and the copyright lies with the current Queen. It’s good to know that the Royals have an abiding interest in preserving labour history.
The photo is a form of a long exposure known as daguerreotype. Part of it is almost certainly missing so we can’t see the full extent of the protest and it is generally thought that it was taken fairly on in the protest before numbers peaked.
Those in the foreground of the picture are probably observers, perhaps sympathetic middle-class radicals, but may include some who found the Common itself sodden after rain.
The Queen and other Royals were so concerned about the possibility of a Chartist attempt to seize power in London on 10th April 1848 that they cleared off beforehand to the Isle of Wight and stayed there for several weeks
More details on the history of the photograph
http://www.kenningtonchartistproject.org/2018/06/04/the-chartist-meeting-on-kennington-common/
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