Johnson first PM to marry in Office since Lord Liverpool who presided over the Peterloo Massacre
Carrie Symonds and Boris Johnson have reportedly got married today at Westminster Cathedral, a grand building on Victoria St close to Victoria station and also close to the current Labour Party HQ.
Back in the day it would have been seen as unusual at best for a Tory PM to live with the unmarried mother of his latest child at Downing St but fortunately times change even in the Tory Party.
Johnson is in any case in good company. The last PM to marry in Office on 24th September 1822 was Lord Liverpool (1812-1827) who presided over the Peterloo Massacre in Manchester in August 1819. Protesters for the vote were cut down and killed or seriously injured by the Yeomanry- local businessmen on horseback with sabres.
E P Thompson in the Making of the English Working Class notes that Liverpool’s verdict on the Manchester Magistrates who sent in the Yeomanry was that their action was ‘substantially right’ in ordering something that led to the death and injury or ordinary people.
Johnson is in good company
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