The butchers of freedom

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James Gillray
1756-1815
The butchers of freedom
aquatint & etching, hand-colored
image: 232 x 341 mm; sheet: 248 x 357 mm
Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1900.
Peel 2680
Published: 
[London] : Pubd. July ... th. 1788 by H. Humphrey New Bond St., [1788]
Provenance: 
Formerly owned by Sir Robert Peel.
Notes: 

Text right of title: Price 1 s.
Printmaker from BM Satires.
Library's copy trimmed within plate mark.

Summary: 

"An election mob in which Townshend and his supporters, as butchers, are violently attacking the populace with cleavers and marrow-bones. They wear aprons with butchers' steels dangling from the waist. George Hanger (right), his hat decorated with three ostrich feathers and the coronet of the Prince of Wales, raises a cleaver in both hands and threatens two constables with staves who fall backwards, wounded or terrified. He is in violent action, one foot rests on the unconscious body of a sailor whose face is gashed and bleeding. In the sailor's hand is a flag with a ship and the words 'Royal Navy'; on this Townshend, who uses his marrow-bone and cleaver as a musical instrument, not as weapons, is trampling. Behind Hanger, Fox, climbing above the crowd, is violently smashing the sign of 'The King's Head' (a bust portrait of the King) which is over a door inscribed 'Martin'. In the foreground a woman half-lying on the ground tries to protect her screaming infant from a cleaver and bone brandished by Sheridan. On the extreme left Lord Derby attacks a kneeling sailor with a wooden leg. Behind Sheridan, Burke raises a cleaver in both hands, and behind him the Duke of Norfolk waves a flag inscribed 'Townsend and Liberty'. Behind is a dense crowd brandishing cleavers and bones, while others attempt to escape. On the right are houses inscribed 'James Str[eet]', the houses of Covent Garden are indicated on the left."--British Museum online catalogue.

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