Who was to blame for the battle of peterloo?
The Peterloo Massacre of August 16, 1819 was the result of a cavalry charge into the crowd at a public meeting at St Peter’s Fields, Manchester, England. It is also called the Manchester Massacre or sometimes the Battle of Peterloo. Eleven people were killed and over 500 were injured. The meeting had been organised by the Manchester Patriotic Union Society, a political group that agitated for radical parliamentary reform and the repeal of the corn laws. They had invited a number of speakers, including Richard Carlile, John Cartwright and Henry Hunt, to a public meeting. Local magistrates, under William Hulton, were concerned that the meeting would end in a riot or, worse, a rebellion. They arranged for a substantial number of militia yeomanry, described as “younger members of the Tory party in arms”, were also ordered to disperse the meeting. The troops included 600 men of the 15th Hussars; several hundred infantrymen; a Royal Horse Artillery unit with two six-pounder (2.7 kg) guns; 40
