The 23rd Charles Bradlaugh Commemoration

Chris Pounds explained how the commemoration was instigated in 2002 by The Charles Bradlaugh Society (CBS). The CBS had been set-up informally earlier that year to promote a ‘Republican Picnic’ in Abington Park. That was the year of Queen Elizabeth’s Golden Jubilee and we were being encouraged to organise street parties to celebrate this. Aware of Northampton’s long Republican heritage and our town’s proud association withthe nineteenth century’s leading Republican, a number of us arranged this alternative to the official Jubilee celebrations. It was a grey day but there was a good turnout, we decked the band stand with mauve, white and green ribbons, and had a good time playing volleyball and cricket. Peter Mulligan suggested that we should commence an annual commemoration of Bradlaugh’s life and his historic association with our town. So, from that year on we have met at the statue on the closest Sunday to Bradlaugh’s birthday, 26th September. Over the years Peter has produced material for a Bradlaugh exhibition and a constant stream of beautifully printed greeting cards and promotional material. Tony Upton has always been a very capable Master of Ceremonies for the event, inviting many special guests and organising public meetings to support the commemoration, including Graham Smith, CEO of Republic who spoke at the university , and a provocative meeting at the central museum with a campaigner against the barbaric practise of ritual male circumcision.

Prior to a meeting at the Central Museum about ‘Bradlaugh, Northampton and India, my Bengal born wife Ruchira and I were interviewed by BBC Radio Northampton. Ruchira memorably observed that in comparison to the holier than thou religionists of Britain who would not tolerate Bradlaugh’s theological views, ‘the citizens of India- the most religious country in the world - loved him!’ The following year we were honoured to be joined by a group of courageous Indian secularists who conduct ‘Love Marriages’ for couples wishing to escape arranged, caste-based weddings. Two years ago I was fortunate to travel to India with Ruchira. We had hoped to include a visit to the derelict Bradlaugh Hall in Lahore Pakistan on behalf of the CBS but unfortunately travel between the two countries was not permitted at that time. However, we were very pleased to receive an invitation from the Reverend Halder of the University of Serampore in West Bengal which was founded in 1818 by Northamptonshire’s most illustrious son, the great missionary and reformer William Carey.

Visitors to the commemoration have included regular delegations from the National Secular Society in London, the Secular Hall in Leicester, and Bradlaugh’s great-great-grandson Mr. Michael Bonner. Tony Clarke MP joined us one year, and in 2003, previous councillor and Lord Mayor Richard Church talked of his life-long admiration of Bradlaugh and how the Lib Dem council had named our beautiful town nature reserve ‘Bradlaugh Fields’ in his honour.

Councillor Choudhary supported the event the following year and explained how he first knew of Bradlaugh because of the existence of the Bradlaugh Hall in his home city of Lahore. This prompted us to find out more about the important role of the hall in the cultural life Lahore, about how it became focal point of the anti-colonial struggle of the 1920’s and 30’s, and most recently the campaign to save the hall from dereliction and ruin which we have wholeheartedly supported.

A high point was a visit in 2010 from Brian Niblett, author of a critically acclaimed and very readable biography ‘Dare to Stand Alone’ which has helped revive interest in Bradlaugh life and career beyond Northampton.

More recently, in 2023 Mayor Dennis Meridith told us how he had rescued a seriously damaged portrait of Bradlaugh from the Guildhall skip, which he proceeded to have repaired and restored. It has been proposed that if we can get Dennis’s approval, we might approach the council and ask them to consider gifting this beautiful portrait to the citizens of Lahore, who will be able to hang it in the Bradlaugh Hall upon the completion of the on-going restoration work. In view of us already having two fine portraits of Bradlaugh in Northampton – not forgetting the statue- we believe that this would be a fitting gesture, recognising that this painting, like the Hall and Bradlaugh’s legacy, has been ‘rescued from the dustbin of history!’

However, we are not complacent about local awareness of Bradlaugh’s legacy and Northampton’s radical heritage. . In 2018 I wrote to a prominent Northamptonshire aristocrat who has a side-line as a historian, in the hope that he might support the campaign to save the Bradlaugh Hall. He didn’t reply directly, but I did receive an email from one of his flunkeys stating that ’His Lordship has never heard of the man!’

For anyone to describe themselves as a true Northamptonian there should first be a requirement for them to dodge the busy traffic of Abington Square and study the words inscribed upon the plinth, before singingthe words of Northampton’s forgotten anthem ’Bradlaugh for Northampton!’

After the 2024 commemoration the CBS regulars decided to wind down the society due to differences of opinion about its continuing role.

However, following calls for the commemoration to continue, a group of us gathered again last Sunday 28 September 2025.

Chris finished his address by remembering the many commemorations that have taken place in the years before creation of the CBS. On the 18th November 1968 the Chronicle and Echo reported an exhibition at the Northampton Central Museum and a meeting at the Guildhall to celebrate the centenary of Bradlaugh’s first great election campaign. ‘Mr. David Tribe, the President of The National Secular Society, entertained the audience of nearly 200 with expressive readings of extracts from Bradlaugh’s speeches. ‘Bradlaugh’s 1868 election address was a sad document,’ said Mr Stephen Jakobi. ‘Every radical had the right to expect that if he returned 100 years later he would be thought a conservative. It is extraordinary how little we have advanced.’ Accompanied by Miss Elizabeth Frazer on the piano, Mr Derek Wilkes provided a musical interlude, singing a selection of numbers, including Bradlaugh’s electioneering song. Earlier in the day more than 100 members of the National Secular Society toasted Bradlaugh and his noble supporters at a memorial luncheon at the Wedgewood Restaurant. ‘We have come to honour the men and women of Northampton for without their support there would never have been the titanic struggle of one constituency against the whole kingdom. We owe them a great debt.’ After the luncheon the members, many of whom wore ribbons of green, white and mauve,formed up on the Market Square to walk in procession along Abington Street to the statue where they laid wreaths.’

In 1976 the Northampton Community Theatre Company staged a production ‘Bradlaugh for Northampton!’ at the Willow Room, Corby.

In 1991, 100 hundred years to the day of Bradlaugh’s death, Lord Mayor Geoff Howes spoke at the foot of the statue and ’praised the rebel’s refusal to abandon unpopular ideas, like his campaign for birth control, for Indian reform, and for secularists’. Edna Bodily,75, the great-great grand-daughter of Bradlaugh’s election agent Thomas Adams, said‘Bradlaugh was a man before his time. When Thomas Adams was Mayor, there was chaos and confusion and people threw rotten apples because he supported Bradlaugh.’ 91-year-old Edward Jeffrey, from Ennerdale Road, Spinney Hill, recalled the popular poem his father made him learn by heart:

‘When I was a little boy,

There has been a lot of bother,

In Parliament we are told Charlie Bradlaugh was the cause of it,

Some say he was too bold.

When he got into the House of Commons, things occurred,

They would not let him take his seat, or say a single word.

But quietly he said all the time he had a perfect right,

To speak as any man, and for that he would fight.

They locked him in the Tower, said he was far too clever.

He said: ‘ I don’t care if you lock me up for ever!’

And when they let him out again, he returned to the same old spot,

And that proves thatCharlie Bradlaugh was the Daddy of the lot!’

As the ceremony drew to a close, Councillor Howes placed a wreath at the statue’s feet, but Bradlaugh seemed not to notice. Stern and unsmiling, he continued to point forward.’

Several attendees commented that some parts of the text on the plaque were in a state of disrepair, and the council should be approached to correct this.

A copy of the score of ‘Bradlaugh For Northampton’ has been located recently. It is a complicated arrangement, and it is hoped that somebody with musical skills might be able to work on this so that it can be properly performed at next year’s commemoration!

Russ Hickman of the Northamptonshire Radical History Group told us about the work to recognise James Gribble (1868 – 1934) Northampton’s most important Radical of the 20th century. Gribble’s father was a passionate supporter of Bradlaugh’s, and his childhood was influenced by the tumultuous events of that period. Like Bradlaugh some 20 years before, he was on one occasion forcefully ejected from the House of Commons. Gribble was an influential figure in the Northampton branch of the Social Democratic Federation which was a political home for the next generation of Northampton Radicals. He played an important role in the development of Northampton General Hospital by helping set up the successful Hospital Fund in the 1920’s, popularly known as ‘The Gribble Fund.’ After his death a ward was named after him and a brass plaque recognised his important role. Sadly, sometime in the 1980’s the plaque was removed from display and the ward was renamed. The plaque now resides in the hospital archive, and Gribble’s name and contribution is remembered now only by a dwindling few. Chris, who has worked at NGH since 1989, has established the support of the hospital unions to campaign for the restoration of Gribble’s name in some manner, possibly with the creation of some form of new memorial. Hopefully next year we will be able to give news of a positive development on this front!

Finally, we adjourned for refreshments at the Charles Bradlaugh Pub.