Life and Struggles of William Lovett in His Pursuit of Bread Knowledge, and Freedom - With Some Short Account of the Different Associations He Belonged to and of the Opinions He Entertained #227126

The Life and Struggles of William Lovett which is now reprinted from the first edition of 1876, is more than the mere autobiography which its title might suggest. Lovett was a Cornishman, born in 1800 at Newlyn, who migrated to London in 1821. From about 1825 onwards he was actively engaged in public work, and from 1836 to 1839 he was the spokesman of the political labour movement which started with the formation of the London Working Men's Association, and which developed into Chartism. Place, whom he knew intimately, and whom Lovett esteemed as a "clear-headed and warm-hearted old gentleman," described him as a "man of melancholy temperament soured with the perplexities of the world," but "possessed of great courage and persevering in his conduct," and remarked, "his is a spirit misplaced." Though without either the cool adroitness of Place, or the gifts of the mob-orator which made and ruined O'Connor, he was enough of a personality to be the leader of working-class politics in London, at a time when London was more truly the political capital than it is to-day, and was evidently one of those who are born to be given office by any organisation with which they are connected.