The Cato Street Conspiracy - a plot to assassinate Prime Minister Lord Liverpool and the entire Cabinet as they attended a private dinner party - was foiled on February 23rd, 1820. Thwarted by an informant within their ranks, the conspirators were exposed, and either deported or executed.
Arthur Thistlewood and his cohorts had planned a ruthless assault, complete with grenades, firearms, and symbolic decapitations. Their ideology fused Marxist principles with revolutionary fervour, aiming to redistribute land and provoke a proletarian uprising. Yet their vision faltered, as their violent ambitions clashed with the realities of British governance.
In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly consider the turbulent period of British radicalism after the Napoleonic Wars; explain why the Coldstream Guards were considerably less effective at the scene of the crime bust than they might have been; and discover one of Thistlewood’s prior Dick Dastardly-style schemes to destabilise the government…
Further Reading:
‘Cato Street Conspiracy: the rebel and the spy’ (Museum of London, 2023): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-apjYCejsac
We'll be back on Monday - unless you join 🌴CLUB RETROSPECTORS🌴, where we give you ad-free listening AND a full-length Sunday episode every week!
Plus, weekly bonus content, unlock over 70 bonus bits, and support our independent podcast.
Join now via Apple Podcasts or Patreon. Thanks!
The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.
Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.
Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2023.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
The Temple of Reason
Roosevelt's Panamanian Photoshoot
The Instant Message Murder
Meteorite!
Creating The At-Home Pregnancy Test
Muhammad Ali and the Hail of Toothbrushes
The First Cheerleader
The Flying Artilleryman
The BBC's Halloween Hoax
Building The Chunnel
Rebel Without A Script
Making 'Under Pressure'
America's First Black General
Mourning Jane Seymour
Not The Beginning Of The World
Australia's Most Iconic Building
David Blaine, Trickless Magician
Let's Buy Alaska
The Sound of the Circus
Catch Me If You Can
Create your
podcast in
minutes
It is Free
Irish Songs with Ken Murray
History Obscura
Historycal: Words that Shaped the World
The Rest Is History
Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra