TO THE INHABITANTS
OF THE COUNTY
COUNTY NOTTINGHAM.
AN ADDRESS was on Saturday the 22d of April instant posted up in the Town and Neighbourhood of Nottingham, inviting the Inhabitants of Nottingham and its Vicinity to RESIST ALL DEMANDS MADE BY GOVERNMENT until certain Acts were done, and to attend a Meeting to be held on the Forest, on the Monday next, at Five o'clock.
The Magistrates for the Town have taken very active and formidable measures, by calling out the Peace Officers and the Military, and by other proper means, to counteract the mischief which might arise from any numerous Assembly, called together for such illegal purposes. The High Sheriff and Magistrates for the County concurred with the Magistrates for the Town, in the measures taken for preserving the peace, and the intended Meeting was prevented.
The Law was pointed out the relief for poverty and distress, for which no remedy can be derived from tumultuous Meetings; such Meetings are designed to give an opportunity to the [conspirators] and the abettors of mischief, to seduce and deceive the many, who are not aware of the pernicious and dangerous consequences of their proceedings; and also to create general confusion, and the subversion of all order and government.
It is proper for the Magistrates for the County, as Conservators of the public peace, to state the consequences which may arise to every Individual, who shall constitute a part of any Assemblies, held for the purposes expressed in the late invitation for a Public Meeting, that no persons may ignorantly incur the danger: and that those who shall meet for any such purposes may be hereafter without excuse.
To assemble for the purpose of devising means to resist the Law, and to proceed to any Act of such resistance in consequence, is Rebellion against the State, and every Person so acting is guilty of High Treason.
The Magistrates and therefore to express their earnest wish, that all persons who have any regard for the public Peace, for their own personal safety, and to their duty to their King and Country, will abstain from forming a part of, being present at, any such illegal meeting; and they wish it to be well understood, that notwithstanding any specious legal pretences for which any numerous meeting of Persons may now be held, such meetings will be viewed with the greatest suspicion, and those who administer the Law will not permit it to be evaded.
By Order of the Magistrates for the County
of Nottingham,
WILLIAM SCULTHORPE.
County Hall, Nottingham, April 25, 1815.
This notice was posted in the Nottingham Gazette of 28th April 1815.
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