Paisley, a town located in the west of Scotland, has a rich and vibrant history that dates back to ancient times. In this informative volume, author Robert Brown offers a detailed account of the town's history, from the Roman period to the Victorian era. Drawing on extensive research and firsthand accounts, Brown paints a vivid picture of life in Paisley throughout the centuries. A must-read for anyone interested in the history of Scotland and its people. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

The untold story of 19th century Scottish revolutionaries who fought for an independent republic is recounted in this “astonishing book” (Observer, UK). In April of 1820, the last armed uprising on British soil ignited in Glasgow. The attempt to sever the Union and establish a radical Scottish republic ended in executions, imprisonments, transportations and eighty-five trials for high treason. Yet despite its political and social importance, the story of this working-class revolution has all but vanished from the historical record. In The Radical Rising, historians Peter Berresford-Ellis and Seumas Mac a’Ghobhainn restore the radical rising to its rightful place in history. With an incisive analysis of the rising itself and the events which led up to it, this volume vividly recaptures the extraordinary heroism of insurrection leaders John Baird and Andrew Hardie, as well as the savagery with which the movement was crushed by the forces of the British state.

The prevailing historical view of the Catholic Irish in the first half of nineteenth-century Scotland is that they were despised by native workers because of their religion and because most were employed as strike-breakers or low-wage labour. As a result of this hostility, the Catholic immigrants were viewed as a separate isolated community, concerned mainly with Irish and Catholic issues and unable or unwilling to participate in trade unions, strikes and radical reform movements. The Protestant Irish immigrants, on the other hand, were believed to have integrated with little difficulty, mainly because of religious, families and cultural ties with the Scots. This study presents a radically different view. It demonstrates that, whereas some Irish workers were used as a blackleg or cheap labour, others participated in trade unions and strikes alongside native workers, most notably in spinning, weaving and mining industries. The various agitations for political change in the region are analysed, revealing that the Irish – Catholic and Protestant – were significantly involved in all of them. It is also shown that Scottish reformers welcomed, and indeed actively sought, Catholic Irish participation. The campaigns for Catholic emancipation and the repeal of the Act of Union of 1800 are reviewed, as are the attitudes of the Scottish Catholic clergy to the political activities of their overwhelmingly Irish congregations.