The Derby Mercury, a brief introduction.

The Derby Mercury, founded in 1730 by Joshua Drewry, was typical of late 18th century provincial newspapers in that it was essentially a digest of London newspapers. It reprinted national and international news while local news was restricted to bread and cheese prices, accidents and trials. Local marriages and deaths were only included if they were 'well attested'.

It was put together weekly by a small team consisting of proprietor, editor, apprentice and printer, and appeared weekly on a Thursday, which was market day. The proprietor, John Drewry, lived on the first and second floors. He sold medicines, new and second-hand books, stationery and arranged charitable concerts at All Saints' Parish Church and in the Playhouse. He also printed and published books, these included a History of Derbyshire, written by the Presbyterian minister, and published while Ward was editor of the Mercury. He was almost certainly a member of the Friar Gate Presbyterian Chapel, along with the leading industrialists and bankers of Derby.

Drewry ran a circulation library from his home which included as members those same dissenting bankers and industrialists - along with William Ward.

The newspaper was called 'Drewry's Derby Mercury' until the beginning of 1789.

On 5th January 1789 the whole newspaper had a makeover. Drewry's name was dropped from the masthead and the paper became just the 'Derby Mercury'. A poetry section became a permanent fixture on page three and all the old, much used Caslon type was replaced with 'entire new type... cast on purpose by the celebrated W. Caslon Esq. Letter Founders to his Majesty'.

It is reasonable to assume that the middle-aged John Drewry had installed the 19 year-old William Ward as his editor at this date with new type, new masthead, and new ideas. J. D. Andrew, in his unpublished thesis 'The Derbyshire Newspaper Press 1720-1855', 1955, notes that editorial paragraphs appear in the newspaper for the first time at around this date. Sometimes they stand out clearly on the page by extensive use of italics, underlining and capital letters, at other times editorial comment is inserted after particular stories.

The success of the the new editor can be judged by the paper's increase in size, increased number of columns (three to four per page) and an increase in price, which happened in March 1793.

Whatever Baptists there were in Derby travelled to, and became members of, the Friar Lane Chapel in Nottingham, or the Baptist Chapel at Burton-upon-Trent, Staffordshire. The only Baptist chapel in southern or central Derbyshire was at Loscoe, (1) near Ripley. A Chapel had been built in 1722 and shared with the Unitarians, but in 1783 the Baptists took full possession. Unlike Nottinghamshire, Dissenters in Derbyshire were either Presbyterians, Unitarians, or Independents. Baptists did not take root until the Agard Street Chapel was built in 1794.

The following articles appeared under Ward's editorship. He selected them and may even have set the type himself. They have a certain poignancy in the light of what was to happen later. The articles about India are not unique. They appear next to similar articles about the peoples of Australia, Africa, and the Americas.

The most looked for article is not there, that of an account of Carey's sermon in Nottingham at the meeting of ministers at Friar Lane, Nottingham, on 30th May, 1792. There is nothing in the Nottingham newspaper either. However, in the relevant edition of the Mercury there is a report of a meeting of Methodist ministers at Leicester, so perhaps Ward was still a Methodist at the time. From Andrew Fuller's arrival in Derby on 21st October, 1792, the situation changed radically.

At the end of September 1794 John Drewry died aged 55. His nephew John Drewry II took over the business and also became editor. William Ward moved to Stafford to help his former employer's brother, Joshua Drewry II, to start a newspaper. The Staffordshire Advertiser was first published at the beginning of 1795.

25th August, 1791.

GENERAL BAPTISTS:

On Sunday last, after a sermon in the open air by a General Baptist preacher, nine persons, five men and four women, were publicly baptized by immersion in the River Derwent in this town, in the presence of a great number of spectators, who behaved in general with great propriety; though such an act of religious service in this town can scarce be remembered, we think, by the oldest inhabitant.

 

19th April, 1792.

METHODISTS MISSIONARIES TO BENGAL:

A missionary establishment from this country to the province of Bengal in the East Indies, by Mr. Wesley's connection, is determined upon, on a respectable footing, in which the principal qualification will be a knowledge of the provincial language.

 

27th September, 1792.

BRAHMINS:

It is now proved, on an examination of the Astronomical Tables of the Bramins in India, that the Planetary system and that of the earth moving round the sun, with us a comparatively modern discovery, has been known to the Indians at least 3100 years before the Christian aera. - St James's Chron.

 

18th October, 1792.

REV. ANDREW FULLER:

We hear that the Rev. Andrew Fuller is expected to preach on Sunday next, in a room opened for public worship at Mrs. Murden's, by the Brook-side.

This is the first recorded meeting of Particular Baptist in Derby. Mrs. Murden, whose husband was involved in Ward's political activities, either owned a shop, or an inn, on Brookside and provided a room for the meeting. It took place on 21st October 1792, four and a half months after Carey's sermon in Nottingham and 19 days after the founding of the Baptist Missionary Society in Kettering.

 

28th February, 1793.

CAREY AND THOMAS:

The Rev. Mr. Carey of Leicester, and Mr. Thomas are about to embark from England, upon a Mission to Bengal. Mr. Thomas has already resided several years in the East Indies, and is acquainted with the Hindoo Language, and from the known peaceable & inquisitive disposition of the natives we have reason to believe that the benign influence of Christianity will be extended to that part of the Globe.

 

9th May, 1793.

SUTTEE:

TRAVELS IN INDIA. By W. Hodges.

From this pleasing volume we select the following description of the horrible ceremony of a hindoo female devoting herself to the flames with the dead body of her husband.

"The person whom I saw was of the Bhyse (p***nant) tribe or cast; a class of people we should naturally suppose exempt from the high and impetuous pride of rank, and in whom the natural desire to preserve life should in general predominate, undiverted from its proper course by a prospect of posthumous fame. I may add, that these motives are greatly strengthened by the exemption of this class from that infamy with which the refusal is inevitably branded in their superiors. Upon my repairing to the spot, on the banks of the river where the ceremony was to take place, I found the body of the man on a bier, and covered with linen, already brought down and laid at the edge of the river. At this time, about ten in the morning, only a few people were assembled, who appeared destitute of feeling at the catastrophe that was to take place; I may say, that they displayed the most perfect apathy and indifference. After waiting a considerable time, the wife appeared, attended by the Bramins and music, with some few relations. The procession was slow and solemn; the victim moved with a steady and firm step; and, apparently with a perfect composure of countenance, approached close to the body of her husband, where for some time they halted. She then addressed those who were near her with composure, and without the least trepidation of voice or change of countenance. She held in her left hand a cocoa-nut, in which was a red colour mixed up, and dipping in it the fore-finger of her right hand she marked those who were near her to whom she wished to shew the last act of attention. At this time I stood close to her, she observed me attentively, and with the colour marked me on the forehead. - She might be about 24 or 25 years of age, a time of life when the bloom of beauty has generally fled the cheek in India; but still she preserved a sufficient share to prove that she must have been handsome; her figure was small, but elegantly turned; and the form of her hands and arms was particularly beautiful. Her dress was a loose robe of white flowing drapery, that extended from her head to her feet. The place of sacrifice was higher upon the bank of the river, a hundred yards or more from the place we now stood. - The pile was composed of dried branches, leaves, and rushes, with a door on one side, and arched and covered on the top: by the side of the door stood a man with a lighted brand. From the time the woman appeared, to the taking up of the body to convey it into the pile, might occupy the space of half-an-hour, which was employed in prayer with the Bramins, in attentions to those who stood near her, and conversations with her relations. When the body was taken up she followed close to it, attended by the Chief Bramin; and when it was deposited in the pile she bowed to all around her, and entered without speaking. The moment she entered, the door was closed; the fire was put to the combustibles, which instantly flamed, and immense quantities of dried wood and other matters were thrown upon it. The last apart of the ceremony was accompanied with the shouts of the multitude, who now became numerous, and the whole seemed a mass of confused rejoicing. For my part, I felt actuated by very different sentiments: the event that I had been witness to was such, that the circumstances attending it could not be erased from the memory."

* = unreadable.

 

30th May, 1793.

HINDU CASTE SYSTEM:

The POULIATS, and the POULICHES.

The following article, drawn from Abbe Raynal, presents two pictures of the debasement of the human race, which history has never paralleled.

'There is a tribe amongst the Indians which is the refuse of the rest. The members of it are employed in the meanest offices of society.- They bury their dead, carry away dirt, and live upon the flesh of animals that die natural deaths. - They are prohibited from entering into the temples and public markets; neither are they allowed the use of the wells, that are common to all their inhabitants. Their dwellings are at the extremities of the towns, or consist of solitary cottages in the country; and they are even forbidden in the streets where the Bramins reside. As all other Indians, they may employ themselves in the labours of agriculture: but only for the benefit of other tribes; for they are not permitted to have lands of their own, not even upon lease. Such is the degree of horror they excite, that if, by chance, they were to touch anyone not belonging to their tribe, they would be deprived, with impunity, of a life reckoned too abject to deserve the protection of the laws. Most of them are involved in the culture of rice. Near the fields where they carry on this work is a kind of hut, into which they retire when they hear a cry, which always comes from a distance, to give them notice of some order from the person on whom they depend; to which they answer not coming out of their retreat. They take the same precautions whenever they are warned, by a confused kind of noise, of the approach of any man whatever. If they have not time to hide themselves they fall prostrate on the ground, with their face downwards, with all the marks of humiliation which all the sense of their disgrace can suggest.

'Whenever the harvests do not answer to the avidity of an oppressive master, he sometimes sets fire to the huts of these unhappy labourers; & if they attempt to escape the flames, he fires upon them without mercy! The condition of these people is horrible in every respect, even in the manner in which they are forced to provide for their most urgent wants. In the dusk of the evening, they come out from their retreats in bands; they direct their steps towards the market, at a certain distance from which they bellow. The merchants approach,and they ask for what they want. They are supplied, and the provisions are laid out on the very spot where the money destined for the payment of them has been previously deposited. When the purchasers can be assured that they shall not be seen by anyone, they come out from behind the hedge where they had concealed themselves, and carry away,without precipitation, what they acquired in so singular a manner.'

 

5th June, 1794.

OPENING OF AGARD STREET PARTICULAR BAPTIST CHAPEL, DERBY:

THE BAPTIST MEETING HOUSE lately erected on NUNS GREEN, will be opened on THURSDAY the 12th instant, by the Rev. RICHARD HOPPER, of Nottingham, and the Rev. SAMUEL PEARCE, of Birmingham:--- Service to begin at half past ten o' Clock in the forenoon.
Derby, 4th June, 1794.

This was the first Baptist Chapel in Derby.

 

2nd October, 1794.

A PRINTER IS ARRESTED IN CALCUTTA:

The last intelligence received by Government from the East Indies is by no means pleasant. The instructions left by the Marquis of Cornwallis for the settlement of the Company's Army, have been carried into execution by Sir John Shore, and have produced much clamour. Meetings of the Company's Officers have been held, and a committee appointed for the conduct of their cause. A printer in Calcutta, who had published in his paper the proceedings of this meeting, was taken up by an order of the Governor General, and was detained for some time in prison; nay, he was threatened with trial for sedition; but to such a height had the clamour extended, that he was enlarged without trial, and the Officers have a printing apparatus of their own, for the publication of their papers.

 

(1) This information comes from a booklet called 'The Heritage of Codnor and Loscoe' by Fred S. Thorpe, published in 1990. The Derbyshire villages of Loscoe and Codnor are side-by-side. The deeds of Loscoe Baptist Chapel record that Francis Mather, among others, became possessed of the Chapel in 1782, being for the benefit of the Church and Society of Protestant Dissenters, called 'Particular Baptists'. William Fletcher started the first Particular Baptist Chapel in the County of Derbyshire, at Loscoe, in 1783, and was ordained on 29th September, 1784.

The Church records read:

'We whose names are hereunder written, have been baptised upon profession of faith, having agreed to unite together in the fellowship of the gospel, to maintain the precious doctrine commonly called 'Calvanistic' and to maintain the independency of the churches inviolably. Also after many months of trial of the gifts of our brother William Fletcher, we unanimously agreed to call him out to the work of the ministry and to exercise his gifts among us, his labours having been much owned of the Lord for our edification and for the conversion of sinners. Our brother William Fletcher was unanimously called to take upon him the pastoral care over us in the Lord. Signed: Francis Skerrit, Susannah Skeritt, Esther Sporton, Peter Grundy, John Lilley, Susannah Fletcher, Sarah Hack, Mary Lilley, Ann Burgin. September 29th, 1784.

There is no mention of Codnor Baptist Chapel in this booklet. So it is possible that Codnor and Loscoe were confused in John Clark Marshman.

The minister of Trinity Baptist Church, Derby, in his booklet celebrating 100 years of the Derby Particular Baptists, in 1896, (available on the Digital Library Page 2) causes some confusion by saying that: a Particular Baptist Chapel was formed in Codnor in 1788; that it afterwards merged with Loscoe, established in 1806; and also mentions that nearby Swanwick Baptist Church was formed in 1796.