12th January 2020
I've recently been reading about the bread riots which took placed in Torquay in 1847 and 1867 and this gave me the idea for some lyrics to go with a new tune idea I had. There was an interesting article which mentioned the bread riots in a local magazine called the Beach Hut. The article was written by Jack Critchlow about Torquay Museum and having read this it sparked off the idea for a song. The idea for the tune came from watching a tutorial on youtube about playing a country and western style steel guitar riff. My tune idea sounds nothing like that style of music though.
Here is a link to some information about the Torquay bread riots
https://www.torbay.gov.uk/media/8996/the-bread-riots-1847-and-1867.pdf
The harvest was so poor
The price of bread it would soar
The potato crop and failed
Hope for the poor had not prevailed
There were riots in Torquay
In Union street like an angry sea
It was Eighteen Forty Seven
Great discontent for the poor in Devon
The price of bread so high
Could this the baker justify
A mob in Union street
The Constables had to defeat
There were riots in Torquay
In Union street like an angry sea
It was Eighteen Sixty Seven
Great discontent for the poor in Devon
A sharp rise in the price of bread
Led to a riot the newspaper said
It was bonfire night when the shops were trashed
Broken into, ransacked, trashed and smashed