Gordon Riots

Gordon Riots, a series of violent 'No Poperty' disturbances which occurred in London in June, 1780, so called after Lord George Gordon, the President of the 'Protestant Association.' The authorities behaved with the utmost imbecility and for four or five nights abandoned the town to the fury of the mob, who amongst other outrages sacked and burned Lord Mansfield's house in Bloomsbury Square and destroyed his library and a priceless collection of manuscripts, many from the pen of Mansfield himself. At length the military were called in and the riots suppressed, but not until an immense amount of damage had been done. Lord George Gordon was indicted for high treason on the charge of levying war against the King. He was defended by Erskine and acquitted for want of evidence; see 21 St. Tr. 485; Lecky's Hist. of England in the Eighteenth Century, ch. xii. For an account of the riots, see Dickens's Barnaby Rudge; and Memoirs of Sir Samuel Romilly.