Spa Fields riots

The Spa Fields riots were mass meetings that took place at Spa Fields, Islington, England on November 15, December 2, and December 9, 1816 between revolutionary Spenceans against the British government. The Spenceans had planned to encourage rioting at this meeting and then seize control of the British government by taking the Tower of London and the Bank of England. Authorities learned of the plan and dispersed the meeting. Arthur Thistlewood and three other leaders were arrested and charged with high treason. When James Watson was acquitted, the authorities released Thistlewood and the others as well.

The Spa Field meetings are now considered to have been held with peaceful intentions. They were one of the first cases of mass meetings in public, and the first meeting on 15th November 1816 was made up of around 20,000 people. This was mainly peaceful, although some of the crowd did march through Westminster in protest at the high prices of the time. At the second meeting, a small group of protesters followed Dr, Watson and his son to the Tower of London, looting a gun shop along the way. They were met by troops at the Tower of London and dispersed or arrested. However, some historians have suggested that this was more a spontaneous act under the influence of alcohol than an attempt at revolution, and the main witness to the 'plotting' was a government spy, who may have been working as an agent provocateur. For this reason, the case against the arrested men was dropped and they were released.

Henry Hunt's role in the events is disputed. Although not a Spencean, he was a speaker at the meetings. He claimed afterwards not to have known about an uprising, and tried to distance himself from events, however, some historians do not believe him.