The British Democrats

The London Corresponding Society

The London Corresponding Society (LCS) was founded in London in 1792. From the start it had ambitions to act as a co-ordinating centre for the Constitutional Society bodies across the country. The LCS expanded rapidly to become the largest radical organization in England, and sent English delegates to the abortive British Convention in Edinburgh. The founding LCS Chairman, M. Margarot, was deported following the dispersal of the Convention. The main defendants in the treason trials that followed were leading figures in the LCS. Although acquitted, the Seditious Meetings Act of 1795 made it hard for the organization to continue its public activity, and it was finally banned by name in 1799.

• Thomas Hardy on the founding of the Society (1792)
• Regulations of the Society (1792) (also in [pdf])
• Address following the dispersal of the British Convention (1794)
• Appeal for a new Convention (undated)
• Aid for prisoners' families (1794)
• A Narrative of the Proceedings at the General Meeting of the London Corresponding Society (1797) [Transcription in progress]