James Broadhurst and the Liverpool Rebels - 1820s

The Liverpool rebels by David Harrison

In December 1823, a group of Masonic rebels met at the Shakespeare Tavern in Williamson Square, Liverpool to recreate the Antient Grand Lodge. The group, led by local tailor Michael Alexander Gage, were rebelling against the central control of London, and what they saw as the ‘tyranny’ of the Duke of Sussex, Grand Master of the United Grand Lodge of England (UGLE).
The Liverpool rebellion was the culmination of discontent within the large Lancashire Province, which seemed to have been simmering since the Union of the Antients and the Moderns Grand Lodges in 1813.
Lodge of Friendship No. 277 in Oldham had witnessed disruption in 1817. Bickering between the brethren split the Lodge in two, and the rift was only healed the following year after the direct intervention of the Provincial Grand Master.
Many of the rebels, who were mainly a collective of Liverpool and Wigan-based tradesmen and merchants, eventually returned to the UGLE, renouncing their initial grievances and apologising. But a hard core remained, and under the leadership of Gage, the rebels created the groundbreaking Magna Charter of Freemasonry and formed the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of England According to the Old Constitutions, later to become the Grand Lodge held at Wigan.
Ironically, many of the Liverpool-based Masonic rebels were originally from outside the city, such as Gage, who was born in Norfolk, John Robert Goepel, a jeweller who originated from London, and James Broadhurst, a watchmaker from Great Sankey near Warrington.
James Broadhurst was baptised on 25th August 1771 at St. Mary’s Church, Great Sankey. He was the son of a watchmaker, and followed in his father’s footsteps, eventually moving to Liverpool, where he set himself up in business and married Christian Litherland at St. Nicholas’ Church in Liverpool in 1794.
Christian was the sister of Liverpool watchmaker Peter Litherland, who had also originated from Warrington, and was famous for inventing the patent lever watch. Litherland had relocated to Liverpool in 1790, and James seemed to have been close to this fellow watchmaking family.
With the outbreak of the French wars, Liverpool was rife with press gangs, and Broadhurst was ‘inrolled’ into the navy in 1795. He served as an able seaman on the Namur, taking part in the decisive Battle of Cape St. Vincent on 14th February 1797, an outstanding victory, revealing the brilliance of Nelson. In December 1800, Broadhurst was transferred to the San Josef, one of the two captured Spanish ships from the battle, which Nelson commanded at the time. It would be another two years before James was released from service, and he returned to Liverpool back to watchmaking, settling in Trowbridge Place.
In 1847 he received the Naval General Service medal, the medal only being presented to the veterans still surviving at the time. In 1817, like many veterans of the Napoleonic Wars, he entered Freemasonry, joining Merchants’ Lodge No. 442, and in 1820 he joined Ancient Union Lodge No.348, where he became Master. Both of these Lodges became involved in the rebellion.
Broadhurst took an active part in Provincial Grand Lodge meetings, and was quick to join his fellow Masonic tradesmen in the rebellion, sharing the same grievances, freely giving his signature to the document which outlined these issues.
The discontent had started a year after Broadhurst had become a Freemason, and quickly gathered pace, Lancashire Province suffering in part due to the neglect of its Provincial Grand Master, Francis Dukinfield Astley, who never took action in Liverpool or Wigan to diffuse the situation.

Perhaps, like his fellow tradesmen, after surviving through the Napoleonic Wars, Broadhurst sought the equality and freedom of speech for which he had fought, which was perhaps the initial attraction to a society which, he felt, held those qualities.
At a Provincial Grand Lodge meeting at Manchester in October 1818, a resolution was passed which declared that any Lodge whose membership was reduced to less than seven, should not be considered ‘regular’ and the Warrant be declared void.
This resolution was used by Gage as a bureaucratic move to complain about the UGLE, and sent shock waves through the Liverpool Lodges, some of whom, such as the Ancient Union Lodge, was an old ‘Antient’ Lodge which had at the time only ten members. The Ancient Union Lodge held an emergency meeting prior to the Provincial Grand Lodge meeting, and sent a brother to attend to keep an eye on proceedings.
Many Lodges at this time had suffered a decline due to the impact of the Combination Acts 1799-1800 – which outlawed associations of workers against employers – and the majority of Liverpool Lodges, some suffering more than others from low attendance, bonded together.
This led to some Freemasons, such as Broadhurst, joining other Lodges, a move which ensured the survival of the struggling Lodge. The decisive meeting at the Castle Inn, Liverpool, in November 1821, set the scene for rebellion.
A document was drafted with 34 signatures, including Gage and Broadhurst, outlining the dissatisfaction felt by the rebels. This move followed the drafting of a letter, which had been addressed to the Duke of Sussex personally almost two years previous. The letter was extremely direct and revealed the anger felt by the rebels, complaining how certain ‘Modern’ practices were being enforced and how new rules concerning the Royal Arch conflicted with traditional practices.
During this period, certain local Lodges had their own slightly different practices, and hampered by the neglect of the Provincial Grand Master within the rebellious areas of Liverpool and Wigan, the rebels grew extremely sensitive to the transition of the Union of the ‘Antient’ and ‘Modern’ practices.
In a letter to the Duke of Sussex, the rebels refer to an incident in Bath, where petitions for Royal Arch Chapters were dismissed by the Grand Chapter because it was “not desirable to make the Number of Chapters in any place equal to the Number of Lodges.”
The rebels seized upon this example, indicating that they saw the Royal Arch as part of Craft Masonry, and the rejection of the petitions was an abuse of power. The Duke of Sussex, however, did not reply to the letter, which intensified the anger of the rebels and culminated in the November 1821 meeting.

Broadhurst was Master of Ancient Union Lodge in 1821, and along with William Walker, John Pilling and Thomas Berry, represented their Lodge in the rebellion, adding their signatures to the Castle Inn document.

The 34 brethren who signed the document were subsequently suspended by the UGLE, and Gage’s Lodge, No. 31, was erased. This action created further isolation for the suspended rebels as they were not allowed to visit any other Lodges, ultimately providing greater bonding between them.
The dissent spread rapidly through Liverpool as certain Lodges began to support their fellow brethren. The Liverpool based Sea Captain’s Lodge No. 140 threatened to separate itself from the UGLE if Lodge No. 31 was not reinstated, and by the middle of 1822 a list of 65 brethren from Liverpool and Wigan were recorded as being suspended.
On 2nd December 1822, a meeting was held at Lodge of Harmony No. 385, at the Magpie and Stump in Key Street, Liverpool. Lodge of Harmony, like Ancient Union Lodge, had belonged to the Antient Grand Lodge before the Union in 1813. This meeting had visitors from The Merchants’, Mariners’ and Ancient Union Lodges, local Liverpool Lodges which had certain members involved in the rebellion.
The meeting revealed a Lodge in crisis as the Master and Wardens were appointed during an emergency meeting, and not elected or installed, as was the custom. The result of this particular gathering was the wish by all the members present to write a letter to the UGLE declaring the present state of the Lodge of Harmony.
It seems that the Lodge decided against the rebellion and kept their distance, giving their support to the UGLE. Despite this show of loyalty, the Master at the time of the meeting was suspended in 1824 for 12 months, and another brother for seven years, for what was described as ‘un-Masonic conduct.’
Broadhurst also opted out of the rebellion, and along with a number of rebels, presented an apology which brought them back into the fold. He rejoined the Merchants’ Lodge in 1824, but his payments ceased two years later, the experience of the rebellion and the subsequent fall-out perhaps affecting the camaraderie of the Lodge.
Of the rebels representing the Ancient Union Lodge, only Thomas Berry remained to become an active member of the Grand Lodge at Wigan, attending its first meeting at the Shakespeare Tavern in 1823 and serving as secretary at the meeting of March 1825.
Having been suspended during the rebellion, James turned his back on the rebels and conformed. He was not present at the Shakespeare Tavern at the formal opening of the rebel Grand Lodge in December 1823, and took no part in the Magna Charter of Freemasonry which outlined Masonic independence and recreated the ‘Antients’. The leader of the rebellion, Michael Gage, was to fall out with his fellow rebels and resigned from Wigan Grand Lodge in 1842.
Although Broadhurst eventually left Masonry, several of his descendants, who also became Liverpool watchmakers, also became Freemasons, continuing a family tradition. He died in October 1851, and was buried at the Wesleyan Brunswick Chapel in Liverpool.

The rebel Grand Lodge met only at Wigan from 1825, and its last remaining Lodge survived until 1913, a legacy as the longest secessionist Grand Lodge resounding into the early 20th century.

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