The ensuing violence, known as the Newport Rising, was a chapter in the ongoing struggle between the British government and a group of reformists called Chartists.
The case was prosecuted by the solicitor-general, Sir William Follett (the attorney-general being busy in Lancaster prosecuting Feargus O'Connor and 57 other Chartists following the plug riots).
The society embraced representatives of Left Chartists, German workers and craftsmen – members of the League of the Just – and revolutionary emigrants of other nationalities.
At that time, chartists drew their candlesticks on a scroll of rice paper, from right to left, with a crow quill and India ink ground by hand.