that he saw an attorney, John
Brook, go among the mob and point towards Priestley's chapel. However
that may be, the rabble moved off thither and speedily wrecked it. His
residence at Fair Hill was next demolished, his library and scientific
instruments being burnt or smashed. This was but the prelude to
organized attacks on the houses of the leading Nonconformists, whether
they had been at the dinner or not. The resulting riots soon involved in
ruin a large part of the town. Prominent Churchmen who sought to end
these disgraceful scenes suffered both in person and property. A word of
remonstrance sufficed to turn into new channels the tide of hatred and
greed; for, as happened in the Gordon riots of 1780, rascality speedily
rushed in to seize the spoils.

The usually dull archives of the Home Office yield proof of the terror
that reigned in the Midland capital. A Mr. Garbett wrote to Dundas on
17th July that the wrecking still went on, that the Nonconformists were
in the utmost dread and misery, and all people looked for help from
outside to stay the pillage. As for himself, though he was not a "marked
man," his hand trembled at the scenes he had witnessed. There can be
little doubt that the magistrates from the first acted with culpable
weakness, as Whitbread proved in the House of Commons, for they did not
enrol special constables until the rioters had got the upper hand.
Dundas, as Home Secretary, seems to have done his duty. The news of the
riot of the 14th reached him at 10 a.m. on the 15th (Friday); and he at
once sent post haste to Nottingham, ordering the immediate despatch of
the 15th Dragoons. By dint of a forced march of fifty-six miles the
horsemen reached Birmingham on the evening of that same day (Sunday);
but two days more elapsed before drunken blackmailers ceased to molest
Hagley, Halesowen, and other villages. Few persons lost their lives,
except about a dozen of the pillagers who lay helpless with drink in the
cellars of houses which their more zealous comrades had given over to
the flames.[33]

The verdict of Grenville was as follows: "I do not admire riots in
favour of Government much more than riots against it." That of his less
cautious brother, the Marquis of Buckingham, is as follows: "I am not
sorry for this _excess, excessive as it has been_." That of Pitt is not
recorded. He did not speak during the debate on this subject on 21st May
1792; but the rejection of Whitbread's motion for an inqu