Speakers Corner is a very famous spot in Hyde Park, London and like so many places in this old city it has a very colorful history steeped in royal connections.  The famous spot was once home to the famous Tyburn hanging tree.  Established as an execution spot in the early 12^th century, the first record of an execution was made in 1196.  It’s geographic location at the northeast corner of the park was defined by Tyburn Road (now Oxford Street) and Tyburn Lane (now Park Lane) which took their names after a brook that ran nearby - the Tye Bourne.  In 1571 a gallows eighteen feet in height, built in a triangular shape replaced the tree as an executioner that could hang 24 at once – eight on each of its three sides.  It was at these 16^th century executions that the felons would address the crowds.  Here they would speak freely on subjects otherwise taboo.  Here many a Catholic died a martyr convincing members of the crowd to convert after a moving speech.

At the time that Henry VIII acquired Hyde Park it consisted of approximately 620 acres.  (Today’s Hyde Park is approximately 344 acres.)  Henry had the park fenced and used it for entertaining visitors and for deer hunting.  This continued until the time of Charles I when in 1652 the deer and the park were sold.  It was after this that the lessees of the park charged a toll to any carriages entering and during one of these carriage rides an attempt was made on the life of Oliver Cromwell, the man who was then the Lord Protector of Parliament after it assassinated Charles I.  Oliver Cromwell eventually died of natural causes in 1658.  On 30^th January 1661 his exhumed body was executed posthumously with his corpse dangling in a cage at Tyburn as a warning to those who might wish to depose the monarchy.  His head, being a sick souvenir, was passed around and finally buried in 1960 (nearly 300 years later!) near Sidney Sussex chapel.  It is believed that his body is buried near Tyburn.

A brick wall was built around Hyde Park soon after it was returned to the crown during the Restoration.  The park once again became a place of deer hunting with the extra recreation of horse racing; prize fighting, swimming and boating were added.  (At the request of Queen Caroline, in the 18^th century, the Serpentine was formed out of these ponds.)  Carriage rides remained popular in the park, which was opened to the public in 1662.  The famous ‘Rotten Row’ came about after William III ascended, purchased Kensington Palace and built a road through Hyde Park to access it.  “The King’s New Road” or “Route du Roi” was bastardized into Rotten Row.  Among other things the park became famous for were duels, mock sea battles on the Serpentine, and huge public parties for celebrating the coronations of George III, William IV and Queen Victoria.  In 1851, between 1^st May and 11^th October, more than six million people visited the “Great Exhibition of Industry of All Nations” which represented the pinnacle of Prince Albert’s short life.  Besides the tremendous number of visitors it attracted, it saw a profit of approximately 186,000 pounds and was the cornerstone of several museums located in Kensington, including the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Though 1851 seemed to be a year that the park flourished under Albert’s vision, the following years were years of near revolution.  On Sunday, 1^st July 1855 an estimated 150,000 men, women and children assembled in the park to protest the “Sunday Trading Bill”.  Tensions mounted as 30 or 40 policemen appeared attempting to arrest a man.  The crowd - attempting to rescue the man from arrest - started a riot, which saw 104 arrests.  The bill was withdrawn the next day and the pattern of public assembly and police intervention began.  It continued sporadically until 23^rd July 1866 when the police banned a demonstration by The Reform League.  Vast crowds began to gather and large numbers of policemen (1,600 – 1,800 estimated) were brought in to disperse them.  When the police locked the gates surrounding Hyde Park, the demonstrators trapped inside broke down the fence causing injuries and arrests.  The Grenadier Guards and the Life Guards were called in as back up.  The people continued congregating and speeches were given all over Hyde Park that day.

The determination of The Reform League and its supporters finally motivated Parliament to pass The Royal Parks and Gardens Regulation Act in 1872.  This act provided for a space in Hyde Park – the northeast corner of Hyde Park – for public speaking.  This historic spot has been host to many great orators over the years such as George Orwell, Vladmir Lenin, Karl Marx, and Fredrick Engels.  It has been the spot where suffragettes waged a war of words for the rights of women.  The rights Speakers Corner represents continue to cause controversy.  On 2^nd October 1997, Mrs. Alison Redmond-Bate was arrested for breach of peace while preaching on the steps of Wakefield Cathedral.  She appealed her conviction and saw her case dismissed on 23rd July 1999.  Here’s part of ‘The Times: Law Report: Queen’s Bench Divisional Court’* report:

‘Free speech included not only the inoffensive but the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative provided it did not tend to provoke violence.  Freedom only to speak inoffensively was not worth having.

What Speakers’ Corner, where the law applied as fully as anywhere else, demonstrated was the tolerance which was both extended by the law to opinion of every kind and expected by the law in the conduct of those who disagreed, even strongly, with what they heard.’

As you can see, from its humble beginnings back in the days when it was known as the hanging field of Tyburn, through the struggles of the reformers, to the famous orators who stood in their shadows to the woman who fought and over turned her conviction, free speech has been the hallmark of Speakers Corner.  The reason we share this with you now is as a way to introduce the newest section of the “Unofficial British Royal Family Pages”, Speakers Corner.  Speakers Corner will run on Sundays in honor of the traditional day of gathering in Hyde Park.  It will feature the views of the readers whether they be the inoffensive, the irritating, the contentious, the eccentric, the heretical, the unwelcome and the provocative - provided they do not tend to provoke violence.

We welcome your opinions, your questions, your observations, your suggestions, your corrections, and your additions – all the things that keep me in line!  We will share these along with your name, city, state, province and country.  If you prefer that we only use your first name or initials, please sign your email that way.  We will never share your email address on the site or with anyone else.  Our main goal is to share the opinions of our readers from around the globe and we think it would be fun to show where you are from.  Example: Fred, Nova Scotia, Canada; S.L., Las Vegas, Nevada, US; or even an alias will work; Popeye, San Juan, Puerto Rico.

The first Speakers Corner will be published on Sunday, April 1, 2001.  Geraldine is doing her usual awesome job with all the behind the scenes work that makes this site award winning.  I’ll be providing her with excerpts from the letters I receive for posting and I’ll, of course, be adding my two cents.  We are looking forward to bringing this new feature and to your feedback.  Geraldine had a great idea that we are hoping to unveil later this year and we are planning to unveil an idea I mentioned in a previous column on May 31, 2001 – Memorial Day to the Americans.

* Published Wednesday, July 28, 1999 in ‘The Times’

There is a web site www.speakerscorner.net that contains tons of information about Speakers Corner and even some of the articles written by the famous orators.  Worth checking out!

Will there ever be a week without a correction?  Part of me hopes not because I think that will be a week where nobody’s read the column!  Anyway, many thanks to our reader, Lana, who pointed out my error in calling Chancellor Metternich, Prince Albert’s brother.  In fact, Albert had only one brother, Ernest II, who was known as the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.

Geraldine and I had a great time cooking up some new features for the website and walking past all the famous sites of Boston.  We even visited two used bookshops and I got four books.  One is on Queen Elizabeth II’s 1954 tour of Australia that I’m thinking will be the subject of April’s column to commemorate her 50 years on the throne.

-- Eileen Sullivan --