Edward Truelove: radical and freethinker
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This is Edward Truelove (1809-1899), an important figure in British radicalism and freethought. He was above all a bookseller and publisher, a thread linking the Owenite tradition to the high water mark of secularism and freethought in the 1870s and 1880s.
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Here's the transcript:
The Late Edward Truelove - A Free Thought Publisher of London.
By G.J. Holyoake /
The oldest of all the personal followers of Robert Owen in London, has recently died and was buried with honour in Highgate Cemetery, as befitted the end of the valiant old cooperator who defended their right of publicity in dangerous days /
Therefore some words of tribute are due to the memory of Mr. Edward Truelove. It was in 1843 that I first knew him, when he was bookseller to the John Street Institution, where the Social Reformers of that day had sought to found a "society of all classes of all nations." He had been a worker at the Queenswood /
Community, commenced by disciples of Robert Owen. His admiration of the great Social Propagandist never ceased. Mr. Truelove's interest in social improvement, which attracted him at the beginning, remained unchanged to the end of his long life of 90 years. For more than half a century I had /
friendly and personal knowledge of him, and always found him not only honest in dealing - but honest in principle - which is much rarer. He never explained away what he believed, nor sought to identify his beliefs with more profitable opinions, which were quite different, in order to /
shield himself from the consequences of his honest convictions. He stood by the truth. It is said that "the one respect in which a child is superior to a man is its incapacity for lying." In this respect Mr. Truelove was always a child. If consistency brought peril or loss he never /
changed. If it brought imprisonment, which it did, he never complained. He did not seek peril - he did not provoke it; and when it came he did not flinch. Mr. Truelove was best known as a bookseller and occasional publisher. Any honest, well intended work, originating in the byways /
of independent thought was welcome to him. Curious seekers for unconventional truth turned their steps to his shop in the Strand, and when that was displaced by the erection of the Law Courts, - to his shop in High Holborn. Such places are the fortress of prohibited thought - not garrisoned /
without danger. Pioneers of proscribed ideas driven out of society, like the Plague Ship into the loneliness of the ocean, could leave their exposition or defence with the intrepid bookseller, who would give it currency as opportunity offered. Mr. Truelove had not only /
the bookvendor's passion - he had reverence for the works of the exiled thinker, and some of them if scarce, he would not sell save to buyers who could cherish them. Disinterested as well as bold, his preference was for forbidden books which enrich the public, but not the publisher. He believed /
with Madame de Stael, the search for truth is the noblest pursuit of man and the publication of it a duty. Personally, he trusted in truth as the most likely security for the present or the future. Therefore there is praise for his usefulness and courage and honour for his memory. /
These words were my tribute at his grave. He retained his natural force of mind unimpaired. He died of no disease. His end came only by the patient obstinacy of time. A year ago, Mr R. Applegarth, Mr A. Marsh + myself obtained among Mr Truelove's many friends a Tributary Fund, which made certain his enjoyment of supplementary comforts to the last.
The Late Edward Truelove - A Free Thought Publisher of London.
By G.J. Holyoake /
The oldest of all the personal followers of Robert Owen in London, has recently died and was buried with honour in Highgate Cemetery, as befitted the end of the valiant old cooperator who defended their right of publicity in dangerous days /
Therefore some words of tribute are due to the memory of Mr. Edward Truelove. It was in 1843 that I first knew him, when he was bookseller to the John Street Institution, where the Social Reformers of that day had sought to found a "society of all classes of all nations." He had been a worker at the Queenswood /
Community, commenced by disciples of Robert Owen. His admiration of the great Social Propagandist never ceased. Mr. Truelove's interest in social improvement, which attracted him at the beginning, remained unchanged to the end of his long life of 90 years. For more than half a century I had /
friendly and personal knowledge of him, and always found him not only honest in dealing - but honest in principle - which is much rarer. He never explained away what he believed, nor sought to identify his beliefs with more profitable opinions, which were quite different, in order to /
shield himself from the consequences of his honest convictions. He stood by the truth. It is said that "the one respect in which a child is superior to a man is its incapacity for lying." In this respect Mr. Truelove was always a child. If consistency brought peril or loss he never /
changed. If it brought imprisonment, which it did, he never complained. He did not seek peril - he did not provoke it; and when it came he did not flinch. Mr. Truelove was best known as a bookseller and occasional publisher. Any honest, well intended work, originating in the byways /
of independent thought was welcome to him. Curious seekers for unconventional truth turned their steps to his shop in the Strand, and when that was displaced by the erection of the Law Courts, - to his shop in High Holborn. Such places are the fortress of prohibited thought - not garrisoned /
without danger. Pioneers of proscribed ideas driven out of society, like the Plague Ship into the loneliness of the ocean, could leave their exposition or defence with the intrepid bookseller, who would give it currency as opportunity offered. Mr. Truelove had not only /
the bookvendor's passion - he had reverence for the works of the exiled thinker, and some of them if scarce, he would not sell save to buyers who could cherish them. Disinterested as well as bold, his preference was for forbidden books which enrich the public, but not the publisher. He believed /
with Madame de Stael, the search for truth is the noblest pursuit of man and the publication of it a duty. Personally, he trusted in truth as the most likely security for the present or the future. Therefore there is praise for his usefulness and courage and honour for his memory. /
These words were my tribute at his grave. He retained his natural force of mind unimpaired. He died of no disease. His end came only by the patient obstinacy of time. A year ago, Mr R. Applegarth, Mr A. Marsh + myself obtained among Mr Truelove's many friends a Tributary Fund, which made certain his enjoyment of supplementary comforts to the last.
And here's a few links to some of the people and places mentioned:
- the socialist, cooperator and social reformer Robert Owen lived from 1771 to 1858
- the John Street Institution just off Tottenham Court Road in London opened in 1840
- the Queenswood cooperative community in Hampshire was established in 1839
- Robert Applegarth (1834-1924) was a prominent trade unionist
- Alfred Marsh (1858-1914) was an anarchist whose father was a close friend of Holyoake
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The final page of the manuscript is written in a different hand from the others. It raises the possibility that while the bulk of the document was copied out - perhaps for legibility and to edit it - the final page is in Holyoake's own hand.
Below I've posted two postcards of Holyoake including his signature so you can compare the handwriting. A note on the back of the final page of the manuscript reads: 'Presented by / H.G. Green / Editor Free Thought Magazine'. Attached is an article about Holyoake from this same journal. Horace L. Green (1828-1903) was the founder of the Free Thought Magazine (established as the Freethinkers' Magazine) in New York state in 1882. Green and the journal later moved to Chicago. H.G. Green (perhaps a son) was listed in 1895 as the monthly's business manager. Another note on the back of the penultimate page reads: 'Chicago Ill - / Rec'd 7/10/99' |
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In a marvellous moment which links Truelove and Holyoake, in November 1849 Edward Truelove named his son 'Mazzini' after the Italian radical and nationalist - this was celebrated at a secular baptism at the John Street Institution, with the blessing delivered by G.J. Holyoake.
As Holyoake mentions, Truelove was buried at Highgate cemetery in north London. That's where Holyoake too was interred. Their graves, appropriately, are close to each other.
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