THE MASTERS. 45 



The next meeting will be held on Monday next, the 20th instant, at 2 o'clock, at 

 the above ofticc. Signed, C. Rawson, Chairman." 



T/ic History of tlic Volunteer Movement and its Promoters^ b)- Sir 

 Duncan Macdougall, page 60, says : — 



Since the publication of the first edition, I have lieen placed in possession 

 of the following information, by which it appears that Mr. C. Rawson was a 

 prominent promoter of the Volunteer movement. On the 13th March, 1848, 

 a meeting was held at the office of Mr. Rawson in Liverpool, \\h('n it was 

 proposed to form a Volunteer Rifle Corps, and Messrs. Lloyd, Littledale, 

 N'eilson, Campbell, and Rawson, together witJi twenty other influential gentlemen 

 of the city, formed themselves into a committee for the purpose of carrj-ing 

 it out, but unfortunately the Government of that day gave no encoui"igement 

 to the proposition. 



In 1S53 Mr. Rawson most zealously exerted himself in endeavouring to 

 get up a Surrey \'olunteer Rifle Corps, and on the 12th March of that \-ear a 

 meeting was held at \\'alton-on-Thames on the subject of the formation of the 

 jiroposed corps. To the offer of service, the following reply was received from 

 the Home Office. 



" Whitehall, 2nd April, 1852. 



" Sir, — Mr. Walpole directs us to inform you, in reply to your letter of the 

 ist instant, that the principles by which he has been guided with regard to the 

 \'olunteer Corps, have had respect to the nature of the bill he has introduced 

 for the raising of the Militia, which being based on voluntary enlistment in the 

 first instance, and failing that, on the ballot, would be materially impaired by a 

 general adoption of volunteer corps, as in the first instance it is to be expected, 

 that many of the volunteers for the Militia would be found among those for the 

 Volunteer corps ; and in the event of its being necessary to have recourse to 

 the ballot, the burden of that measure would be considerably increased by the 

 exemption of volunteers from its operation. 



" These reasons he thinks you will on reflection admit as fulh' justifying 

 the course he has laid down for his guidance on the subject ; at the same time, 

 he highly appreciates the zeal and spirit which has been manifested in many 

 instances by those who, like yourself, have come forward to offer their services 

 to the Government, which, in the event of the failing of the measure which his 

 sense of duty to the State has led him to introduce, he would be glad to avail 

 himself of, though for the above reasons he cannot recommend for the present 

 acceptance of the Government. I have the honour to be, &c., 



Signed, G. A. Pkkcival." 



The famous Chartist riots appear to have been the mainspring of C. 

 Rawson's action, in striving to promote a volunteer force. He had been in 

 command of a company of special constables during the riots in 1848. and 

 at the dinner given to C. Rawson by the R.R.B., when the National Anthem 

 was sung, the words " frustrate their knavish tricks " were altered to " frus- 

 " trate their Ciiartist tricks." In the list of names forming the committee 

 given in the above extract, the honoured names of several noted old 

 beaglers figure cons[)icuously, siiowing that beaglers were tlien (as they now 

 are) ready for anything, from " pitch-and-toss to manslaughter." 



