Joshua Fielden (politician)

Joshua Fielden (8 March 1827 – 9 March 1887) was a British cotton manufacturer and Conservative politician.

Fielden was the son of the Radical politician John Fielden of Todmorden, and his first wife, Anne Grindrod of Rochdale. He was born in Todmorden, and after education at a Unitarian school in Switzerland, returned to England to act as his father's private secretary, and to work in the family textile firm, Fielden Brothers. He became a partner in the firm in 1852. The business was very successful and profitable, and the Fielden family dominated public life in Todmorden, controlling the town's local board and preventing the erection of a workhouse in Todmorden until the 1870s. In 1865 Joshua and his brothers provided funds for the building of Todmorden Unitarian Church.; they later paid for the building of the town hall.

In 1851 he married Ellen Brocklehurst (a niece of John Brocklehurst, MP for Macclesfield), in the same year purchasing Stansfield Hall outside Todmorden as his residence. Joshua was a strong Unitarian, and together with his older brother Samuel, helped to sustain the denomination in northern England by the paying of salaries to ministers. He was a justice of the peace for both Lancashire and Yorkshire (Todmorden being divided between the two counties).

Joshua played a part in the opposition to the Factory Act of 1850 which added two hours to the working week in order to secure an end to the relay system. By the 1860s Fielden was again becoming involved in national politics, notably by his campaign against the Malt Tax. He also continued to argue for shorter working hours for labourers, while seeking cuts in government expenditure and (although a Dissenter) was opposed to the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland. In August 1868 he was selected along with Christopher Denison as Conservative candidates for the two-seat Eastern Division of the West Riding of Yorkshire in the general election of that year. Accused of betraying his father’s principles, he "defended his father from the imputation of being a Liberal", noting that Conservative MPs such as Lord John Manners and Benjamin Disraeli had supported John Fielden's Ten Hours Act. He supported extension of the Factory Acts and opposed centralising 'reforms' which took power away from local bodies; the New Poor Law showed how much evil they could bring about. Both Conservatives were elected to serve in the Commons, and Fielden was a Member of Parliament for 12 years. In 1871 he was described as "one of those obstinately independent members whom nobody and nothing can move". That year he declared himself to be, like the rest of his family, a Cobbettite Radical and hence wishing to defend and purify the existing Constitution, not (like those now calling themselves Radicals: Sir Charles Dilke, John Bright, and indeed Mr Gladstone himself) to make dangerous innovations on theoretical grounds. He was in poor health from April 1876 onwards, being absent from Parliament for most of the next year and in later years thinking it imprudent to attend when there was a heavy fog. He took up yachting for his health and in 1879 indicated he would not stand at the 1880 general election, subsequently spending much of his time sailing in his yacht Zingara.

...
Wikipedia