Corresponding Society 1795

Ireland - Middlesex Half Penny of 1795. London Corresponding Society. Obverse shows a group of Society members standing over a fasces on the ground. Thomas Hardy was the Secretary to this Society. These are Skidmore made tokens. It is probable that these were never struck by the Society’s order, but were made for sale. Reverse: "United For A Reform Of Parliament." Edge: "payable At Dublin, Cork Or Belfast .XX.
The London Corresponding Society was a Radical organization based in London, England, with a membership consisting primarily of artisans, tradesmen, and shopkeepers. At its peak, the society boasted roughly 3,000 dues-paying members who shared the goal of reforming the British political system. Formed in 1792 by Thomas Hardy, the society's key mission was to ensure universal suffrage (voting rights for all men) for British men and annual parliaments. Due to the perceived French revolutionary influence on the society and its calls for a relatively radical reformation, promising widespread upheaval, the government of William Pitt the Younger bitterly opposed it, accusing it on two occasions of plotting to assassinate the King, and putting its key leaders on trial in 1794 for treason. However, due to the transparent falsity of the government’s claims, those leaders, including Hardy, John Thelwall, and John Horne Tooke, were all acquitted. After exerting "undue influence" on the European political climate in the last decade of the 18th century, the LCS and other organizations like it were outlawed by a 1799 Parliamentary Act, and efforts to maintain an underground organization were stymied by their outlaw status and financial troubles and mismanagement.