Riot Act felt uncertain of their power to take action to stop the riots without a reading of the Riot Act. After the riots, Lord Mansfield observed that the Riot Act did not take away the pre-existing power of the authorities to use force to stop a violent riot; it only created the additional offence of failing to disperse after a reading of the Riot Act. The Riot Act was read prior to the Peterloo Massacre of 1819, as well as prior to the Bristol Riots at Queen's Square in 1831. Both are held to be related to the Unreformed House of
Robert Poole (historian) Smithsonian Institution, National Air and Space Museum, to look at the recently-acquired papers of Arthur C. Clarke. Poole's forthcoming book "Peterloo: the English Uprising," (OUP, 2019) will provide the standard account of the1819 Peterloo massacre in Manchester, on which he has written articles in "Past and Present", "History", "Labour History Review," and edited collections. He is historical adviser to the Peterloo 2019 commemoration programme, run jointly by Manchester Histories and the People's History Museum, and to the 2017-18 community project by ReelMcr, 'Our Sam, Middleton man'.He was instrumental in bringing to the John Rylands Library a full set of the