James Norris (lawyer) aftermath of the massacre, and he was appointed as Chairman of Quarter Sessions for Salford Hundred in 1825, retaining that post until his death in 1838. Despite links with the Middleforth district of Penwortham, where he inherited a mansion built by his family in the Tudor era, Norris was the only magistrate involved in the Peterloo Massacre who actually "resided" in Manchester at the time. James Norris (lawyer) James Norris (c. 1774 – 19 January 1838) was an English lawyer, notable for his role in the Peterloo Massacre of 1819. Appointed stipendiary magistrate of Manchester in March 1818, his reports
Peterloo Massacre a seditious libel. Percy Bysshe Shelley was in Italy and did not hear of the massacre until 5 September. His poem, "The Masque of Anarchy", subtitled "Written on the Occasion of the Massacre at Manchester" was sent for publication in the radical periodical "The Examiner" but because of restrictions on the radical press, was not published until 1832, ten years after the poet's death. The immediate effect of Peterloo was a crackdown on reform. The government instructed the police and courts to go after the journalists, presses and publication of the "Manchester Observer." Wroe was arrested and charged with producing