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
Peterloo Massacre horror felt in the Manchester region, and the feeling of indignation throughout the country became intense. James Wroe, editor of the "Manchester Observer" was the first to describe the incident as the "Peterloo Massacre", coining his headline by combining St Peter's Field with the Battle of Waterloo that had taken place four years earlier. He also wrote pamphlets entitled "The Peterloo Massacre: A Faithful Narrative of the Events". Priced at 2d each, they sold out every print run for 14 weeks and had a large national circulation. Sir Francis Burdett, a reformist MP, was jailed for three months for publishing