I've been rehearsing with Pete Coe today for our 'Road to Peterloo' show. As Jim says, there's a wealth of contemporaneous songs and verses about the event, many of which can be found in Alison Morgan's book published last year, 'Ballads and Songs of Peterloo', which has been a very important source for us.

One of the songs was written by a John Stafford, an eyewitness to the massacre, and is full of vivid detail of the events. There are some really biting satirical pieces as well, describing the bravery of the yeomanry in slaughtering unarmed men, women and children, etc.

I'd also recommend Michael Bush's 'The Casualties of Peterloo', if you want some distressing tales of what happened to actual people, as opposed to just an amorphous crowd.

Incidentally, I have the impression that Sam Bamford didn't just decide that violent confrontation was pointless - he took on a new 'respectable' personage, becoming a constable and to some extent rewriting history to downplay his own role as a radical.