Peace and Goodwill; or, the Season of Reconciliation. J. F. Sullivan [?]. Fun (21 December 1887): 261. Courtesy of the Suzy Covey Comic Book Collection in the George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida. Click on image to enlarge it
The cartoon expresses hopes that all these parties will reconcile — France represented by Boulanger and Prussia in the person of Bizzy or Bismarck; an Irish leader and the Chief Secretary for Ireland (probably not Sir Michael Hicks Beach, who resigned in early 1887, but Arthur Balfour, known for his rigorous suppression of agrarian unrest; Lord Salisbury and “the Irish Leader;” Gladstone, the Grand Old Man, and the Primrose Dames, the female half of the Primrose League dedicated to spreading conservative principles; and finally the Sir Charles Warren, Chief Commissioner of Police, and a leader of a demonstration in Trafalgar Square that resulted in “Bloody Sunday” (13 November 1887) — possibly Cunningham Graham, a Socialist member of Parliament. One of the 1889 Parliamentary debates recorded in Hansard included a statement “that what Mr. O'Brien threatened to do in Ireland the Primrose dames can do in England.”
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Last modified 29 April 2016