The arsenalists in the September Revolution (1836)

Abstract

The septembrist popular movement did not leave any direct evidence to us. Just the press of that time and some historiography speak about it. Among the protagonists of the Revolution of the 9^th September 1836, the Batallion of the Royal Navy Arsenal Workers was particularly noted. And, under the author's point of view, the working population of the largest manufacture in Lisbon was a significant sample that might give us some hints about the social composition of the Lisbon people that, at the time, went down to the streets supporting the National Guards in order to impose the abolition of the Chart of 1826 and to restore the Constitution of 1822. As a matter of fact, the avaiable documentation makes it possible to foresee a pre-industrial world of artisan-workers employed by the State, whose personal and professional destiny was straightly connected with the ups and downs of politics in general and of government in particular. A world permeable, on account of its own daily life experience, to the septembrist propaganda, considering that privilege and political inequality was the source of all evils, thinking that proverty might be extirpated by the regeneration action of stainlessand enlightened men, dreaming of a society where some might not be too rich so that nobody might be too poor.