A festival celebrating Newport's historic Chartist movement is set for its first full edition in three years. The Newport Rising Festival celebrates the Chartists and the Newport Rising of 1839, when 3,000 Chartists marched through the city fighting for better voting rights in the last large scale rebellion in the UK.
In total 22 men were shot dead by the authorities outside the Westgate Hotel on Commercial Street on November 4, 1839 and Newport Rising festival launched in 2018 paying tribute to the movement. It normally sees hundreds of people march through the city's streets in a torch-lit event but this has not taken place for three years due to the pandemic, which saw two of the past three festivals take place virtually and a scaled-down event in 2021.
This year sees a full Newport Rising programme featuring the march as well as talks, workshops, art, the annual Chartist Convention and live music and performance. It will start on Friday, November 4 with the commemoration ceremony at 4pm at the Newport Cathedral churchyard followed by the torch-lit march at 5.30 in Belle Vue Park. There will also be a punk-focused live music lineup at the Westgate Hotel from 7pm on Friday, the Chartist Convention at Newport Cathedral from 10am to 4pm on Saturday, a guided walk to the Chartist Caves, Trefil, on Sunday and open doors and expert discussion on the famous bullet holes in the Westgate Hotel on Wednesday November 9 from 10am.
Read more: Newport's changing identity: The city that always seems to take one step forward and two steps back
Newport's links to Chartist history are regularly celebrated in the city but received national attention back in October 2013 when a long-standing mural commemorating the movement was torn down. Located on a walkway near the square, the 35-metre mosaic of 200,000 pieces of tile and glass created by artist Kenneth Budd had stood since 1978 as a symbol of the Chartists, but was torn down by Newport City Council to make way for the multi-million Friars Walk shopping centre, which opened in late 2015. You can read more about the destruction of the mural here. A new, smaller mural by Oliver Budd - son of the original artist - was later unveiled on Cefn Road, Rogerstone in 2019.
The festival's organisers said: "Newport Rising isn’t just about what happened in 1839 - it’s about today and a celebration of Newport as a place for change, where people can work together to change things for the better. After Covid we’re really pleased to be able to bring the full festival back. We know that the people of Newport feel strongly about the sacrifice made by the Chartists and the story of what happened here continues to inspire new generations. Previous festivals have brought visitors to Newport from all over - South Africa, Brazil, New Zealand and we’ve been blown away by some of the comments from communities that attend."
Poppy Stowell-Evans, spokesperson for the festival, said: "The fight for democracy was hard won by those who went before us, and, as we are seeing more and more, that fight goes on. The right to use our voices is being eroded here in the UK, however with issues such as the climate crisis our voices need to be heard more than ever - there is just too much at stake. This is why it's important we continue to celebrate the Chartists and everything they stood for."
Newport Rising festival takes place from November 4-6. You can find out more about the event here. To get stories from Newport to your inbox, subscribe to our daily newsletter here.
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