Investors began cashing out in droves. Faced with a wave of bank runs, bankers all tried to protect themselves, and they too began selling off low-quality assets. The result was a stock market crash.
Railway stocks, once all the rage, had failed to bring in the expected revenue. Many people therefore considered them low-quality assets, and they became the targets of a frantic sell-off.
A broken chain of financing was fatal to any industry, so a huge number of railway projects ground to a halt, leaving countless workers unemployed.
The unemployed workers flooded into the cities, hoping to find jobs. But in the depths of this economic winter, everywhere was the same: every industry was in decline, and mass factory closures led to the Chartists' resurgence.
David, Jim, and Kate, now among the older child laborers, joined the protest marches. Workers fresh from the mines were the toughest fighters.
They wrestled with Death every day and had years of experience with strikes. Most importantly, the price of British coal had risen, but miners' wages had fallen to a third of what they had been.
Their old contracts had become mere scraps of paper, and John Russell's government turned a blind eye to the miners' grievances.
After all, as far as he was concerned, these people were nobodies. They were just a minor nuisance that could be dealt with by ignoring them or giving them a little scare.
At the time, John Russell had bigger problems to deal with. The bankers had suffered losses, factory owners couldn't sell the goods they produced, and officials had been assassinated and kidnapped.
His first move was to halt so-called Free Trade, especially by imposing heavy duties on Austrian grain and goods.
He also cracked down on smuggling, demanding that not a single grain be