Post by Tamrin on Sept 25, 2014 21:50:25 GMT 10
Early Anti-Masonry: The Gormagons And The Scald-Miserables
Above Geometrical View of the Procession of the Scald Miserable Masons
Great social changes were taking place in Britain in the early 1700s, when Freemasonry was growing into an organized body. Repression by the government was ameliorating, although you could still be arrested and imprisoned on tenuous grounds - witness Bro Alexander Pope being thrown in the pillory in 1727 and Member of Parliament Bro John Wilkes being incarcerated in 1768. Newspapers were multiplying and were being avidly read, whereas in the previous century, the Protector Oliver Cromwell had decreed that there was need for only one newspaper, and that controlled by the government! Things were changing, and people were free to associate in places of public accommodation like the wildly popular coffeehouses and in the new societies and bodies like the Society of Antiquaries, the Royal Academy, and the Freemasons.
The organization of Grand Lodge spawned imitators, and seen from this distance it's hard to determine whether these were real attempts at building a group, or were merely a ludicrous parody. Later in the 1700s, the worthy Oddfellows imitated the Masons in large measure, although their target was more downmarket (as we might say in business-speak today). Many more groups more or less copied the Masons in the 1800s, until directories of the hundreds of fraternal groups were necessary in the early 1900s.
Aping Freemasonry, the Gormogons began in 1724. 'The Antient Noble Order of the Gormogons' was a short-lived society which left no records or accomplishments to indicate its true goal and purpose. From the few published advertisements and notices, it would appear that its sole objective was to hold up Freemasonry to ridicule.
Another group, the Scald Miserables paraded in mockery of the Masonic processions of early days, ridiculing the Order and being in turn ridiculed by members of the Fraternity in the somewhat brutal give and take of those days. The efforts of the Scald Miserables (sometimes "Scald Miserable Masons") were frowned upon by the better classes, who respected the Fraternity to which at that time so many men eminent in public life in England were turning.
The organization of Grand Lodge spawned imitators, and seen from this distance it's hard to determine whether these were real attempts at building a group, or were merely a ludicrous parody. Later in the 1700s, the worthy Oddfellows imitated the Masons in large measure, although their target was more downmarket (as we might say in business-speak today). Many more groups more or less copied the Masons in the 1800s, until directories of the hundreds of fraternal groups were necessary in the early 1900s.
Aping Freemasonry, the Gormogons began in 1724. 'The Antient Noble Order of the Gormogons' was a short-lived society which left no records or accomplishments to indicate its true goal and purpose. From the few published advertisements and notices, it would appear that its sole objective was to hold up Freemasonry to ridicule.
Another group, the Scald Miserables paraded in mockery of the Masonic processions of early days, ridiculing the Order and being in turn ridiculed by members of the Fraternity in the somewhat brutal give and take of those days. The efforts of the Scald Miserables (sometimes "Scald Miserable Masons") were frowned upon by the better classes, who respected the Fraternity to which at that time so many men eminent in public life in England were turning.
Above Geometrical View of the Procession of the Scald Miserable Masons
Ed: The location looks like The Strand, identifiable by "Prince Henry's Room' in the center.
See also Scald Miserable Masons