Joseph Arch.

Cromwell Argus, Volume V, Issue 231, 14 April 1874, Page 3

Joseph Arch.

An exchange says that Joseph Arch, who is now in Canada, is one of the most remarkable men of his age. A humble farm labourer of imperfect education, without a vote, he is the hope and leader of 80,000 farm labourers, and is better known, more loved by the class he befriends, and more feared by the privileged aristocracy than any man in the British Isles. It would appear as if the forces which took Cincinnatus from his plough to save Rome, and Cromwell from his Huntingdon brewery to deliver England, have brought Joseph Arch, the Warwickshire farm labourer, to the enfranchisement of the down-trodden classes of his native land. He has conie forth to make a study of the miserable overpopulated dwellings, the scanty pay, the inferior food, the bad social surroundings of vast multitudes of people who till the soil in England, while they live like serfs, and he will apparently do much to better their condition. Already he is followed by the benedictions of men and women, who cry out as he passes, “God bless you! Our children never had meat until*you came.” He is a “sturdy Saxon labourer,” cf blonde complexion and light blue eyes, a strange frank look, and strong features. His face is weatherbeaten, and-bears traces of smallpox ; the under face is squarish, the cheek bones prominent, the forehead- high and broad. But he is gifted with that which Saad regarded as his greatest earthly treasure, a sweet voice, and his voice has its own physiognomy in a most winning smile. With perfect independence and simplicity in his manner, he takes his seat before the noble lord or the humble labourer, and with equal courtesy ; he converses with the utmost frankness, as one who has nothing to conceal; and he has the high charm of a reformer, the faculty of completely forgetting himself in his cause. Joseph Arch is a native of Barton, Warwick, and is now forty-five years of age. He was born in the humblest social condition, among the c.ass who rarely rise above the common level. While labouring in the field Arch taught himself to rend, and the companions of his toil ever were the Bible and the newspaper. He was married at the age of twenty-five, and had two children at the time when he first felt the terrible pressure of want. He was getting Is Gd per day, and he struck. From that time he never took regular employment, but worked by the job. He excelled in hedge planting. This caused him to lead a nomandic life, studying the condition of the people, and often after a light supper sleeping at night in a barn or under a hedge-row.