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| With the 'cotton famine' taking a firm grip and leading to real hardship for factory workers even the Manchester Guardian instructed the mill hands that they were better off dropping their support for the cotton embargo. However, at a noisy meeting at the Manchester Free Trade Hall in 1862, in a historic show of solidarity against slavery, the workers agreed to keep supporting Lincoln's embargo. Recognising the difficulties this issue raised for the mill workers, Lincoln acknowledged the self-sacrifice of the 'working men of Manchester' in a letter he sent them in 1863. Lincoln's words - later inscribed on the pedestal of his statue that can still be found in Lincoln Square, Manchester - praised the workers for their selfless act of "sublime Christian heroism, which has not been surpassed in any age or in any country." These words were followed by the arrival of US relief ships packed with provisions sent by grateful Americans as an act of brotherhood between the Union states and Lancashire. |
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