EDWARD

See also:

• EDWARD MIALL (1809-1881)

MIALL (1809-1881)  , English Nonconformist divine and journalist, was born at Portsmouth on the 8th of May 1809 . He was Congregational minister at Ware (1831) and Leicester (1834), and in 1841 founded the Nonconformist, a weekly newspaper in which he advocated the cause of disestablishment . Miall saw that if the programme of Nonconformity was to be carried through it must have more effective representation in Parliament . One of the firstfruits of his work was the entrance of John Bright into parliamentary life; and by 1852 forty Dissenters were members of the House of Commons . This was due largely to the efforts of the Anti-State Church Association, afterwards known as the Liberation Society, which Miall had founded in 1844 . The long fight for the abolition of compulsory church-rates was finally successful in 1868, and then in 1870 Miall was prominent in the discussions aroused by the Education Bill . He was at this time M.P. for Bradford (1869-1874), having previously (1852-1867) sat for Rochdale . In 1874 he retired from public life, and received from' his admirers a present of ten thousand guineas . He died at Sevenoaks on the 29th of April 1881 . See the Life, by A . Miall (1884) .