UNIVERSITY researchers have identified the editors of a tiny hymn book discovered at Todmorden Library.
The 165-year-old Chartist pamphlet, dedicated to the 19th-century working class movement, was first uncovered in a cigar box just over two years ago.
Dr Mike Sanders, of the University of Manchester, believes the South Lancashire Delegate Meeting were behind the remarkable work.
His detective work has found appeals for contributions in the Chartist newspaper, The Northern Star.
One from 1845 asks for submissions to be sent to an address in Manchester and another records West Riding Chartists giving their approval to the venture.
Dr Sanders said: “The Chartists were Christians, but radical Christians who fought for justice in this life not the next. There was also an absence of warlike imagery prevalent in Victorian Christianity.”
The hymns concentrate on themes such as social justice and ending slavery and child labour.
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