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Offered languages
- English
Discover Manchester’s revolutionary history on a 2-hour walking tour that reveals the city’s role as a hub of radical activity. This engaging tour takes you through the heart of Manchester, known for its football and music, while exploring tales of resistance and the working-class spirit. Meet at the iconic Manchester Cathedral and delve into the stories of those who shaped the city’s identity. Ideal for students and history enthusiasts, this tour operates daily at 10:30 AM and 2 PM, providing a unique perspective on Manchester’s past.
- 2-hour guided walking tour focusing on Manchester's radical history
- Explore significant sites related to the Industrial Revolution
- Meet at Manchester Cathedral for an immersive experience
- Available daily with special rates for students and concessions
What's Included
Meeting and pickup
Meet by the Lady Chapel entrance on Cathedral street, next to the Love Bee. Your guide will be wearing a Rebel Tours badge.
Itinerary
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1Manchester Cathedral
Manchester Cathedral, once dominated by the city’s elites, discover how this medieval church sat at the heart of a rapidly industrialising town where wealth, power and poverty collided.
10 minutes • Admission ticket free -
2
Step inside Chetham’s Library, the oldest public library in the country, where Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels studied Manchester’s slums and began shaping ideas that would fuel revolutionary movements.
5 minutes • Admission ticket free -
3
Visit the Corn Exchange, once a bustling hub for grain traders and fiery Anti–Corn Law League meetings, and learn how struggles over food prices, free trade and working‑class survival shaped Victorian Manchester before the building’s reinvention as today’s dining arcade.
5 minutes • Admission ticket free -
4
Admire the Royal Exchange, a grand Victorian symbol of Manchester's commercial might, and uncover its radical underbelly where merchants debated free trade radicals rallied against exploitation in the world's first industrial city.
5 minutes • Admission ticket free -
5
Explore the Arndale Centre, Europe’s largest shopping mall when opened in 1972, and uncover displaced communities, gentrification and the devastating 1996 IRA bombing that tested Manchester’s resilience and led to its regeneration.
10 minutes • Admission ticket free -
6
Piccadilly Gardens, a bustling city-centre public space reborn from clay pits and a former Royal Infirmary site.
5 minutes • Admission ticket free -
7
Visit Manchester Art Gallery, born from the elite Royal Manchester Institution in 1823 and later a flashpoint for suffragettes who damaged artwork in 1913 to demand votes for women.
5 minutes • Admission ticket free -
8
Reflect in Sackville Gardens, a serene city oasis created in 1900 amid industrial decay, now home to memorials for Alan Turing, trans lives and HIV/AIDS victims—stand where Manchester’s defiant queer community turned prejudice into Pride and progress.
7 minutes • Admission ticket free -
9
Stand in St Peter’s Square, formerly St Peter’s Field and site of the 1819 Peterloo Massacre where 60,000 peaceful reformers demanding democratic rights were sabred by cavalry—killing 18 and injuring hundreds in a bloody clash that ignited the working class fight for representation ntation.
10 minutes • Admission ticket free -
10
Pause before the striking bronze statue of Emmeline Pankhurst in St Peter’s Square—known as ‘Rise up, Women’ or ‘Our Emmeline’—and learn how this fearless Manchester-born leader ignited militant protests, hunger strikes and global campaigns that shattered barriers to women’s suffrage.
5 minutes • Admission ticket free
Additional info
- Wheelchair accessible
- Infants and small children can ride in a pram or stroller
- Service animals allowed
- Public transportation options are available nearby
- All areas and surfaces are wheelchair accessible
- Suitable for all physical fitness levels
Tags
Cancellation Policy
For a full refund, cancel at least 24 hours before the scheduled departure time.
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Cancellation Policy
- For a full refund, you must cancel at least 24 hours before the experience’s start time.
- If you cancel less than 24 hours before the experience’s start time, the amount you paid will not be refunded.
- Any changes made less than 24 hours before the experience’s start time will not be accepted.
- This experience requires a minimum number of travelers. If it’s canceled because the minimum isn’t met, you’ll be offered a different date/experience or a full refund.
- This experience requires good weather. If it’s canceled due to poor weather, you’ll be offered a different date or a full refund.
You can cancel up to 24 hours in advance of the experience for a full refund.
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