Birmingham has become notorious over the course of the eighteenth century for its riots, sparked by a number of causes.

In 1714 and 1715, the townspeople, as part of a "Church-and-King" mob, had attacked Dissenters (Protestants who do not adhere to the Church of England or follow its practices) in the Sacheverell riots during the London trial of Henry Sacheverell, and in 1751 and 1759 Quakers and Methodists had been assaulted.

During the anti-Catholic Gordon Riots in 1780, large crowds had assembled in Birmingham.

In 1766 and 1782 ,mobs had protested high food prices; they will do so again in 1795, and 1800.

Up until the late 1780s, religious divisions had not affected Birmingham's elite.

Dissenter and Anglican lived side by side harmoniously: they were on the same town promotional committees; they pursued joint scientific interests in the Lunar Society; and they worked together in local government.

They stood united against what they viewed as the threat posed by unruly plebeians.

After the riots, however, scientist and clergyman Joseph Priestley argues in his An Appeal to the Public on the Subject of the Birmingham Riots (1791) that this cooperation had not in fact been as amicable as generally believed.

Priestley reveals that disputes over the local library, Sunday Schools, and church attendance had divided Dissenters from Anglicans.

In his Narrative of the Riots in Birmingham (1816), stationer and Birmingham historian William Hutton will agree, arguing that five events stoked the fires of religious friction: disagreements over inclusion of Priestley's books in the local public library; concerns over Dissenters' attempts to repeal the Test and Corporation Acts; religious controversy (particularly involving Priestley); an "inflammatory hand-bill"; and a dinner celebrating the outbreak of the French Revolution.