This article discusses the use of contemporary newspaper reports to study the Bogota bread riot of January 23, 1875. It argues that these sources interpreted the riot in light of electoral interests during that year’s national presidential campaign. As such, their reading of the riot was conditioned by the fact that it was organized by artisans inspired by the ideology of the French Revolution. Such limitations underline the need to elucidate the motivations and circumstances that gave rise to the bread riot. To explain the forms in which the protest were conducted, the article turns to the concept of the ‘moral economy of the crowd’.