Tag: 1920s

Labour history news

Historical Studies in Industrial Relations: the General Strike of 1926

A special virtual issue of Historical Studies in Industrial Relations dealing with the General Strike and mining lockout of 1926 has been published to the Liverpool University Press website. Drawing on articles published in the journal over recent years, it includes an open access selective bibliography compiled by John McIlroy, Alan Campbell, Keith Laybourn, and Quentin Outram running to twenty-four pages. The virtual issue also … Continue reading Historical Studies in Industrial Relations: the General Strike of 1926

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Events

West Yorkshire textile workers’ strike: one hundred years on

In the summer of 1925, all eyes were on the coal industry, where employers had been forced to back off from their threat to cut miners’ wages. But in the parlous economic circumstances of that year, the miners were not alone in fighting to preserve their living standards from attack. That July and August, more than 150,000 workers in West Yorkshire’s textiles industry came out … Continue reading West Yorkshire textile workers’ strike: one hundred years on

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Labour History Review

Book reviews in Labour History Review volume 90 (2025), Issue 1

The books listed below are reviewed in Labour History Review (2024), 89, (3). Read more. Joseph Stanley reviews John Sanders, Workers of Their Own Emancipation: Working-Class Leadership and Organisation in the West Riding Textile District, 1829–1839, London: Breviary Stuff Publications, 2024, pp. xii + 536, p/b, £24.99, ISBN 978 19161 58672 John Cunningham reviews Peter Gray, William Sharman Crawford and Ulster Radicalism, Dublin: UCD Press, 2023, pp. xix + 467, … Continue reading Book reviews in Labour History Review volume 90 (2025), Issue 1

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Labour history news, SSLH news

General Strike 100: planning for the centenary

As the centenary of the 1926 General Strike approaches, the Society for the Study of Labour History has joined a group of museums, libraries, archives, and history groups in a national collaboration to mark the occasion. The General Strike 100 project is working in partnership with the trade union and wider labour movement to develop an interactive map of sites for public visitation throughout 2026. This … Continue reading General Strike 100: planning for the centenary

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Labour history news

Gertrude Tuckwell and the Women’s Trade Union League papers online

From 1885 when she first arrived in London aged twenty-four to become secretary to her aunt, the writer, suffragette and trade unionist Emily Dilke, until her retirement in January 1921, Gertrude Tuckwell was among the most prominent and influential figures in the women’s trade union movement. In nearly four decades of activism, she first became active in the Women’s Trade Union League, serving as its … Continue reading Gertrude Tuckwell and the Women’s Trade Union League papers online

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Documents & objects

A Nation on Strike: first thoughts on 1926

In September 1926, Walter Milne-Bailey, head of the TUC research department, sat down to record his thoughts on the General Strike, which had taken place in May of that year. As we approach the centenary of that event, the typewritten script of his report has been digitized and published online by the TUC Library Collections.1 Milne-Bailey notes at the very start of his report that … Continue reading A Nation on Strike: first thoughts on 1926

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Commentary

Class Encounters: Walter Hannington unemployed workers activist

In the twelfth of our series on meetings with figures from labour history, Gregory Billam encounters Walter Hannington of the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement. Walter Hannington was a young toolmaker from Camden, best known as the National Secretary of the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement (NUWM) during the interwar period. The 1930s, often popularly referred to as the ‘Hungry Thirties’, was a period marked by high … Continue reading Class Encounters: Walter Hannington unemployed workers activist

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Commentary

Class Encounters: A.V. Alexander, co-operator

In the eleventh of our series on meetings with figures from labour history, Jane Donaldson encounters co-operator, government minister and peer A.V. Alexander. My place of work at the Co-op Archives in Holyoake House in Manchester is among many buildings in an area still known sometimes as the Co-operative Quarter and I am surrounded by collections which tell the history of the co-operative movement. Holyoake … Continue reading Class Encounters: A.V. Alexander, co-operator

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Commentary

Class Encounters: Gwendolyn Adams de Puertas, Spanish civil war activist

In the tenth of our series on meetings with figures from labour history, Liz Wood encounters the Shropshire-born nurse and anti-Franco activist Gwendolyn de Puertas. I first encountered the distinctively named Gertrude Gwendolyn Adams de Puertas about twelve years ago, when digitising Trades Union Congress archives on the Spanish Civil War. Gwendolyn Adams, a Shropshire plumber’s daughter and teenage milliner’s apprentice, was born in 1895. … Continue reading Class Encounters: Gwendolyn Adams de Puertas, Spanish civil war activist

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MA & BA bursaries

Ciarán Kelly (Trinity College Dublin) on the Irish Labour Party and Trade Union Congress, 1918-1923

My thesis examines the policy and activism of the Irish Labour Party and Trade Union Congress (ILP&TUC) during the late revolutionary period (c.1918 to 1923). I seek to understand how the party responded to, and navigated, the various socioeconomic crises (unemployment, poverty, wage inequality, and cost of living) which plagued the island of Ireland post-First World War. My thesis also considers the issues of British, … Continue reading Ciarán Kelly (Trinity College Dublin) on the Irish Labour Party and Trade Union Congress, 1918-1923

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