Tag: 1920s

Labour History Review

Citizen strike breakers: volunteers, strikes and the state in Britain, 1911-1926

Author: Liam RyanThis is the abstract of an article published in Labour History Review (2022), 87, (2), 109-140. Read more. This article provides the first systematic historical study of volunteer strike-breaking across a relatively broad time frame, focusing specifically on the period between 1911 and 1926. These years bore witness to the largest industrial conflict in British history, encompassing the Great Labour Unrest of 1911-14, … Continue reading Citizen strike breakers: volunteers, strikes and the state in Britain, 1911-1926

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Labour History Review

Bolshevization, Stalinization, and Party Ritual: The Congresses of the Communist Party of Great Britain, 1920-1943

Author: Kevin MorganThis is the abstract of an article published in Labour History Review (2022), 87, (2), 141-182. Read more. This paper examines the national congresses of the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) in the period of the Communist International (1919-43). Both in Britain and internationally, communist party congresses in this period lost any independent decision-making role and became a mechanism activated and controlled … Continue reading Bolshevization, Stalinization, and Party Ritual: The Congresses of the Communist Party of Great Britain, 1920-1943

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Labour history news

Castles of the labour movement: inside the trade union head office building boom

By the early twentieth century, an increasingly confident trade union movement was building statement ‘castles’ in which to house their headquarters. Mark Crail looks at what came close to being a trade union quarter in central London. As trade unions grew in size and complexity in the 1920s, so increasingly they moved into larger, more imposing, and often purpose-built headquarters – some leaving their original … Continue reading Castles of the labour movement: inside the trade union head office building boom

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Bursary reports, Research bursaries

David Isserman (Edge Hill) on transnational syndicalism and industrial unionism in Liverpool and Glasgow, 1905-1926

My research focuses on the history of syndicalism and industrial unionism among maritime workers in Liverpool and Glasgow during the early twentieth century. Both cities were centres of labour unrest during the Edwardian and inter-war years, with Liverpool experiencing the 1911 transport strike and Glasgow being the host city to the dual unionist British Seafarers Union (BSU) and Scottish Union of Dock Labourers (SCUDL). Thanks … Continue reading David Isserman (Edge Hill) on transnational syndicalism and industrial unionism in Liverpool and Glasgow, 1905-1926

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Documents & objects

‘War to end war’: the Union of Democratic Control and the call for alternatives to conflict

David Hanson shares a leaflet from his collection of political memorabilia to help tell the story of the Union of Democratic Control Founded at the very start of the first world war by an alliance of socialists, liberals and pacifists, the Union of Democratic Control represented a brave attempt to stand against jingoism and to demand alternatives to conflict based on new international structures and … Continue reading ‘War to end war’: the Union of Democratic Control and the call for alternatives to conflict

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Labour history news

Seven labour history anniversaries in 2022

In 2022, as every year, it is possible to look back and see significant milestones in labour history taking place 25, 50 or 100 years ago. Here we recall seven memorable events, each a quarter of a century further back in time. They include labour movement victories and defeats, and like all of history their interpretation and significance continue to be contested – the role … Continue reading Seven labour history anniversaries in 2022

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Documents & objects

The Stepney branch committee of the Municipal Employees Association, 1901

This formal studio portrait (technically a cabinet card) captures the officers of the Stepney branch of the Municipal Employees Association shortly after the union came into being in 1901. Dressed in suits and ties, some in fashionable wing-collars, each wears what is most likely to be the union’s badge on their jacket lapel, ceremonial sashes across their chests recording the office they held. The MEA … Continue reading The Stepney branch committee of the Municipal Employees Association, 1901

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Bursary reports, MA & BA bursaries

Mick Ekers (Essex) on Burston strike school master Tom Higdon and labour activism between the wars

Mick Ekers visits Norfolk Record Office to research the life in politics of Tom Higdon, one of the two teachers at the heart of the famous Burston School Strike which lasted from 1914 to 1939. The story of the Burston School Strike is quite well known. In 1914 Annie and Tom Higdon, two teachers in a village school in Norfolk, were sacked as a result … Continue reading Mick Ekers (Essex) on Burston strike school master Tom Higdon and labour activism between the wars

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