The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-07-20
A GREAT ENGLISH STRIKE
A TINE WHEN ALL KINDS OF INDUS
TRY WE'RE IDLE FOR SIX WEEKS.
Even the Public Schools Were Closed
and the Highways Were Rendered
ImpassabIe by Strikers.
Pittsburg Dispatch.


interesting just now, when strikes and
rumors Of strikes are engaging the atten-
ton of nearly everybody Mr. Grundy is
now upwards of sixty years of age, and
has been a hard worker in the labor move
ment nearly all his life. He drew his first
inspiration from q mob of striking weavers
who, when Mr.. Grundy was seven years
old, called at the schoolhouse where he was
beginning his education and compelled the
teacher to give the scholars a vacation
This was unique form of enforced SYM
patty strike, which Mr.. Grundy has never
since seen duplicated. He had sometimes
wondered at the tameness Of labor strug
giles which he has since witnessed COM
pared with what he saw in his boyhoods
days, but he remembers his feeling on
the great occasion it was simply one of
satisfaction that the strikers should relieve
him of the necessity of going to school.
According to Mr.. Grundy's description of
this strike it must have been one of the
greatest labor struggles that ever occurred.
In 1912 the condition of the cotton workers
in Lancashire, Yorkshire and Cheshire had
become so bad owing to the Introduction
of machinery, that a general strike move
ment was brought about without any or
In its spontaneous character it seems to
have much resembled the present miners
strike now on in half a dozen States,
though Mr.. Grundy insists that the miners
have possessed great advantages for the
Inauguration of a general strike compared
with what the Weavers had on that oc-
casion, the latter were absolutely with
out any organization whatever. During the
six weeks industry of every kind was en-
tirely suspended in the district affected, it
being estimated that in the neighborhOod
of 100000 people were idle. This included
the weavers themselves and persons of eV-
cry other occupation, whom they obliged
to leave work The small tradesmen and
manufacturers were obliged to close their
places, the teachers in the schools had to
send their pupils home, and the strikers
even prevented the passing of vehicles upon
the highways by massing themselves in
compact bodies, through which no horse
Mr. Grundy having been very young at
the time this strike occurred most OF his
Information ab3 out it has been gathered
memers are principally the forcing of his
teacher to dismiss school and the oblging
Grundy's father was a halter having a
shop of his own and employing a few
hands in the town of Ashton, near Man
and it was only necessary for one of them
to say, put out that fire, Grundy," and the
halter Immediately suspended all work in
his little place and sent his men home to
wait for the strike to be over.
ROADS INIPASSABLE.
Mr.. Grundy remembers seeing bodies of
the strikers marching along the highways
thickly massed together and filling the
roads from side to side as far as they could
be seen. They were always armed with
clubs, and when marching would line up
close together, each grasping the club of
the man on either side of him, and so weav-
ing themselves into a solid mass. In this
way it was rendered impossible for any
thing or anybody to occupy the road but
the strikers, and their object of forcing a
general suspension of business in the dis
trict was obtained This was only for
little while, however, as large bodies of the
troops OF the empire were ordered into the
district held by the strikers and soon
obliged them to preserve the peace and
desist from interfering with the affairs of
those who desired to carry on business.
Mr.. Grundys recollection of the matter
is that much sympathy was displayed for
the strikers by the troops and that The
latter were of very little use so far as
concerned The strike was lost, however,
the weavers going back TO their work at
the end of six weeks without having OBJ
tanned any increase of wages or any short
ening of their hours of labor. 1t was not
long however, until Parliament, as result
of this strike, began to pay some atten-
laws which served very effectually to anne
liorate their condition were passed
Golden, Bright and other great Engnsh
statesmen took up their cause, and investi-
cations and discussions resulted, the good
effects Of which are still felt. The repeal
of the corn laws, by which English work.
ing.rnen were enabled to obtain cheaper
food Mr.. Grundy thinks, was largely due
to this strike, though it had been advocated
before the strike took place. Another law
which was of great benefit forbade women
and children under eighteen years of age
to be employed in the cotton mills longer
than ten hours a day. This law was not
only good thing in itself, but it caused
the workers generally to thnlk ana aSltate
for a general ten-hour day, and some ten
wears after the great strike of 1912 there
was a general strike for ten hours, which
resulted successfully, and which was the
beginning of better times in the matter OF
hours of labor in nearly all English INDUS
tries. 49,
MIR. Grundy was employed in a cotton mill
himself at the time this last strike TOOK
place. The WOrkmen simply quit Wnen tney
had worked ten hours one day, and so in
augurated a movement which was success
full. Mr.. Grundy says that at that time
there was so little general education tnat
many persons could not tell the time OF Gay
by a clock, and so in passing around the
word for the inauguration OF the strike,
everybody was instructed to stop work
when the clock pointed straight up and
down, this being method OF securing
more general understanding IMAM 10 say
O'Clock in the evening.
A TEN-HOUR DAY.
In the mill where Mr.. Grundy worked
the clock was watched all afternoon. and
when the time came there was a general
rush for the outside of the mill. The fore
man had the gates locked and proceeded
to harangue the workmen but it was to
no purpose Several were notified that they
were discharged, but this produced no eff
feet upon them or the others. Mr.. Grundy
thinks that among ignorant workmen, that
is among those who are ignorant in the
matter of education obtained from books
there has been as a rule more loyalty TO
each other displayed than by those who
are fairly we'll educated. At any rate they
stuck together upon this occasion, and won
their strike so thoroughly that there was
never afterward a general return to the old
practice of working twelve or fifteen hours
a day In the mill where Mr.. Grundy was
employed too, the manager, after the ten
hour system had been in force for some
time, called the workmen together and ex-
pressed his satisfaction with 1t, saying that
the results obtained were much more salts
factory from the standpoint of the pro-
prietors than under the old way
Mr.. Grundy came to this country in 1863,
and since he has been here has met num-
Der of leaders of the great strike of 1912,
who were either obliged TO leave England
to escape arrest or who Were banished to
one of the English penal colonies. and aft
erWard came to America. Two of these
persons. James Ratcliffe and Richard Pill
ling Mr. Grundy thinks died recently in
Philadelphia. In all some eighteen or TWEEN
w men fed from England, or were deported
because of their participation in the great
strike which Mr.. Grundy remen4D~rS "oest
by the attack of the strikers upon his
schoolmaster.
Mr.. Grundy is an earnest advocate of
politics in connection with labor movements
out that much of the good which the English
have obtained through their trades unions