Meet at Gardiner Haskins Car Park (near Old Market), New Thomas Street, BS2 0JP As a belated launch for three new pamphlets released by BRHG in 2012-13 (The Bristol Strike Wave of 1889-1890 Socialists, New Unionists and New Women - Part 1: Days of Hope, Part 2: Days of Doubt and The Origins and an Account of Black Friday - 23rd December 1892) authors Mike Richardson and Roger Ball will navigate us through one of the most intense periods of class struggle in Bristol in the late 19th Century. In […]
Autumn 1892 in Bristol saw a violent class war between employers, strike-breaking labour and police on one side and strikers and their mass of working-class supporters on the other; picketing, mass marches and public meetings of thousands of ‘new’ industrial unionists were common. The strike-wave culminated in the use of military and police by the local state to break up a pre-Christmas parade which had been organised to collect money for strikers and their families. This event, which popularly […]
Bye-Laws, Rules, & Orderes, for the Conduct, Management, & Government of all Pilots and Others Employed in any Pilot Boats or Other Vessels or Boats within the Port Of Bristol and within the Bristol Channel to the Eastward of Lundy Island, and or fixing and ascertaining the Rates and Taxes to be received and taken by such pilots and other persons, and for Repealing All Former Bye-Laws, Rules and Orders, Relating To Such Pilots &c Bristol: Printed at the Mirror Office By John Taylor […]
From the earliest days of recorded history river pilots have navigated ships through the dangerous waters of the Bristol Channel and up the river Avon, with its twisting bends, shifting sand banks and strong currents. In the early nineteenth century, Bristol was granted rights to compulsory pilotage over the whole of the Channel. The Society of Merchant Venturers managed and regulated licenced pilots on behalf of Bristol Corporation. However, pilots were self-employed and operated in competition […]
Following on from part one, this pamphlet traces the period of industrial unrest in Bristol between January and August 1890. The lockout of boot and shoe workers that began in December 1889, and continued for the first few weeks of January 1890, provided the opportunity for combining the forces of skilled organised workers with the unskilled and unorganised, in the drive to improve working conditions. It also encouraged forms of social unionism, with links to the wider community. Employers […]
During 1889-1890, a strike wave swept across Britain hitting many major towns and cities. Bristol was not immune. The scale and intensity of industrial unrest in the city reached a level never experienced before. The city’s labour historian Samuel Bryher depicted Bristol at this time as ‘a seething centre of revolt’. This experience set in train a qualitative change in the organisation of workers; and salutary lessons emerged for consideration for those politically active in the newly formed […]
