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The General Strike of 1926: the tragic story of how the world's best organized working class confronted the world's most powerful, and self-confident, government.In May, 1926, nearly three million British workers downed tools to support nearly one million of their countrymen, miners whose employers meant to lengthen their working day and cut their pay. This General Strike brought the country to a grinding halt - which, according to Conservative Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, represented a threat not merely to the nation but to the parliamentary system itself. For nine days, the world's best organized working class confronted the world's most powerful, and self-confident, government. And yet the outcome was never in doubt, for Britain's most important trade-union leaders thought as Baldwin did, although they kept saying they were engaged in a wages dispute only. Really, they feared winning even more than they feared losing.
In
Nine Days in May, award-winning author and historian Jonathan Schneer mines hitherto untapped archival sources to explain why and how the Strike came about, why and how it was waged and countered, why and how it ended. In addition to government reports and TUC reports, he uses reports of undercover agents and spies, "special" constables sworn in for the duration of the Strike, volunteer strike-breakers, Communist agitators, trade-union leaders and rank-and-file members of trade unions; also, of course, the papers of politicians of all parties.
This is a tale of Shakespearian dimensions, replete with tragic heroes and villains and buffoons and opportunists and double-dealers, and contending, evenly matched, forces - both of which meant to do their duty whatever the cost. There may never be another general strike in Britain, but the General Strike of 1926 was one for the ages, illuminating the human condition.
List of contents
- Part One: Context
- 1: Miners
- 2: Owners
- 3: Unions
- Part Two: Confrontation
- 4: Fridays: Red and Black
- 5: Hiatus
- 6: Crisis
- Part Three: Conflict
- 7: Crescendo
- 8: Climax
- 9: Coup de Grace
- Part Four: Conflagration
- 10: Specter
- 11: Volunteers
- 12: Spies, Snitches and "Specials"
- 13: The Communist Party (I)
- 14: The Communist Party (II)
- 15: Eccleston Square
- 16: Police and Military
- 17: A Day in the Strike
- Part Five: Contrails
- 18: Ending It (I)
- 19: Ending It (II)
- 20: The Burghers of Calais
- 21: Conclusion: Reflections, Deductions, Speculations
- Acknowledgements
- Endnotes
- Bibliography
- Index
About the author
Jonathan Schneer was an Assistant Professor at Yale University from 1979-84 and an Associate and Full Professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology until 2018, when he retired. The recipient of numerous academic fellowships and awards, he has written numerous books, one of which,
The Balfour Declaration: The Origins of Arab-Israeli Conflict (2010), won a National Jewish Book Award.
