North West Labour History Society

Today in London’s radical history: sacred socialist James Pierpoint Greaves dies, 1842. James Pierrepont Greaves, a merchant draper, from Merton, became convinced that he had a spiritual mission in life to share his commitment to the love of God with others. In 1818, he joined Johann …

#OnThisDay in London's radical history, 1842: ‘sacred socialist’ James Pierpoint Greaves dies, at the freethinking school/commune he founded on Ham Common.
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Today in London radical history: entire non-stop picket of S. African embassy arrested, 1989. Racism and White Supremacism are currently fashionable again, after a few decades when even rightwing politicians felt it politically unacceptable to express toxic garbage about one ‘race’ deservin…

#OnThisDay in London radical history: entire non-stop 24-hour anti-apartheid picket of South African embassy arrested, Trafalgar Square, 1989.
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Today in London’s anti-war history, 1900: meeting against Boer War attacked by police. For socialists the Boer War of 1899-1902 was a prefiguration of their experiences in the First World War, and in many ways the similarities are quite marked. Jingoism had been growing for years, im…

#OnThisDay in London's anti-war history, 1900: a street meeting protesting against the Boer War is attacked by police.
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Striking Manchester workers queue up at Amalgamated Engineering Union headquarters in Rusholme Road, All Saints, to sign on for their strike pay, March 1957 (Mirrorpix/Getty/Manchester Evening News).

Lewis Willcox (St Andrews) on the rural labour movement in Scotland, c.1918-1935. The ‘Celtic Fringe’ is a somewhat unorthodox location for a labour historian to conduct archival research. Beyond the dynamics of agrarian protest between the 1880s and the 1920s, studied by histor…

We provided a research bursary to help @loadaigh99.bsky.social research Scotland’s rural labour movement for his PhD. Here’s what he found.
sslh.org.uk/2026/03/10/l...

Strikes do not last forever. They are an important tactic for workers. Not many of us will ever be on strike for as long as the @unison.org.uk #Gloucestershire Phlebotomists.

This lot have been incredible. 37 on strike out of at least 9,000 workers, for over 300 days.

ra.co/events/2366371
Vinyl Against Apartheid present our first fundraiser. As always we will be raising money for humanitarian aid in Palestine and showing solidarity with the Palestinian people.
We have some very special guest DJs spinning their favourite records for us at the Carlton Club

ra.co/events/2366371
Vinyl Against Apartheid present our first fundraiser. As always we will be raising money for humanitarian aid in Palestine and showing solidarity with the Palestinian people.
We have some very special guest DJs spinning their favourite records for us at the Carlton Club

#OtD 10 Mar 1906 the Catastrophe de Courrières occured in France. It was a mining disaster killing 1,060 workers and sparked 45,000 miners going on a 55 day strike, which was eventually crushed by the French Army stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/8215...

#OtD 10 Mar 1958 a general strike began in Eritrea, which had been given to Ethiopia by the UN and UK. Unions were banned, and Amharic language was imposed in schools. Ethiopian troops fired on strikers, which spurred support for independence. More: stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/7724...

Breaking the cycle of war SADLY in politics we often see governments and parties committing the same errors of judgement over and over again. I have always hoped to learn from the past and take account of the mistakes my party...

Breaking the cycle of war - As tensions escalate over Iran, CAROL MOCHAN MSP argues that Britain must finally learn from the disastrous legacy of Iraq and choose diplomacy over another catastrophic conflict
morningstaronline.co.uk/article/brea...

The eternal hunger for oil: how the West has been strangling Iran for 100 years IT ALL BEGAN in 1909 with the establishment of the Anglo-Persian Oil Company under the wing of the British empire. For decades, Iranian wealth flowed directly to London while the local population live...

From the colonial oil plunder of 1909 to the current threat of a regional inferno: Western interference in Iran forms a chain of coups, puppets, and cynical geopolitics centered on oil, says MARC VANDEPITTE
morningstaronline.co.uk/article/eter...

Read about the 1826 Chatterton Massacre in the latest edition of North West History Journal. Our 50th edition is now available
Details at nwlh.org.uk

Read about the 1826 Chatterton Massacre in the latest edition of North West History Journal. Our 50th edition is now available
Details at nwlh.org.uk

A wooden coffin with bread and red roses

#ICYMI: 2026 marks the 200th anniversary of the Lancashire weavers' uprisings and Chatterton Massacre.

Find out more about the events local partners are facilitating, here: www.balh.org.uk/news-commemo...

#WeAreLocalHistory #LocalHistoryForAll

Blair: the end of the affair… Tony Blair’s comments that Starmer should have done what he did with Iraq in 2003 and just back Trump over Iran have not gone down well. Of course Starmer is in effect backing Trump by lettin…

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Today in London’s radical history: jingoistic mob break up anti-war meeting, Islington, 1917. Although in the run-up to the outbreak of World War 1, trade unions and Labour movement figures had produced a lot of hot air about resisting the war, but when the conflict began, the Labour Party,…

#OnThisDay in London's radical history: jingoistic mob break up anti-war meeting, Islington, 1917.
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These women's stories will be celebrated in our upcoming exhibitions on the Grunwick Strike, and the General Strike. Keep an eye out for updates!

#IWD #WCML #Womenshistory #GrunwickStrike #GeneralStrike

Knocking Off Time, Salford Docks, painting by Tom Dodson (1911-91).

#OtD 8 Mar 2018 a monument to Mary Barbour was unveiled in Glasgow. Barbour was a peace campaigner and a pioneering advocate of family planning services, and a leader during the great Glasgow rent strike of 1915. stories.workingclasshistory.com/article/1083...

Miner With A Dog, 1968, painting by Josef Herman (1911-2000), Polish refugee who lived at Ystradgynlais in Wales's Swansea Valley (y Gaer Gallery).

#OtD 8 Mar 1937 the Battle of Guadalajara during the Spanish Civil War began with an Italian and nationalist attack on Madrid. The attack and several following were repelled and the republicans launched a successful counter offensive. More in our podcast: workingclasshistory.com/podcast/e39-...

Remembering 33 fans who were crushed to death and 400 injured at Bolton Wanderers’ Burnden Park stadium when a barrier and a wall collapsed during an FA Cup game against Stoke City on this day 1946. Worst British football stadium disaster until Ibrox in 1971.

Unemployed miner’s child, Jarrow, Tyneside, 1937, photo by Bill Brandt.

The voices of division in our country are growing louder.

It’s up to us to unite against them.

Join us at the trade union bloc in London on 28 March for the Together Against the Far Right national demonstration.

Save the date and contact your regional secretary to join.

#Together

#OtD 5 Mar 1871 Jewish revolutionary socialist, Rosa Luxemburg, was born. A critic both of reformist socialists and Lenin's "ultra-centralism", she was murdered by right-wing paramilitaries on behalf of social democrats after the failed 1919 uprising shop.workingclasshistory.com/collections/...

#OtD 5 Mar 1984 6,000 miners went on strike at Cortonwood Colliery starting the great miners' strike. They were joined by most miners in Britain in opposition to pit closures, but they were sadly defeated by the Conservative govt. More in our podcast: workingclasshistory.com/tag/1984-5-m...

North West Labour History Journal. 50th anniversary issue now available.

See nwlh.org.uk for details. Articles on Blackburn, Chatterton, Leonard Hall, Labour women in Eccles, David Graham, Cammell Laird and the General Strike

North West Labour History Society invites budding authors to write articles about the working class in the North West of England. see nwlh.org.uk or the latest journal for details