British Trade Unions, 1707-1918, Part I, Volume 4

Drawing from a variety of libraries and archives, this collection brings together material to illustrate the history of the development of trade unionism and industrial relations. It spans the period from the early journeymen's trade societies as they emerged in the 18th-Century through to the end of the First World War. Part I, Volume 4 spans 1840-1864.

W. Hamish Fraser

Volume 4: 1840-1864 Debates on the value of trade unions among both friends and enemies continued with even greater vigour in the mid-Nineteenth Century, while, at the same time, more effective and permanent national unions appeared among groups such as glassmakers, engineers, printers and miners offering benefits to members that went beyond mere support in industrial disputes. There was a conscious effort to court public opinion and this began to get a response from some employers and from politicians, although there were still plenty of industrial disputes. Chartism, Trades-Unionism, and Socialism; or which is best calculated to produce Permanent Relief to the Working Classes? A Dialogue. By Thomas Hunt (1840); [J Drury], Reply of the Committee of the Central United Grinding Branches of Sheffield to Earl Fitwilliam's Speech at the Cutlers' Feas, (1844); 'Report of the Trade Council to the Compositors of London, on the proposed National Typographical Association' The Printer (1844); 'Society in its Past and Present State', Flint Glass Makers' Magazine (1850); On the Future', Flint Glass Makers' Magazine (1851); Trades Unions, What they Were, What they are, and What they Ought to be. In Bookbinders' Consolidated Union Trade Circular (1852); Report of the Central Committee of United Trades on the Proceedings Connected with the Combination of Workmen Bill in the Parliamentary Session, 1853. To the Members of the Association of United Trades and to the Trades of Great Britain and Ireland (1853); 'Strikes and Strike Allowance', Flint Glass Makers' Magazine (1854); Amalgamated Society of Engineers, Address of the Executive Council ... to their fellow workmen throughout the United Kingdom and British Colonies (1855); Masters and Workmen. Evidence of Sidney Smith, Secretary of the Association of Employers of Operative Engineers, and William Newton, Member of the Amalgamated Society of Engineers. Given before a Select Committee of the House of Commons on the cause of strikes and the desirability of establishing Equitable Councils of Conciliation, with Appendices and an Analysis of the evidence, by William Newton (1856); A Defence of Trades Unions in General and the Sunderland Shipwrights' Society in Particular. Address to the Clergy and all who oppose such Unions. Being a Reply to the Rev. D.R. Falconer, Curate of Bishopwearmouth. By an Operative Shipwright (1857); Balance Sheet of the Strike and Lock-out of the London Building Trades from July 24th1859 to May 1st 1860 (1860); Trades Unions and Strikes: Their Philosophy and Intention by T J Dunning, Secretary of the London Consolidated Society of Bookbinders (1860); John Bedford Leno, An Essay on the Nine Hours' Movement (1860?); Anon., Trades-Unions, Strikes and Lockouts (1860); London Operative Bricklayers' Society. Report and Balance Sheet of the Dispute relating to an attempt to introduce a System of Hiring and Paying by the Hour (1861); George Potter, The Labour Question. An Address to Capitalists, and Employers, of the Building Trades, being a few Reasons in behalf of a Reduction of the Hours of Labour, &c. (1861); 'The Sheffield Trade Outrages', The Bookbinders' Trade Circular (1862); Transactions and Results of the National Association of Coal, Lime and Iron-Stone Miners of Great Britain, held at Leeds, November 9, 10,11, 12, 13, and 14, 1863 (1863); 'To the Workmen of France from the Working-Men of England', Operative Bricklayers' Society's Trade Circular (1864)