The world in 1911

The 1911 census was taken at a time of rapid change, both in Britain and the rest of the world. International politics was becoming increasingly turbulent as relatively young nations such as Germany and America underwent rapid industrialisation, and Japan’s economic power grew after the end of 200 years of isolation in 1853. All posed a threat to Britain’s economic supremacy, which was reflected in an increasing sense of nationalism both in Britain and abroad that was to culminate in World War I.

Great Britain in 1911

British industry suffered a year of industrial unrest with several strikes in key industries, such as shipping, mining, and the railways. There was also political unrest, with a political power struggle between The Liberals and Conservatives over Asquith’s programme of social reform.

Life in 1911

Life expectancy is 54 years for women and 50 for men
The average family has 2.8 children
Just over five percent of children aged 10 to 14 are in employment
The richest one percent of the population holds approximately 70 percent of the UK’s wealth
Electricity is available through a patchwork of small supply networks and the London Underground gets its first electric escalators. Earl’s Court is the first tube station to benefit.
The UK is connected via a series of local telephone networks. Some wealthy homes have phones and telephone kiosks are available.

National events

The coronation of George V and Queen Mary – who would become the first of the Windsor monarchs – takes place at Westminster Abbey on 22 June.

Politics

The Liberal Prime Minister, Herbert Henry Asquith, is head of a minority government; David Lloyd George is Chancellor of the Exchequer. After a two year struggle, the Parliament Act is passed, which abolishes the right of veto in the House of Lords
The Commons vote to pay MPs a salary
Home Rule is given to Ireland, in return for the support of the Irish Nationalist Party in the Parliament Act.
The Official Secrets Act is passed
The 1911 National Insurance Act comes into force
The Manhood Suffrage bill is proposed, which would give the vote to all men but not to women. The bill does not become law
The movement for women’s suffrage gains momentum, culminating in a mass boycott of the 1911 census.

Arts and Culture

The first edition of the Concise Oxford English Dictionary is published, 18 years ahead of the final instalment of the complete OED
The UK cinema industry is in its first years; people can watch films at cinema chains such as The Rex
In the UK, 16 male artists including Walter Sickert, Augustus John and Henry Lamb form the Camden Town Group
In Europe, Cubist artists continue their experiments with abstraction. Picasso produces Ma Jolie and Georges Braque paints The Portugese.
In May, Edward Elgar conducts the premiere of his Symphony No.2 in London
The song Any Old Iron is published

Sport

In football, Manchester United win the 1910-11 First Division title
The American Jack Johnson is world heavyweight boxing champion
In golf, Harry Vardon wins the British open.

Crime

In January, three policemen are killed and two injured after trying to arrest a group of Latvian anarchists trying to break into a jeweller’s shop. The event becomes notorious when the gang hold off 300 police in the ‘Siege of Sydney Street’. Winston Churchill, the Home Secretary, attends the scene and refuses to let the Fire Brigade intervene when the building catches fire. Two bodies are found, but a mythical third man, ‘Peter the Painter’, escapes.

In Parliament

The years preceding the First World War were tense for Britain politically, at home and abroad. Recession loomed as the country struggled to retain its status as the world’s economic superpower, as France, Germany, and Japan became industrial nations.
The economic rivalry created tension in international politics, with increased militarism in the industrialised countries. Britain was engaged in an expensive naval arms race with Germany, and at home the Liberal government faced industrial unrest and political agitation from the common people for the cause of universal suffrage.
The Liberal government, motivated by the need to fund their social reforms and the arms race, became embroiled in a two-year conflict with the Conservative-dominated House of Lords. The battle would eventually see the power of the Upper House permanently curbed, as well as bring Ireland to the brink of civil war.

The battle for power

In 1909 the Chancellor, David Lloyd George, proposed a radical Budget to pay for the programme of social reforms that included a super-tax against incomes of more than £5,000 pa, a tax on the land of wealthy landowners and an increase in death duties.

The Lords rejected the Budget, breaking an unwritten protocol in which the Upper Chamber refrained from rejecting financial bills put forward by the elected Lower House. It provoked a constitutional crisis and Prime Minister H. H. Asquith dissolved Parliament, calling a general election in January 1910. The Liberals were re-elected with a greatly reduced majority and formed a coalition with the Irish Nationalists.

The Parliament Act

The election forced the Lords to accept the Budget and the Finance Act was passed in April 1910. But a wider issue had been raised, and now the government sought to reduce the power of the House of Lords by removing their right of Veto. The Parliament Act proposed to give the government the right to bypass the House of Lords and obtain Royal Assent for any Measures that had been passed three times in the Commons and rejected three times by the Lords, making them an Act of Parliament.
Anticipating that the Lords would reject the bill, Asquith lobbied King Edward VII for the creation of several hundred new peers to force the bill through. The King agreed, provided the government obtained a mandate for change from the people, and in December 1910 the government called a general election for the second time in a year. Again they were returned to power. Despite the election results, the Lords made substantial amendments to the bill on the third reading, before it was passed.
The Liberals made it clear that they would not accept the changes and Edward’s successor, George V, agreed to create 250 new Liberal peers to remove the Conservative majority in the Lords.
On 10 August 1911, with the support of 24 Conservative peers and 11 Lords Spiritual (Bishops of the Church of England, who do not normally vote), the bill was passed by 131 to 114 votes.

Home Rule for Ireland

The support of the Irish Nationalist Party had been crucial in the power struggle with the House of Lords, and in return for their support the Irish Nationalists had been promised Home Rule, which involved the transfer of power for Ireland to a parliament in Dublin. Previous attempts to pass a Home Rule Act had failed and this attempt also met with resistance. The House of Lords rejected the bill and the government used the Parliament Act to make the Government of Ireland Act 1912 law.
The House of Lords also used the Parliament Act to delay the Government of Ireland Act 1912 for two years, so that it did not come into force until 1914. During that time the two opposing factions, the Ulster Unionists (anti Home Rule) and the Irish Volunteers (pro Home Rule), began to arm. Civil War was avoided by the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914 and the postponement of Home Rule.

Industrial unrest

Between 1910 and 1914 Britain experienced a wave of industrial unrest. Wage cuts, poor working conditions, and rapid inflation (between 1889 and 1910 the cost of food had risen by 10 per cent and the cost of coal 18 per cent) left workers deprived and disgruntled. The various trade unions were swelling in size and in 1911 there were widespread strikes. The most significant of these were in Liverpool, where a successful strike among sailors inspired a summer of strikes throughout the city’s other industries. That August a peaceful demonstration turned into days of anarchy, which led to the slaying by soldiers of two workers. The strikes were otherwise largely successful, and their organiser Tom Mann was heralded a hero, although he was imprisoned the following year for an innocuous offence connected with the strikes.

The summer of strikes

At Liverpool on the morning of 14 June 1911, the crews of two North American Liners refused to sign on for work. Later that day their stance was mirrored by the crews of several liners at Southampton. Tom Mann, co-founder of the Transport Workers Federation (TWF), was due to announce a general strike among seamen later that day, but the crewmen at Liverpool and Southampton, being eager for action, had decided not to wait.
Mann had started the TWF alongside his friend Ben Tillett the previous year – their aim was to unite every transport worker in the country under a single auspice. Since then the TWF had grown rapidly; numerous transport unions were now affiliates and had brought thousands of workers with them. A huge TWF demonstration, held at Liverpool on 31 May in support of two seamen’s unions that were on strike, had foreshadowed the June general strike. Two TWF affiliates, the National Sailors and Fireman’s Union (NSFU) and the National Union of Ships’ Stewards, Cooks, Buthchers and Bakers, were behind this first strike. Their initial purpose was to protest against degrading medical inspections, but they soon added further demands, including wage increases, improved accommodation, union recognition, and an end to the medical inspections.
On the evening of 14 June Tom Mann addressed a meeting of the first strikers with the mantra: ‘War declared. Strike for liberty’, and boldly predicted that the fight would be ‘short, sharp and decisive’ [The Guardian]. The next day seamen at most major UK ports, and some from as far afield as Belgium and Holland, began a general strike. Later that month the shipping companies acceded to the strikers’ demands, handing them victory. Inspired by the sailors’ success, on 28 June 4,000 dockers went on strike, demanding improvements in pay and conditions. They were quickly followed by scalers and coal heavers, which meant no fewer than 10,000 men had gone on strike by the end of the day. The seamen then went back on strike in support of the dockers, and within a week the Shipping Federation (an employers’ organisation) gave in, with most companies agreeing to improve workers’ hours and pay, and to end discrimination against union members.

Liverpool crippled by strikes

The success of the strikes against the shipping companies inspired a wave of strikes across other industries in Liverpool throughout the summer. Workers from warehouses, breweries, rubber plants, oil mills and wool houses went on strike, and on 5 August railwaymen from several depots joined them, demanding reduced hours and increased pay. Within two days 15,000 railwaymen were on strike and picketing stations throughout the city. Fighting erupted between strikers and police and thousands of extra policemen and soldiers were brought to the city and given live ammunition. Dockers and other transport workers struck in sympathy for the railwaymen, and goods transportation in Liverpool ground to a halt.

On 13 August a mass demonstration at St Georges Plateau, Liverpool saw 100,000 workers turn out to hear speeches from workers and union leaders, including Tom Mann. The event began peacefully, but some time after 4:15pm a scuffle began between police and demonstrators, which led to a full-scale riot. The event, which became known as ‘Bloody Sunday’, left scores of people injured, and in the days that followed continued fighting across the city resulted in two workers (a docker and a carter) being shot dead by troops.

The next day Liverpool’s ship owners carried out a threat to ‘lock out’ 20,000 dock workers unless they returned to work. When a number of dockers, against the strike leaders’ advice, failed to return to work, the ship owners shut down the docks. To support the dockers, the Joint Strike Committee, headed by Tom Mann, declared a general strike across all areas of shipping. The general strike lasted until 24 August, when a deal was struck ensuring all strikers would be allowed back to work. After a unanimous vote amongst the unions, Mann told all workers to return to work but added:

…neither shipowners nor reactionary committees nor councils, railway magnates, nor any other section shall be able to demoralise us again or drive us into poverty… We have done splendidly, and in a few weeks have brought 50,000 men into our unions.

A political prisoner

During the strikes Mann had published an article, written by a railwayman called Fred Crowsley, urging soldiers not to shoot at strikers. The following May he was found guilty of sedition on the grounds that, by publishing the article, he had tried to incite His Majesty’s forces to ‘commit a traitorous and mutinous practice contrary to the Indictment to Mutiny Act, 1797’. He was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment, but was released after seven weeks, the term being reduced by the King, on the advice of the Home Secretary, following a public outcry.