Today is the 95th anniversary of the Glasgow General Strike

[weepiper]

Today is the 95th anniversary of the start of the Glasgow General Strike, when 70,000 workers came out on strike for a 40-hour working week. It ended with a riot in George Square and the government sending tanks into central Glasgow

'Howitzers were positioned in the City Chambers, the cattle market was transformed into a tank depot, machine guns were posted on the top of hotels and, remembering Easter 1916, the main post office, and armed troops stood sentry outside power stations and patrolled the streets'

They don't like it when we stand up for our rights much.

From here

 

[danny la rouge]

Thanks for this, weeps. This was very much part of the background to my political upbringing.

 

[weepiper]

Thanks for this, weeps. This was very much part of the background to my political upbringing.

Whereas I knew nothing at all about it until a few years ago. This is interesting history. We should learn about this sort of stuff in school because it's directly relevant to normal kids' lives. But while I'm wishing I'll have a pony.

 

[weepiper]

A couple more pictures which have come up on facebook today

Argyle St:


and tanks stationed in the Cattle Market



Edit, apparently that first picture is actually from the year before when tanks went on a kind of war effort fundraising tour, not from the Strike. The second picture is authentic though.

 

[equationgirl]

The soldiers were stationed at Maryhill Barracks, ready for deployment. IIRC, the glaswegians among them refused to go to George Square and fight against people of their own class, that they knew.

 

[Belushi]

Whereas I knew nothing at all about it until a few years ago. This is interesting history. We should learn about this sort of stuff in school because it's directly relevant to normal kids' lives. But while I'm wishing I'll have a pony.

There was so much radicalism and real mass protest in the UK in the early twentieth century, the establishment really were shitting themselves. Yet it's almost as if its been airbrushed from history..

 

[equationgirl]

Also a lot of historians refer to this event as 'The Battle of George Square', if you're looking for more information on it.

 

[Casually Red]

There was so much radicalism and real mass protest in the UK in the early twentieth century, the establishment really were shitting themselves. Yet it's almost as if its been airbrushed from history..

it tends to get written by the winners, sadly

 

[weepiper]

The soldiers were stationed at Maryhill Barracks, ready for deployment. IIRC, the glaswegians among them refused to go to George Square and fight against people of their own class, that they knew.

The troops at Maryhill were locked in because the authorities were afraid they would refuse to fire on their fellow Glaswegians and switch sides. They brought in English troops and soldiers from the North-East because they were so concerned about local allegiances

 

[equationgirl]

The troops at Maryhill were locked in because the authorities were afraid they would refuse to fire on their fellow Glaswegians and switch sides. They brought in English troops and soldiers from the North-East because they were so concerned about local allegiances

Probably a correct assumption though.

 

[Belushi]

I suspect that it's standard procedure, I know when they used troops in South Wales it was always English regiments for that very reason.