Silvertown

The lost story of a strike that shook London and helped launch the modern labour movement

John Tully, Lawrence and Wishart, 267 pages, hardback, £17.99

In 1889, Samuel Winkworth Silver’s rubber and electrical factory was the site of a massive worker revolt that upended the London industrial district which bore his name: Silvertown. The workers, long ignored by traditional craft unions, aligned themselves with the socialist-led New Unionism movement.

They shut down Silvertown and, in the process, helped to launch a more radical, modern labour movement.

Historian John Tully presents the Silvertown Strike as a source of inspiration for today’s workers who continue to struggle for better workplaces.

The book also has an introduction from John Callow, previously from the Marx Memorial Library and now working for the GMB, the union that was at the heart of this strike. He argues that the dispute provided inspiration for figures such as Eleanor Marx but also contains many lessons for union members today.

As Callow says, if “unskilled women and men — with no financial reserves or access to the media, and with starvation threatening — braved police truncheons, pauperisation and the chill of the cold to wage a strike that lasted some 89 days, how many more possibilities could be achieved by the unions of today…”

Reviews contributed by the Bookmarks socialist bookshop. Order online at www.bookmarksbookshop.co.uk