The 1926 General Strike in Somerset

Ninety-five years ago, Somerset lived through the brief but divisive General Strike, held in support of the coalminers’ dispute with the private mineowners over attempts at imposing wage cuts and longer working hours. At that time, the Somerset coalfield was an important part of Britain’s vital coal industry, making the strike a significant event here.

Earlier disputes in 1921 and 1925 in the mining industry failed to provide any lasting solutions, and a showdown between the miners, backed rather half-heartedly by the wider trade union movement, and the Government-backed owners became inevitable when negotiations broke down in the spring of 1926, and the owners enforced a lockout of the miners.

The General Strike, run by the TUC in support of the miners, began at midnight of 3^rd/4^th May 1926. In the Somerset coalfield there was a mass meeting of miners, their families, and strikers from other industries, in Midsomer Norton on 5^th May, described in the local paper as “the biggest meeting ever held in the district.”

Along with the Government’s emergency British Gazette, most local media, where it could produce limited editions at all, took an anti-strike line. Their articles balanced tales of disruption to important services and industries with reports of action by both central government and by local councils (which in those days provided various basic utilities), and by local volunteers, to keep things going.

Publicly neutral on the strike itself, local councils tried to mitigate its impact. Yeovil’s Mayor issued a bulletin on ‘the national emergency’, stating that “whatever differences of opinion there may be … the duty of all good citizens is to support the constitutionally elected Government in its determination to maintain order and to secure the distribution of the necessary supplies for all classes of the community.” The optimistic Mayor of Glastonbury “sincerely hoped that everything would be carried out in an amicable way.” In Chard, the council managed to debate the provision of robes for its members, before going on to consider the availability of coal for the local Gas Works. The Bath Chronicle reported “little diminution” in tourism. The Wells Journal reported “unusually large congregations at all places of worship” on the Sunday of the strike: “The preachers all … expressed the hope that the good sense of the British people would soon prevail.”

Countering the mass of official ‘news’, pro-strike outlets sounded a more positive note. A report from the Bath Trades and Labour Council on 6^th May asserted “Position here still solid. Response magnificent.” A special report in the British Worker of 9^th May provided an upbeat view of the strike in Somerset: “I rode through the Somerset mining villages, where it was good to see how the colliers had been inspired with the knowledge that their fellows of the working class had rallied solidly to their aid. At Bridgwater and again at Taunton I found all solid, and business almost at a standstill.”

However, a 9^th May message from Frome’s strike committee to the TUC warned that a lack of funds could force a return to work by some strikers: “We think it is up to you to help us out of this rut. YOUR ADVICE & ASSISTANCE IS URGENTLY REQUIRED.” A 26^th May Taunton Courier editorial bemoaned the misery imposed on the strikers and their families by the strike, saying that Day 1 of the strike was “the saddest day of their life.”

After 9 days, on 12^th May the TUC gave up the struggle, leaving the miners to battle on alone, though with little chance of success, amid a gradual drift back to work, and defeat was confirmed by the end of the year.