The Belfast Dock strike or Belfast lockout took place in Belfast, Ireland from 26 April to 28 August 1907. The strike was called by Liverpool-born trade union leader James Larkin who had successfully organised the dock workers to join the National Union of Dock Labourers (NUDL). The dockers, both Protestant and Catholic, had gone on strike after their demand for union recognition was refused. They were soon joined by carters, shipyard workers, sailors, firemen, boilermakers, coal heavers, transport workers, and women from the city's largest tobacco factory. Most of the dock labourers were employed by powerful tobacco magnate Thomas Gallaher, chairman of the Belfast Steamship Company and owner of Gallaher's Tobacco Factory.
The Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC) later mutinied when ordered to escort the blackleg drivers of traction engines used to replace the striking carters. Order was eventually restored when British Army troops were deployed. Although largely unsuccessful, the dock strike led to the establishment of the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union.
Former Irish Labour Party leader Ruairi Quinn described the Belfast strike as having been a "major event in the early years of the trade union movement".
Background to the strike
Belfast in the early 20th-century was a flourishing centre of industry with shipbuilding, engineering and linen-manufacturing the main sources of the city's economic lifeblood. Its skilled workforce of shipyard workers and engineers earned wages and enjoyed working conditions comparable with the rest of the United Kingdom. Additionally, they enjoyed the security of trade union membership."The 1907 Dock Strike". Culture Northern Ireland'. 11 December 2008 For the unskilled workers, such as dock labourers and carters, it was a completely different story. They worked up to 75 hours a week in conditions which were dangerous and unsanitary, without holidays. The pay was low and employment was erratic and uncertain. Unlike the skilled workers, these labourers had no trade union to look after their interests. The men who worked in the docks lived in Sailortown, a community adjacent to the Docks which had a population of 5,000, excluding the transient sailors who swelled the numbers. This mixed Protestant and Catholic populace was packed into tiny streets of red-bricked terraced houses that were built between the docks and York Street. They were damp, airless, overcrowded and poorly lit. Poverty, hunger and disease was rife. Women and children were compelled to work long, arduous hours in the linen mills and cigarette factories. Most families in Sailortown had men who were merchant seamen; with boys as young as 14 going off to sea. The other men obtained unskilled work on the waterfront as dockers, carters and coal heavers.
By this time there were 3,100 dock labourers, 2,000 of whom were casual workers or "spellsmen" hired on a daily basis at low pay. Whilst Protestants and Catholics held the same jobs, the sectarian attitudes which dominated every aspect of life in Belfast ensured that Protestant dockers worked in the cross-channel docks where employment was more regular whilst Catholic dockers were made to work in the more dangerous deep sea docks, where the casualty rate was the highest. They were also the first to be laid off when labour cutbacks were required. Author John Gray in his book, City in Revolt: James Larkin and the Belfast Dock Strike of 1907 described the differences in wages earnings and the standard of living between the skilled and unskilled workers as "a yawning abyss, unequalled anywhere else in the United Kingdom".
It was into this environment and social milieu that trade union leader James Larkin (a Liverpool-born Irish Catholic) arrived in January 1907. He was sent to Belfast by James Sexton, head of the National Union of Dock Labourers (NUDL), with the aim of bringing the dock workers and carters into the union. Addressing crowds of people on the steps of Belfast's Custom House, he vociferously articulated the grievances of the working classes. Due to his charismatic personality and considerable oratorial skill, Larkin succeeded in unionising the unskilled Protestant and Catholic workers.
The lockout
By April 1907, Larkin had recruited 2,000 workers into the NUDL union; in May the number had reached 4,500. The massive wave of labour strikes which would bring chaos to Belfast throughout the summer commenced on 26 April at Samuel Davidson's Sirocco Engineering Works in East Belfast with a walk-out by non-union workers demanding higher wages. The union members amongst Sirocco's employees were promptly sacked and the rest of the workers were each obliged to sign a document pledging not to join a trade union. The next strike occurred on Queen's Quay by employees of the coal merchant Samuel Kelly. This was after he had dismissed union members from his workforce and Larkin called for the rest of the coal workers to go on strike. On 6 May, dockers working on the SS Optic owned by Belfast Steamship Company also went out on strike after refusing to work alongside non-union members.
Most of the dockers in Belfast were employees of magnate Thomas Gallaher who owned Gallaher's Tobacco Factory and served as chairman of Belfast Steamship Company. Gallaher and Kelly were forewarned about the strike, and had sent to Dublin for 50 blackleg dockers and coal heavers to fill the strikers' places. Feeling that a strike was premature at this point in time, Larkin sent the dockers and coal heavers back to work. Upon their return, however, the men discovered that they were locked out with the imported blacklegs working in their stead. The locked-out NUDL dockers and coal heavers proceeded to force the blacklegs away from the Belfast Steamship Company's sheds and the coal merchant's quay.
Although Kelly gave in and recognised his workers' rights to union membership, when Gallaher sacked seven women for attending a meeting held by Larkin, one thousand female employees of his tobacco factory walked out of their workplace in a display of solidarity on 16 May. They marched to a strike meeting held that afternoon in Corporation Square.Gray, John (1985). City in Revolt: James Larkin and the Belfast Dock Strike of 1907. Blackstaff Press. pp.105, 115 The women, however, were compelled to return to work the following day. Although Larkin had called on them to join a trade union, neither the NUDL nor any other trade union could admit such a high number of new members at one time. Additionally, no financial assistance was available to the women, many of whom had families to support. Thomas Gallaher refused to recognise the NUDL and had hundreds of blackleg dockers working on Donegall Quay under the protection of the RIC and troops deployed by Belfast's Lord Mayor Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 9th Earl of Shaftesbury. Larkin denounced Gallaher in speeches as an "obscene scoundrel". Gallaher for his part lamented that "the whole business is, I think, due to the uprising of socialism".
In mid-June 500 coal heavers from other firms went out, demanding higher wages. As the end of June approached, more than 3000 dockers were on strike, including 300 from the cross-channel companies, most of which were owned by powerful British railway magnates. As unrest among Belfast's workers grew, the strike soon spread from the docks and quays to the rest of Belfast with shipyard workers, firemen, sailors, iron moulders, and transport workers joining the dockers. Between 5,000 and 10,000 people turned out to attend the strike meetings that were held daily outside the Custom House. The NUDL demanded an increase in wages along with union recognition and better working conditions, all of which Gallaher and the other shipping bosses adamantly refused to grant. At this stage, however, the dockers' strike was hampered by the strong police and military presence on the quays. On 1 July, Larkin decided to lead the striking dockers in a march to Belfast City Hall to put their case before the council chamber who were in session. According to a newspaper report, the dockers were "marshalled in a long column of fours, and headed by Mr. Larkin they marched in military order through the streets gathering an immense crowd at their heels".Gray, p. 75 The politicians inside City Hall had to perforce admit a delegation of dockers to their meeting, but they would not make any concessions.
The tide suddenly turned in the dockers' favour when carters on the railway company quays refused to transport goods unloaded from the ships by the Dublin blackleg dockers. On 4 July after submitting a general pay claim, Larkin called the thousand remaining carters of Belfast, who were employed by the 60 firms of the Master Carriers Association, out on a sympathy strike.Gray, p. 83 Gallaher and the other employers had no means of getting their merchandise out of the port. The Belfast Newsletter commented on the situation with the following words: "It was remarkable to see the stagnation which existed from the Custom House to the Clarendon Dock. With the exception of an isolated van or lorry driven by the obvious amateur, there was scarcely a sign of life or movement". Soon afterwards engineers and boilermakers were striking; workplaces all over the city stopped production and shut down. The strike escalated into bitter violence when shipyard workers burnt company vans, hurled rocks at the police and attacked blacklegs with "shipyard confetti" which consisted of rivets, nuts and bolts. Blackleg workers had to be billeted aboard a ship in the Belfast Lough for their own safety.
Solidarity between Protestants and Catholics
The strike was characterised by unrest in working class areas of Belfast and solidarity across the sectarian divide. Given that Protestants made up the majority of Belfast's workforce, most of the strikers and local strike leaders were in fact, Protestants, although Catholics comprised a significant number. Specifically, three-quarters of Belfast's carters and three-fifths of its dockers were Protestants.Hepburn, Anthony C. (2008). Catholic Belfast and Nationalist Northern Ireland in the era of Joe Devlin, 1871–1934. UK: Oxford University Press. p. 121
That July Belfast experienced the most unusual Twelfth ever witnessed before or since. Instead of the traditional rioting and sectarian clashes which typically accompanied the Orange Order parades, the strike leaders gave public speeches defending the workers' interests against all forms of sectarianism.Gray, p. 77
On the Shankill Road, a Protestant area of the city and a regular scene of sectarian clashes, on 26 July 100,000 workers marched in support of the strike in a parade that featured flute bands from both Unionist and Nationalist traditions, a very rare occurrence.Darlington, Ralph (2008). Syndicalism and the Transition to Communism: An International Comparative Analysis. Ashgate Publishing. p. 117 The parade ended at a mass rally held outside City Hall, where 200,000 demonstrators had gathered.Gray, p. 105
Although it involved members of both the Protestant and Catholic communities, the Irish Unionist Alliance establishment opposed the strike and subjected Larkin to a sectarian campaign of condemnation, aimed largely at coaxing Protestant workers away from the strike. Larkin did however secure the support of the Independent Orange Order, an offshoot of the mainstream Orange Order which at the time had close ties to the Protestant labour movement. Larkin was joined in public meetings by the Independents' Grand Master, R. Lindsay Crawford. Crawford encouraged workers to stand firm for the sake not only of organised labour, but also of "the unity of all Irishmen".
Police mutiny