An Introduction To George Garrett

An introduction to George Garrett

Writing on the Wall Kuumba Imani Millennium Centre 4, Princes Road, Liverpool L8 1TH Published by Writing on the Wall 2014 Š Mike Morris, Tony Wailey First Born and The First Hunger March Š The Garrett family

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Introduction to Garrett To some who have knowledge of his work, George Garrett is regarded as one of the most significant working class writers of his generation. Yet, since his work was published in the late 1930’s, and following his death in 1966, he has almost disappeared from view. The George Garrett Archive Project, launched with the support of the Heritage Lottery Fund by Liverpool’s Writing on the Wall Festival, aims to celebrate and preserve his legacy, bring his life and work to a new generation of readers, and inspire a new generation of writers. www.georgegarrettarchive.co.uk admin@georgegarrettarchive.co.uk

Contents Page Introduction to George Garrett

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Mike Morris and Tony Wailey First Born

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George Garrett The First Hunger March

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George Garrett Glossary

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Introduction to George Garrett A Stoker with Punch George Garrett, Merchant Seaman, writer, playwright and founder member of Liverpool’s Unity Theatre, was a radical activist who travelled the world and wrote a series of short stories, stage plays and documentary reports about poverty and struggle in the 1920’s and 30’s. He occupies a unique and significant position as the central point of a compass that links Liverpool’s literary, cultural, and maritime history.

Seagoing was central to George Garrett’s life.

Here he learned everything about comradeship, whether as galley boy or as a member of the ‘down below’ crew amid the fearsome toil of the stokers.

The sea gave him a taste of the cosmopolitan, encouraged him to jump ship in the great ports of Latin American or New York, just as it enabled him to return home, and never left him through all his bouts of unemployment in the 1920’s and 1930’s.

George Garrett lived a life that few of us these days could imagine. Born to a protestant and a staunchly catholic mother, his early life was characterised by uncertainty and poverty; born out of these circumstances was a burning hatred of injustice, and a desire to escape.

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Upheaval came early. Shortly after his birth in 1896, in Seacombe on the opposite bank of the Mersey, the family were forced to move across to Liverpool after his father lost his confectioners business to drink. They built a new life in the slum areas around Park Road on the Dingle, living within sight of the docks and the river, which were to shape both the man and writer until the end of his days.

He developed an early distaste for religion in all forms, but not before his mother had won the argument for George to be educated at St Vincent’s Catholic Primary School on St James’s Street. The tyrant priests and Christian Brothers who ran the school left their mark on many of their young charges, but maybe none more so than George. His son John relates how his father once intervened in defence of a classmate being beaten, by smashing a slate over the head of the offending priest.

In his short story, Apostate, George bears bitter witness to the memory of this by telling the tale of a young boy wearing hand me downs, or ‘Dees clothes’, donated for the children of the poor, who rebels in class, kicks the priest with his clogs, and, to the delight of his classmates, escapes over the school wall and away across the canal.

George’s ‘christening’ into radical politics and protest came in 1911 on his fifteenth birthday, when he attended a mass demonstration on Lime Street 2

outside Liverpool’s St George’s Hall. A series of strikes by seamen, dockers and transport workers had erupted into a city-wide general strike. The Home Secretary, Winston Churchill, likened it to revolution, sent in police reinforcements and ordered gun boats into the River Mersey. On what became known as ‘Bloody Sunday’, the police used a minor incident to charge the mass ranks of up to 100,000 demonstrators, and the young George Garrett, a bystander, suffered a broken nose and the loss of a few teeth when he was smashed in the face by a police baton.

In incidents such as this from his own life, we find many of the themes George returned to throughout his time as an activist, advocate and writer; the injustices of petty authority; poverty and its effect upon the working class; the powerlessness of the poor and the defenceless, and, though sometimes violent, the need for both collective and individual action to strike back and win some sort of victory. This is often accompanied by a fair slice of humour, and a knowing wink towards the reader.

He was always an avid reader but living in a port city furnished him with a world view. In his fragmented autobiography, ‘Ten years On the Parish’, he recounts how the seamen coming off the ships filled him ‘with wonder as they filed down gangways holding up parrots, or monkeys, or 3

canaries, or any souvenirs that showed a trace of a far-off country’. He ‘secretly yearned to be one of them’ and was ‘eager to go to any part of the world’.

His desire to escape finally came to fruition one Saturday afternoon when, aged seventeen, after falling out with his father and spending time sleeping in stables, he stowed aboard a tramp steamer bound for Argentina. After being discovered too far from shore to return, he was given a dressing down by the Captain, a meal by the crew, and was set to work as a stoker, heaving coal into the furnaces to keep the ship’s engines turning.

Secretly he cried with the pain of the intense labour, but stuck it out until they docked in Buenos Aires, where he jumped ship and went ashore in search of work and adventure. Prior to 1914 the world was a much more open place; George didn’t even need a passport to set himself up with work and lodgings. But he hadn’t travelled three thousand miles just to hump ‘back-breaking’ sacks on some distant dock, and so didn’t think twice when three other young lads from Britain invited him along to go on the tramp and see what the country had to offer.

Long before Jack Kerouac turned it into a way of life for the Beat Generation, George was on the road, enjoying living off the land and taking whatever work came his way. These experiences left an 4

indelible mark upon him and shine through in his writing. They show him to be a modern man, cosmopolitan in his views and his outlook, and sympathetic to the struggles of workers across the world.

In 1914 the world changed, and with the outbreak of the First World War George returned home and signed on officially as a Merchant Seaman. He sailed on the convoys among the warships and Uboats, was taken prisoner and forced to sign a declaration not to take up arms against the Germans, when his first ship, The SS Potaro, was captured by the German destroyer, Kronprinz Wilhelm. He escaped and went back to sea, only to be taken prisoner a second time when his ship, The Oswald, was also torpedoed.

These experiences fed through into his writing.

Letter Unsigned tells of a seaman struggling to write a letter home against the inevitability of his ship sinking amidst a violent storm. But this, and other stories, came later. For now the most profound influence he encountered during the war was on reaching America, most specifically New York.

George was impressed by the conditions on the American ships, which were much better than those endured by British merchant seamen under the British Flag. But it was New York itself that enticed him. The young stoker, with his political and cultural 5

ambitions, and the City’s bohemian mix of radicals, writers and syndicalist union activism, were a match made in heaven. It was here that George met and joined the IWW - the Industrial Workers of the World, more commonly known as The Wobblies.

The Wobblies, with their belief in ‘One Big Union’, also organised the great travellers, hoboes and unskilled who did not fit into craft based unions. By combining radical protest and cultural production – theatre, art, propaganda, prose, poetry and song, they earned themselves the accolade of the most literate radical movement in history.

In 1918, with the war over, George returned to Liverpool and married Grace Hughes. But with endemic unemployment the only thing on offer, he immediately returned, with Grace’s blessing, to The States, no doubt with work on his mind, but also to immerse himself in the radical movements of one of the world’s great cities.

Seaman Syndicalist and Scribe Garrett’s experience of America in New York in 1918 at the end of the war, revealed the flip side of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s ‘Jazz Age’. Not for him the endless parties and pointless conversations, but rather the daily struggle to work and keep on working. In postwar New York, with mass immigration, especially 6

with Irish, Jewish and Italian communities, and a boom-time economy, people from all strata of society shared a feeling of hope; they were poor, but they were rich with ideas. Garrett found himself here, earning good money, but also starting to write. Jose Luis Borges says ‘if you want to talk about a place, imagine yourself in another’. New York had this effect upon Garrett throughout his life.

He searched for work on American ships and classed himself as a wobbly in the ‘five and ten’ seaman’s branch in New York. The Wobblies though were coming under huge government attacks after the First World War, with The Palmer anti-alien raids and the criminal Anti Syndicalist acts being designed to destroy them. On the docks the International Longshoremen Organisation gained control after a long strike supported by 40,000 port workers in 1919. There was extensive solidarity between blacks Irish and Italians, but also extensive strike breaking.

Legendary Labour leader James Larkin was in the City, and was later jailed in the raids on radicals in 1920. Garrett may or may not have known Larkin, but what is beyond doubt is that he thrived in this melting pot. He was around New York during the strike for the Irish Republic that was fought on the docks in 1920 with the Liverpool White Star ship, the Baltic. But in 1921, recognising the danger of being 7

arrested himself, Garrett abandoned his attempt to bring his wife Grace over to join him, and jumped ship back to Liverpool.

His two years back in the city from 1921 to late 1922 could fill a book. He played a leading role in the formation of the Communist Party, the National Unemployed Workers Movement, the Seaman’s Vigilance Committee and the Walker Art gallery ‘riots’. He was the leader of the Liverpool contingent on the first Hunger March to London in 1922. When the Hunger March was over, with his radical activities guaranteeing his name first on the blacklist, George realised his prospects in Liverpool were worse than ever. And so, in 1923, with a growing young family to provide for, he hitched to Southampton, boarded the Homeric, and sailed again for the USA. This was a different George Garrett than the one who first passed Ellis Island. He boarded the ship as George Garrett, but jumped in New York as George Oswald James, one of the many pseudonyms he used throughout his life. He wasn’t just going for money, he was leaving Liverpool to find space and time to write. He lived on East 42nd Street, sharing rooms with young Irish actors Barry Fitzgerald and Victor McLaglen, later Jackie Gleason, all of whom went on to achieve success in Hollywood. According to George’s son John, these actors cemented within 8

him his love of theatre. His first play, Two Tides, may well have been completed in New York, coming as it does after the first performance of The Far Horizon by Eugene O’Neill in 1920, a writer that was to profoundly influence Garrett, and after whom he would name one of his sons.

In many ways this was his first period of sustained work, his ‘siege in the room’. His decision to leave Liverpool after the end of the Hunger March relieved him of the duty he felt towards his fellow unemployed, a responsibility he took seriously.

Often working at night, coupled with a great literary energy, lodging with struggling actors, suggests he was in America for one specific reason – to hone his craft.

The excellent work of the late Michael Murphy, who, in The Collected George Garrett ( 1999) , brought George’s short stories together for the first time in print since the 1930’s, situated him primarily as an artist of the short form. Yet when you consider the three plays he wrote in the early 1920’s, Two

Tides, Flowers and Candles and Tombstones and Grass, and when he set up the Unity Theatre in 1938, in support of the Republic at the time of the Spanish Civil War, it could be argued that his role was primarily as a dramatist.

Taking into account that the only evidence we have of his plays in New York are two rejection

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letters from theatre groups there, one of whose directors was Eugene O’Neill himself, it seems surprising that upon returning to Liverpool in 1926 he seems to have left this form of expression behind.

Sustained writing time was no doubt one factor; it’s difficult to write a 120 page, three Act play, in the way you can jot a note for a short story at the kitchen table. But also, in the early 1920’s, there was very little opportunity for a young working class writer, straight from the sea, to get his work into theatres still filled with melodramatic productions.

George’s intensely creative period in in New York in the mid-twenties drew to a close when the work dried up, workers were being divided over immigration, and America began to withdraw into ‘isolationism’ in advance of the Great Crash of 1929.

With no success in seeking ‘naturalisation’ for his family, and with his efforts as a playwright making little headway, he took the only decision open to him, to again jump ship back to Liverpool.

On the Parish George arrived back home at the end of the 1926 General Strike to witness ‘Strikers and Policemen playing football together’; a metaphor for everything returning ‘to normal.’ Britain was a country with a deep residue of imperialism and a conservative 10

hatred of organised labour. The repercussions of the failure of the strike led to a 1927 Act of Parliament that introduced further wage cuts, and benefit cuts for those deemed to be ‘not genuinely seeking work’.

George managed to ship out for three months, but this and other short runs, counted for no more than five months work over the next thirteen years.

In the early 1920’s he had written for journals associated with the Red International of Trade Unions. In the 1930’s, during this long war of attrition, he maintained his wry humour and honed his skills by sticking to the pen. He left his plays behind and embarked upon a series of short stories and critical reportage that soon brought him his first publishing success.

He was far from inactive but took a role more closely aligned to advocacy and civil rights than the mass organisational work of the 1920’s. He was involved with The Fellowship of Reconciliation, writing for their magazine and trying to minimise conflict between Catholics and Protestants. His reputation as a fighter stood the test of time during his three year absence, and in 1928 he campaigned for election in the Brunswick Ward as an independent candidate, standing as The Man Who

Can’t Be Bought, The Man Who Led the Unemployed, The Fighting Candidate and The Seamen’s Champion.

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These were hard times. In 1922, when he was leading the Liverpool contingent of the Hunger March, a million people were unemployed. Between 1929 and 1932 this rose to over three million.

However, such was the impact of the defeat of the General Strike that the rise in unemployment was met with despair rather than militancy. Treks across the country to the Imperial City had long since turned into crusades, or in Garrett’s words, ‘conducted tours’, rather than marches. They echoed the resigned mood of the times.

Garrett, however, wrote himself into things. The development in the 1930’s of new magazines – The Adelphi, New Writing, and Left Review, coupled with the Mass Observation movement, signalled a new interest in working class writers and gave George his chance. As a result, between 1934 and 1938 he had thirteen short stories published. His key themes were justice and identity, of puncturing pomposity and celebrating often small, individual victories during this depressed period. This was his high water mark. Novelist and critic, Sylvia Townsend Warner, commented favourably upon his technique as the ‘art of the artlessness’.

His first story, fittingly titled ‘First Born’, was published in June 1934 by John Middleton Murry’s The Adelphi magazine. It was published under the pseudonym Matt Low, a play on Matelot the French 12

word for sailor. First Born, and three other of the thirteen stories, are attributed to Matt Low. This may well have been to avoid losing benefits, although it seems that George also enjoyed playing around with identity, from his subterranean days in American as a Wobbly.

But it was a major struggle to write living with five young sons in a cramped tenement. He had to get out to find a place to be on his own, but Garrett’s nature was such that he could never turn people away. He complained he could not even escape to the library to write as he was constantly accosted by other unemployed men seeking advice and assistance over claims for relief. He chaired the Seaman’s Defence League and was constantly besieged for support about relief, or for reports on seamen who had gone missing. They had no thought for his own problems, he glumly noted. That he not only managed to get anything written but saw his work published alongside some of the major literary figures of the day, Isherwood, Auden, Orwell and DH Lawrence, is testament to his skill and determination.

When George Orwell came to Liverpool in 1936 to research ‘The Road to Wigan Pier’, he was introduced to Garrett as someone who could show him the working conditions and effects of poverty in Liverpool. They sat up all night discussing books 13

and politics. The following day Garrett took him to the docks to witness how men were hired ‘like cattle.’

Orwell spoke very highly of George in his ‘Wigan Pier Diaries’.

Unfortunately Garrett didn’t share the same opinion of Orwell. He regarded ‘The Road to Wigan Pier’ as ‘one long sneer’, commenting to his editor, John Lehmann, that ‘a book like that could do a lot of damage’. Lehmann himself, recognising the difference between Orwell’s middle class sensibilities compared to Garrett’s handling of working class life, noted, ‘Garrett’s needle of sensitivity does not quiver so violently as Orwell’s who hates and despises all the things that Garrett does but knows them in a far less familiar way.’

Lehmann, publisher of New Writing, and a great supporter of Garrett, wanted him to write ‘his book’ a different view of unemployment of the 1930’s. His support for Garrett to complete the work flows through every page of their correspondence. But so too does Garrett’s frustration at the conditions he was condemned to live and work in. They began to overwhelm him. From slum to tenement housing, with five children of his own, a family of eight next door and nine on the floor above, the cacophony of noise competed only with the constant threats and intimidation of the UAB - the Unemployed Assistance Board, who regularly knocked at the door 14

to ensure he was ‘genuinely seeking employment’ and eligible for benefits.

The noise, his failure to find space of his own in which to write, and to gain enough financial support for him to escape the tentacles of the UAB, had disastrous consequences. In 1938 he conceded to John Lehman that the year before he had finally broken down and spent time in hospital, ‘good for little more than the loony bin.’ Sadly, in the eyes of Lehmann, George had ‘dropped out of the writer’s movement’.

But this was far from the end. After he recovered he left behind his stories the way he had his American drama of the 1920’s, to return to a more collective endeavour and play a leading role in setting up Merseyside Left Theatre, later to become

The Unity Theatre.

The Subterranean Theatre The Spanish Civil War was a clear call to arms. Here was a focal point with which he was familiar, similar to the struggles he had engaged in with the Wobblies on the New York Waterfront. The civil war entered the European conscience in deciding between, fascism, communism or social democracy, and proved ultimately both inspiration and nightmare. It demanded his full attention and involvement as the 15

cause was so clear; an elected government had been overthrown by the military and people, particularly in the cities, had risen up in its defence.

Merseyside Left Theatre was formed with a radical manifesto that declared, ‘We are a political theatre involved in the struggle for socialism.’ It sought out a working class audience to bring to them the ‘most urgent political issue of the day – the need to rouse support for the Spanish people in their fight against international fascism. Their first plays were ‘Guernica’ and ‘Spain’, and they toured the region appearing in theatres, church halls and on the streets.

There was a ready response, and many of their productions played to full houses.

Jerry Dawson, George’s friend and one of the theatre’s leading lights, commented that ‘Merseyside Left Theatre were lucky. They had a man who had worked with The Wobblies in America. He could set the cast firmly in Brooklyn and the Bronx. He had led the Liverpool contingent in the Hunger March of 1922. He could carry the American Struggle across the Atlantic and make it British.’

John Garrett, the fifth son of seven, remembers his father George talking of the children he had witnessed when he was young, wearing hand me down clothes from recently deceased relatives: ‘these children walking around in grown-up’s clothes reminded him of a children’s theatre group. The 16

children dressed in these almost bizarre clothes, however, didn’t strut and sparkle…they slunk around…totally ashamed.’ That George should witness this poverty and relate it to theatre is no surprise. His great talent lay in seeing the drama in everyday circumstances, and to represent authentic voices without side effect or sneer.

George’s return to drama brought a more collective way of writing and protest to his art. Just as the Wobblies provided him both with industrial protest and cultural inspiration, so the Left and Unity theatres were to act as presentiments to another war. When the International Brigades returned from Spain following the defeat of the Republican forces at the last battle of the River Ebro in 1938, it must have been clear to George that the phrase Left Theatre had daubed on walls, ‘Madrid Today – Merseyside Tomorrow’, was soon to become reality.

In 1939, with the outbreak of World War Two, he again returned to sea, sailing on the Nagara from Liverpool to Buenos Aires, the city to which he had first stowed away more than quarter of a century before. As Jerry Dawson was to wryly remark, George ‘was allowed to work once again, so that he could risk his life for his country.’

George did his bit, but always the street fighter, the activist, the man on the ground, it may have been 17

he felt out of step with this new ‘people’s war’ mentality. He knew well the experiences of the unemployed after WW1, and how workers fared both during and after state conflict. The Second World War was far less eventful for George than WW1, and after completing a few trips he worked through the worst of the blitz as a night watchman on the Bootle Docks.

Just one short story, The Maurie, comes from this period, but it is in this story, finally published in full in 1999, in which he returned to the phrase Subterranean Theatre. It is a phrase he used again and again, and one that could well be applied to his own life as a writer and dramatist, as he laboured below decks to create a body of literary and propagandist work about the life and conditions of the working classes.

Following the war George was still active, creatively as a writer and actor, and as an activist and advocate. He co-wrote two major plays staged

by The Unity Theatre; One Hundred Years Hard, commissioned to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the founding of The Trades Council, and Man with a Plan, a production designed to support the claims of the Labour Party in power, and keep them on the path of nationalisation. Both productions successfully toured across the North-West. His unpublished notebooks also reveal his private 18

writings, including a part-finished script for another play set at half-time during a football match.

By the mid 1950’s, time, according to Jerry Dawson, seemed to be passing George by. But he remained active around the Seamen’s Reform movement, writing, printing and distributing leaflets to push the Seamen’s Union towards a democratic structure. However, aside from one far-sighted letter published in 1957 in the Liverpool Echo calling for a regeneration of Liverpool’s waterfront, it seems George wrote very little. He worked for ten years as night watchman on a Shell tugboat until he retired.

In many ways he had seen it all and done it all; written and published his short stories, developed his plays, lived among Hollywood actors in New York, and tramped across Latin America. He’d served in two world wars, been torpedoed and taken prisoner, escaped, and fought on, for the unemployed, for his fellow workers, and helped found a theatre that still exists today. All this was while sustaining a relationship and a large family.

Only a true understanding of the odds he faced can give us a sense of perspective for what he achieved.

In 1966 he spoke at several meetings in support of the seamen during their first official strike since 1911. At one of the meetings he threw his own bus fare into the collection and walked home. He died later that year of throat cancer after a life given over to 19

creativity, art and struggle. He went out the way he had lived, supporting the underdog, the restless and the poor. He left behind a body of work to be proud of, and a legacy as one of the most significant working class writers of his generation.

Mike Morris & Tony Wailey

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FIRST BORN George Garrett Harry had remained on the steady, until the night he bumped into Poulton after six years spent widely apart, and broke the pledge. Poulton dragged him part of the way home and assisted Mrs. Marsden to lift her singing son into bed. He awoke the next day, and remembering Poulton’s invitation, sent his mother to buy a new shirt, collar and tie. He tidied himself before the mirror, looked at his watch and decided to wait a while. It would be more advisable 21

to go about eight o’clock because calling too near opening time might create a bad impression. Perhaps Bob’s people were very sedate.

A church clock was striking the hour as Harry halted at the bottom of Leasowe Street. Considering he was strange to the neighbourhood, the walk could not have been judged better. He read the numbers, gazed twice at twelve, skipped nimbly up the steps, withdrew his hand from the knocker without making a sound, then rapped a tattoo on the panel of the open door. ‘Hello,’ sang a girl’s voice. He hesitated, then rapped again. Along the lobby came a young woman holding a curling-iron to her hair.

‘Who do you want?’ she asked in a tone that demanded a speedy reply. His wits fled. She removed the iron, cupped one hand over her ear and indicated she was listening. He was not sure whether his sensation of blushing was caused by vexation or shame.

‘Does Mr. Poulton live here, please? Bob Poulton,’ he mumbled as if seeking a favour.

‘Oh,’ she said solemnly, ‘I thought you were an undertaker at the wrong house. Yes. He lives here. I am his sister. Bob’s on the Desillo. Working late. He won’t be in till nine o’clock.’

He felt she was looking at him rather penetratingly. Suppose she was scrutinising him in the same direct fashion as her brother? As if 22

mesmerised, he was already in her power and unable to fly.

Her voice lost none of its challenge. ‘Are you a shipmate of his?’

‘We sailed together, years ago’ he answered.

‘Come inside, then,’ she ordered. ‘You’re wasting the fire.’

‘No, thanks,’ he managed to say, I’ll…I’ll walk around the block.’

He was backing down the steps as she stared at him accusingly.

‘I know that kind of a walk! You’ll sneak into the ‘Butts’, and stay there until the barman throws you out. Bob will be here soon. You’d better come in,’ she said.

Helplessly, he obeyed. His creaking boots greeted the oilcloth. Dumbly he accepted correction for heeling his hat under a chair in his embarrassment.

The neck of his shirt was saturated. He wished he could disappear through the window.

She pinned a shawl over her head. ‘Shan’t be a few minutes away. I’m going for Bob’s supper. He likes pigs’ feet. Do you? ‘Course you do! And will you, please, get nearer the fire.’

Meekly he shifted the chair, then moved it back when she had gone. Each resounding footstep set him on edge. He hoped nobody would find him there. He hoped Bob would not be late. He glanced at the 23

mantel-clock. Turned half-past eight! Jeese! Another half-hour! If she caught him walking out she would probably make an exhibition of him in the street! His own stupidity had landed him in that kitchen! What would her people think? What would anybody think?

Footsteps pattered along the lobby. Clumsily he worked the chair to the fire. ‘Ah! You’re the boy. Not the least bit shy,’ she said as her shawl was tossed aside. ‘Put the kettle on like a good fellow.’ He bit his lip. ‘Where’s the tap?’ he blurted.

She wagged her head roguishly. ‘Aha! I knew you had a tongue. Through that door on the right. Mind the step.’ His trembling hand dropped the lid. ‘Oh, my God,’ she mocked, snatching the kettle from him, ‘I wouldn’t choose you for a husband.’ He stood awkwardly, and began to doubt Bob’s fitness to guard a secret. ‘Sit down, man!’ she said. He sat.

At last he recognised a welcome humming.

‘Hello,’ greeted Bob, ‘been here all afternoon?’

Harry tried to speak normally. ‘About an hour.

Your sister pressed me to stay.’

‘She would,’ Bob remarked.

‘I’m thankful you’re in,’ said Marie, without blinking, ‘this chap has me talked to death.’

There was a vacancy in the Desillo and Harry joined her. When at sea a week, though shaky of the result, he asked permission to write to Marie. No objection was raised.

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‘Take a tip from me,’ warned Bob; ‘be careful.

She’ll put the mooring chains on you.’

‘I know,’ was the other’s startling reply. Bob eyed him curiously. ‘If you know, that’s settled.’

Correspondence piled up from a few short lines to crowded pages. Between voyages Harry called frequently at the house in Leasowe Street. He adapted himself to the extent of going for pigs’ feet, an amazing act for a man unaccustomed to entering shops of any description. He was guilty of blunders too. She reproved him for paying too much for an engagement ring, and later declined a crepe-de-chine blouse because she thought the price extravagant. But she took the money and added a hearthrug to her accumulating household effects. When alone she wondered how such a strong fellow could be so bashfully tender, unaware that in him the new was wrestling with the old.

The date of their marriage was announced.

Because of the housing shortage, she furnished a large-sized backroom for his home-coming. There he suffered disappointment. She pushed him away. ‘No! Do you want our baby born among those things?’ She pointed to the unemptied ash bins.

‘You know best,’ he muttered tamely, and curled himself on the sofa. He went to sleep. She didn’t.

He was glad to rejoin his ship again. All sorts of notions bothered his head. The ash-midden excuse 25

was concealing something else! Perhaps she thought he was unclean. Maybe Bob had opened his mouth too wide. But surely he ought to know, could not help but know that his presence was sufficient to keep any man straight.

Bob noted Harry’s miserable appearance. ‘What’s the matter with you? Had a quarrel?’ he asked sympathetically. ‘Only a few words,’ lied Harry, incapable of introducing his delicate grievance.

In Santos, he rapturously pocketed a letter which was thickly underlined. ‘I’ve been lucky to get a small house. A door of our own. Our happiness will be complete here.’

Weeks later, on his return, he found the small house. It was small, but it was a house. Her face aglow, she showed him around.

‘Fine! Fine!’ he ejaculated as each additional ‘this’ was displayed. Over a hot tea she instructed him to seek a job ashore. This he did. Her continued resistance provoked him. His resulting bad temper had to be restrained on account of the neighbours.

‘You’re not even fair,’ he complained. ‘You’re deliberately throwing me open to temptation.’

She burst into tears. ‘Why do you think only of yourself? Haven’t I desires too?’

On a friend’s recommendation he got a job in the Corporation depot. ‘I’ve clicked,’ he told Marie 26

gruffly. ‘I’m a muck-driver.’ ‘What kind of a thing’s that?’ she asked. ‘A sewer cleaner,’ he snapped.

‘Is it constant?’

‘Don’t know! Why should I care?’

She tried to appease him. ‘At any rate it will be better than going to sea. You’ll have a comfortable bed to lie in at night.’

‘Bed!’ he roared. ‘Bed! What use is a bed to me?’

He slammed the front door behind him in case their row might revive past escapades which he preferred to leave buried.

His workmates often heard him mumbling to himself, ‘You’re not playing fair. You’re not playing fair.’ He came to be known as ‘Playfair.’ Then one night Marie relented and he fell asleep in her arms.

When he booked on at the depot next morning the ganger noted the change. ‘You seem merry enough, Playfair. Did you have your rations last night?’

‘Sure thing,’ answered Harry, as if the world was entitled to hear he was a real husband at last.

Towards the end of the month he whispered an inquisitive ‘Well?’ to Marie and she smilingly nodded.

On their evening strolls he shortened his stride to tune with hers and as she clung to his arm there grew in him a unique sense of ownership. She gazed longingly at an attractive baby-robe in a shop window. ‘I’d like that — very much’ she said, ‘but 27

the price is beyond us. Thirty shillings, almost.

That’s half a week’s wages.’

She requested him one pay-day to fetch a small bag of jumbo toffee.

‘Have a pound of chocolates,’ he generally suggested.

‘Jumbo toffee,’ she insisted, knowing its low price would not deprive him of cigarettes. The bag of toffee was a regular weekly delivery. He wondered how she ate the sticky mess. Then he nibbled bits from his pocket and was obliged to increase the order.

Arriving home earlier than usual on a Saturday afternoon he saw the kitchen empty. He tip-toed upstairs, peeped through the key hole and studied her squatting on the floor religiously folding her baby clothes. When her face turned slightly, there was an extra-ordinary pleasure in it. If cheap odds and ends can do that, he thought, what would the silk robe do. He was determined to get the robe somehow. It was no simple task to approach the ginger-haired shop assistant.

‘No sir,’ she answered. ‘Our terms are strictly cash. We do not take instalments. There is a firm in Borough Road. They do business that way.’

Though disheartened, he persevered. ‘My wife wants that particular robe. Nothing else will do,’ he was finally driven to explain.

28

The girl took pity and agreed on a private arrangement by which he was to pay regular instalments to her only. The robe was packed away.

As the weeks wore on he performed various household duties, cleaning windows, chopping sticks, and emptying slops. On one occasion Marie discovered him scrubbing the floor, and was wild.

‘Get up!’ she demanded. ‘None of that in here.’

He stammered confusedly. ‘There’s no harm. I thoughtShe carried the bucket away. ‘I won’t let you be a Mary Ann.’ He could not understand why it should be a manly action to go down a sewer and an unmanly action to go down on his knees for a woman hardly able to bend. He never argued.

The morning came when he had to pant through the streets for aid. He suffered three panicky hours until the woman invited him into the bedroom for a few moments to see the cause of all the upset. While he looked at the forced smile on his wife’s chalky features, his mumbling enthusiasm concealed a violent desire to strangle the bald-headed creature by her side for the agony it had caused them both.

His lateness for work meant a deduction of two shillings and threepence, a loss he could ill afford, particularly at this time when every penny was needed. One more instalment and the robe would be 29

his. Beautiful soft white silk, and well worth twentynine shillings and elevenpence. He chuckled over the surprise in store for Marie. Imagination partly repaid him. He had pictured her face when the time arrived to let her cut the string. First he would rush upstairs, pass her the scissors, make her shut her eyes, sneak the parcel on to the counterpane, and intone, ‘One, two, three! Go ahead. Open it.’

In the next couple of days he was very diligent in his grubbing for scrap metal. In one grid he found four pennies and three half-pennies. ‘If they were only silver!’ He jingled them hopefully in his vest pocket. Then a puffing foreman hurried him on to the old culvert. ‘There’s an obstruction in the pipe-line.

Six houses have been flooded. There’ll be hell to play if it isn’t cleared’ He pencilled the directions.

Top off! I’ll send another man from the yard with a pair of rubber boots.’

The helper appeared in twenty minutes, having cycled from the depot. Harry shoved his legs into the rubber boots, then prised the manhole cover. Slowly he descended the familiar wall ladder into the damp putrid blackness. He waited until he became dark-sighted, and lit a candle. According to the scribbled outline the blocked pipe was thirty feet to the left. He waded shin-deep towards the spot.

The pipe was on a level with his shoulders. He held the candle closer, gaped at the obstruction, saw 30

it was a dead body and almost fainted, for the first time in his life. As fast as he was able he retraced his steps and went up the ladder for a breath of fresh air.

‘You weren’t long,’ commented the helper, inwardly envying the five shillings extra which Harry received in addition to the basic weekly wagerate.

‘Phew,’ gasped Harry.

‘What’s up chum? You look like a dose of yaller jaunders. Blimey! It must be a meller down there.’

‘Phew-w! Wicked!’

‘Somebody has to do it,’ observed the helper, with no intention that it should be himself. ‘It’s not my job,’ he reflected. ‘I wouldn’t get a cent ‘compo.’

Wretched and silent, Harry was sitting on the kerbstone. The matter was so vital. If he did not remove the obstruction he would be sacked, and maybe lose his home, everything. To report it would mean a coroner’s inquest, and the paltry court expenses were poor recompense for the loss of a full day’s wages. He needed every penny so badly. And the robe…the robe. He could not let that go!

As he descended the ladder again his underwear became wet and sticky. Very determined, he strode quickly to the pipe. He closed his eyes in an attempt to dismiss the rat-eaten cheek of the dumped baby. It was difficult to get a proper grip, and his sight was 31

necessary. The sweat poured from him. The body was jammed tight, the head pressing hard on the doubled-up knees. A decayed throat tape frayed in Harry’s fingers. One arm was hanging loose. In his hazy condition he had noticed this before. With an effort he grabbed the arm just hard enough to dislodge the body. The arm tore adrift from its socket. Staggering blindly, Harry tossed it down the culvert.

He tried again. By painful manoeuvring he succeeded in wedging his hands behind the buttocks.

Despite a strong pull he only jerked the body slightly towards him. The face was fully exposed now. In a frenzy he began to drag forcibly. He could feel the thing moving. As it came easier he did intend to lay it down reverently on the culvert floor, but the volume of released water and refuse knocked him flat on his back. He dropped the body. The candle was swept away, and the matches were soaked in his pocket. He wanted to scream. He groped towards the ladder. The rush of water swept the body after him.

He reeled shiveringly when it touched his boot. He groped on, felt an iron rung, and clambered wearily into light.

He flopped to the kerb and sat for a while as if doped. He was too exhausted to brush himself. The helper dangled his watch as a hint. He pulled Harry’s rubbers off, mounted the bicycle and rode 32

away. To lock the ghastly thing underground for ever, Harry kicked the manhole cover into position.

He looked at his clothes. No tramguard could be expected to let him aboard a car in such an objectionable condition. Drearily he trudged into the yard.

At home, that evening, he told Marie that the chill he had was a mild recurring attack of ague. Although poorly herself she oiled his chest.

Pay-night arrived. He took his turn impatiently in the queue. With the sludge of the day on his boots and pants he dashed from the cash-window to the draper’s. When he reached the shop half a dozen women were being served. He instantly withdrew and loitered outside until only a woman and her little girl remained. The dark-haired assistant was attending to them. The ginger girl was free. She beckoned him. The flat cardboard box was on the counter when he re-entered. The girl smiled. Having shared his aspiration she felt at liberty to speak. She gave him the receipt.

‘I’m sure you’re glad. Your wife will be pleased!’

He did not answer. His mind was rambling.

The girl draped the robe from her chin. ‘Lovely, isn’t it?’ she said.

‘Mm,’ he abstractedly murmured, for to him the robe was smelly, the sheen was green-mouldy and the folds were horribly teeth-marked. For the moment he 33

forgot all but the sewer ordeal, forgot the shop, the assistants and the woman customer.

Unobserved, the little girl gradually edged her way along the counter. Suddenly she thrust an adventurous hand into Harry’s. ‘Hello, Mister,’ she said.

Startled, he gave the terrified child a rough push.

‘Get away! For God’s sake! Don’t touch me!’ he roared.

The irate mother ran to the doorstep. ‘You big brute! If I see a policeman I’ll give you in charge.’

His contrition was pathetic. ‘Really, I’m sorry, missus. Really! My nerves are gone,’ he stammered, as he fumbled for a coin. Obeying its parent, the weeping child flung the sixpence into the street, where it rolled steadily towards a grid.

34

THE FIRST HUNGER MARCH George Garrett The first national march, organised in the winter of 1922, found the unemployed with barely enough cash to pay the preliminary postages of active branches up and down the country.

The money collected at each stopping-place was only sufficient to pay for an occasional sandwich, firstaid requisites, and bundles of boot leather.

Cigarettes, too, had to be provided; smokes being indispensable to meals and morale.

The men responsible for the initial organisation of the march, having learned much from capitalist warfare, vested leadership in those who as noncommissioned officers had handled men in the army.

Their actions were checked by the watchful marchers’ council who regularly sat up each night to discuss the 35

next day’s activities. On account of spies, important decisions were occasionally withheld from the body of the marchers.

Most of them understood why, having walked in local street demonstrations where a dirty-dungareed stranger was probably a member of the C.I.D. or else a paid tout. Secrecy was therefore accepted when the circumstances warranted. All recognized the need for discipline in their determination to reach London. From field, factory, mine, and dockyard they had gathered; a miniature army with a purpose, not a rabble cadging for bread.

Marching four abreast they may have appeared so.

Some wore Australian dinkum hats. All shouldered haversacks. Their khaki puttees revived their recent military training. Many a shabby overcoat hid a bare backside. One constant trouble was bad boots. Men down at heel are down at heart. The old campaigners knew this and kept the cobblers in the contingent busy with hammers and lasts.

This was their special job, but every man had something to do. Only the sick, or those with very sore feet were excused. The leaders taking their turn at the pull-ropes of the trek-carts, and also at washing dishes, sustained a morale that debarred favouritism or differentiation of any kind.

The fifes and drums of the bandsmen quickened many a lagging footstep along the narrow country 36

lanes. Two tunes mingled strangely as expressions of contempt for a hypocritical social system: ‘Colonel Bogey,’ and ‘The Red Army March.’ There was inspiration in this song of the Russian Revolution.

On leaving a town, especially an inhospitable one, ‘Rulers who sit in High Places’ was played and sung through bourgeois residential districts. As windows and doors shot open, the scornful refrain of ‘Colonel Bogey’ quickly slammed them shut again.

‘And the same to you!’ was a parting retort.

The bandsmen, as much part of the morale as the food the marchers ate, were exempt from the ordinary routine work of the contingent. Relays of men took turns-about in dragging the loaded trekcarts with their bulgy canvas coverings. Hidden beneath, according to newspaper know-alls, were spare parts of machine-guns. The marchers enjoyed that story enough to mischievously keep it alive.

At each stopping-place, selected men stood guard over the carts to make sure the covers were never untied in the presence of strangers. Suspicious loiterers, usually news-hawks, were referred to the marchers’ council and beckoned aside while the machine-gun story was solemnly whispered into their ears. Always they swore to respect it as a confidence, then would dash off to scribble it down for immediate publication. What a scoop!

37

Even the police knew it was a hoax for the trekcarts merely contained the usual odds and ends of camping equipment; spare cooking-utensils, cobblers’ tools, shaving-gear, portable tents, and a few battered storm-lamps for night use on the dark roads.

During daytime rests in the country lanes, the marchers would have an impromptu snack; the leaders, an inspection. Out would come the cobblers' tools, while the barbers cut hair. First-aid men were quickly on their knees dressing sore heels and swollen ankles. Men unfit to walk further were sent on in a friendly vehicle to the nearest hospital.

But the march was in their blood and they caught up the contingent a few days later.

Faced with such enthusiasm, the leaders dare not accept a scanty food allowance from any workhouse.

It required tact to know how to refuse it. This enabled the chief marshal to avert a nasty riot in a big, wealthy industrial town. Two of the bicycle scouts had gone ahead of the contingent to say the marchers would arrive late that night. Close on ten o’clock, two hundred of them, representing six or seven towns, limped through the workhouse gates into a dimly lit high-walled yard. At the top end, sixty hefty policemen were lined up, their helmets bobbing provokingly. The slightest mistake might easily start a slaughter. The marchers, hungry and sore-footed, felt they had been walked into a trap.

38

The police inspector’s sneering face seemed to confirm it.

The marshal, managing to conceal his anger, addressed the men in a quiet tone.

‘Comrades,’ he advised. ‘Stand easy. Above all, keep your tempers. Be as silent as you possibly can. Our job is to get to London. Don’t forget that.’

With two of the marchers' council he was shown into a long drab dining-room. The police-inspector kept hovering near. The workhouse-master, smiling condescendingly, pointed to the tin plates of steaming skilly and hunks of coarse dry bread.

‘Everything’s quite ready for you,’ he said.

The marchers’ leaders looked at each other. The marshal, veteran of two wars, glanced at the rows of tin plates again.

‘My men won’t have that stuff,’ he declared.

The workhouse-master seemed greatly surprised.

‘Why? What’s wrong with it,’ he asked.

‘Everything.’

‘Well, what the - - what the — what am I going to do with it, then?’

‘You ought to know,’ the marshal politely told him. ‘Stick it where you stick your Christmas pudding.’

The police-inspector shot his face forward threateningly. ‘Is that your idea of a joke?’ he demanded.

39

Nobody answered him. The marshal turned away followed by his two companions. Outside in the yard, the rest of the contingent stood waiting, cold and fidgety. The police had not moved. The marshal ignored them as he walked by. His own men were instantly attentive.

‘Comrades,’ he began. ‘For obvious reasons we have decided not to stay here to-night. We will manage to stagger on for a few more miles. I have a place in mind.’ He glanced sideways at the sneering police-inspector, then continued. ‘Remember,’ he said, ‘you came through that gateway as a disciplined body. I want you to leave in exactly the same manner, and NOT as a disorderly mob. Do you thoroughly understand that? All right, then. Fall in.

Everybody ready? By the left. Quick march!’

Back into the street limped the contingent. The band struck up ‘Colonel Bogey.’ The big drummer could not resist banging in a few whacks for his own gratification. Far away from the workhouse some of the hungry men broke ranks for chips and fish. On being reprimanded the stragglers moved off in orderly formation again, balling their greasy papers in the roadway.

Long after midnight, they reached a big field on the outskirts of the town and spotted a dilapidated barn. In here they chucked themselves down on some old straw, huddling close together for warmth and a 40

few hours’ sleep. The storm-lamps lined a passage to the exit. Luckily there was no rain.

The marchers’ council, tired as they were, dared not lie down. There was too much for them to worry over. In undertones they discussed the next move.

The experience at the last workhouse necessitated a complete change of tactics; stereotyped methods had failed; pauper treatment had to be avoided or the men’s morale would weaken; such was the essence of their talk.

The marshal bore the added strain of controlling the few hotheads who were raving to go back to town and smash the big shop windows in protest. They strongly felt they had been tricked and insulted. But the marshal would stand no talk of going back.

When somebody said so outright, he was afraid he lost his temper for once.

‘There’ll be no party to any fancy heroics,’ he roared. ‘These men started out to march to London.

And I’m bloody well going to get them there.’

A few of the marchers raised their heads from the floor. The marshal was himself again.

‘It’s all right, comrades,’ he said. ‘Go to sleep.

There’s nothing the matter.’

The quarrel passed over. Different methods of approach were introduced. Lamps were brought nearer, and the maps spread out to decide upon the next stopping-place. A railway time-table proved an 41

asset. Connections between neighbouring towns on the line of the march were noted, also the rimes of first and last trains by which extra police might be quickly drafted from one place to another. This danger had to be reckoned with. The marshal pointed out how a blundering skirmish now would drive a proportion of the marchers dribbling back to their homes. His alternative suggestions were approved by a majority vote.

At six o’clock that morning, the men arose shivering but glad of their water-flasks. After a hasty snack of bread and cheese which had been held in reserve, they were ready to move on. Two cyclists went pedalling ahead of them with sufficient money to buy more bread.

There were four other bicycle scouts in this particular contingent. Two, with a printed card ‘NATIONAL UNEMPLOYED MARCH’ strung to their handlebars, were sent on to a town the marchers were deliberately avoiding, to notify the local authorities that the contingent would arrive there at a late hour that night. By contact or examination of a directory the numerical strength of the police was sought. This was reported back when the cyclists rejoined the contingent at an agreed spot on a forkroad at noon. Meantime, the remaining two cyclists with no identification cards rode on to a town the leaders considered more suitable as a stopping42

place; there to seek contacts, find exactly whether the workhouse was situated in a back street or main road, and if any police were being drafted in or out.

Long before dusk the band was ordered to stop playing. Just the single tap of a drum kept the contingent in step. The night grew very dark. In the narrow country lanes the men stumbled blindly along, bumping into hedges and each other, and cursing in spasms as the trek-carts wobbled awkwardly over the humpy roadway. Two stormlamps were carried at the front and tail-end of the contingent in case of accident from onrushing motorcars that occasionally whizzed close and vanished in the dark again.

At half-past ten, the marchers limped into the town least expected. The sleepy inhabitants wondered what had happened. So did the astonished chief constable. He might have been a kind man. He was certainly a wise one. He was told the men were ravenous and wild and could not be restrained for long. It was even hinted they might help themselves from the shop windows. There was not enough police in that small town to prevent them.

The chief constable was obviously uneasy. ‘What can I get them at this time of night,’ he asked.

‘They want eggs and bacon.’

43

‘Eggs and bacon! My God! That’s impossible. I’d better see what the chairman of the guardians has to say.’

The latter, a bearded old man, was also afraid of the marchers looting, but saw no way of providing such a large order of eggs and bacon at that unusual hour. The marchers’ council knew that to accept eggs for some and none for others was inadvisable. A compromise was arrived at; cold meat, cheese and pickles for all, with heaps of bread and butter and plenty of tea. This would be served in a spare ward in the hospital. The marchers, as instructed, tiptoed through the grounds. Special care was taken to lessen the squeaking of the trek-carts.

The sleeping day-staff were left undisturbed. At the suggestion of the marshal, a party of marchers was put in charge of a night matron to help prepare the meal. She was genuinely relieved to find they were flesh-and-blood beings who actually spoke English and had never been in Russia or worn ferocious whiskers.

The meal over, all the crockery was washed and noiselessly replaced on the kitchen shelves.

Tables were lifted back against the walls, and the men bedded down for the night. Though the beds were on the floor, the floor was scrupulously clean, and the ward comfortably heated. Soon all hands were asleep.

44

Before seven next morning, blankets were neatly folded, beds rolled up, and all returned to the hospital storeroom. The chief constable seemed impressed by the discipline.

Maybe it did not coincide with what he had heard or read. Besides, there was something kindly in his bearing. He stood by as the marchers filed in for their breakfast.

‘There’s your eggs and bacon, boys,’ he said. ‘I hope you enjoy them.’

They did. The next party of men on the rota were detailed off to wash dishes. The remainder smartened themselves up, then cheery and refreshed, mustered in the hospital grounds. Cart-ropes were grabbed in readiness.

The satisfied marshal strapped on his haversack. The men’s chatter ceased as he held his hands up appealingly.

‘Hush, comrades. Please,’ he cried. ‘Don’t forget where you are. There must be no band, nor no noise of any description until we are well clear of this building. Don’t spoil things.

Everybody here has been really decent to us. I have already thanked them on your behalf A chorus of ‘hear-hear’s’ brought his hands up again. ‘Shush. The whole bunch of you.’ He looked them over. ‘Come on. Are you all set?

Good! Quietly now. Quick march!’

45

The chief constable, stationed at the gate, wished them luck. They saluted briskly and wheeled past smiling into the street. At a safe distance from the hospital, the bandsmen searched their music, then led the contingent out of town to a rollicking Irish jig.

The distance to the next intended stop was less than eighteen miles. Half-way, the contingent was joined by a small body of twenty. Each carried a strong reliable walkingstick. The night previous they had attended a large indoor meeting, where the chief speaker, a parliamentary candidate, was also a very prominent barrister. The leader of the small group, having once been sentenced in a court where the barrister practised, saw an opportunity of pocketing a good collection for his men’s immediate needs. From the body of the hall he put a question which left the platform no option of refusing. The collection was a substantial one. The barrister in handing it over hoped that wherever the marchers went they would always behave as gentlemen.

In promising to do so they had no thought of walking-sticks. That only occurred to them the next morning when buying cigarettes at a small general shop. The sticks were hanging in the doorway. The men with badly blistered feet 46

recognized their immediate value and twenty were bought at a reduced price. As they limped along, the desire to act as gentlemen grew stronger in their minds. They visualized the advantages of walking-sticks in an emergency, having long since been taught that it was the privilege of English gentlemen to defend themselves against attacks.

Members of the main contingent soon grasped the idea. During rest-halts in country lanes, those familiar with trees cut their own sticks, trying them first to make sure they were serviceable enough to lean on. The next town was reached in the evening. Tea was in readiness at the local workhouse. The hospitality here was fairly satisfying, there being no need for veiled threats or bluff. Perhaps a timely word had come over the phone from the last place of call.

Despite this apparent goodwill, a startling discovery was made. Local families whose homelife had been broken up on entering the workhouse were now compelled as inmates to live separate existences. A high wire netting divided the workhouse grounds into sections. Through this, wives conversed with husbands, and children with their fathers. Some of the marchers stared in amazement as little tots pressed their lips to the 47

wire in awkward kisses for their fathers, stooped low on the opposite side of the netting.

An explanation was asked for. The fathers complained that they only saw their children for an hour or so in the evening.

A marchers’ deputation immediately tackled the workhouse-master. He could see nothing wrong in the wire-netting arrangement. It had been the rule long before his time. So coolly was this said that the angry deputation threatened to pull down the wire netting, and perhaps wreck the institution unless the fatherinmates and their wives and children were allowed to fraternize in the common-room that night. The workhouse-master gave way.

The common-room was soon crowded. A marcherpianist pounced on the harmonium to play those hymns whose parodied words had often roused the American I.W.W. to action. Ex-members of that organization led the rest of the marchers in singing ‘Pie in the sky,’ ‘Dump the bosses off your back,’ and ‘There is power, there is power, in a band of workingmen.’ The choruses were repeated with gusto, particularly: ‘You will eat in the sweet bye and bye.’

As the night wore on, interested groups ringed around talkative enthusiasts were urgently advised to read this book, that book, and the other book to help understand the implications of warships and workshops, workless and workhouses, and the reason 48

for the unemployed march to London. The names of Dietzkin, Lenin, and Marx cropped up, also the usual interruptions on the correct interpretation of a paragraph from Das Kapital. The bewildered inmates were entirely flabbergasted by the continuous rush of strange phrases that poured down their ears. Whatever they thought, the privilege of sitting up late and the solace of a welcome cigarette was due to the marchers’ intervention.

How long the concession was to last nobody could tell. It had temporarily weakened the authority of the workhouse-master, and he was much relieved to see the marchers depart the following morning. The next workhouse was a gloomy and forbidding hole, both outside and in. The master, truly reflecting its atmosphere, demanded test-work; some stonebreaking as per regulation. On being informed that the marchers were not prepared to break stones except for their own use, he threatened to call in the police.

The chief marshal soon stopped that move by pointing out the considerable number of police that would be needed to frighten a disciplined body of two hundred and twenty men who had spent a couple of years in the trenches and returned with plenty of grievances. The economic aspect, too, was detailed: the cost of extra police to the local ratepayers, the damage the marchers might do, the publicity it would 49

get in the newspapers, and its bad effect on people throughout the country; all of which could be avoided by a little common sense. He also mentioned how the marchers at all times could act like gentlemen. That’s why they were carrying walking-sticks.

The master did provide a warm and satisfying meal of roast and veg. The same could not be said of the sleeping accommodation. It was horrible; a row of crypt-like stone-floored openings off a passage, dark and musty. The rickety old building could offer no better. The rough smelly horse-blankets must have been stored in a damp cellar for months.

In the morning they were piled in the yard to air.

They needed airing; so did the marchers after one night under them. It almost spoilt their appetites for the breakfast of ham and eggs which had been insisted upon, and was now the mainstay of their diet.

As they were assembling to move off, a husky voice bawled from a white-washed outhouse: ‘Get out, you gang of Bolsheviks. You ought to be bloody well shot.’

A few of the marchers darted across to the halfopened doorway. Inside was a ragged unshaven fellow working his feet on a treadmill and not daring to stop. Between scowls and mutterings he wanted to know why the marchers should escape test50

work while he had to stay behind. They ignored his insults and invited him to come with them. But he persisted in shouting out at the top of his voice that he was no bloody Bolshevik. The marchers could waste no further time convincing him that they were genuine Britishers. They were too eager to move on to a place with decent baths. The blankets had made them lousy.

At a main-street propaganda meeting, hoarse speakers who taunted the inhabitants about their horrible workhouse did not deter collectors from raiding their boxes in the faces of hesitant givers.

Within an hour the meeting had closed and the contingent was on its way again.

Just outside the town they met a meandering group of thirty. These men had decided to march at the very last minute. One of them, a tall gawky chap looked like a superintendent in charge of a Sunday school treat. He was at least six foot six in height, wore a new bowler hat, and carried an umbrella. This he swung around in grand style as he jogged along, chest stuck out, humming gaily to himself. Probably he was unaware of the interest he was causing. It came out by mere chance that under his bowler hat lay plenty of romance. On overhearing the exI.W.W.’s talking of America he sidled over to one of them. ' Have you really been in America, Mr B.,’ he 51

asked. ‘Why, sure. I was there for twenty years. I tackled everything from steamboats to ranches.’

The big gawky chap shook his head enviously.

‘God, you’re lucky,’ he sighed. ‘Really you are. I wish I could go there. I’d love to be a cowboy.’ Though the next town was a small one the general atmosphere was sociable and kindly. The two hundred and fifty marchers were allowed the free use of the baths. On top of this the manager of a variety theatre offered a hundred free admission tickets for the second evening performance. The men’s council, chary of accepting, were persuaded to do so by the rest of the contingent who drew lots to obviate grumbling. It was agreed that should a similar offer be repeated elsewhere, the first hundred men would automatically be passed over. The cobbly condition of the roads in this area blistered their feet terribly.

The pace had to be slowed down and the daily mileage reduced from twenty’ to twelve. It was this and a heavy drenching rainfall that compelled the contingent to diverge on a small town renowned for its schools and culture.

As usual, two cyclists were sent ahead. They returned to report there was no big workhouse in the locality, but that suitable premises would be in readiness to lodge the marchers on their arrival. The men' s council had visions of the celebrated school buildings being placed at their disposal.

52

At eight o’clock that evening they were greatly surprised to be directed to a big tin-roofed barrack drill-hall. On sitting down at the bare tables they were more surprised still to have dished before them that eternal soldier feed, bully beef. Most of them thought they had finished with this particular diet on being demobbed from the army. Yet here it was once more whether they liked it or not.

They could only sit and stare at it in silence.

Though hungry, they were soaked to the skin and all too lame to start a rumpus. Reluctantly they ate what they could. It was as much as the marshal was able to do to scrounge a few pickles.

The marchers’ council sat up that night to devise an effective protest that would give this reputed home of culture the horse-laugh. A mock military funeral was decided upon.

The corpse, a seven-pound tin of bully beef, was saved for the purpose. Not a word was broached to the body of the marchers. The ‘funeral’ could only be a success if they were made to believe that one of their comrades had actually died overnight. As soon as they were asleep, no time was lost in laying out the ‘corpse.’

A dozen men, specially picked, were sworn to secrecy. All had had experience of military funerals in France. They went prowling around the drill-hall for the necessary props. A stretcher was found and 53

taken to the bottom corner of the long shed. It was easy to smuggle a couple of white sheets and two pillows. The pillows were laid lengthwise on the stretcher, the tin of bully beef placed in the middle and the sheets spread on top, ends tucked in. Before daybreak, a large-sized Union Jack had been draped over all.

Four of the tallest marchers mounted guard, leaning piously on their walking-sticks. One of the cyclists, a florist, rose early, and sneaked out to gather some flowers and foliage for making a wreath.

There were a number of private gardens close by to select from.

The awakening marchers sat up, heard the whisperings, gazed down the long shed, and were dumbfounded. On tiptoes they approached the supposed corpse. Alert guards motioned the overcurious away.

During a bully-beef breakfast, gloomy guesses as to the identity of the ‘dead man’ were proved incorrect by glances across the tables. It was finally agreed that the ‘corpse’ was a little fellow left in hospital three days before. Having died, his body had been sent on. Everybody murmured ‘Poor beggar.’

The worst had happened. It became more convincing when the cyclist appeared with his wreath. There was silence as the marshal laid it tenderly on the Union 54

Jack. He particularly, seemed to be taking the ‘death’ to heart.

Everything was now almost ready for the ‘funeral’: stretcher-bearers, an experienced firingsquad, a band to play the ‘Dead March,’ and a bugler to sound the ‘Last Post’; everything except a clergyman.

Two of the marchers’ council were ex-Roman Catholics. Both could gabble Latin in pagefuls. One had been a serving altar boy; the other, a chaplain’s clerk in the navy. Both had travelled around the world in ships, and knew how to wangle in a fix. The first had a blubbery priest’s face; the second, the ascetic drawn features of a fasting saint. Though they fitted naturally into their respective parts, neither owned a prayer-book. The ‘priest’ said he must borrow one from somewhere if the ‘service’ was to appear real.

Arranging to meet the ‘funeral’ procession in the centre of the town, he slipped out of the barracks on his strange errand. It would have been easier to ask for money. Busy housewives jerked open their doors to the most absurd request ever made on a front step: ‘Can you lend me a prayer-book, missus, please.’

Thinking the man was a lunatic the women dashed in with fright.

Shops were now opening. Amongst them was a dirty-looking secondhand store. The contents of an 55

attic had evidently been dumped into the window.

The ‘priest’ spotted a bundle of broad linen collars and bought one for a penny. In a pile of rubbish on the floor he found an aged Bible with a clasp. This cost threepence. More eager now to complete his clerical ‘rig-out,’ he rummaged about for a bowler hat that could be cut down to resemble a clergyman’s.

The few bowlers in the shop were on the small side.

He suddenly became ambitious. Why not a tall silk hat? Church dignitaries wore them. The old woman shopkeeper had none in the place. She mentioned an undertaker’s where an old one might be bought cheap from one of the coachmen.

‘Is it for a concert?’ she asked. The ‘priest’ nodded his head and hurried out.

The undertaker’s yard was not far away. A cheeryfaced stableman was rubbing a horse down. His forearms were tattooed. This served as a helpful introduction. In a moment he was quite pally. The ‘priest’ in confidence explained what the hat was really for.

The stableman’s round face spread in a grin.

‘That’s a good one, sailor,’ he said. ‘A right good one.

Now just half a mo.’ He scratched his head while he pondered. ‘Yes. I can do it. Come on over to the harness room.’

Very quickly the ‘priest’ was dressed: collar back to front; a piece of black sleeve-lining down his 56

chest, and a silk hat on his head. The coachman next brought out a mournful-looking overcoat, buttoned it on the ‘priest’ then stood away a few paces. While flicking off some pieces of chaff he burst out laughing.

‘You look the real McCoy, now,’ he said. ‘By Jeese, you do.’ The road being clear, the ‘priest’ in his anxiety not to miss the procession went to run out of the yard. The stableman slowed him down to a correct funeral stride.

Crowds of wondering people were already squeezed on the narrow sidewalks. Others gazed down from open windows. The police had stopped all traffic. There was a tense silence as the procession slowly approached; the band playing the ‘Dead March’; the stretcher-bearers, heads bent, crawling just behind; while the rest of the marchers followed, their walking-sticks reversed. The six kettle-drums were covered in black crepe paper.

The ‘priest’ watched for an opportunity to step into line. A section of the crowd respectfully eased a passage to let him through. Looking very downcast he joined in behind the ‘corpse.’

The saintly ex-navy clerk lifted his eyes, gaped at the silk hat, and blurted out: ‘A tall shiner!

Gawdblime! That’s the limit.’

Men on the kerb doffed their hats and stood bareheaded. Women grouped together were bitter in 57

their denunciation of the government. ‘Imagine poor lads coming home to that after fighting for their country,’ said one. Some of her neighbours were crying. Even a few of the marchers were unable to hold back their tears. The ‘priest’ was compelled to keep his eyes to the ground. By his side walked the ascetic-looking clerk, his hands joined in prayer like a church-window figure. As they drew near, a sternfaced policeman shook his finger warningly at some squabbling children.

The procession passed slowly by the famous college and halted a short distance away by a double-sized pillar-box that stood on a traffic island in the centre of the main street. The flagcovered stretcher was lowered gently to the ground.

The ‘priest’ solemnly handed his hat to the clerk, then stepped across to deliver a short oration. His head was still bowed. With an effort he raised it.

‘Friends,’ he began with an ecclesiastical drawl.

‘We are gathered here to pay a last tribute to our dearly departed comrade, B.B. The greatness of our empire is in no mean measure due to him. He served on all fronts in the last war. A very old soldier, he saw service in the Boer War. He was always at hand, and could be rushed anywhere in an emergency. We are mindful of the praise lavished on prominent generals; and begrudge not the fame of two other names, none of us are likely to forget, Tickler and 58

Maconachie; but with all due respect to them, our late comrade B.B. was the real backbone of the British army.14 The song says, ‘Old soldiers never die,’ but like everything else they must die eventually. And comrade B.B. has ended his days with us. May he rest in peace.’

Solemnly the ‘priest’ fingered the pages of the open Bible. The ascetic clerk moved nearer to mouth the response. The ‘priest’ mumbled a few sentences in Latin, then raised his right hand piously for the blessing.

‘Dominus vobiscum,’ he chanted.

‘Et cum spiritu tuo,’ responded the clerk.

‘Requiescat in pace.’

‘Amen.’

The Bible was snapped to. At a signal from the marshal, the firing squad closed in on both sides of the stretcher. On the command ‘Fire!’ they cocked their sticks skyward. Six muffled kettle-drums rumbled through the stilly silence. As the air vibrated, broken sobs spread contagiously.

Three times the sticks were cocked, and three times the muffled drums rattled off a long-drawnout tattoo. Then the bugler stepped forward to sound the ‘Last Post.’ The large crowd could no longer hide its emotion. Men and women wept openly.

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The ascetic-looking clerk slyly nudged the ‘priest.’ ‘Hey, Joe,’ he whispered. ‘Take a peep around.

Some of our bloody fellers have gone wet-eye too.’

The ‘priest’ dared not look around. As the last lingering notes of the bugle died away he stooped over the stretcher and lifted the wreath aside. The Union Jack was thrown quickly over the pillar-box and after it the white sheets. The tin of bully beef was then set in the middle, and the wreath hung on top like a crowning laurel.

The vast crowd stared and blinked. They were still uncertain of what had actually taken place. So were the marchers in the rear.

Their doubts were soon settled by the marshal.

Barking out ‘Attention!’ he ran his eyes over the bewildered men as they straightened up and reversed their sticks. Shouting to them to ‘Be lively,’ he gave the order ‘Quick march!’

The band struck up ‘Colonel Bogey.’ The contingent immediately swung into stride, and into song against bully beef culture. ‘And the same to you!’ was the roaring challenge that reached the college roof-tops.

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Glossary 1. ‘Dees Clothes’: second hand clothes handed out to ‘deserving families’ by a police charity, notably heavy boots and trousers. They feature in Garrett’s story Apostate 2. Jack Kerouac: American writer best known American classic novel On the Road. Pioneer of Beat Generation in the 1950s.

3. The Industrial Workers of the World ( IWW) , commonly known as the Wobblies: an international revolutionary industrial labour organisation formed in America in 1905. It promoted the concept of ‘One Big Union’ 4. Jorge Luis Borges ( 1899 – 14 June 1986) : Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator who came from the port city of Buenos Aires. His work embraces the ‘character of unreality in all literature’ 5. The Palmer raids: named after an American Senator, purpose was to arrest and/or deport radicals particularly anarchists, syndicalists and communists from USA in early 1920’s.

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6. James Larkin ( 21 January 1876 – 30 January 1947) : Liverpool born Irish Labour leader, best known for his role in the 1913 Dublin Lockout.

7. Ellis Island: the gateway for millions of immigrants to the US. The nation' s busiest immigrant inspection station from 1892 until 1954.

8. Eugene O' Neill ( 1888 – 1953) : Irish American playwright. His plays introduced into American drama, included speeches of New York vernacular and involved characters on the fringes of society.

9. Mass-Observation: Involving thousands of volunteers and investigators, it aimed to record everyday life of working people in Britain in the late 1930’s.

10. The National Seamen’s Reform Movement ( NSRM: began in Liverpool in 1960. Main demands were for an eight hour day, decent wages and the right to have shipboard representatives, which was the case in the USA.

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A special thanks to: The George Garrett Family for support and permission to publish First Born & The First Hunger March; Heritage Lottery Fund; Liverpool John Moores University - particularly Val Stevenson, Emily Parson, Anne Foulkes and her team and Stuart Borthwick; David Stoker, Helena Smart, Sharon Oldale and all at Liverpool Libraries; Alexei Sayle; stephen@ivso.co.uk; Wes Storey & Chris Chadwick at The Hatch for film; John Lucas, Ken Worpole, Joseph Pridmore and Deryn Rees-Jones; Jon Spruce and LJMU Art and Design students, Chloe Buckley, Joanna Popiela & Emma McGurty; Carl Cockram; Graeme Phillips and staff at Unity Theatre Liverpool Special thanks also to The George Garrett Archive Project Volunteers: Carol Willats, Denise Kennedy, Eric Radcliffe, Frank Boyce, Joan Boyce, Sean Garrett, Hannah Holmes, John McCarthy, Abigail Garrett, Kim Johnson, Paul Mcguire, Ray Quarless, Bethany Garrett, Rochelle Ellis, Scott Murphy, Chris Robinson, Sheila Mcgowan, Clara Garrett, Anne McDermott, Steve Higginson, Sue Smith, Mary NG, Michael Garrett.

Special dedication to the late Michael Murphy for his work on producing ‘The Collected George Garrett’, Trent Editions ( 1999) .

Writing on the Wall Writing on the Wall is a dynamic, Liverpool-based community organisation that coordinates projects and events that celebrate writing in all its forms.

We work with a broad and inclusive definition of writing that embraces literature, creative writing, journalism and non-fiction, poetry, songwriting, and storytelling. Writing on the Wall works with local, national and international writers whose work provokes controversy and debate. We work with all of Liverpool’s communities to promote and celebrate individual and collective creativity.

To find out more visit: www.writingonthewall.org.uk Contact: info@writingonthewall.org.uk

Mike Morris & Tony Wailey Mike Morris is the Manager of The George Garrett Archive Project and is a founder member of Writing on the Wall. Mike was co-director and producer of a ground-breaking documentary, Liverpool’s Cunard Yanks, Granada TV 2008, and co-writer and producer of the play Waiting for Brando, Unity theatre 2013.

Tony Wailey, is an ex-Merchant Seaman, novelist, poet and teacher, who studied at Ruskin College, Liverpool, Oxford and Essex University. His writings include The Experiential Fear, 1996, American Women, 2002, and Edgy Cities, 2006.

Tony was project tutor for the George Garrett Archive Project, and has written many times about Liverpool’s port city culture.

www.georgegarrettarchive.co.uk admin@georgegarrettarchive.co.uk