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And it was a real big viaduct at , back of .

And er now this chap him a wan he he was about ninety and him and his pal, they said, Well we'll lie in the, there were a lot of bull rushes, we'll lie in these bull rushes, he says, And we'll throw bricks at them as they go by, at these two police and er this blackleg.

And er he tells me he says, Well we night that we were going to do it, meeting them from work it w it was getting dark of course, December, he said that there was only me turned up.

He says er er and he says me pal didn't come, he said, Well, I thought well I've come here to do it, and I'm going.

So I said I went and lay in the in these bull rushes and I got half a brick, yes, he says, and I saw them coming and he says and I threw it and hit him this er blackleg with this half brick.

He said of course I scampered through these bull rushes, they never saw me they never caught me and they never ever knew who it was who'd done it, see.

And he always tells me, he said that er he had no sleep during the night he he thought he'd killed this man, you see, he says, I seen him drop, and I seen blood.

So I thought I've killed him.

And er so he never had any sleep that night, well that was the that's a story about them days.

How how did you feel about trade unionism then?

Well now everybody had to be in a union in our factory, it was er it it it was they were closed shops all of them.

And er y y and it's surprising isn't it?

There was you know little firms like that and yet everybody was in, nobody nobody would ever try and er and er and er and escape paying their contribution, but there was a law you couldn't join a union till you were sixteen, that was the law then in then, but er when this strike came back and we came on strike in December, er we lads who was under age joined the union, they give us all six bob a week, the union did.

Un until they were broke you know, after a week or two they got broke.

And so th union er er issued er er a a leaflet affair and said that they'd be pleased to receive loans from any of the members.

Would any of the members lend them any money?

Now the Co-op allowed, of course there was individual Co-ops then, this was Co-op, it wasn't like what had a big Co-op.

But they allowed all strikers er to have er free credit, free credit, and er well of course this six bob was what we got o practically on an ordinary weeks work, was about as well off on strike then and we was going to work you see.

But what I was going to tell you about this loan and I was there on this Friday morning when we were drawing our money, and the men were bringing their their s life savings to lend to the union.

And I saw one man the fact that he was me uncle don't make any difference, but he was, and and he was very religious, very Christian man,S Sunday School superintendent.

But I saw him with his cap full of golden sovereigns and turned on the table and lent them all he'd got.

And everyone were paid back, you know.

That that's good, isn't it?

Mm.

Now So anyway the strike er never reached a successful conclusion, this firm had it's blacklegs and er eventually closed because it couldn't carry on.

But every other factory agreed to take so many each of the men, so they'd nobody be at, lose their job.

And they did.

And the factory where I work I should think we took about fourteen of the men at this factory.

But no man was unemployed.

Was it mainly male labour then?

Well it were main i i no really there was er well pretty equally divided then.

And the general run of hosiery is that there is of course that there's a lot more females than males but in our side pretty equal.

The finishing side, and so that was that.

Er you read a lot about women in the hosiery industry not being as willing to join the unions, was that true?

Well in them days everybody used to be in anyway, there was no question.

All the women were, and that's true of of the hosiery industry, of course you've got a a there's a big distinction between the hosiery industry as such and the hosiery finishing industry which was then the, they're amalgamated now, but there were two entirely distinct unions, in tho Er as a matter of fact they n n they never met together.

Course the hosiery union was as it is now, was always right wing and the small finishing union was really er left wing you know.

But we was all in and they was er they wasn't fifty per cent organized anyway near.

Now of course that's er er the story but I went to them afterwards you see.

So anyway I er the War came and went but before it went I was in, went int eh Army of course.

At eighteen, I was called up for the Army and I was three years there.

Came back in twenty one.

I don't think there's anything really amazing about me Army career, I didn't .

I don't know whether I was a good soldier or not, but I went to Egypt and the Sudan.

I had a good look round you know.

Cairo.

Er right are you?

We're still going.

Switch er as switch it off a minute, while I er

Er i i nineteen eighteen in the Army, they er came round er asking for volunteers to relieve the British troops er on the Russian front, where there was fighting, the Russian Revolution.

And of course you know there are twenty odd fronts at where they were fighting, and er they made big paly of this because er the people who did volunteer knew, there was a few volunteered, they they gave them er white bands to wear round the arm to show that they was members of the relief force you know.

And so it were good propaganda this er this, people were saying, Well they're prepared to go to Russia and fight the Russians to re re you know release our lads, they're trying to capture.

And er but of course that didn't last long because of course you know the story of the Jolly George, when that really stopped England's intervention, didn't it.

You know that?

I don't know about the Jolly George.

Don't you, you should do.

I well I could tell you the inside story of that but I'm not going to but I will tell the outside, the public story.

The the Jolly George er was a ship that was loaded with arms er to send to Russia, to for our the use of our troops in Russia, and the sailors refused to sail it, and there was quite a to do about this because they'd got the steam up and it was ready to go but they never went.

And it never sailed.

And that was the real reason why it was stopped, because the the the the other dockers were going to refuse to allow ships to leave the ports with arms, and that's where it really stopped, but you never heard, you don't hear about it now in history.

No.

But anyway er and then of course I, we went to To the East, well we went to Ireland first, there was trouble in Ireland you know.

I went to Ireland, but we was only there about three weeks.

The reason why we was there b it was because er there was so many deserters in our lot.

But they took what few they'd got left on our regiment to Ireland so nobody else'd desert, while they rounded the others up and took them to Ireland you see.

And then so we went from Ireland er to er to Egypt.

Come back through England and went to on the boat.

We'd took incidentally which is not uninteresting it took us ten days to get to er Egypt, to get to Alexandria from er Plymouth, we went from Plymouth.

And er the date was December the fourth, now December the fourth, and that was the day which er you wouldn't know this but er that was the day when fought er Joe you know, for the European Championship.

I don't know of any boxing match that's ever captured the interest of people and it was that night, course we never heard the result, not until we got to Egypt, you there was no wireless you see, you didn't know what was happening at all.

And er if you were interested in football you'd never know till Tuesday morning what had happened on that Saturday, the previous Saturday.

I mean that's how communications were in them days.

And anyway so we went to er over to Egypt and then it was when we came back and I I, the other morning on the radio they was talking about asking people to ring in about, I've never rang in, I never bother ring, er how they spent their twenty first birthday.

Now my twenty first birthday I'd never had a copper for weeks, w e hadn't got anything, anything at all, and all we got really was the old fashioned dog biscuits.

And I was in in Alexandria, and er and that was it, that was my twenty first birthday there you see.

And anyway when we got back to England er we went to Aldershot, and wasn't there long.

But while we were there they had several meetings because of course we were going to be demobbed anyway, and the Colonel er of the regiment he had us together and so did the officers, and warned us that when we got back to civilian life we must er beware of these agitators who tried to er create suspicion amongst the troops who were coming back, and telling them that they ought to join er these revolutionary parties.

Warning us all about this, so well I thought well if they warn us, something must be good here, if they're warning us that it's bad you know.

And so when I er I wen I went back to work.

And there was a a a a lad who was about a couple of years older than me, he'd be about twenty three, he'd been through the War and er he was a real revolutionary, he was re and and he was very intelligent.

So he started me on the on politics, and he was very good.

He'd got the one of the quickest er turns of er of brain you know, he could switch from one thing to another, and he was most remarkable.

He he really was.

He died pretty but he's got.

And he was a member of the Independent Labour Party.

So I used to go with him, and incidently he was a, he was very good on classical music, although we never went into this although I'd got very close to him but I'm sure he were brought up in an orphanage you know, and never talked about this but I'm sure he was.

But he was a real first class tutor.

Well so we went to the I L P and er at this time we started getting er a class together in the, where I worked there was a hundred men and hundred lads, approximately.

Every man had a lad working for him you see.

So at this er time we decided we'd start er a little class in this we did.

And we got the union to er all all they did was to help us, was to pay for the text books that we had.

If you see we'd got about er twenty eight thirty in this class, and er they bought the text books and we joined a national college of labour colleges.

Now you've heard about them of course, you must have heard about them.

And er I think er the retreat of the working class movement s i i is from the date when the N C L C was abolished, and opt into the General Council of the T U C.

You see the T U C education er department is er rises from the demise of the N C L C but of course the the N C L C was really really good, first class tutors.

We'd got two in and they was really first class.

I could say a lot about ho , but anyway we started this and we used to go to the I L P, and we used to get packed meetings there on a Sunday night, and s then about nineteen, course we had the general strike, and through the general strike we was both in the I L P and we were doing everything we could you know, distributing the illegal leaflets, and er newspapers that we duplicated, on a hand duplicator.

And er so I spent several years in the I L P as a secretary and at that time met er the people who ran the place.

He, including Oswald Moseley, he was a big man in the I L P you know.

Till he formed his new party.