Sound recordings and transcriptions of interviews by Joan Smith of Harry McShane, Marxist activist... 1.30 "Unemployed Movement in 30s" (side 1); 1.7 "pre 1WW" (side 2), [c1972]
1.30 "Unemployed Movement in 30s" (side 1); 1.7 "pre 1WW" (side 2), [c1972]
842/15
[c1972]
Item
Subjects of 1.30 include (transcript page numbers given in brackets): authorities in Edinburgh agreeing in 1933 to McShane’s demand that they pay for hunger marchers to return home (continued from 842/70) (K1-K2); McShane’s differences with the Communist Party leadership in Scotland over the organisation of marches (K4-K6); riot at unemployed demonstration in Glasgow in 1932 (K9-K10); Glasgow branches of the National Unemployed Workers’ Movement and their flute bands (K11-K12); effective campaigning of the south-west district [of Scotland] committee of the NUWM (K14-K15); inadequate support for campaigning about unemployment in Scotland, both in the 1930s and at the time of the interview (K15-K16); campaigning for the unemployed with John Maclean in the early 1920s (K16-K18); Maclean’s opposition to the Scottish campaign becoming part of the NUWM and McShane becoming its sole leader in consequence (K18-K19); support for individual benefit claimants from local NUWM branches (K20-K23); speeches to mass meetings on unemployment (K24-K25); extent and nature of Communist Party membership in the 1920s and 1930s (K26).
Subjects of 1.7 include (transcript page numbers given in brackets): negligible contribution of Glasgow MP Jimmy Mackeson (L3-L4); variety of content in the early ‘Daily Herald’, including inflammatory speeches by Ben Tillet during the 1911 dock strike (L7-L9); support of Glasgow working-class voters for the Liberal Party because of its introduction of old age pensions, unemployment insurance and taxation of land values (L10-L12); growth in support for socialism before First World War (L12-L14); strength of Orange Order and freemasons in shipyards and other Glasgow workplaces (L14-L17); high proportion of socialists among engineers (L20); examples of sectarian violence (L21-L22).
Brand: Scotch C90.