Alex Park ......... the people’s park ........ remembering a century and bit of protest

It was Keir Hardie who called Alex Park “the people’s park” in 1893 and I rather think that remains a pretty good alternative name for the place.*

Expressing free speech, 1980

On any day of the week at any time of the year there will loads of people doing something in the park, from walking the dog, to watching the sun glint on the lake or kicking a ball and of course once the weather gets just a little like summer out will come the picnic baskets, the old rugs and a heap of interesting sandwiches.

All of which fulfils Keir Hardie’s reference to the people’s park.

But Mr Hardie’s description was less about the park’s recreational opportunities and more about its place as a forum for debate, and on that day in May 1893 he wasn’t alone in addressing the crowds.

There were according to the newspaper reports a number of platforms each with speakers but all united by the issue of demanding an eight hour working day summed up by the slogan “work for all out work for none.”

But like some many demonstrations down the centuries it was also about free speech with Mr Hardie condemning “the authorities in refusing the legitimate demand of the citizens to the free use of the people's park, and regards that refusal as an overt attempt to crush the right of free meeting and free speech.”*

Mrs Annot Robinson, date unknown

And that has intrigued me. For almost a century one of the popular meeting places had been Stevenson Square, and long before that peaceful assembly gathered in St Peter’s Field the centre of much popular unrest had been New Cross at the junction of Oldham Street and Great Ancoats Street.

But now increasingly protest marches would finish with a rally in the park.

It was here that Mrs Annot Robinson spoke in 1908 spoke to a crowd of thousands on “Votes for Women” and was undeterred by a section of the crowd “of young fellows inclined to be hostile [and] frequently hostile.”

Now I have great admiration for Annot Robinson juggled the demands of being a single parent and played an important part in the politics of the labour movement here in Manchester.***

And two years later she was back, speaking from the Women Workers' platform, she argued “that women were ‘too cheap@ in the home and in the labour market. ...........The best step that could be taken to raise the position of women in society was to allow them to have some share of political power. 

There were cases in Manchester, Mrs. Robinson went on, of girls who worked long hours for six, seven, or eight shillings a week. In the mackintosh trade wages sank even below that. It was this underpayment of girls that incited them to evil living. If women were given an opportunity of influencing the laws of the land matters would be mended.”****

Nor was she alone because during the period after her first meeting there were a whole series of political rallies in support of extending the vote to women.

Busy with the business of protest, 1980

It was a tradition of political protest which has continued.

There will be many like me who remember finishing marches in the park in the 1970s and 80s and I even came across a reference to the veteran fascist Oswald Mosley attempting to peddle his bankrupt ideas.

So there you have it ........... the people’s park more than just a place for a picnic.

At which point I just have to say that the banner of the Moss Side Constituency Labour Party often appeared in the park but not in this picture which was taken in Liverpool in 1980 on another demonstration.

So if anyone has a picture of a demonstration in the park I would love to see it.

Location; Alexandra Park

Picture; popular protest, the Moss Side CLP banner, Liverpool, 1980 from the collection of Andrew Simpson

* The Alexandra Park Labour Demonstration, Manchester Guardian, May 8 1893

**Annot Robinson, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Annot%20Robinson

*** Votes for Women, Interruption in Alexandra Park, Manchester Guardian, July 13 1908

**** Women's Suffrage, The Conciliation Bill, Meeting in Alexandra Park, Manchester Guardian, October 10 1910

If you fancy walking the churchyard in Haworth ............. plan your trip carefully

Now if you have to do a bit of research there is a bonus in it being in the parish church yard at Howarth.*

Throw in the fact that this was a trip out for our Jill and Geoff up from London and all set well for a promising jolly.

I reckoned that we could do the Bronte museum take in all the touristy shops and grab something to eat with me wandering off to look for the gravestones of the Sunderland family.

The research was linked with the ever growing story of Mr Henry Hurdus who brewed ginger beer and other such drinks from his brewery in Hollinwood, with one of his lost glass bottles discarded in Alexandra Park in the 1890s.

The story has taken some nice twists including making contact with Annette a family historian in Australia and talking to her relative Olive who during the 1950s visited the very brewery.

Olive is directly related to Mr Hurdus and in the course of a conversation yesterday with Olive she mentioned that another branch of the family was buried in Haworth.

That just set the seal on the day.

But even the best laid plans can go awry.

Last time we had been there it had been in spring, on a sunny  day.  The tourists were out in droves and the Bronte house along with the grave yard, the parish church and shops were all at their best.

Yesterday was different.  The rain came down like stair rods and worse when the wind got up the church yard was no place to be.

Added to which by 3 pm many of the shops were closing.

Still there was the pub and Geoff and I were given instructions by Tina to go find a pub with food, which we did.

The sign outside the place advertised food, but having bought the beer settled down to ask for the menu we were told “food was off till tomorrow.”

Such are the problems faced by the would be researcher.

That said there was another which offered up a good meal some pleasant beer all of which retrieved the day.

And that just leaves me to fix a date in spring for a return.

Pictures; Haworth, 2014, from the collection of Andrew Simpson

*Haworth, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/Haworth

What were the 3rd Battalion of the Manchester Pals doing at Alex Park in the September of 1914? ........... stories behind the book nu 10

An occasional series on the stories behind the new book on Manchester and the Great War.*

The entrance to Alexandra Park, 1907

Now this is one of those stories that started off full of promise with just a chance that I would uncover a lost part of the Park’s history.

The 3rd Battalion were one of the eight Pals’ Battalions raised in the first few months of the Great War.

The authorities had not quite been prepared for the rush of recruits.

The first two battalions had been raised in a matter of days and by the time the 3rd and 4th were complete there were still no where to put them.

So while the first and second fairly quickly moved to a tent city at Heaton Park, the 3rd was accommodated at White City and the 4th were billeted at home.

And that brings me to the 3rd Battalion and Alexandra Park.

The definitive book on the Manchester Pals* describes how the battalion had been recruited in just three days between Saturday September 5 and Monday the 7th but “unlike the first two companion battalions [it was] initially trained at White City, a sports and racing stadium in the Old Trafford area, and accommodated  there in hastily  erected and draughty constructions.  Before those huts at the White City became available this battalion’s parades were undertaken in the City Hall with route marches to and from Alexandra Park.”**

Heaton Park, 1914

As late as September 26 the Manchester Guardian reported that “the recruiting authorities have in mind the undoubted convenience of being able to billet the men on themselves, in which case they would be in the same position as the men who were recently posted to reserve, though of course their full time would be required in training.”***

Which nicely brings us back to those route marches to Alexandra Park.

I have to confess I had misread the original newspaper entries and made the assumption that they had camped out in the park but no evidence has come forward to support this and so I can only assume that on arriving at the park gates and after a suitable rest they marched away to White City where they were still to be found two month later.

Pictures; entrance to Alexandra Park, circa 1907 courtesy of Ann Love, and Heaton Park, 1914 from the collection of David Harrop

*Manchester and the Great War, Andrew Simpson, was published in 2017, http://chorltonhistory.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/A%20new%20book%20on%20Manchester%20and%20the%20Great%20War

**Manchester Pals A History of the two Manchester Brigades, Michael Stedman, 1994

***ibid, page 25

****City Battalion and Winter Quarters, Manchester Guardian, September 24 1914