Bryant & May Matchwomen's Strike, 1888

Catalogue record

Notes

Part 5 of the BOA series, 'People & Protest in Britain and Abroad, 1800-2000'. On the 2nd July 1888, around fourteen hundred mostly female workers from the Bryant & May match factory in Bow, London, went out on strike. The reasons for action were numerous. Wages had been driven to levels lower than they had been ten years previous, which was compounded by the increased imposition of fines and compulsory contributions upon its workforce. Conversely, it would be revealed by contemporaries such as Annie Besant that Bryant & May shareholders enjoyed the pay-out of high dividends. Additionally, the grisly, and often fatal, industrial disease, phosphorous necrosis ('phossy jaw'), was a danger well known to the Bryant & May hierarchy though little counteraction had been taken. By the end of the two week action, however, the matchwomen had all their demands met, including a wage increase as well as the abolition of all fines, though phosphorous necrosis would remain an on-going issue until the use of white phosphorous in matches was finally banned in 1908. The records available here are derived chiefly from the Bryant & May company records (D/B/BRY) currently housed at the C L R James Library in Hackney, London. These records are supplemented by selected personal papers of the historian and author, Dr Louise Raw, whose research in recent years has done much to 'revise' the traditional historiography belonging to the strike.

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