John
Doherty
was born at Inishowel,
County Donegal in 1798. He received very little formal education and
at the age of ten went to work at the Buncrana cotton mill. Later
he moved to Larne near Belfast
where he found work as a cotton spinner. At the age of eighteen Doherty
left
Ireland to seek better pay and conditions in England.
In
1816 Doherty found work in a textile factory
in Manchester.
Doherty
joined the Manchester
Spinners' Union
and in 1818 took part in a strike for higher wages. During the strike
Doherty was arrested while picketing and charged with assault. He
was found guilty and sentenced to two years'
hard labour. Doherty, who was completely innocent of the charge, was
radicalised by this experience. After he was released from Lancaster
Castle in 1821 he became involved in a wide variety of different political
campaigns. This included attempts to repeal the Combination
Acts and the Corn Laws. Doherty also
became friendly with Henry Huntand the two
men often spoke at several meetings demanding universal
suffrage.
John Doherty, who married Laura, a milliner, in 1821, continued to
work in the textile industry in Manchester.
In 1828 he stood for the post as the leader of the Manchester
Spinners' Union. Doherty's radical political views and his Irish
Catholicism meant that he was unpopular with some of the workers
but he still managed to win the election. Doherty was a passionate
opponent of child labour and persuaded his union to campaign for factory
reform. In 1828 Doherty was the main figure behind the formation of
the Society for the Protection of Children Employed in Cotton Factories.
Doherty's organisation attempted to secure enforcement of existing
legislation and the enactment of new factory laws. The organisation
continued until 1831 when it changed its name to the Manchester
Short Time Committee.
In April 1829 textile factory owners began imposing wage reductions
on their workers. In an attempt to persuade the employers to change
their minds, members of the Manchester
Spinners's Union
went on strike. The strike lasted for six months but in October the
spinners, facing starvation, were forced to accept the lower wages
being offered by the factory owners.
John Doherty realised that it was very difficult
for local unions to win industrial disputes so he organised a meeting
of spinners from all over Britain. The result of the meeting was the
formation of the Grand
General Union of Operative Spinners of the United Kingdom. A few
weeks later, Doherty called a meeting of Manchester trade unionists
and it was decided to form a General Union of Trades. The purpose
of the organisation was to give support to fellow trade unionists
involved in industrial disputes. In March, 1830, the organisation
started publication of the United
Trades' Co-operative Journal.
Doherty, who was editor, attempted to use the journal as a means of
communicating information to fellow trade unionists. The government
was worried about this new development and in October, 1830 forced
Doherty to stop publishing the journal.
Doherty's next venture was the formation of
the National
Association for the Protection of Labour. Within a few months twenty
different trades joined Doherty's organisation. At first it mainly
involved workers from Lancashire but by the end of 1830 it spread
to the Midlands and Staffordshire and had a membership of over 100,000
people.
In March 1832, Doherty opened a small print shop and bookstore in
Manchester. The following year he expanded
the business and including a coffee-house where ninety-six newspapers,
including Doherty's own Voice
of the People,
could be read. Rev. Gilpin, a local clergyman objected to some of
the articles included in the newspaper
and
as a result Doherty was sent to prison in 1832.
After Doherty was released from prison he joined
Richard Oastler and Michael
Sadler in their campaign for the Ten
Hours Bill. Doherty helped form the Manchester Short Time Committee
and began publishing
a new journal, The
Poor Man's Advocate.
In 1832 Doherty published a book on the factory experiences of Robert
Blincoe.
Disappointed
by the 1833 Factory Act, Doherty joined
Robert Owen, and John
Fielden to form the Society for Promoting National Regeneration.
The main objective of the organisation was an eight-hour day for all
workers. In 1839 John Doherty met Frances
Trollope and provided
her with a considerable amount of information that later appeared
in her novel Michael Armstrong: Factory
Boy. John
Doherty
continued
to work for social and political reform until his death on 14th April,
1854.
Child
Labour Debate Activity (International School of Toulouse)
Child
Labour Simulation (Spartacus Educational)
(1)
John Doherty, speech in January 1831.
Fellow
Workers. The fearful change, which the workings of the last few years
have produced in the condition of every class of labourer, summons
you to a serious investigation of the cause. Your power as regards
the operations of society is omnipotent. You are the great lever by
which everything is effected. Let British operatives become firm and
united and their unanimous voice of complaint will command respect.
(3)
John Doherty, speech in 1832.
Mr.
Oastler is a Tory in politics but when we ask, will any of your boasting
"liberals" or professing Whigs contribute a tithe of service
which Mr. Oastler has rendered to the cause of suffering humanity.
(3)
In his autobiography, What I Remember, Thomas Adolphus Trollope
described his mother and himself meeting a group of men in Manchester
in 1839 who were campaigning against child labour.
Nearly
all of them, men a little raised above the position of the factory
hands, to the righting of whose wrongs they devoted their lives. They
had been at some period of their lives, in almost every case, factory
workers themselves, but had by various circumstances, native talent,
industry and energy managed to raise themselves out of the slough
of despond in which their fellows were overwhelmed. John Doherty came
to dine but his excitement in talking was so great and continuous
that he could eat next to nothing.
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