1. The Frazer River
Fellow workers pay attention, to what I’m going to mention
It is the fixed intention of the Workers of the World
I know you’ll all be ready, brave-hearted, true and steady
To gather round our standard when the red flag is unfurled!
Where the Frazer River flows, each fellow worker knows
They bullied and oppressed but still our union grows
We’re going to find a way boys, shorter hours and better pay boys
We will win the day boys where the Frazer River flows!
Oh gunny sack contractors have all been dirty actors
They’re not our benefactors each fellow worker knows
So we’ve got to stick together in fine or dirty weather
We will show no white feather where the Frazer River flows!
Now the boss the law is stretching, bulls and pimps he’s fetching
They are a fine collection as Jesus only knows
But why their mothers reared them and why the Devil spared them
Are questions we can’t answer where the Frazer River flows!
The Frazer River, British Columbia, Canada, was the scene of union-busting violence perpetrated by mining bosses. The Western Federation of Miners, largely led by the International Workers of the World (IWW) or ‘Wobblies’, attempted recruitment here and all the way south through the Rocky Mountains chain. Opposition by the bosses was formidable with hired guns, state militias and National Guards along with police and ‘Citizens Alliances’ raining death and beatings on union activists who campaigned against child labour, exceedingly long hours and illegal truck systems or debt bondage.
‘Wobbly’ activists would ‘ride the rods’ of trains to arrive at a dispute where they would alight singing songs of unionism and labour to attract an audience. Chief songmaker was Joe Hill, who wrote this song, and was later falsely charged with murder and executed in Salt Lake City, Utah in 1915.
2. Joe Hill
I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night,
Alive as you or me
Says I, “But Joe, you’re ten years dead,”
“I never died,” says he.
“I never died,” says he.
“In Salt Lake, Joe,” says I to him,
Him standing by my bed,
“They framed you on a murder charge,”
Says Joe, “But I ain’t dead,”
Says Joe, “But I ain’t dead.”
“The copper bosses killed you, Joe,
They shot you, Joe,” says I.
“Takes more than guns to kill a man,”
Says Joe, “I didn’t die,”
Says Joe, “I didn’t die.”
And standing there as big as life
And smiling with his eyes
Says Joe, “What they forgot to kill
Went on to organize,
Went on to organize.”
“Joe Hill ain’t dead,” he says to me,
“Joe Hill ain’t never died.
Where working men are out on strike
Joe Hill is at their side,
Joe Hill is at their side.”
From San Diego up to Maine,
In every mine and mill –
Where working men defend their rights
It’s there you’ll find Joe Hill.
It’s there you’ll find Joe Hill.
I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night,
Alive as you or me
Says I, “But Joe, you’re ten years dead”,
“I never died,” says he.
“I never died,” says he.
Written in 1931 by Alfred Hayes, a British born novelist, poet and screenwriter. It was later set to music and remains a powerful memorial to the class fighter that was Hill.
Joel Hagglund, born in Sweden, emigrated to the USA and became active in the IWW or ‘Wobblies’. He was also known as Joe Hillstrom, changing his name because of blacklisting which was rife amongst the employers. His name was shortened to Joe Hill and he wrote many good, often bitingly ironic, songs including ‘The Preacher and the Slave’, ‘The Rebel Girl’, ‘Casey Jones – the Union Scab’ and ‘The Tramp’.
Joe was framed on a murder charge and executed by firing squad at Salt lake City, Utah, in 1915. His body was cremated, the ashes placed in 600 small envelopes which were then distributed to IWW branches and around the world as far as Australia.
Hill’s last will and testament read:
My will is easy to decide,
For there is nothing to divide.
My kin don’t need to fuss and moan,
“Moss does not cling to a rolling stone.”
My body? Oh, if I could choose
I would to ashes it reduce,
And let the merry breezes blow,
My dust to where some flowers grow.
Perhaps some fading flower then
Would come to life and bloom again.
This is my Last and final Will.
Good Luck to All of you,
Joe Hill
3. The Blackleg Miner
It’s in the evening after dark
When the blackleg miner creeps to work
With his moleskin pants and dirty shirt
There goes the blackleg miner!
He takes his pick and down he goes
To hew the coal that lies below
But there’s not woman in this town row
Would look at a blackleg miner!
Delaval is a terrible place
Around the heaps they run a foot race
To rub wet clarts* into the face
Of the dirty blackleg miner!
They grab his duds and picks as well
And hoy** them down the pit of hell
Down ye go and fare ye well
Thou dirty blackleg miner!
Don’t go near the Seghill mine
Across the mainway they stretch a line
To catch the throat and break the spine
Of the dirty blackleg miner!
So join the union while you may
Don’t wait ‘til your dying day
For that may not be far away
Thou dirty blackleg miner!
*clay, lumps of dirt **throw, toss
This Northumbrian song, author unknown, may have had its origins in the 18 C and, typically for folk song, was adapted to suit more modern conditions.
The term ‘blackleg’ precedes that of ‘scab’ for strike-breakers. It is thought that strikers captured then rolled up the blackleg’s trouser leg to see had he been mining by the evidence of coal dust on his leg. ‘Scab’ is an American term now widely used throughout the English-speaking world where workers are in dispute. During the Great Strike of 1984-85 the pious cant of Tory and Labour Party leaders would have us believe the violence (actually perpetrated by the state) was peculiar to that event. This song shows clearly the bitterness caused by those who chose to ignore their fellow workers in dispute.
In north-east England most of the blacklegs were recruited from Ireland and Cornwall. Often these men were utterly unaware of their intended role as strike-breakers and most, to their credit, came over to the union side.
As Fred Beal noted of the 1929 textile strike at Gastonia, North Carolina, “today’s scab is tomorrow’s striker”.
4. Bill Brown
Bill Brown was born at half-past two
The doctor said his blood was blue
He doubled up his little fist
But the doctor put him on that list
He grew up fast and went to school
Where segregation was the rule
As soon as Bill came into sight
They put him on the list as white
He went to work to earn a buck
The pay was bad and the job was struck
The boss he cried “I’ve had my fill”
On the blacklist went young Bill
Jobless Bill cried to the skies
“Workers of the world arise”
They said he was a Communist
And put him on another list
He’s gone and left his old home town
Has red, white and blue, black and blue Bill Brown
But wherever he may be
He’s just plain Bill Brown to me
An American song once performed by Pete Seeger. Its etymology is unknown but no less effective for that.
5. Vigilante Man
Have you seen that vigilante man?
Have you seen that vigilante man?
I’ve been hearing his name
All over the land
Well, what is a vigilante man?
Tell me what is a vigilante man?
Has he got a gun and a club in his hand?
Is that a vigilante man?
Rainy night down in the house
Sleeping just as quiet as a mouse
Man came along and chased out in the rain
Was that a vigilante man?
Stormy days we’d pass the time away
Sleeping in some good warm place
Man come along and we’d give him a little race
Was that a vigilante man?
Preacher Casey was just a working man
And he said “Unite all you working men!”
Killed him in the river – some strange man
Was that a vigilante man?
Oh why does a vigilante man
Why does a vigilante man
Carry a sawed off shotgun in his hand
Would he shoot his brother and sister down?
I rambled around from town to town
I rambled around from town to town
And they herded around like wild herd of cattle
Was that a vigilante man?
Woody Guthrie, said to have inspired Bob Dylan, composed and performed this song and many others saluting the working class all over the USA.
Vigilantes were hired thugs brought in by the bosses of the big corporations and trusts to bust unions. State militias, ‘citizens committees’, police and even the army assisted them in beating and killing strikers and their families with impunity. The infamous ‘detective agencies’ such as Pinkertons and Thiel provided ‘security’ for the bosses by offering employment to the worst of society’s lumpen thugs and freed criminals who relished the opportunity to behave violently towards people seeking no more than social justice.
Amongst their greatest crimes were the massacres at Ludlow, Colorado and Calumet, Michigan both taking place in 1913. Guthrie composed songs about these events also.
6. The Motor Trade Workers
I’m one of those motor trade workers
Labelled as loafers and shirkers
We’re ruining the country the newspapers say
With too low an output and far too much pay
Far too much pay, far too much pay
With too low an output and far too much pay
Each morning we leave about seven
And drive to our mechanised heaven
We make cans of tea have a laugh and the craic
‘Til the half-seven bell rings then off goes the track
With pressing and turning and milling
We’re finishing and trimming and drilling
We paint and wet-flat, we rivet and bore
While the foreman walks round like a Varna Road whore
The big bankers who’re running our nation
Say we are the cause of inflation
He sits at his desk on his fat pin-striped arse
While we do the donkey work he counts the brass
Our trade fluctuates with the season
That’s mainly the cause and the reason
We organise now and go in with both feet
For tomorrow we may well be walking the street
Investors and financial backers
Are greedily counting the ackers
A fiver an ounce for a working man’s sweat
Then the bosses begrudge us the wages we get
So a word for those wealthy fat Tories
Who dream up those newspaper stories
If it’s true what you say and we’re all in a stew
Then we’re the red peppers – the dumplings are you!
Written around 1969 by Don Perrygrove – a track worker and TGWU shop steward in the Austin motor works at Longfield, Birmingham. The UK had several indigenous car producers back then and each were strike-riven. Management was combative and stupid. They, for instance, attempted to remove the 15 minutes tea breaks enjoyed, and needed, by production workers as well speeding up the production line – known as ‘the track’. Cue frothing at the mouth by the Tory press and MPs berating ‘lazy’ workers.
Union organization was very strong – in particular the TGWU and AEU led by good class fighters Jack Jones and Hugh Scanlon respectively. The shop stewards’ movement was at its peak and encouraged by union leaders. The ETU, however, led by former CP luminary Frank Chapple, opposed and organized against this militancy. At the heart of the motor trade’s problems was a distinct lack of investment in machinery and design leading to the British falling behind their European competitors.
Needless to say, the workers were blamed and bullied by reformist Labour MPs.
7. McAlpines’ Fusiliers
Down the glen came McAlpines’ men
With their shovels slung behind them
It was in the pub their drank their sub*
Now up in the spike** you will find them
They sweated blood and washed down mud
With pints and quarts of beer
And now we’re on the road again
With McAlpines’ Fusiliers
I remember the day ‘The Bear’ O’Shea
Fell into a concrete stair
What ‘Horseface’ said when he found him dead
Wasn’t what the rich call prayer
“I’m a navvy short!” was the one retort
That reached up unto my ears
When the going gets rough
You must be tough for McAlpines’ fusiliers
I’ve stripped to the skin with the darkie Flynn
Down on the Isle of Grain
With ‘Horseface’ Toole you knew the rule:
No bonus if you stopped for rain
For McAlpines god was a well-filled hod
Your shoulders all cut and seared
And woe to he who went to look for tea
With McAlpines’ fusiliers
I’ve worked ‘til sweat has had me beat
With Russians, Czechs and Poles
On the shuttering jams and the hydro dams
Or underneath the Thames in a hole
I grafted hard and I got my cards
With many a ganger’s fist across my ears
If you pride your life don’t join – by Christ
With McAlpines’ fusiliers
Penned by Dominic Behan, brother of writer Brendan, this rousing song accurately captures the scene in the boom years of British construction when legions of unemployed Irishmen manned the industry. Conditions were often brutal and the men often turned to drink. McAlpines – big donors to the Tory party along with Laings, Wimpeys and other construction companies – turned a blind eye to ‘the Lump’, a system by which the men adopted false names and non-existent children to avoid income tax at the same time claiming benefits.
Behan himself, a one-time Communist, later moved to Ayrshire where he became active the Scottish National Party! He also wrote the haunting ‘The Patriot Game’ dismissing the IRA leadership and Irish nationalism in a well-aimed swipe.
*an ex-gratia payment made in lieu of wages usually by the GF (General Foreman)
** a system of county refuges for vagrants – rough and basic in nature
8. Larkin
When Larkin came to Dublin town
When Larkin came to Dublin town
Said he the poor have mighty weapons
To fight and bring the tyrant down
We are the poor of Dublin town
We are the poor of Dublin town
Where will we find these mighty weapons
To fight and bring the tyrant down?
“Come follow me” said Larkin then
“Come follow” me said Larkin then
“I will show you a mighty army
To make you all free Irishmen”
“No ship must sail no wheel must turn
No crane must swing no furnace burn
And these are far, far greater weapons
Than gun or gaudy uniform”
“The sun goes down each weary day
The sun goes down each weary day
On slum and tenement and people
Who starve and yet will not give way”
“Come all ye noble Irish men
Come join with me for liberty!
We will make one mighty army
To break the bonds of slavery!”
A homage to ‘Big’ Jim Larkin, a Liverpool native syndicalist who organised the Irish Transport & General Workers Union. Larkin, with James Connolly, led the year-long dockworkers strike (which was joined by other groups of workers) in 1913. All the arms of the Irish capitalist state, then still a part of Great Britain, were ranged against them and eventually the long and bitter strike – known as the ‘Dublin Lockout’ – failed. The union lives on and Larkin remains a revered figure in Irish social history. Modern day Irish reformists claim both Larkin and Connolly as their own, conveniently overlooking the fact both men were ardent socialists.
9. The Davison Wilder Blues
Mr Chivers said if we block our coal
We’d run four days a week
There’s no reason we shouldn’t run six
We’re loading so darn cheap
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
Mr Chivers to Mr Baldwin said
“This is what we’re going to do
We’ll get the names of the union men
And we’ll fire the whole darn crew”
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
I’ve got the blues, sure have got them bad
I’ve got the blues, worst blues I ever have had
It must be the blues of the Davison-Wilder scabs
Mr Chivers he’s an Alabama man
He came to Tennessee
He put on two of them Yellow Dog cuts
But he failed to put on three
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
Big Jim organised a holler
About two hundred strong
We stopped LL Chivers
From putting that third cut on
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
Mr Chivers called the committee men
Said “Boys I’m gonna treat you right
I know you’re all good union men
And first class Carmelites”
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
Well, I felt just like a cross-breed
Between the Devil and a hog
And that’s all I could have called myself
If I signed that Yellow Dog
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
There’s a lot of officers in this town
Would never let a lawbreaker sit
They wore their guns when the scabbing began
‘Til the hide wore off their hip
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
I’d rather be a Yellow Dog
In a union man’s backyard
Than to tote a gun for LL Chivers
Or the thieving National Guard
It’s the worst old blues I ever have had
This American song from Tennessee encapsulates the bitterness of strikers against the Davison Wilder Coal Company. Company thugs shot and killed Barney Graham, President of the local union, in 1932. A Yellow Dog was a contract pitmen had to sign to agree to increase production of coal whilst accepting short time and lower wage rates.
The battle for union recognition in the USA was far more violent, openly vindictive on the part of the state and employers than most countries in the developed world. Once, reluctantly, accepted by the state and employers unions largely divided into two steams: syndicalism or ‘business unionism’ – the latter reaching ‘sweetheart’ agreements with the employers.
10. Lord Lambton
One Sunday morn young Lambton went to Norma Levy’s flat
When she saw his chequebook she got out the welcome mat
But little did young Lambton know what naughty Norma planned
Her husband was behind a screen with a camera in his hand – y’bugger!
Whist lads, haad your gobs I’ll tell youse of an awful Tory
Whist lads, haad yer gobs for Lambton was his name!
Now Levy and his photographs of Lambton’s kinky capers
Thought he’d make a bob or two by flogging them to the papers
“What! Print this filthy muck?” they cried “These pornographic tales?”
And then they published all the lot and trebled that week’s sales – y’bugger!
Meanwhile our gallant boys in blue were working very hard
And very soon the news had got to dear old Scotland Yard
Not only had our noble Lord been seen in bed with tarts
He’d been smoking cannabis and eating purple hearts – y’bugger!
Rumours of our gallant boy and of his deeds so sinister
Soon reached the unbelieving ears of our beloved Prime Minister
He called young Lambton to Downing Street to have a little chat
He said “I hear you’ve been having sex – now tell me what is that?” Y’bugger!
So now you know of this great Lord this pillar of our nation
Through screwing a lass and smoking grass has lost his reputation
And now you of Lambton’s fall and of his sorry plight
I’m sue you’ll all join in with me saying “Serve the bugger right!” – y’bugger!
Anthony, Lord, Lambton, owner of a stately home (Biddick Hall) near Chester-le-Street was Tory MP for Berwick upon Tweed. As the song states he was the victim of a blackmail plot which hugely embarrassed Ted Heath’s Tory government of the time. Heath was a confirmed bachelor not known to have had any close encounters with a female throughout his life. He was thought to be asexual. The song is a parody of a popular music hall ditty of the 1850s, ‘The Lambton Worm’ and, therefore, was just begging to be written. North-east folk singer Howard Baker duly obliged. Lambton retired to his estate in Italy where he devoted his life to his collection of classical art. Heath’s government later succumbed to the 1974 miners’ strike which led to the power blackouts and workers on a three-day week.
