London Docklands History for GCSE

The Great Dock Strike of 1889
Physical condition of the workers

B: The poor fellows are miserably clad, scarcely with a boot on their foot, in a most miserable state ...

These are men who come to work in our docks who come on without having a bit of food in their stomachs, perhaps since the previous day; they have worked for an hour and have earned 5d. [2p]; their hunger will not allow them to continue: they take the 5d. in order that they may get food, perhaps the first food they have had for twenty-four hours.'

Colonel G.R. Birt, the general manager at Millwall Docks, to a Parliamentary committee (quoted by John Pudney in London's Docks, 1975).

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