Revival: Trade Unionism (1900) (ePub)

George Howell (5 October 1833 - 17 September 1910) was an English trade unionist and reform campaigner and a Lib-Lab politician, who sat in the House of Commons from 1885 to 1895.

George Howell, the eldest of eight children, was born in Wrington, Somerset, on 5th October 1833. His father owned a small general builders but found it difficult to find enough work to support his family. At the age of twelve Howell left his Church of England school in Bristol and started work with his father. After a period as a mortar-boy he became a bricklayer. He worked a twelve hour day but used his Sundays for reading. Early favourites included Foxe's Book of Martyrs and Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.

Howell disliked the heavy work of the building trade and found employment as an apprentice shoemaker. Several of the men held radical political views who were active Chartists. They introduced him to the newspapers such as the Northern Star and the Red Republican and in 1848 Howell joined the Chartist movement.

Several of the shoemakers were also Methodists and Howell was persuaded to attend meetings at the Wrington Chapel. Howell was converted and became a lay preacher. He also became an active member of the local Temperance Society.

In 1854 George Howell moved to London. Unable to find work as a shoemaker, he returned to his former trade of bricklaying. Howell attended a large number of political meetings where he met Karl Marx, George Holyoake, Charles Bradlaugh and Frederic Harrison.

Howell joined the Operative Bricklayers' Society and in 1859 became involved in an industrial dispute over demands for a nine-hour day. Howell joined the strike committee and soon emerged along with Robert Applegarth and George Potter as one of the main leaders of the union. As a result of his union activities he was blacklisted and for the next five years found it impossible to work as a bricklayer.