By Dr. Mellissa Ifill
British Guiana, and in particular Georgetown was the scene of intense, violent protest action in 1905. The immediate cause of the protest was the poor compensation and working conditions at Sandbach Parker and Company that led to workers proceeding on strike to demand higher wages between November 28 and December 5, 1905.
As Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow notes, waterfront workers had grievances about the exploitative working conditions they were forced to endure and the callous response of their employers to their complaints and attempts to redress same,
“Our working hours were 101/2. The system of a quarter day existed. There was no overtime for night work. We asked the employers to change these conditions.
The reply was that we must take them or go. I organized a strike on the waterfront in December 1905. Our aims were for an increase of pay, which was very low. Truckers (called boys although adult men) made two shillings a day. They could scarcely get a whole day’s work, taking cargo to the barn.
There was no trade union, and the employers refused. So I got the working men, boys together, and they agreed that when there were six boats in the harbour they must strike. A great thing and at that time I did not know that all the estates in the country followed us and struck on account of low wages.”
Led by Hubert Nathaniel Critchlow, striking workers’ demands were met with strong resistance from the shipping companies and the conflict eventually turned violent which necessitated the entry of British troops. The strike initially spread slowly over the first two days as street protest increased. By day three, Ashton Chase states that “hoodlums and gangs of work shirkers took matters … out of the hands of the strikers, and by their frequent acts of violence at various wharves on the third day it was plain that the strike had turned into a riot”. The Riot Act was read on November 30 after the state had already applied violent repressive measures. December 1st saw the intensification of street activity as incensed workers, particularly women whose working conditions and wages were even more abysmal than their male counterparts, invaded Public Buildings, attacked persons of Europeans descent on the streets whom they associated with their employers and looted European homes. The police responded by opening fire on the protesters and the consequence was the death of eight persons and injuries to over thirty. The next day saw protesters again converging on the streets of Georgetown. Governor Hodgson addressed the striking workers, urged them to disperse and promised an enquiry. His request was ignored however as the strikers continued to mingle in groups to discuss the situation. The police arrested hundreds of strikers, whipped some and cut off the hair of some of the females. It took the arrival of two British warships on December 5th to finally end the revolt. The strike failed to achieve its objectives and eight persons lost their lives, but as Critchlow noted above, this revolt ignited attitudes of resistance throughout the colony as workers in all labour sectors and regions had long standing, deep seated grievances that their largely European employers refused to address.
According to Kimani Nehusi, the deeper, multiple causes of the 1905 protests that affected the entire workforce were low wages, high taxation, lack of political participation, and the resistance of the planters to facilitating changes in the socio-economic and political structures since ultimately the priorities in the colony were all connected to the needs, fate and survival of the sugar industry.
Virtually all workers, irrespective of their location in the division of labour or their ethnicity in British Guiana were confronted by a monocrop economy that had been contracting from the 1880s that led to higher taxes, increased living costs and stagnant or declining wages. Although the sugar industry, which dominated the domestic economy and provided the greatest employment, had recovered from the post emancipation labour crisis by 1880, globally, the industry was shrinking and by the late 1890s it was noted that British Guiana was in a “perilous position of being dependent on a single agricultural industry, the production of sugar, that industry being in a state of extreme depression and threatened with possible extinction”.
Efforts on the part of planters to reduce their costs by operating on a larger scale and introducing new machineries along with the opening up of Canadian and American markets did result in brief periods of stability. Formidable challenges to British West Indian cane sugar were however posed by the beet sugar industry, aided by a bounty that wasn’t repealed until 1902, cane sugar from Cuba and Brazil and a disease outbreak in 1890. One repercussion of the repetitive decline in the sugar industry was generalised economic distress for the lower classes, particularly those working on sugar estates or in industries aligned to sugar estates. By 1905, the situation in the sugar industry had improved slightly but the future prospects for the industry were still unclear.
British Guiana’s economy by this time had experienced some level of diversification, but a similar condition of contraction, unemployment, underemployment and poor working conditions characterized the rice and gold industries, although the former was largely a peasant activity. Those workers who secured employment within a generalized climate of high unemployment and underemployment were forced to endure a long working day for low and declining wages which were entirely inadequate to address living costs which were conversely continually rising. Wages in the colony in all productive sectors fell sharply. For instance, wages declined between 1894 and 1897 by as much as 25% and women who sometimes earned half as much as their male counterparts were particularly affected by decreased wages. Poor wages therefore represented a key factor that generated the riots in 1905.
To compound the situation, high direct and indirect taxations were imposed on the poorest classes in the society. Whereas commodities needed by the planters attracted low or no duties and taxes, on the other hand, basic consumer goods used by the poorer groups in the society, such as flour, oatmeal, corn, dried fish and rice attracted high taxes. Additionally, while members of the growing Creole middle class were forced to pay high taxes and purchase licences to operate as porters, hire cart drivers, shopkeepers and hucksters, estates on the other hand were the beneficiaries of reduced income and export taxes.
Meanwhile the already inadequate social infrastructure was further deteriorating and Georgetown’s living conditions were described as deplorable. Many lived in overcrowded shantytowns with insufficient potable water supply, poor drainage and little or no garbage disposal. Not unexpectedly, in these circumstances, diseases were widespread, infant mortality rates were high and life expectancy was low. Poverty in Georgetown also spawned criminal activity and a disregard for authority.
Altogether, these circumstances indicate horrendous working and living conditions for all categories of workers. Moreover, there were few mechanisms available for workers to address grievances as those tasked with securing workers’ interests more often than not sided with the plantocracy. No worker organization existed to negotiate with employers on behalf of workers rather the governing apparatus offered unwavering support to employers to the detriment of the workers. To continually rejuvenate the sugar industry which was deemed by the legislature as crucial to the very survival of the colony, the plutocracy, used their dominance in the legislature to introduce regulations to advance sugar interests and retard the growth and development of the any other activity which they perceived to be a competitor for labour, capital and land. The legislature in the colony failed to standardize income and hours of labour and denied legal status to trade unions. Further, planters and other members of the expatriate business community were defended by the state in the face of charges that they exploited workers while military power was also used to quell unrest by workers.
Despite the liberalisation of the franchise introduced by the 1891 constitutional reforms, the constitution still excluded the majority from participating in the legislature and there was increasing dissatisfaction with this lack of representation. Although there were instances when members of the middle class advocated on behalf of the poor, these were usually over specific issues of concern to the former thus it was only during times of mass protest as occurred in 1905 when the masses were forced to employ unconstitutional measures, that the voice of the majority was clearly heard.
The long term impact of this strike in 1905 was considerable despite its failure. It clearly signalled that it was essential that workers organise themselves to advance their interests, preferably within a trade union. An exploratory meeting was held in 1906 in Georgetown to explore the possibility of forming a trade union. In January 1919 the first trade union was established in British Guiana, the British Guiana Labour Union, an achievement that its founder Critchlow noted was a direct consequence of the agitation, protests and riots that occurred over a decade earlier in 1905.
