And may to-night’s proceedings quickly lead
To well-paid work where energy and skill
May meet with justice, kindness, and goodwill.”
The suspended men on whose behalf the concert was held were Messrs. Norman, Ryan, Robinson, Nottingham, and others.
Within a fortnight after the collapse of the strike, the whole of the suspended men at Liverpool were reinstated. The men of other affected towns were similarly recalled to duty, or induced to return by promises that the grievances of telegraphists generally should be immediately seen into. Thus terminated the brief but exciting strike period of 1871.
Ashden of Bradford, regarded as one of the principal ringleaders, being allowed to return, was after a while dismissed for “generally unsatisfactory conduct.” Few of those who had participated in the recent unfortunate attempt at a strike were allowed to remain at their own offices, for fear their influence might survive, and it was thought a very necessary precaution to transport them to other distant places. By this means they were well distributed about the country, as it was thought that a man finding himself among strangers would be less prone to give effect to his proclivity for agitation.
Judged on the surface, the strike was a complete failure; but its actual effect was a lesson both to the men and the authorities. It rudely awakened the department to the fact that some improvement was imperatively necessary; and at the same time it paved the way for a protective organisation on an improved and permanent basis.
There can be little doubt that these few days of excitement and agitation must have been very trying to one in the position of Mr. Frank Ives Scudamore. Though perhaps he had to take some share of the blame for making possible the strike, it must be said he acted with some tact, firmness, mud moderation in the handling of an extremely delicate as well as difficult problem which had thus suddenly confronted the department. But he might have averted it in the beginning by a little of the good judgment and moderation displayed towards the end. His warning circular issued to the strikers the day after they broke out of bounds, was almost as much an appeal as a command to the erring ones to return to the fold. He seems to have been a somewhat gentle nature whom circumstances eventually hardened into an indifferent diplomatist.
Then there was a breathing time for some months, and the men cautiously refrained from discussing and advertising their grievances too freely, but they were sustained by the hope, based on semi-official information, that some sort of remedial measure was being prepared by the department.