Partisan players: sport, working-class culture, and the labour movement in South Wales 1920–1939

Abstract

This article argues against the prevalent notion that sport was insignificant to inter-war Welsh labour by showing that it was in fact a ‘vital area of interest’ for local activists associated with leftist organisations. In South Wales, numerous sporting opportunities provided by the local labour movement were taken up with notable enthusiasm by local workers. It is demonstrated that this represented a ‘vibrant attempt to forge a coherent alternative to mainstream sporting activity by fusing it with political allegiance’ and that sport became ‘an articulation of working class self-awareness … [and] a mechanism through which working class desires and visions could be expressed’.

Keywords::

• sport
• labour
• Wales
• socialism
• clarion
• communism

Notes

^1. Lush, Young Adult, 72–5.

^2. Fielding, Labour Governments.

^3. Pugh, “Popular Conservatism in Britain,” 263.

^4. In the South Wales context see, for example: South Wales Labour Pioneer, May 1901, March 1902; Merthyr Express, 22 March 1924; and Caerphilly Journal, 28 February 1931.

^5. Storch, Red Chicago, 200–201 and Kidd, Struggle for Canadian Sport, 146–83.

^6. Berger, “Herbert Morrison's London Labour Party,” 296.

^7. McKibbin, Evolution of the Labour Party, 245 and Holt, Sport and the British, 148.

^8. Jones, Sport, Politics and the Working Class, 74.

^9. Williams, “Labour and the Challenge,” 143.

^10. Johnes, Soccer and Society, 209.

^11. Hill, “Sport and Politics,” 357.

^12. Greater Manchester County Record Office (GMCRO), National Clarion Cycling Club Records, O16/39: ‘Scrapbook’. List of Sections, 1912, 3–5; List of Sections, 1913, 6; and List of Sections, 1914, 7.

^13. Jones, Sport, Politics and the Working Class, 74 and Leeworthy, Fields of Play, 61–82.

^14. GMCRO, O16/5/1: National Clarion Cycling Club, Handbook 1932, 154.

^15. GMCRO, O/16/5/1: National Clarion Cycling Club, Handbook 1934, 158.

^16. Berry, History Is What You Live, 76.

^17. The Clarion Cyclist: Official Organ of the National Clarion Cycling Club I, no. 10 (April 1937), 150 and I, no. 11 (May 1937), 171.

^18. GMCRO, O16/5/1: National Clarion Cycling Club, Handbook 1938, 157–61 and Rhondda Leader, 22 May 1948

^19. Jones, Sport, Politics and the Working Class, 108.

^20. People's History Museum and Archives, Manchester (PHMAC), CP/ORG/MISC/5/3: British Workers' Sports Federation, Minute Book 1923–1925, 5 April 1923.

^21. Cardiff Trades and Labour Council, Yearbook 1922, 26.

^22. Cardiff Trades and Labour Council, Yearbook 1924, 44–5.

^23. Cardiff and District (Saturday) Baseball League, Official Handbook, 1932; Official Handbook, 1936; and Welsh Baseball League, Official Rule Book, 1938.

^24. Welsh National Baseball League, Official Handbook, 1957.

^25. Welsh National Baseball League, Fixture List 1950.

^26. Cardiff Trades and Labour Council, Yearbook 1925, 49.

^27. Barry and District Football League, Official Handbook, 1926–1927; Official Handbook, 1927–1928; and Barry and District News, 10 September 1926.

^28. Labour Party, 1924, 24 and The Pioneer (Merthyr), 28 February, 26 June 1920.

^29. Labour Party, National Executive Committee, Minutes, 25 June 1924.

^30. Richard Burton Archives, Swansea University, MNB/POL/6/16: Newport Young People's Labour League, Minute Book, 1928–1931, 30 April 1928.

^31. Ibid, 3 May 1928.

^32. Newport Labour League of Youth, Minutes 1934–1936, 11 July, 1 August 1934, 15 August, 18 December 1935, 29 January 1936; The Newport Citizen, May 1938, January 1939; Brecon and Radnor Labour League of Youth, Minute Book 1937, 10 May 1937; and Griffiths, Labour and the Countryside, 79–105.

^33. Newport Labour Party, Annual Report and Balance Sheet for Year Ending December 31st, 1929; Newport Labour Party, Annual Report and Balance Sheet for Year Ending December 31st, 1930; and Newport Labour Party, Annual Report and Balance Sheet for Year Ending December 31st, 1931.

^34. Newport Young Peoples' Labour League, Minute Book, 1928–1931, 23 July, 21 August 1928.

^35. Brecon and Radnor Labour League of Youth, Minute Book 1937, 6 July 1937.

^36. National Library of Wales, Rhondda Borough Labour Party Records: Rhondda Borough Labour Party & Trades Council, Minute Book, 1932–1935, 14 June 1935.

^37. Richard Burton Archives, MNA/POL/24/1: Ynyshir Branch Labour Party, Minute Book, 1936–1938, 25 July, 17 October 1938.

^38. Pontypridd Trades and Labour Council, Minute Book, 13 November 1933.

^39. Pontypridd Library Local Studies Department: “Robert Stradling Interview With Alun Hughes”, undated.

^40. J. Glynn-Jones, ‘Boys’ Clubs and Camps', Welsh Outlook 20, no. 8 (1933), 214–7.

^41. Merthyr Tydfil Educational Settlement, Annual Report for 1937; Order of Friends, Annual Report, 1938, p. 35; Aberdare Valley Educational Settlement, Bulletin, October 1938; and Pontypridd and District Educational Settlement, “Minutes of Governing Body, 2 May 1939.”

^42. Meara, Unemployment in Merthyr Tydfil, 6–7.

^43. Meara, Juvenile Unemployment in South Wales, p. 14; Cox, People Can Save South Wales, 7; and Labour Party, South Wales.

^44. Johnes, Soccer and Society, 105.

^45. Morgan, Village, 9 and Ocean Area Recreation Union, After Ten Years.

^46. Williams, Capitalism, Community and Conflict, 58.

^47. Worley, Class Against Class, 194–230.

^48. Howkins, “Class Against Class,” 254.

^49. Hill, George Sinfield, 8.

^50. Linehan, Communism in Britain, 48.

^51. The Mardy Leader: Organ of the Mardy Local Communist Party, 28 August 1925. The YCL branch had been formed the month before. Ibid, 31 July 1925.

^52. Macintyre, Little Moscows, 31.

^53. PHMAC, CP/ORG/MISC/05/05: British Workers' Sports Federation, Minute Book, 1929–1930, 1 November 1929.

^54. Ibid, 15 November, 29 November, 13 December 1929, 3 January 1930.

^55. Ibid, 17 January 1930.

^56. ‘W.R. King: Interview with Martin Johnes’. Notes in possession of Martin Johnes.

^57. Francis and Smith, Fed, 146.

^58. British Workers' Sports Federation, Minute Book, 1929–1930, 23 February 1930 and Francis and Smith, Fed, 171.

^59. British Workers' Sports Federation, Minute Book, 1929–1930, 28 February, 17 April, 2 May 1930; The Times, 2 May 1930; Daily Worker, 29 April 1930; and British Workers' Sports Federation, Agenda of the 3rd National Conference, 1933.

^60. PHMAC, CP/ORG/MISC/05/08: British Workers' Sports Federation, ‘Minutes of Full National Committee, 7 June 1931’, 4.

^61. Sports and Games: The Organ of the British Workers' Sports Federation, I: 3 (1932), 13–16.

^62. Rhondda Urban District Council, Mardy, Ferndale and Penrhys Parks Committee', Minutes of Committee, 17 June 1937.

^63. PHMAC, CP/ORG/MISC/05/08: British Workers' Sports Federation, “Credentials Card: Provisional Committee Rhondda”.

^64. Jones, Rhondda Roundabout, 252.

^65. Wheeler, ‘Organized Sport and Organized Labour,’ 205 and Johnes, Soccer and Society, 105.

^66. Cited: Smith, Out of the People, 1.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Daryl Leeworthy

Daryl Leeworthy is a Lecturer in Community History at the University of Huddersfield and joined the History department in August 2013. He grew up in the South Wales Valleys and left them in 2004 to read history and politics at Oriel College, Oxford. After that, he crossed the Atlantic to undertake a master's degree in history at Saint Mary's University in the beautiful Nova Scotian metropolis of Halifax. He finally returned home in 2008 to undertake doctoral research on sporting heritage and the labour movement at Swansea University, which he completed in 2011.