Bolton Labour Church; its links to the churches and with the labour movement.
© Craig MUir 1998

	The Labour Church was formed in October 1891 when John Trevor attempted to create a religious organisation which would meet the needs and concerns of working people. It flourished for a decade, providing a place where socialists could meet, express themselves and listen to the band of itinerant socialist preachers who viewed the labour movement as a religious movement. Labour Churches were involved in the formation of Independent Labour Parties and in the first national conferences. They continued with rather less influence in the early years of the twentieth century before dwindling away in the years up to 1914. What overall influence they had is difficult to gauge;. Pelling regards them as "a short-lived protest against the link which the Non-conformist churches had established with the middle class, and in particular against the alliance with the Liberal Party" (1965, 143).  Inglis largely agrees with him suggesting that "not many people, even within the Labour Churches, were ever interested in them except as a means towards a united Labour movement and once the Labour party was firmly established they were anachronisms" (1963, 249). Hobsbawn's verdict  is that "its chief function was to lubricate the passage of Northern workers from Liberal Radicalism to an Independent Labour Party and having done this it disappeared" (1959, 162) and Howell (1983) doesn't even believe Labour Churches to be worthy of mention. Smith on the other hand regards the Labour Church movement as the third significant landmark "in the thrust for independent Labour representation" (1992, 259) where "it had provided a meeting point for those with a wide variety of theological viewpoints who saw their religion and politics as part of a common hope, expressed on the one hand in terms of the 'Fatherhood of God and the Brotherhood of Man', and on the other in terms of the practical programme of the ILP" (1992, 261).
	The purpose of this essay will be to look specifically at the Labour Church in Bolton, telling those bits of its story which can be ascertained or surmised, reflecting upon its internal and external relationships and exploring its influence within the town. In most accounts of the Labour Church movement, Bolton warrants a short mention. As Pelling, quoting the Labour Prophet of May 1892 says, "At Bolton . . .  the Rev. B.J. Harker made his church a Labour Church 'so far as their constitution as a Congregational Church would allow'" (1963, 134) and the assumption seems to be that the link remained. What seems to have been previously missed is that within nine months the Labour Church had split from Dukes Alley Congregational Church and Harker had become persona non grata within the Labour Church movement.
	Dukes Alley was the remnant of the oldest Congregational church in the town. When the majority of the congregation left for bigger modern premises on St. George's Road a small group had continued at Dukes Alley. One contemporary commentator expressed the opinion that "The surroundings of the chapel are not favourable, and it has long been felt by the Bolton Congregationalists that the Duke's Alley friends would do well to go and break up fresh ground" (Nightingale, 1892, 29-30). In May 1891 Ben Tillett, leader of the Dockers Union had preached at the Sunday School sermons (BEN, 11 May 1891) and the next evening he lectured on "Christianity and Social Progress" at the Temperance Hall. The meeting was presided over by the Vicar of Bolton and on the platform with him were a number of non-conformist ministers along with members of the Trades Council (BEN, 12 May 1891). The following year Tom Mann preached to "a large congregation of working men" (BEN, 23 May 1892), on the estrangement between the churches and the working man. A week later at a public meeting in the Co-operative Hall Robert Blatchford called for the establishment of an Independent Labour Party in Bolton. The meeting was chaired by Joe Shufflebotham, a member of the Social Democratic Federation and amongst the platform party were James Johnson, a Congregational minister out of pastoral charge, and Llewellyn Williams the minister of Zion Baptist Church (BEN, 30 May 1892). Harker had sent his apologies to that meeting but was present on 6 June when a meeting was held in Dukes Alley Schools to form a Bolton ILP with Harker elected as president and an initial membership of 254. 
	An insight into Labour Church activities comes from the diary of Dr. John Johnston who on  Saturday 9 November had attended the Labour Church to hear Katherine St. John Conway, "a rare treat I enjoyed". A week later was 
A red letter day through the visit of Edward Carpenter who came today for the purpose of delivering a lecture in the Labour Church. . . we all winded our way to the Labour Church where we found a good audience assembled to hear Carpenter deliver his lecture on "The breakdown of our present Industrial system". The Revd. Harker who occupied the chair, introduced the lectures . . . at its conclusion 20 went to "Talbots" in Deansgate where over coffee we had a profitable talk on social subject  (BLSU, ZJO/1/22, 14 November 1892).
	The first inkling of a problem comes in January 1893 when Johnston received a letter from Sam Hodgkinson, enclosing a copy of a letter received from Keir Hardie about "the crisis in the Bolton Labour Church" and inviting him to meet with John Trevor who was coming to Bolton to confer with local leaders (BLSU, ZJO/1/24, 17 January 1893). He also recounts a conversation with Katherine Conway in which she tells how
At Bradford she met Miss Elsie Harker, to whom she said she was very sorry that anything unpleasant had occurred in connection with or following her (KC's) visit at Bolton. Where upon Miss Harker said rather loftily, "Oh it doesn't matter now; Father preached a sermon on the following Sunday which quite undid all the harm you had done" (BLSU, ZJO/1/25, 3 February 1893).
But clearly the split had become irredeemable. The following day John Trevor met with the local leadership. The main conversation was about Bolton Labour Church "which has now entered upon a new phase of existence - having severed its connection with the Rev. Harker" (BLSU, ZJO/1/25, 4 February 1893). On March 4th a Labour Institute was opened in Bowkers Row by the ILP. "The premises will principally be used as a meeting place for members, but it is also proposed to utilise the building on Sundays as a Labour Church" (BEN, 6 March 1893).
	The reasons for this break are not clear. A hint appears in Johnston's inclusion within his diary of Trevor's article from the Labour Prophet of February 1893. The crucial paragraph says 
Many of the more active and intelligent ministers of religion are very anxious to turn the rising tide of the Labour movement into their little buckets of churches. They mean well, as a rule, but the success of their schemes would, I am convinced, be disastrous, both to our religious and our social redemption. If any minister thinks he can get his particular church identified with the Labour movement, I warn him that he will burn his fingers. . . . I never made such an effort myself, but I know of two cases where it was tried, at first with the most promising results. But in each case the success has been of brief duration, and the end has been tragic. 
Johnston identified the two cases as Oldham and Bolton.
	We do not have Harker's version of events, but perhaps it was not possible to steer a middle way between the Labour Church and a denominational interest. The pressure would have come from both directions.  Trevor at this time was becoming increasingly anti-clerical and anti-denominational, he had remarked about the difficulties of running
a church without a minister. I know some of our churches are feeling it a little difficult. I can only hope it won't be necessary to have anything like a minister" (Labour Prophet, May 1893).
He warned off London Unitarians from attempting to create a Labour Church, saying: "a Labour Church must be absolutely free from identification with an existing denomination" (Labour Prophet, June 1893). In time he began to see the need for designated trained leadership and introduced a plan for such to the Labour Church Union of 1899. It was seen as a plan for paid ministry and utterly condemned. "Trevor should not have been surprised, for he himself had encouraged a hostility to the clergy as an institution" (Inglis, 1963, 246). 
	Returning to the possible pressures on Harker we must also consider the likelihood of denominational opposition. At the Congregational Union Assembly at Bradford in 1892 a debate had ensued after one delegate had made an attack on the Keir Hardie and the Labour Church. Hardie had been present and made a defence of his own words and of the need for Labour Churches because established churches were not concerned with the needs of the poor. The Labour Prophet concluded its report of the incident by declaring, 
Which observations pretty clearly indicate the seed, the soil and the atmosphere of the Congregational Union, and prove that within the Union no healthy Labour plant can flourish. We, too, as the Congregationalists of yore, must develop a Religion of Independence (November 1892).
The feeling was mutual, in later years, at the Assemblies of 1894 and 1896 the chairmen of the Union were to issue attacks on the Labour Churches during their addresses. 'A Labour Church has no more right to be than a capitalist Church, or an educated man's Church'" said Rev. G.S. Barrett (Congregational Year Book, 1895, 42) and Rev.  Jones stated that, "The Labour Church is not a Christian Church" (Congregational Year Book, 1897, 41). Caught between such antagonisms it is hardly surprising that Harker's attempts to turn Dukes Alley into a Labour Church met with failure. 
	Nothing more is heard of Harker, the man who had preached at the first anniversary service of the Manchester Labour Church in October 1892; who in the same month had published a sermon which had made a vigorous defence of the movement because "It is the capitalist Church that necessitates the Labour Church"  and seen it lauded by Labour Prophet (October 1892) as good reading for Labour Church Services, disappears without trace from the memory of the movement. When in 1898 Trevor tells of a visit to Bolton Labour Church, he associates its foundation with March 1893 rather than with May 1892 and with James Sims rather than with Bailey Harker (Labour Prophet, April 1898). Harker continued at Dukes Alley until 1902 and then moved to Adlington where he continued to minister until 1907. His obituaries make no mention of his socialist interests or writings (BEN, 9 October 1916 & Congregational Year Book, 1917, 183-4). Elsie Harker on the other hand continued her interest in socialism; joining the London ILP, singing at Tillett's election campaigns, assisting Hardie with his office work, and from 1898 to 1941 as Mann's common-law wife (Tsuzuki, 1991, 105-6).
	James Sims now became the leader of the local ILP and Labour Church. Born in 1836 he was "a radical whose political experience stretched back to the later stages of Chartism" (Salveson, 1984, 32). Sims says of himself, 
I took an active part with some of the old teetotallers. I was connected with the first Sabbath Evening Ragged school. I have always been a kicker, though, and I was attracted to the Labour Church because I thought it stood for right (BLSU, ZZ/257/1/13).
What few references there are for the period 1893-5 suggest that the Labour Church and the ILP were closely aligned. They shared the same building; during 1893 Sims was a delegate to the ILP conference (ILP Conference minutes, 1893)  and the Labour Church Union (LCU Minutes, 1893); Brocklehurst, Secretary of the Labour Church Union was the ILP's parliamentary candidate for Bolton; Mr Thomas and Mrs Beta Hope were respectively secretary of the Labour Church (Labour Prophet, February 1895) and vice president of the ILP (Labour Annual, 1895).
	Howarth (1982) claims that it was because of the support and encouragement of the Bolton Labour Church that the ILP survived through 1893-5. The ILP lacked the support of the Trades Council, which was dominated by the powerful Spinners Union and had formed an alliance with the Liberal Party,  hence progress was going to be difficult within the town. No doubt for this small group of socialists the Sunday evening lectures from a variety of speakers helped to maintain their enthusiasm, but Howarth seems to have missed the point that in fact the two organisations were two parts of the one organisation, and that cracks were beginning to appear. As the General election of July 1895 approached, a split had occurred. In June 1895 the Labour Prophet reported "the Bolton Labour Party has decided to divide into two sections, one working under the ILP banner the other as a Labour Church". For the ILP to separate at such a time suggests that the tensions between those who saw the Labour Church as an extension of the political platform and those who saw the need for a religious organisation were immense. 
	It has long been known that this was one of the difficulties facing Labour churches. In June 1895 the LCU had sent a letter to all Labour churches warning of the danger of becoming a branch of the Labour Party and concluded,
We stand ultimately for those great moral principles on which all true politics and economics are based; . . . our movement should therefore be preserved from the danger of becoming a mere political or economical propagandist medium  (Labour Prophet, June 1895).
Amongst the signatories of the letter was Sam Hodgkinson, treasurer of the LCU and member of Bolton Labour Church. The confirmation that in Bolton the split had been along these lines comes from Trevor's "Notes from the Field" in the Labour Prophet of April 1898. He says,
In the early days there was no distinct church. The services were simply the Sunday meetings of the ILP. It was believed that a separate organisation was undesirable and that the whole Labour movement would be stronger, both morally and financially, through the complete union of the Political party and the Church in one body. . . 
	Experience has converted our Bolton friends, and converted them thoroughly. In the Political party Materialists and Secularists gained the upper hand; they grew increasingly antagonistic to any expression of religious sentiment; at last they passed the resolution that there should be no Labour Church in Bolton; economics and politics were all they believed in or cared for.
	. . . such a resolution was far more unwise than an attempt to fuse the two organisations and happily proved fruitless. Those who really wanted a Labour Church banded themselves together, found a new home, struggled on through many difficulties and now success has crowned their efforts.
	The changing ethos can be seen within the advertised talks which prior to the split had been very political and economic in character, after June 1895 such titles continue but now alongside religious issues. One report points out that past speakers have included socialists, ILP'ers, churchmen, dissenters and anarchists. It concludes "I am not sure that we are orthodox from the point of view of some of our Labour Church brothers but we do often have the sayings and doings of Jesus read and quoted with general approval and we find them anything but 'anachronistic'" (Labour Prophet, February 1897). 
	The need for a religious and moral dimension was clearly important for Sims. He had come from an Independent Methodist background, before joining the Baptists where for a time he was Superintendent of the Sunday School (BEN, 21 September 1905), but he was struck of the roll in November 1887 for persistantly failing to attend services (BLSU, NB/1/1/2). His attitude towards national  Labour figures was revealed by his son in a letter to an Australian cousin, 
Father was known by a great many all over the country. He did not think much of them from a moral standpoint, namely Tom Mann and Ben Tillett. Father knew both well, particularly Tom Mann, because he lived in Bolton for sometime, but . . . it is not person's but principles we support (BLSU, ZZ/257/1/11).
	Sims was also committed to sustaining the Labour Church as a distinctive organisation. This led to his suggestion that eminent speakers should not be invited to the LCU conference for they were not members of any Labour Church and therefore could not speak of the "obstacles each church has to contend with" (Labour Prophet, March 1896) and at the LCU Conference 1897 he called for the establishment of Sunday Schools so that a new generation would help the church endure. However, following Sims death Bolton Labour Church was only to endure for a further two years. The last advertised meeting was on May 19th 1907 (Clarion, 17 May 1907). The two previous weeks had advertised important meetings immediately after the service, presumably this was to wind up the church. Yet part of their function seems to have been quickly missed for on 6th October 1907 the Bolton Socialist Party opened a Socialist Sunday School with children's activities in the afternoon and adult classes for study and discussion in the afternoon. 
	Bolton Labour Church had been established for fifteen years, clearly with fluctuating fortunes. In order to assess its external relationships we need to establish the connections it had with other groups within the town, this is not particularly easy as the available evidence is vague and therefore inconclusive. We can establish that the initial impetus came from Dukes Alley Congregational Church and that clergymen were present at Tillett's 1891 talk and the formation of the ILP. What is not known is how much contact these people had with the Labour Church or what contact the members of the Labour Church had with other churches but we will explore the few examples of which we are aware. 
	Thomas Boston Johnstone was the minister of St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church from  1882 until his death in 1902. He was one of those present at Tillett's lecture and  in 1893 he argued 
that there was no necessity for a Labour Church as such and that the Labour Party would have more influence if they can reform the church than they have by remaining outside . . . I am doing all I can for the poor. I preach socialism, I'm on the Committee of the Poor Protection Society, I help to distribute coals, food, clothing . . . 
But this was not good enough for Dr Johnston and his friends for the diary continues; "He was going on in this complacent self-satisfied stream but  . . .we do not want charity we want justice and the opportunity of developing our manhood (BLSU, ZJO/1/24, undated, January 1893). Rev. Johnstone's obituary confirms that he was secretary of the Poor Protection Society but also an active member of the Bolton Liberal Association. Thus his concern for labour issues did not stretch to political support, but it did stretch to arranging for the Labour Church to use St. Andrew's schoolrooms (BLSU, NP/1/3/1, 26 October 1893). 
	Other connections are few and far between. Johnston mentions a "Rev (hateful word!) Llewellyn Davies who declared himself 'an official Liberal' who should have joined the ILP but for their 4th clause" (BLSU, ZJO/1/25, 10 March 1893). but I can find no other references to Davies or establish the church in which he ministered. Rev. James Johnson, President of the Shopassistants Association (BEN, 27 April 1890), seems to have been involved during the Dukes Alley months but moved to Hollinshead Congregational Church, Darwen in 1892. When he returned to Bolton, once again out of pastoral charge, there is no evidence that he re-established contact with the labour movement. In June 1895 J.M. Wilson, the Vicar of Rochdale gave a talk to Bolton ILP on the "Ethical Basis of the Labour Movement" which was published by Bolton Labour Church but with a disclaimer regarding his theological views (Labour Prophet, June 1895). In March 1896 the speakers included Reverends Reynolds, Wallace and Hardy, and in April 1897, Reverends Horne, Noel and Thompson but none of these seem to have any connection with Bolton . The little evidence we have suggests that the Labour Church had very little impact on the religious life of the town, for many church people it was probably not worthy of mention or consideration and in the trade directory it is never listed under church but always as a Religious Society, whether that was their decision or an editorial one can not be known.
	The Labour Church was also a place where different strands of the labour movement could meet. Joe Shufflebotham (SDF) and Fred Brocklehurst (ILP) were regular speakers. Occasional speakers  included Councillor Tootill (President of the Trade Council, Methodist lay preacher and in 1914 the first Labour MP for Bolton), George Harwood (Liberal M.P.) and nationally renowned figures such as Conway, Glaister, Carpenter and Snowden made regular visits throughout the years. 
	For Dr. Johnston and his friends the Labour Church was an extension of their Whitmanite interest, a place where they could bring the inspiration they gained from Whitman to a wider audience. Sam Hodgkinson, Fred Wild and Wentworth Dixon were all Whitmanites who were also members of the Labour Churches throughout its existence and played leading roles in it. For other people the Labour Church was a place of discovery and a stepping stone into the wider labour movement. Alice Collinge came to Bolton in 1903, in future years she became President of the Women's Social and Political Union and involved in local socialist activities until her death in 1957, but her introduction was through the Labour Church. 
Coming into contact with the virile Labour Church, social proclivities which had been lying dormant wakened and the socialism of that day claimed me. What days those were and how privileged I was in my humble role at the piano to hear such people as Mrs Despond, Miss Margaret McMillan, Mrs Bruce Glaisier, Edward Carpenter, people who more or less, gave time and service to the movement and desired nothing in return but the good of the country. Idealists they were, putting their ideals into practice. Needless to say I carried out my political faith as far as I could, sometimes on political platforms, but mainly on orange boxes placed in various parts of the town. (BLSU, B 920 COL)
Collinges's introduction had been made by Sarah Reddish a prominent member of the Bolton Socialist Society and occasional speaker at the Labour Church. Alice Foley's introduction came through her elder sister.
Cissy had become an active and reforming influence in her particular section of the textile trade union and had tenaciously elbowed her way into the male precincts of that executive. She was also allied with the Suffragettes and, more disturbing still, a zestful member of the local Labour Church (Foley, 1973, 45).
Soon Alice was to follow her sister into the mill and "under the influence of Cissy we joined the Labour Church and the newly established Socialist Sunday School where we enthusiastically imbibed and extolled a broader ethical faith" (Foley, 1973, 45). Such enthusiasm was to be carried forward into a life of Trade Union activity and involvement in the Workers Educational Association. If the evidence of these young women was also true of others then Liddington and Norris are right in their view that "the Bolton Labour Church encouraged young women like Cissy Foley and her friends to argue out the advanced ideas of the day in a comradely atmosphere" (1978, 117).  However they conclude that it "only whetted their appetite . . . for a more sustained socialist programme they turned . . . to the Clarion" (1978, 118).
	It was this inability to provide a more sustained programme which perhaps meant that the Labour Church could not continue. They could not provide the social atmosphere of the Clarion clubs or the political excitement of the Socialist Party. They had tried to walk a middle way between religion and politics which had found a niche in the 1890's but was increasingly marginalised in the 1900's. For those whose politics was derived from a theistic understanding of the world they must have appeared too secular. For the growing secularist culture they would have been too religious. To both groups ventures such as the Daisy Colony experiment (Salveson, 1984b) were far too idealistic. The church clearly met a need at its time and in providing the impetus and initial organisation for the ILP, in laying the groundwork for some of the Socialist Societies activities and in bringing together people who had a vision for a new, equitable society it had a legacy which lived on well into the present century.
	One hundred years later there is once again an acknowledgement of the role a spiritual dimension can play within the political arena. We have a Prime Minister who is aware of the debt his politics owes to his spiritual upbringing and the way in which they continue to feed one another. In church reports such as Faith in the City and Unemployment and the Future of Work we see Christians combining their religious convictions with radical politics. As more and more British church people take on board the example of Liberation Theology  there is a growing believe that liberation can be political and spiritual. Many of us are comfortable with the idea that to seriously address issues of poverty, inequality and the concerns of labour  there is a need for fundamental social change. As one committed to such an integration of political and religious life, the ideals of the Labour Church are attractive. I find myself in sympathy with much that they stood for and wondering if there were such a church today, would I be involved?
	However we need to put the Labour Churches into context. They were not in the middle ground of politics, they would view New Labour as Old Liberal and the alliance that it has with the churches as similar to the non-conformist /Liberal alliance of the late nineteenth century. Labour Church supporters were at the radical end of politics, perhaps more comfortable with modern equivalents such as Militant and SWP, but attempting to bring a spiritual dimension to their work. For such groupings the churches are no doubt seen as too moderate, too conservative, too middle-class, too wedded to the capitalist system. For one whose political convictions are based on a Christo-centric Trinitarian faith, the Labour Church would have appeared too un-Christian to be anything more than a passing interest, and possibly these were problems for Harker, Johnstone and other church people. Their sympathy for the cause outweighed by their religious convictions, the conflicting demands of denominational interest, Sunday meetings and the antagonism of both camps.
	The Bolton Labour Church served its purpose for fifteen years. In many ways it took a prophetic role, throwing out sparks which lit various fires, but like so many prophets did not have the power to sustain its own flame. Perhaps Bolton ILP would have existed without it, perhaps the Socialist Society would have found other sources of inspiration, maybe young women and young men whose socialist appetite was whetted by the Labour Church would have found other ways to take those first bites. But for a few short years it was the Bolton Labour Church which served the town in this way and it was the Labour Church which was the shuttle interweaving Bolton's socialist ideals.

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