= Over 30,000 Winnipegers joined in
Market Square. national ARCHIVES OF CANADA

Winnipeg General strike drew
broad pubic support in the west
After more than 30,000 Winnipeg
workers joined the general strike on
May 15, 1919, sympathy strikes took
place across Western Canada in
Brandon, Regina, Prince Albert,
Saskatoon, Edmonton, Calgary, New
Westminster and Vancouver and as
many as 20 other towns.

A New York Times headline
exclaimed that “Bolshevism” was
invading Canada. The Russian
Revolution had occured two years
earlier. A government inquiry, years
after, proved that this was false.
Strike organizers were taken from
their homes during the night. The
Criminal Code of Canada’s sedition
provisions were amended. British
Trade Unionists were deported as
were Eastern European workers
involved in the strike.

Two Hundred city police, sympa-
thetic to the strikers were fired
prior to the violent march of the
North Western Mounted Police.
Private militia beat protesters and
the federal government sent in
vehicles armed with machine guns.
Among those arrested was a young
J S Woodsworth, who would
become the founding leader of the
CCF (Cooperative Commonwealth
Confederation) in 1933.

= The Winnipeg General strike saw thousands of civilians join striking workers in
the city’s central core. manitosa ARcHives

General strike galvanized Manitobans

The Winnipeg General Strike of
1919 sent a message to the entire
country after WWI: Canadian
workers needed progress

This year, USW-IWA Council local
unions attended District 3’s
Conference in Winnipeg, where
they saw a National Film Board of
Canada video commemorating
Winnipeg General Strike of 1919.

The strike took place during a
period of great social turmoil in
Canadian history and during the final
months of World War I as soldiers
returned home to miserable econom-
ic and social conditions. Class con-
flict rolled across the country. In 1919
about 150,000 Canadian workers
participated in 428 separate con-
frontations.

The OBU (One Big Union) an
umbrella trade union organization
that drew large support from metal
and mine workers, loggers and trans-
port industry trades, saw the general
strike as the primary means of mak-
ing gains for the working class.

In Winnipeg, iron workers and
boilermakers, working in contract
shops for such companies including

Dominion Bridge, Manitoba Bridge
and Iron Works and Vulcan Iron
Works, sought wage parity with rail-
way workers.

Meanwhile Building Trades
unions working for the City of
Winnipeg wanted improved wages
and conditions. They sought a legal
collective bargaining process but
were denied. In May the Metal and
Building Trades called for support
from the Trades and Labour Council
of Winnipeg and got it. Over 11,000
members (with less than 600
against) voted to join them on a sym-
pathy strike. Even city police, fire-
fighters and waterworkers employ-
ees voted to walk out.

An “inner committee” of 15 trade
unionists worked with an “outer
committee” of over 300 to ensure
that vital services were maintained
during the strike which ended on
June 26, five days after the Royal
North Western Mounted Police beat
and fired on protesters gathered at
Market Square. Two were killed and
30 were injured during the riot, pro-
voked by agents of the City’s corpo-
rate elite. Until then the strike had
been peaceful in nature.

38 T DECEMBER 2006 THE ALLIED WORKER