The centenary of the ‘massacre’ came at a time when the town (and much of Yorkshire) was still raw from the pit strikes and confrontation with the Thatcher government during the 1980s. Almost all of the local pits had been closed as a consequence. So the events of 1893 took on an extra level of significance for local people and the mining community.
Featherstone born writer Ian Clayton (now well-known as a Yorkshire TV presenter) wrote a play about the events of 1893 that was performed by local people at the community centre.
A book by two local historians was published (highly recommended for the full story of these events), and launched at a local working men’s club with a talk about the massacre and its place in the struggle between pit owners and the miners by then NUM President, Arthur Scargill.
The culmination of the town’s remembrance was a march. Hundreds of people, with pit banners, walked from the North Featherstone cemetery, where the two victims are buried, to the town precinct for the unveiling of a striking sculpture that was movingly dedicated by Arthur Scargill.
Featherstone Town Council produced a booklet with colour photographs of this event.
The plate at the base of the sculpture reads:-
The Featherstone Massacre 1893.
This memorial records the centenary of an incident on September 7 1893 when, following a disturbance in Featherstone, the Riot Act was read and in the ensuing military action troops opened fire on the demonstrators, killing James Gibbs and James Arthur Duggan and wounding several others. This was just another chapter in the struggle by miners for better pay and working conditions.
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Further Reading
Lumb, Tony & Lewis, Brian: Featherstone & Its Disturbance (Briton 1992)
Scargill, Arthur: The Featherstone Massacre (1975)
Terrett, J. J.: The Right Hon. H. H. Asquith, M.P. and the Featherstone Massacre (1906)
Home Office: Minutes of evidence, with appendices, taken before the committee appointed to inquire into the circumstances connected with the disturbances at Featherstone on 7th September 1893. (H.M.S.O. 1893)
