Lambeth Music History. An Introduction. Part 3. Politics & Music

Politics And Music

Political activity has involved the use of music and song. An example in the struggle for the vote in 1832 was A Lambeth Melody. After the Reform Act of that year a song was published Canting Unmasked, or, the Saints of Lambeth.

The Tolpuddle Martyrs 

In 1837 there was a mass procession starting at Kennington Common in support of the Tolpuddle Martyrs who had been pardoned for illegally setting up a trade union and had returned to England. A description states: ‘The operatives with their numerous banners, and preceded by a band of music, were the first to arrive on the ground, and to take up the position assigned to them by the managing committee. They were shortly after followed by the carpenters, masons, bricklayers, plasterers, sawyers, smiths, glassblowers, silk hatters, united leather trades, tailors, goldbeaters, and bricklayers' labourers who fell into the places assigned to them in regular order and without the least confusion. ‘When arrived opposite the Horse Guards the bands struck up the National Anthem, and other lively and martial airs, which was taken to be in good taste, and for which they were loudly applauded by the concourse of people, which by this time was immense.’ 

Socialism

 Many people across the country became attracted to socialism in the 1880s particularly because of the experience of poverty. William Stephen Sanders, who became an important figure in Battersea’s labour movement, a member of the London County Council and later one of Battersea’s MPs, spent part of his childhood growing up in North Lambeth before the family moved to Battersea. He re-called that in the winter the unemployed "patrolled the district chanting the doleful refrain: 

                   We've got no work to do-oo-oo,

                   We've got no work to do-oo-oo;

                   We're all froze out poor labouring men,

                   And we've got no work to do.

 At some time in the period 1898-1901 the socialist and trade union activist Tom Mann and comrades organised a series of meetings on successive Sunday evenings at the Lambeth Baths. He recalled that it had 'a good choir and a good orchestra, conducted by H. W. Lee, the Secretary of the Social Democratic Federation) and ‘good soloists.' They ran a series of twelve meetings with Mann as the lecturer. 'The singing by the audience, aided by the choir and orchestra was inspiring.'

Percy Dormer

One of the curates working for Rev William Alexander Morris the vicar of St. Anne’s and All Saints Church 1891-1903 was Percy Dermer. Morris was known as the 'Gasman’s Vicar' because of his support for decent wages and living conditions and the new unions from 1889. Dermer was a socialist, Secretary Christian Social Union from 1891 to 1912, who in 1906 compiled the English Hymnal with Ralph Vaughan Williams.

Clarion Cyclists

The London labour movement held fund-raising events in support of the music hall strike. The South London Clarion Cycling Club’s February 1907 Fellowship Gathering included entertainment provided by a couple of members of the Variety Artistes' Federation. The collection raised £1.3s.6½d for the Music Hall Strike Fund.

The Club drew its members from Battersea, Clapham, Tooting, Brixton and Kennington. It was part of a movement built up around The Clarion newspaper edited by Robert Blatchford from 1891. He hated the drabness of so many people's lives and started the Clarion Clubs to provide for leisure and friendship. Through them he hoped to widen the appeal of the socialist movement. Its cycle runs on Saturdays and Sundays went to various destinations in Surrey and Kent. The runs ended in tea, usually at an inn, where they would sing, go for a walk, play billiards and pool. For their last run of 1907 the Clarionettes were urged "please tune up your singing boxes and bring your best voices."

Poplar

Music, especially song, continued to be an important activity in the labour movement. When the Poplar Borough Councillors were released from Brixton Prison for refusing to pay the surcharge following the district auditor’s finding of excessive expenditure, thousands of their supporters waiting outside sang The Red Flag.

In the 1960s Lambeth Council had ambitious plans to redevelop large areas of what it regarded as run-down and slum housing. Many of the modern estates like Stockwell Park, Myatts Field and Ethelred are the result. As the Council moved people out and boarded properties up whole areas fell into disrepair. This was the case in many other parts of London and in opposition a widespread squatting movement developed, especially in Lambeth. Areas squatted included Villa Rd. St Agnes Place became the most famous, particularly because the first Rastafarian Temple was located there. It made major news headlines when the Council used the police to support bailiffs in an abortive attempt to drive out the squatters, failing in the attempt.

1970s Squatting

The musician Pete Cooper was a member of the Villa Rd squatting community in the 1970s. The street had its own band ‘Cuckoo’s Nest’, which once supported the ‘101-ers’, Joe Strummer’s band before The Clash. Cooper is featured in Property Is Theft, about squatting in the 1970s shown on BBC-4 in February 2006. He sang The World Turned Upside Down and Leon Rosselson's song The Savage Hornpipe about the 1640s squatters, the Diggers.

Bread & Roses

The link between politics and music continues today at the Bread & Roses pub in Clapham Manor Street. Owned by the Battersea & Wandsworth Trades Union Council and its subsidiary The Workers Beer Company. The Company has run beer tents at Festivals like Glastonbury and Reading. Organisations that supply volunteer helpers are given a donation from the profits made. The pub is named after the song Bread and Roses from the poem by the American James Oppenheim from a speech given by American women's suffrage activist Helen Todd and published in 1911, and later set to music.