by Mary Easson
‘It would need the cooperation of the nurse,’ commented Mrs Duncan.
‘Dae ye think she’d be up for it?’ Mary obviously feared she would not.
‘Leave the nurse to me. I don’t see how she can refuse if I approach her in the right way. And where the actual classes are concerned, you’d help too, Mrs Birse. As well as making the participants feel at ease, your experience would be invaluable.’
The women nodded their approval. Helping people to help themselves was at the heart of the Co-operative Society’s philosophy. It had attracted them to the organisation in the first place. Passing on some basic knowledge and skills relating to health care had to be a good thing and they were all for it.
Mrs Duncan admired the china cups more than once as we drank our tea and chattered about families and fears for the future, bearing in mind developments in the miners’ dispute. The possibility of the families being evicted, should it come to a strike, was an ever present worry they said, and it made them grateful to have a roof over their heads despite the shortcomings of the accommodation provided in the Rows. I pointed out that a Parliamentary enquiry was being made into the condition of housing in Scotland’s industrial areas with a long period of information-gathering, inevitably, before the report was published in two or three years’ time. It would be a crucial step in the process of improving housing conditions for working people.
‘Mr Doonan, the miners’ agent, has reported on conditions hereaboots, oan oor behalf,’ said Mary.
‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘But why should you have to wait so long for decisions to be made. Pressure should be brought to bear on the landlords, leading to improvements in conditions sooner rather than later.’
‘New raws are put up oan a whim,’ said Mary, ‘An’ they never seem tae be much better than the last lot.’
I decided there and then that I would investigate how the women’s lives might be improved through better housing. It was the beginning of an idea though I didn’t quite know how I would proceed or what I would do with the information once I had it.
‘Surveyors have been seen oan the Rashiepark side o’ the village,’ said Mary sipping her tea. ‘There’s rumours Melville’s puttin’ up raws for the Back o’ Moss workers.’
Suddenly I knew how I might proceed and I’m sure Mary Birse knew too, judging by the hint of a smile on her face. Despite the differences in our circumstances, it seemed we had much in common.
Richard was hovering when it came time to show the visitors the door, keen to see the back of them and have it out with me. But I couldn’t resist the temptation to tease him further. I explained to the women how I had been in the garden earlier when they’d arrived. There was a lot of watering to be done and would they like a tour? My onions were coming on a treat, would be just about ready in time for the Blackrigg Horticultural Show. Mrs Birse and Mrs Broadley seemed particularly interested since their husbands, who kept allotments, would be entering produce for judging as usual. It wouldn’t do them any harm to report back on the competition being lined up at the manse, they admitted. Richard was left fuming as I trailed my visitors through the house and out of the back door.
I visited Rose the next day, late in the afternoon. She had not looked in on Catherine Melville and the new baby though she had been staying with her father for some time by then so I offered to accompany her to Parkgate. Wouldn’t Rose feel better if she took the bull by the horns and put in an appearance? She was interested in the progress of the baby, wasn’t she? Rose said that she was. How could I think that she wouldn’t be? But it wasn’t straightforward, if I thought about it, she said. I did think about it, as I had done so many times since my friend had first revealed her secret to me. I knew from my own experience how complicated and confusing affairs of the heart could be. My stomach churned when I thought about my own situation. But thanks to the Stoneyrigg women, I now had an ulterior motive for visiting the Melvilles and I hoped that Rose would soon give in to my pestering.
After supper with Dr Matheson, Rose packed a bag of overnight things whilst I inspected the garden. A lecture on Women’s Suffrage was being given in the public hall later that evening and we were both keen to attend. It would be easier all round if Rose stayed the night in the manse rather than having to make her way back to Rowanhill afterwards. Besides, we would be able to talk well into the night and we both had plenty to talk about.
Dr Matheson’s garden was well tended so I was full of admiration. It stretched down-slope to where the Red Burn flowed through a deep gorge. I could hear the rushing stream in the bottom of the chasm on the far side of a tall beech hedge that marked the end of the garden ground. Productive vegetable patches and pretty flower beds, with an aviary half way along, were separated by a grassy path that led into a fair sized orchard. I sat on a wooden bench tucked into one corner beside a painted metal gate that gave access to the burn below. It was a sheltered corner and still bright in the early evening sunshine though cloud was building. I closed my eyes letting the birdsong and insects calm me but rustling beyond the hedge soon put me on edge.
I heard him before I saw him – which was strange given that he was sitting on the back of an enormous great horse. I had the feeling that he had been there for quite some time, watching – not me but the house. The beech hedge was dense, impenetrable, but I carefully manoeuvred into position beside a small gap, big enough to see, with an eye on the path back to the safety of the house should that be required. The rider sat breathing hard with his hands on the pommel, whilst his mount took a rest. Ears twitching, alert for the small sounds of a quiet evening, the horse gave a shiver and a snort. Flies were out for blood. He flicked his tail back and forth, head down in a patch of clover.
‘Is someone there?’ the rider said at last.
I cursed myself for a fool. Why could I not stay at peace? I took a deep breath.
‘Dr Matheson?’
Silence.
‘Rose? Is that you?’
It was David Melville’s voice.
I swallowed hard, walked over to the gate. ‘Good evening, David,’ I said, shielding my eyes with a hand against the brightness of the sky.
He looked startled.
‘Lovely evening for a ride-out,’ I remarked.
‘Indeed, Miss Fraser. Such lovely views around here.’
You didn’t come for the views, I thought.
‘Next time I see him, I’ll make a point of complimenting Dr Matheson on his garden. As the warm summer has unfolded, I’ve noticed how the fruit has developed and the flowers have bloomed in an endless succession of colour.’ He sounded awkward.
You come by often, I surmised, but did not reply. Too many thoughts were rushing through my head.
‘Such a delightful place yet so close to the industry that has transformed the community hereabouts,’ he said, filling the gap created by my silence.
Delightful not only because of the garden, I guessed.
‘Well hidden from the brickworks, pits, and ironworks of Mr Imrie’s domain,’ I said quickly, the words out before I knew it.
My remark, reminding him of his father-in-law, seemed to hit him like a sledgehammer. He dug his heels into his mount, much harder than he meant to. The horse took off, galloping furiously along the old coach road until they were out of sight.
I stood, gripping the cold metal gate with both hands.
When we arrived in the village later, Rose and I joined the women at the back of a crowd that had formed in Main Street. A large group of men had collected around the speaker who was a smartly dressed, rather elderly man with a large moustache and a Glasgow accent. A caravan with the word Forward painted in big letters along each side, had parked up on the pavement and the horse grazed a nearby patch of grass. Periodically, a round of applause and ‘Hear, hear!’ sounded out.
An onlooker might assume that Mr Maxwell was speaking to the converted when he set
out his stall as a representative of the Independent Labour Party but many were yet to be swayed, like the worker who complained that they had let the Unionists in by taking votes from the Liberals in recent bi-elections. And another who said that people like him were funded by underpaid miners who had a fight on their hands. Mr Maxwell was undeterred, he had come to bring a message of hope and support to the mining villages of Scotland, engaged as they were in their struggle against the tyranny of capital. He explained that the Labour Party was behind them in their battle with the coalmasters for fair recompense. It was difficult and valuable work they did, work that kept the fires and furnaces of homes and industry lit across the land. Greed was at the heart of the owners’ request for an overall reduction of one shilling in the miners’ daily rates, he raged.
‘Hear, hear!’ called the audience.
Their struggle hadn’t been lost on the people of Glasgow, the speaker assured them, where workers were demanding a living wage and decent housing, just like them. Had they heard about plans in the city for £8 cottages? That got a cheer from the crowd, especially the Stoneyrigg women who were there in some number. Mr Maxwell acknowledged the presence of the women, perhaps mindful of the need to gain their trust and support in the furtherance of the Labour cause. They had been ignored for too long. So he stayed with the housing issue for a while before changing tack.
Why was so much spent on armaments when workers and their children were in such need, he asked? Weren’t the workers of Germany in exactly the same position in their own country? Hadn’t miners across Europe supported the British miners during the 1912 stoppage when they had agreed to resist any moves on the part of the foreign mine owners to flood the British market with their coal, and in so doing they had prevented the miners’ cause here from being undermined, in the best traditions of International Socialism? At the same time, the Liberal government had sold the miners down the river, claiming they were taking a neutral stance to bring the 1912 dispute to an end but, in point of fact, they had come down on the side of the capitalists, acceding to their demands so that nothing of any note was gained by the Federation as a result of the strike. Why had the Liberals’ social reforms taken so long to be passed? The Liberals were merely using reform to protect the status quo!
‘Hear, hear!’ agreed the crowd.
What the working classes needed was more radical measures not reform, he continued. Nationalisation of land and resources, not kowtowing to the landowners.
‘Hear, hear!’
This was also a government that was taking the nation to the brink of war, a war that suited the arms manufacturers and who else? Not you! Not me! Nor our counterparts in other nations! We have no quarrel with the workers of Germany! But we are led by imperialists, whose greed takes them around the world to conquer small nations and peoples who cannot resist, whose riches they seek to plunder; imperialists who compete for trade routes and see conflict as a means of realising their vaulted ambitions. It does not suit them to work for peace for our sakes, when war might bring them greater reward.
‘Hear, hear!’ People in the crowd looked at their friends and neighbours, all nodding in agreement.
A small number of women began to move away from the crowd leaving behind the powerful words of the speaker. Mr Maxwell spoke a great deal of sense, that much was true. He seemed to have the crowd wrapped around his finger and, I have to say, I felt excited by his plea for good sense and social justice, articulated in such a positive and hopeful manner. However, the problem for the women, and many of the men too, was one of means: the means to an end that was satisfactory from their point of view; action that would not jeopardise their ability to put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads, even if that roof was presently damp and invested with vermin. That was the worry. Fighting talk was all very well. But at the end of the day, in spite of Maxwell’s protestations in favour of peace in Europe, fighting talk usually resulted in exactly that – a fight. And always in a fight, someone – usually the weak and defenceless – got hurt.
Women gravitated towards the public hall where another lecture was due to commence. Rose followed them whilst I ran back to the manse with her overnight bag. I eventually took a seat beside her at the front of the hall but in good time for the start of a lecture about the Women’s Movement. I must have looked hot and flustered – I certainly felt it. When I caught my breath, I explained that Richard had kept me talking longer than I had anticipated. It was almost as if he had been trying to keep me back, deliberately, knowing how much I wanted to hear the speaker.
He had been in a frightful mood since the evening of the visit by the Cooperative Women’s Guild and had argued vociferously against any further involvement with them. He had stressed the importance of the kirk remaining neutral in the political sphere. The role of the church was spiritual. Temporal matters should be left to others. It was especially important to avoid being tainted by any hint of socialism which, in his opinion, was the devil’s work. It went against the natural order of things which had been handed down through history from God.
In respect of the classes in nursing the sick at home which I was seeking to instigate, Richard had been stuck for an answer when I asked if he agreed that since it was the family that bore the responsibility for nurturing and caring for its members, the family should be well-informed on such matters. Also, the prevention of ill-health in the first place made practical common sense. How could such a notion be against the natural order of things? Perhaps, I had suggested, when he had thought up one of his convoluted arguments backed up by Scripture, we could resurrect our discussion at some time in the future. Also, if he could explain to me how the subject could be construed as a political one, far less a wholly socialist one, I would be very grateful. Wasn’t good health a goal that everyone aspired to? And something that true Christians could not deny another human being? Helping others aspire to good health could be seen as a manifestation of God’s Love through the work of His church in the community. Yes? Therefore, how could the spiritual be seen as separate from the temporal? Weren’t the two inextricably linked by the human condition? Didn’t the church have views about how people lived; how they were treated by their neighbours; about morality and good and evil? Yes, it most certainly did. And wasn’t the Cooperative Movement a logical development that sat well with temperance and personal responsibility, regularly preached from the pulpit? In fact, I had added finally, he would do well to reach out to the Cooperative Guild and offer them the use of the church hall, free of charge, for the classes. It would reflect well on the church and on him personally, as a man of the cloth, would it not?
My questions often came too quickly for him and he would retreat into his study to construct a sermon full of carefully crafted arguments and answers, at which he was very skilled.
Rose had listened patiently to my rant. She patted my hand to show support and admiration for my perseverance with Richard. Rose and I increasingly discussed matters of social and political importance, when we had the opportunity. Later, we would discuss what we had heard at the Forward Van. It was a pity the two events had been organised for the same evening but our ears pricked up when Miss Mutch appeared on the stage ready to deliver her talk about the history of the struggle for women’s suffrage.
The audience was rapt from the very start as the speaker gave an historical overview of women’s struggle for freedom, beginning with the loss of rights in earlier times that had resulted in the female sex being regarded as frivolous and having no opinion worthy of merit. This had induced prejudice and inequality in education, opportunity and inheritance, a situation that had proved very difficult to remedy.
Miss Mutch followed with a long list of the advances already made by brave women who had challenged such obvious injustices, standing in the face of ridicule and vested interest. This was what was being called the season of silent growth, essential groundwork that made Votes for Women possible. Although parliamentary
bills and amendments had been defeated repeatedly since the 1860s, it was only a matter of time before legislation was enacted for women’s suffrage, claimed Miss Mutch. In addition to the progress already made, women would continue showing their capabilities in many fields and Votes for Women, when granted, would open the floodgates giving access to all spheres of social, political, and commercial life which had been deprived of the opinion and experience of the female sex for far too long, to the great detriment of society as a whole.
‘We merely wish to take our place in the world,’ concluded Miss Mutch, an hour later. ‘Free to be citizens of our country, to contribute to the society we live in, to use our talents – and we have many – for the greater good of all. Who could not agree?’
Miss Foulkes agreed wholeheartedly, starting the applause with a cheer. Her colleagues from the local branch of the Women’s Freedom League joined in. Rose stood up in the front row provoking others to follow, including the handful of men present. I felt compelled to join them. But the response from many in the audience was simply cordial, the more enthusiastic tempered by the more sceptical. Their lack of passion confounded me.
There were few questions. Miss Mutch had spoken a great deal of sense, certainly. Some did not wish to disturb the clarity of her argument with awkward questions. Others, who had been left with a sharp dislocation within their sense of self, when all that they had come to believe about their sex had been deconstructed by the lecture, were left too confused to articulate their thoughts in such a public place. They would pick holes in the woman and her arguments later when they had had time to think, behind closed doors. But Isabelle Melville felt riled enough to put in her tuppence-worth about the methods employed by the suffragettes. The message of the women’s movement, which did have some merit in her opinion, was lost in the outrage felt by right-minded people. It had been such an inconvenience to Lady Moffat when all of the telephone wires around Blairhall had been cut earlier in the spring and wasn’t such anarchy a threat to social order, something to be resisted by us all? Also, the bomb hoax that had delayed proceedings of the Bo’ness Town Council had been an attack on local democracy when one thought about it, she added. She was delighted when Miss Silver shouted Well said! Isabelle did not require a debate from Miss Mutch and swept out of the hall.