Note 352 — Chapter IV

The largest and most powerful of the other Unions in 1851 were those of the Ironfounders and the Stonemasons, which numbered between four and five thousand members each. It must be remembered that the previous ephemeral associations of the cotton-spinners and miners, which often for a time counted their tens of thousands of members, were exclusively strike organisations, with contributions of 1d. or 2d. per week only. The huge associations of 1830-34 had usually no regular subscription at all, and depended on irregularly paid levies. A trade society which, like the Amalgamated Engineers, could count on a regular income of £500 a week was without precedent.