Note 397 — Chapter V

The Alliance was always administered by an executive elected by the Sheffield trades, the leading men amongst which had been active in its formation. The veteran secretary of the Typographical Society, William Dronfield, was the first general secretary. Among the trades represented were the South Yorkshire and Nottingham Miners, the Amalgamated Tailors, Boilermakers, Cotton-spinners, Scottish Associated Carpenters, Yorkshire Glass-bottle Makers, North of England Ironworkers, and the trades of Wolverhampton. The minute books from 1867 to 1870, and its printed Monthly Statement, show that the Alliance at first supported the men in numerous lock-outs, especially among the tailors, miners, and ironworkers, but that there were constant complaints of unpaid levies. Dronfield informed us that the Judicial Committee and the Executive experienced great difficulties from the absence of any control over the constituent Unions, and the impossibility of accurately defining a lock-out. The first conference of the Alliance was held at Manchester from the 1st to the 4th of January 1867, when fifty-three trades had been enrolled, numbering 59,750 members. The “Rules” adopted at this conference contain an interesting address by Dronfield upon the principles and objects of the federation. The next conference was at Preston in September 1867, when the membership had fallen to 23,580, in forty-seven trades, the Boilermakers, among others, formally withdrawing (Minutes of Conference at Preston, Sheffield, 1867, 16 pp.).