The 1891 Shearers' Strike is one of Australia's most important industrial disputes. Working conditions for sheep shearers in 19th century Australia were atrocious. In 1891 wool was one of Australia's largest industries. But as the wool industry grew, so did the number and influence of shearers.
By 1890, the Australian Shearers’ Union boasted tens of thousands of members, and had unionised thousands of sheds. At their annual conference in Bourke in 1890, the Union laid down a new rule, which prohibited members from working with non-union workers. Soon after, shearers at Jondaryan Station on the Darling Downs went on strike over this issue. As non-union labour was still able to process the wool, the Jondaryan shearers called for help. The Rockhampton wharfies responded and refused to touch the Jondaryan wool. The unionists won the battle.
This galvanised the squatters, and they formed the Pastoralists’ Federal Council, to counter the strength of the unions. The battle lines were drawn, conflict was not far away; the only question was where and when.
On January 5, 1891 the shearers announced a strike until the following demands for a contract were met:
The strike spread quickly and from February through until May, central Queensland was on the brink of civil war.
Striking shearers formed armed camps outside of towns. Thousands of armed soldiers protected non-union labour and arrested strike leaders. The unionists retaliated by raiding shearing sheds, harassing non-union labour and committing acts of sabotage, although the incidents of actual violence or arson were few.
Typical of the action, on the 28th of March 1891 dozens of shearers including a strong band of union leaders were arrested in towns nearest to the shearers’ camps. Eleven strikers, with three union leaders among them, were arrested at the Clermont railway station. Mr Griffin, Mr Taylor and Mr Stewart, who all hold high-ranking union positions at the Sandy Creek Camp, were arrested and charged with conspiracy. A short-lived scuffle broke out between police and two of the men, Taylor and Stewart. The handcuffed trio were then marched through the town under heavy police guard.
Eight more union shearers were arrested and charged with causing a riot when they tried to prevent free labourers from travelling to work at Peak Downs.
In a carefully planned police operation, another seven shearers were arrested in Barcaldine. Around noon, two divisions of mounted infantry formed a line outside the union office in the town’s main street, virtually hemming in a large crowd of onlookers who were mainly unionists. A detachment of the mounted infantry then rode to the office door as a contingent of police walked through the mounted lines and into the office, arresting five men: Thomas Ryan, Michael Murphy, William Fothergill, Hugh Blackwell and William Bennett. The prisoners were then marched across the street into the police station where they were charged with conspiracy. The formal charge being conspiracy with the aforementioned Mr Taylor and others to commit an unlawful act; to wit, to unlawfully prevent certain of Her Majesty’s subjects from following their lawful occupation’. The five men were immediately put in the cells. Two more men were arrested on the same charge several hours later.
Tales of intimidation of strike-breakers and disturbing reports of violence in the bush are commonplace in many Queensland towns. Incidents of paddocks being set on fire, fences destroyed and houses, barns and woolsheds being torched have been revealed during the many court cases.
The shearers were fighting for the exclusive use of union labour to become standard policy among employers and wanted individual shearers to work on terms agreed between union officials and employers. The gulf between the pastoralists and shearers could not be wider as the employers cling to their demand for the right to negotiate with both union and non-union labour.
One of the first Mayday marches in the world took place during the strike on 1 May 1891 in Barcaldine. The Sydney Morning Herald reported that 1340 men took part of whom 618 were mounted on horse. Banners carried included those of the Australian Labor Federation, the Shearers' and Carriers' Unions, and one inscribed 'Young Australia'. The leaders wore blue sashes and the Eureka Flag was carried. The "Labor Bulletin" reported that cheers were given for "the Union", "the Eight-hour day", "the Strike Committee" and "the boys in gaol".
But the shearers were unable to hold out. The summer had been unseasonably wet, and the strike was poorly timed for maximum effect on the shearing season (winter). The union camps were full of hungry penniless shearers.
In August 1891, the Pastoralists emerged the victors at the conclusion of a two-day conference which effectively signalled the end of the shearers’ strike. After a bitter and often violent five-month feud, representatives of the Amalgamated Shearers’ Union and the Pastoralists’ Union finally met and drew up an agreement which was in fact a total cave-in by the Shearers’ Union.
Dozens, possibly hundreds of workers were arrested for their part in the fight against freedom of contract arrangements but the new agreement was based totally on that very principle - that employers may employ any form of labour they choose, be it union or non-union.
The pastoralists regarded the resolution as proof of the unquestionable’ right of every employer to employ whom he pleases, as well as the ‘unquestionable’ right of every man to work for his livelihood.
Speaking at the conclusion of the conference, Shearers’ Union leader Mr W. G. Spence backed down from his previous position, branding strikes as ‘barbarous’.
But the employers’ victory was hollow, Labour politician Mr Thomas Glassey told the Queensland Parliament. ‘It simply means that the man who has the most money and the best social position is ting to enforce his will, and that the man who has nothing but his labour to sell, must accept the terms offered or starve. The freedom rests with the man of means; the contract with the man who has no means,’ Mr Glassey said.
Thirteen union leaders were charged with sedition and conspiracy, taken to Rockhampton for the trial, convicted, and sentenced to three years in gaol on St Helena Island Prison.
The squatters had won this time, but it had proved a costly exercise.
The 1891 Shearers Strike is credited as being one of the factors for the formation of the Australian Labor Party.
Henry Lawson's well known poem, Freedom on the Wallaby, was written as a comment on the strike and published by William Lane in the Worker in Brisbane, May 16, 1891.
Banjo Paterson's song Waltzing Matilda, an unofficial Australian anthem, was also written about this era of shearers' industrial disputes in Queensland.