IOO YEARS AGO THIS WEEK (24th - 30th MAY 1921)
This week's stories include the large-scale thieving from an old Sutton munitions works, the Clock Face miner with an extraordinary international background, the benefit cheque presented to a longstanding Saints scrum-half and a tragedy at Rainford that demonstrated the need for a bypass.
The week began with some bad news for many in St Helens. The Sunday postal delivery service was being axed from next month! People had long been used to 7-day-a week letter deliveries (even on Christmas Day!) and in reporting the decision the Liverpool Echo wrote: "There are some to whom a Sunday without letters has always seemed to be unthinkable." The axing of Sunday post and raising of some prices (such as the cost of sending postcards from 1d to 1½d) was because the Post Office was losing money. The Daily Mail had recently criticised the GPO, demanding that it should be run more on a proper business footing. Sounds familiar? There'll be more on what the Echo called "The Wobbly Post" next month.
The Sutton Bond munitions plant in Lancots Lane (pictured above) had operated out of the old Sutton Glassworks site and it closed down shortly after the end of the war. But fully decommissioning the works was taking a long time and only last November there had been another sale in Sutton of surplus stuff. These included 495 chairs, 573 strong benches, 60 tables, 500 mugs, 226 towels, plus 2,400 plates and basins. And only recently during the miners' strike, the Government had been flogging off old ammunition boxes at Sutton Bond for 10 shillings a ton, which many buyers would have used as a substitute for coal.
But there was clearly a lot more stuff still in the stores in Lancots Lane and some folk thought it wouldn't do any harm to help themselves to it. They were wrong! On the 24th thirteen men (seven from St Helens) appeared before St Helens Police Court charged with stealing Government property. Exactly what was taken was not stated in the reports but it amounted to £124, which was a lot of money. Some of the accused had been members of the Royal Defence Corps and had been guarding the stores during the miners strike.
The men were alleged to have secreted some of the stolen items in boilers, stoves, and other places about the works waiting for an opportunity to remove them. I expect they felt the items were going spare but the taking of them was treated seriously and they were all committed to the next Liverpool Assizes where sentences could be severe.
Cowley School was advertising for a new headmaster on the 24th with its advert in the Yorkshire Post saying: "The School is maintained by the St. Helens Borough Council, and is a recognised Secondary School with an Advanced Course in Science and Mathematics. The building was erected in 1912, and there are good Playing Fields." The successful applicant would have a commencing salary of £700 per annum, rising by £50 increments to £900.
Before the building of the Rainford By-pass in the late 1930s, the narrow and winding St Helens Road needed to be used by those travelling north out of the town. Before turning right towards Rainford, commuters would pass the separate clay works and pipe works at Hill Top on their left and the Bottle and Glass pub on their right. The latter was where Harold Holland's inquest was held. The 32-year-old from Haresfinch did not appear to have been very familiar with the layout of the area, something that cost him his life.
He had been a foreman glass bottle gatherer but – like many others in St Helens – had been placed on short time due to the ongoing coal strike. Harold was fortunate to be able to obtain some temporary work as a labourer at the Rainford clay pits. However on the day after first starting his employment, Harold was run down by a heavy motor lorry upon leaving the works. The driver, John Robinson, claimed to have only been doing six or seven miles an hour and the coroner, after viewing where the accident had taken place, exonerated him from blame. He said motorists driving along the road would scarcely expect any traffic coming out of this narrow lane. The coroner's comments underlined the need for a bypass – although that would take twenty more years.
The annual meeting of the St Helens Rugby Football Club was held during the evening of the 26th in the Co-operative Hall in Baldwin Street (pictured above). Playing for Saints was not very lucrative but long-serving players were entitled to a benefit season. Last year it had been the turn of Fred Trenwith who'd been a scrum-half at the club for 13 years but had now retired. The 34-year-old received a cheque for £164, which was a considerable sum. At his job at an iron or leadworks in St Helens, Fred was probably earning around £3 to £4 per week.
Alex Service of Saints Heritage Society has written this about Fred Trenwith: "Fred was a tough, combative little so-and-so, who could tackle well above his own weight, very much in the Tommy Bishop category. A local firm once offered an overcoat to any Saints' player who scored three tries in a match. Trenny had already scored two tries, when he was carried off the field.
"“They took me over the touchline and didn't want me to go back,” he recalled later. “I said I still needed another try to get the overcoat, and when they weren't looking, I dodged onto the field and managed to score the third just before time.”" That was in the pre-substitute / interchange era and the firm would have been Stewart's "The King Tailors" which had a branch in Church Street.
The St Helens Eisteddfod took place at the Town Hall on the 28th and was well attended with the Welsh performers praised for the quality of their singing.
An extraordinary article from an intellectual coal miner from Clock Face was printed in the St Helens Newspaper this week. It was largely about the art of learning but the piece so impressed the Newspaper that they decided to interview the author, who told a remarkable tale: "My name is really Alexander Nevelsky. I am a Pole by birth – born in the much disputed at present city of Wilna [aka Vilnius]. At the age of twenty I, owing to political persecutions, had to leave the country, and in October, 1904, landed in Liverpool penniless, friendless, destitute, and not knowing a word of the English language.
"I struggled on for a time doing the best I could to keep myself alive, but the times were bad, and I could not get regular employment, so I went to sea, and sailed about South America, Africa, and the far East, with many and various adventures, such as taking part in many a battle between crew and the skipper for bad treatment and underfeeding, etc., and on one such occasion I was imprisoned in a Mexican State prison, which is a marvellous institution. In 1908 I returned to England and worked down coal mines. In 1914 I enlisted and spent two years in the trenches and have been wounded.
"In 1917-18 I was in Russia on war propaganda, and travelled twenty-five thousand miles lecturing. There I have seen some of the darkest sides of revolution, and also the Communistic Idealism in practice having spent some time in the Red Prison. Besides Russia I lectured in this country, France, and Belgium. Now I am getting, or should be getting coal again."
The coal strike was, of course, preventing Alexander from undertaking his occupation. In the 1911 census the 29-year-old was boarding in Walkers Lane and stating his birthplace as Vilna, Russia. In the 1939 Register (census), now married, Alexander was living in Fleet Lane.
And finally my now customary non-St Helens news article that caught my eye in the Liverpool Echo this week. It was another shocking story about the Ku Klux Klan, which was published under the headline "Night Riders Of Texas": "Masked raiders, after the manner of the Ku Klux Klan, who claim as their object the “upholding of the supremacy of the white race,” have been spreading terror in various parts of the State of Texas. Whites and negroes alike who come under their displeasure have been subjected to tarring and feathering and other more painful and serious indignations. Despite the efforts of the local and State police not a single arrest has yet been made.
"Mr. Bertram Hobbs, a lawyer, of Houston (Texas), who has appeared as counsel in several negro divorce cases, was taken from his house, tarred and feathered, and ordered to leave the city. In Dallas, another leading city of the State, a negro porter was seized on the streets, whisked out of the city, severely beaten, and left on the roadside after the initials “K. K. K.” had been branded on his forehead with acid. A white doctor of Beaumont was kidnapped from his home, tarred and feathered, and thrown out of his motor-car in the centre of the business section of the city. Many other cases have occurred in other towns."
Next week's stories will include uproar at a Town Council meeting, a St Helens bigamy case, the Sinn Fein telephone wire cutting and forty-eight miners are summoned to court for ruining a Parr farmer's field after digging for coal.
The week began with some bad news for many in St Helens. The Sunday postal delivery service was being axed from next month! People had long been used to 7-day-a week letter deliveries (even on Christmas Day!) and in reporting the decision the Liverpool Echo wrote: "There are some to whom a Sunday without letters has always seemed to be unthinkable." The axing of Sunday post and raising of some prices (such as the cost of sending postcards from 1d to 1½d) was because the Post Office was losing money. The Daily Mail had recently criticised the GPO, demanding that it should be run more on a proper business footing. Sounds familiar? There'll be more on what the Echo called "The Wobbly Post" next month.
But there was clearly a lot more stuff still in the stores in Lancots Lane and some folk thought it wouldn't do any harm to help themselves to it. They were wrong! On the 24th thirteen men (seven from St Helens) appeared before St Helens Police Court charged with stealing Government property. Exactly what was taken was not stated in the reports but it amounted to £124, which was a lot of money. Some of the accused had been members of the Royal Defence Corps and had been guarding the stores during the miners strike.
The men were alleged to have secreted some of the stolen items in boilers, stoves, and other places about the works waiting for an opportunity to remove them. I expect they felt the items were going spare but the taking of them was treated seriously and they were all committed to the next Liverpool Assizes where sentences could be severe.
Cowley School was advertising for a new headmaster on the 24th with its advert in the Yorkshire Post saying: "The School is maintained by the St. Helens Borough Council, and is a recognised Secondary School with an Advanced Course in Science and Mathematics. The building was erected in 1912, and there are good Playing Fields." The successful applicant would have a commencing salary of £700 per annum, rising by £50 increments to £900.
Before the building of the Rainford By-pass in the late 1930s, the narrow and winding St Helens Road needed to be used by those travelling north out of the town. Before turning right towards Rainford, commuters would pass the separate clay works and pipe works at Hill Top on their left and the Bottle and Glass pub on their right. The latter was where Harold Holland's inquest was held. The 32-year-old from Haresfinch did not appear to have been very familiar with the layout of the area, something that cost him his life.
He had been a foreman glass bottle gatherer but – like many others in St Helens – had been placed on short time due to the ongoing coal strike. Harold was fortunate to be able to obtain some temporary work as a labourer at the Rainford clay pits. However on the day after first starting his employment, Harold was run down by a heavy motor lorry upon leaving the works. The driver, John Robinson, claimed to have only been doing six or seven miles an hour and the coroner, after viewing where the accident had taken place, exonerated him from blame. He said motorists driving along the road would scarcely expect any traffic coming out of this narrow lane. The coroner's comments underlined the need for a bypass – although that would take twenty more years.
Alex Service of Saints Heritage Society has written this about Fred Trenwith: "Fred was a tough, combative little so-and-so, who could tackle well above his own weight, very much in the Tommy Bishop category. A local firm once offered an overcoat to any Saints' player who scored three tries in a match. Trenny had already scored two tries, when he was carried off the field.
"“They took me over the touchline and didn't want me to go back,” he recalled later. “I said I still needed another try to get the overcoat, and when they weren't looking, I dodged onto the field and managed to score the third just before time.”" That was in the pre-substitute / interchange era and the firm would have been Stewart's "The King Tailors" which had a branch in Church Street.
The St Helens Eisteddfod took place at the Town Hall on the 28th and was well attended with the Welsh performers praised for the quality of their singing.
An extraordinary article from an intellectual coal miner from Clock Face was printed in the St Helens Newspaper this week. It was largely about the art of learning but the piece so impressed the Newspaper that they decided to interview the author, who told a remarkable tale: "My name is really Alexander Nevelsky. I am a Pole by birth – born in the much disputed at present city of Wilna [aka Vilnius]. At the age of twenty I, owing to political persecutions, had to leave the country, and in October, 1904, landed in Liverpool penniless, friendless, destitute, and not knowing a word of the English language.
"I struggled on for a time doing the best I could to keep myself alive, but the times were bad, and I could not get regular employment, so I went to sea, and sailed about South America, Africa, and the far East, with many and various adventures, such as taking part in many a battle between crew and the skipper for bad treatment and underfeeding, etc., and on one such occasion I was imprisoned in a Mexican State prison, which is a marvellous institution. In 1908 I returned to England and worked down coal mines. In 1914 I enlisted and spent two years in the trenches and have been wounded.
"In 1917-18 I was in Russia on war propaganda, and travelled twenty-five thousand miles lecturing. There I have seen some of the darkest sides of revolution, and also the Communistic Idealism in practice having spent some time in the Red Prison. Besides Russia I lectured in this country, France, and Belgium. Now I am getting, or should be getting coal again."
The coal strike was, of course, preventing Alexander from undertaking his occupation. In the 1911 census the 29-year-old was boarding in Walkers Lane and stating his birthplace as Vilna, Russia. In the 1939 Register (census), now married, Alexander was living in Fleet Lane.
And finally my now customary non-St Helens news article that caught my eye in the Liverpool Echo this week. It was another shocking story about the Ku Klux Klan, which was published under the headline "Night Riders Of Texas": "Masked raiders, after the manner of the Ku Klux Klan, who claim as their object the “upholding of the supremacy of the white race,” have been spreading terror in various parts of the State of Texas. Whites and negroes alike who come under their displeasure have been subjected to tarring and feathering and other more painful and serious indignations. Despite the efforts of the local and State police not a single arrest has yet been made.
"Mr. Bertram Hobbs, a lawyer, of Houston (Texas), who has appeared as counsel in several negro divorce cases, was taken from his house, tarred and feathered, and ordered to leave the city. In Dallas, another leading city of the State, a negro porter was seized on the streets, whisked out of the city, severely beaten, and left on the roadside after the initials “K. K. K.” had been branded on his forehead with acid. A white doctor of Beaumont was kidnapped from his home, tarred and feathered, and thrown out of his motor-car in the centre of the business section of the city. Many other cases have occurred in other towns."
Next week's stories will include uproar at a Town Council meeting, a St Helens bigamy case, the Sinn Fein telephone wire cutting and forty-eight miners are summoned to court for ruining a Parr farmer's field after digging for coal.
This week's stories include the large-scale thieving from an old Sutton munitions works, the Clock Face miner with an extraordinary international background, the benefit cheque presented to a longstanding Saints scrum-half and a tragedy at Rainford that demonstrated the need for a bypass.
The week began with some bad news for many in St Helens. The Sunday postal delivery service was being axed from next month!
People had long been used to 7-day-a week letter deliveries (even on Christmas Day!) and in reporting the decision the Liverpool Echo wrote:
"There are some to whom a Sunday without letters has always seemed to be unthinkable."
The axing of Sunday post and raising of some prices (such as the cost of sending postcards from 1d to 1½d) was because the Post Office was losing money.
The Daily Mail had recently criticised the GPO, demanding that it should be run more on a proper business footing. Sounds familiar? There'll be more on what the Echo called "The Wobbly Post" next month.
The Sutton Bond munitions plant in Lancots Lane (pictured above) had operated out of the old Sutton Glassworks site and it closed down shortly after the end of the war.
But fully decommissioning the works was taking a long time and only last November there had been another sale in Sutton of surplus stuff.
These included 495 chairs, 573 strong benches, 60 tables, 500 mugs, 226 towels, plus 2,400 plates and basins.
And only recently during the miners' strike, the Government had been flogging off old ammunition boxes at Sutton Bond for 10 shillings a ton, which many buyers would have used as a substitute for coal.
But there was clearly a lot more stuff still in the stores in Lancots Lane and some folk thought it wouldn't do any harm to help themselves to it. They were wrong!
On the 24th thirteen men (seven from St Helens) appeared before St Helens Police Court charged with stealing Government property.
Exactly what was taken was not stated in the reports but it amounted to £124, which was a lot of money.
Some of the accused had been members of the Royal Defence Corps and had been guarding the stores during the miners strike.
The men were alleged to have secreted some of the stolen items in boilers, stoves, and other places about the works waiting for an opportunity to remove them.
I expect they felt the items were going spare but the taking of them was treated seriously and they were all committed to the next Liverpool Assizes where sentences could be severe.
Cowley School was advertising for a new headmaster on the 24th with its advert in the Yorkshire Post saying:
"The School is maintained by the St. Helens Borough Council, and is a recognised Secondary School with an Advanced Course in Science and Mathematics.
"The building was erected in 1912, and there are good Playing Fields."
The successful applicant would have a commencing salary of £700 per annum, rising by £50 increments to £900.
Before the building of the Rainford By-pass in the late 1930s, the narrow and winding St Helens Road needed to be used by those travelling north out of the town.
Before turning right towards Rainford, commuters would pass the separate clay works and pipe works at Hill Top on their left and the Bottle and Glass pub on their right.
The latter was where Harold Holland's inquest was held. The 32-year-old from Haresfinch did not appear to have been very familiar with the layout of the area, something that cost him his life.
He had been a foreman glass bottle gatherer but – like many others in St Helens – had been placed on short time due to the ongoing coal strike.
Harold was fortunate to be able to obtain some temporary work as a labourer at the Rainford clay pits.
However on the day after first starting his employment, Harold was run down by a heavy motor lorry upon leaving the works.
The driver, John Robinson, claimed to have only been doing six or seven miles an hour and the coroner, after viewing where the accident had taken place, exonerated him from blame.
He said motorists driving along the road would scarcely expect any traffic coming out of this narrow lane.
The coroner's comments underlined the need for a bypass – although that would take twenty more years.
The annual meeting of the St Helens Rugby Football Club was held during the evening of the 26th in the Co-operative Hall in Baldwin Street (pictured above).
Playing for Saints was not very lucrative but long-serving players were entitled to a benefit season.
Last year it had been the turn of Fred Trenwith who'd been a scrum-half at the club for 13 years but had now retired.
The 34-year-old received a cheque for £164, which was a considerable sum. At his job at an iron or leadworks in St Helens, Fred was probably earning around £3 to £4 per week.
Alex Service of Saints Heritage Society has written this about Fred Trenwith:
"Fred was a tough, combative little so-and-so, who could tackle well above his own weight, very much in the Tommy Bishop category.
"A local firm once offered an overcoat to any Saints' player who scored three tries in a match.
"Trenny had already scored two tries, when he was carried off the field. “They took me over the touchline and didn't want me to go back,” he recalled later.
"“I said I still needed another try to get the overcoat, and when they weren't looking, I dodged onto the field and managed to score the third just before time.”"
That was in the pre-substitute / interchange era and the firm would have been Stewart's "The King Tailors" which had a branch in Church Street.
The St Helens Eisteddfod took place at the Town Hall on the 28th and was well attended with the Welsh performers praised for the quality of their singing.
An extraordinary article from an intellectual coal miner from Clock Face was printed in the St Helens Newspaper this week.
It was largely about the art of learning but the piece so impressed the Newspaper that they decided to interview the author, who told a remarkable tale:
"My name is really Alexander Nevelsky. I am a Pole by birth – born in the much disputed at present city of Wilna [aka Vilnius].
"At the age of twenty I, owing to political persecutions, had to leave the country, and in October, 1904, landed in Liverpool penniless, friendless, destitute, and not knowing a word of the English language.
"I struggled on for a time doing the best I could to keep myself alive, but the times were bad, and I could not get regular employment, so I went to sea, and sailed about South America, Africa, and the far East, with many and various adventures, such as taking part in many a battle between crew and the skipper for bad treatment and underfeeding, etc., and on one such occasion I was imprisoned in a Mexican State prison, which is a marvellous institution.
"In 1908 I returned to England and worked down coal mines. In 1914 I enlisted and spent two years in the trenches and have been wounded.
"In 1917-18 I was in Russia on war propaganda, and travelled twenty-five thousand miles lecturing. There I have seen some of the darkest sides of revolution, and also the Communistic Idealism in practice having spent some time in the Red Prison.
"Besides Russia I lectured in this country, France, and Belgium. Now I am getting, or should be getting coal again."
The coal strike was, of course, preventing Alexander from undertaking his occupation.
In the 1911 census the 29-year-old was boarding in Walkers Lane and stating his birthplace as Vilna, Russia. In the 1939 Register (census), now married, Alexander was living in Fleet Lane.
And finally my now customary non-St Helens news article that caught my eye in the Liverpool Echo this week.
It was another shocking story about the Ku Klux Klan, which was published under the headline "Night Riders Of Texas":
"Masked raiders, after the manner of the Ku Klux Klan, who claim as their object the “upholding of the supremacy of the white race,” have been spreading terror in various parts of the State of Texas.
"Whites and negroes alike who come under their displeasure have been subjected to tarring and feathering and other more painful and serious indignations.
"Despite the efforts of the local and State police not a single arrest has yet been made.
"Mr. Bertram Hobbs, a lawyer, of Houston (Texas), who has appeared as counsel in several negro divorce cases, was taken from his house, tarred and feathered, and ordered to leave the city.
"In Dallas, another leading city of the State, a negro porter was seized on the streets, whisked out of the city, severely beaten, and left on the roadside after the initials “K. K. K.” had been branded on his forehead with acid.
"A white doctor of Beaumont was kidnapped from his home, tarred and feathered, and thrown out of his motor-car in the centre of the business section of the city. Many other cases have occurred in other towns."
Next week's stories will include uproar at a Town Council meeting, a St Helens bigamy case, the Sinn Fein telephone wire cutting and forty-eight miners are summoned to court for ruining a Parr farmer's field after digging for coal.
The week began with some bad news for many in St Helens. The Sunday postal delivery service was being axed from next month!
People had long been used to 7-day-a week letter deliveries (even on Christmas Day!) and in reporting the decision the Liverpool Echo wrote:
"There are some to whom a Sunday without letters has always seemed to be unthinkable."
The axing of Sunday post and raising of some prices (such as the cost of sending postcards from 1d to 1½d) was because the Post Office was losing money.
The Daily Mail had recently criticised the GPO, demanding that it should be run more on a proper business footing. Sounds familiar? There'll be more on what the Echo called "The Wobbly Post" next month.
But fully decommissioning the works was taking a long time and only last November there had been another sale in Sutton of surplus stuff.
These included 495 chairs, 573 strong benches, 60 tables, 500 mugs, 226 towels, plus 2,400 plates and basins.
And only recently during the miners' strike, the Government had been flogging off old ammunition boxes at Sutton Bond for 10 shillings a ton, which many buyers would have used as a substitute for coal.
But there was clearly a lot more stuff still in the stores in Lancots Lane and some folk thought it wouldn't do any harm to help themselves to it. They were wrong!
On the 24th thirteen men (seven from St Helens) appeared before St Helens Police Court charged with stealing Government property.
Exactly what was taken was not stated in the reports but it amounted to £124, which was a lot of money.
Some of the accused had been members of the Royal Defence Corps and had been guarding the stores during the miners strike.
The men were alleged to have secreted some of the stolen items in boilers, stoves, and other places about the works waiting for an opportunity to remove them.
I expect they felt the items were going spare but the taking of them was treated seriously and they were all committed to the next Liverpool Assizes where sentences could be severe.
Cowley School was advertising for a new headmaster on the 24th with its advert in the Yorkshire Post saying:
"The School is maintained by the St. Helens Borough Council, and is a recognised Secondary School with an Advanced Course in Science and Mathematics.
"The building was erected in 1912, and there are good Playing Fields."
The successful applicant would have a commencing salary of £700 per annum, rising by £50 increments to £900.
Before the building of the Rainford By-pass in the late 1930s, the narrow and winding St Helens Road needed to be used by those travelling north out of the town.
Before turning right towards Rainford, commuters would pass the separate clay works and pipe works at Hill Top on their left and the Bottle and Glass pub on their right.
The latter was where Harold Holland's inquest was held. The 32-year-old from Haresfinch did not appear to have been very familiar with the layout of the area, something that cost him his life.
He had been a foreman glass bottle gatherer but – like many others in St Helens – had been placed on short time due to the ongoing coal strike.
Harold was fortunate to be able to obtain some temporary work as a labourer at the Rainford clay pits.
However on the day after first starting his employment, Harold was run down by a heavy motor lorry upon leaving the works.
The driver, John Robinson, claimed to have only been doing six or seven miles an hour and the coroner, after viewing where the accident had taken place, exonerated him from blame.
He said motorists driving along the road would scarcely expect any traffic coming out of this narrow lane.
The coroner's comments underlined the need for a bypass – although that would take twenty more years.
Playing for Saints was not very lucrative but long-serving players were entitled to a benefit season.
Last year it had been the turn of Fred Trenwith who'd been a scrum-half at the club for 13 years but had now retired.
The 34-year-old received a cheque for £164, which was a considerable sum. At his job at an iron or leadworks in St Helens, Fred was probably earning around £3 to £4 per week.
Alex Service of Saints Heritage Society has written this about Fred Trenwith:
"Fred was a tough, combative little so-and-so, who could tackle well above his own weight, very much in the Tommy Bishop category.
"A local firm once offered an overcoat to any Saints' player who scored three tries in a match.
"Trenny had already scored two tries, when he was carried off the field. “They took me over the touchline and didn't want me to go back,” he recalled later.
"“I said I still needed another try to get the overcoat, and when they weren't looking, I dodged onto the field and managed to score the third just before time.”"
That was in the pre-substitute / interchange era and the firm would have been Stewart's "The King Tailors" which had a branch in Church Street.
The St Helens Eisteddfod took place at the Town Hall on the 28th and was well attended with the Welsh performers praised for the quality of their singing.
An extraordinary article from an intellectual coal miner from Clock Face was printed in the St Helens Newspaper this week.
It was largely about the art of learning but the piece so impressed the Newspaper that they decided to interview the author, who told a remarkable tale:
"My name is really Alexander Nevelsky. I am a Pole by birth – born in the much disputed at present city of Wilna [aka Vilnius].
"At the age of twenty I, owing to political persecutions, had to leave the country, and in October, 1904, landed in Liverpool penniless, friendless, destitute, and not knowing a word of the English language.
"I struggled on for a time doing the best I could to keep myself alive, but the times were bad, and I could not get regular employment, so I went to sea, and sailed about South America, Africa, and the far East, with many and various adventures, such as taking part in many a battle between crew and the skipper for bad treatment and underfeeding, etc., and on one such occasion I was imprisoned in a Mexican State prison, which is a marvellous institution.
"In 1908 I returned to England and worked down coal mines. In 1914 I enlisted and spent two years in the trenches and have been wounded.
"In 1917-18 I was in Russia on war propaganda, and travelled twenty-five thousand miles lecturing. There I have seen some of the darkest sides of revolution, and also the Communistic Idealism in practice having spent some time in the Red Prison.
"Besides Russia I lectured in this country, France, and Belgium. Now I am getting, or should be getting coal again."
The coal strike was, of course, preventing Alexander from undertaking his occupation.
In the 1911 census the 29-year-old was boarding in Walkers Lane and stating his birthplace as Vilna, Russia. In the 1939 Register (census), now married, Alexander was living in Fleet Lane.
And finally my now customary non-St Helens news article that caught my eye in the Liverpool Echo this week.
It was another shocking story about the Ku Klux Klan, which was published under the headline "Night Riders Of Texas":
"Masked raiders, after the manner of the Ku Klux Klan, who claim as their object the “upholding of the supremacy of the white race,” have been spreading terror in various parts of the State of Texas.
"Whites and negroes alike who come under their displeasure have been subjected to tarring and feathering and other more painful and serious indignations.
"Despite the efforts of the local and State police not a single arrest has yet been made.
"Mr. Bertram Hobbs, a lawyer, of Houston (Texas), who has appeared as counsel in several negro divorce cases, was taken from his house, tarred and feathered, and ordered to leave the city.
"In Dallas, another leading city of the State, a negro porter was seized on the streets, whisked out of the city, severely beaten, and left on the roadside after the initials “K. K. K.” had been branded on his forehead with acid.
"A white doctor of Beaumont was kidnapped from his home, tarred and feathered, and thrown out of his motor-car in the centre of the business section of the city. Many other cases have occurred in other towns."
Next week's stories will include uproar at a Town Council meeting, a St Helens bigamy case, the Sinn Fein telephone wire cutting and forty-eight miners are summoned to court for ruining a Parr farmer's field after digging for coal.