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Special pages :
On the Cigar-Workers' Strike in Antwerp
| Author(s) | Frederick Engels |
|---|---|
| Written | 5 April 1871 |
Printed according to the newspaper
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 22
Marx and Engels learned about the strike of the cigar-workers in Antwerp from the letter written by Ph. Coenen, an organiser of the International’s sections in Belgium and the Netherlands, on March 29, 1871. They immediately took steps to organise international aid to the strikers. At the General Council meeting of April 4, 1871 Engels made a report on the strike, and the Council resolved, on Engels’ proposal, to send letters and delegations to the British trades unions. On April 5, 1871 the General Council issued an address to the British trades unions to give assistance to the Antwerp cigar-workers; it was printed as a separate leaflet signed by Eccarius. That very day, Engels informed Ph. Coenen of this and sent a letter to Liebknecht asking him to provide assistance to the Antwerp cigar-workers, with the given item for Der Volksstaat enclosed (see Engels’ letter to Coenen and Engels’ letter to Liebknecht of April 5, 1871, present edition, Vol. 44).
In response to the General Council’s appeal, material assistance to the Antwerp cigar-workers was provided by a number of British trades unions and the workers of Brussels, where the cigar-workers also went on strike. The aid provided by the General Council to the Antwerp cigar-workers, who came out in defence of their trades union, enabled them to hold out till September 1871, when the manufacturers had to accept their terms.
In Antwerp 500 cigar-workers are out of work. The manufacturers gave them the choice: either to dissolve their trade union (which belongs to the International Working Men’s Association) or to be dismissed. Every one of them without exception decisively rejected this unreasonable demand, and so the manufacturers closed their workshops.
The workers have funds of 6,000 Fr. (1,600 Talers); they have already established contact with the cigar-workers of Holland and England and any influx of workers from these countries is being prevented. From England they are to receive fairly considerable financial aid. £176 (1,200 Talers) has already been sent, and further assistance will be provided. Anyway, the Antwerpers are only asking for an advance, since they say they are in a position to pay back any aid which they are given. If the German cigar-workers or any other trade unions are in a position to offer assistance to their brothers in Antwerp, it is to be hoped that they will not hold back. Remittances should be made to Ph. Coenen, Boomgaardsstraat 3, Antwerp. But, at any rate, it is their duty to stop German cigar-workers moving to Antwerp as long as the manufacturers there insist on their demands.