Alderman Lorenzo 'Len' Edward Quelch (1862 - 1937) - Pioneering Reading Socialist
This entry was contributed by Keith Jerrome.
Born at Hungerford on 5th January 1862: "One winter I had been ill with
what the Doctor called a low fever, and had been in bed for twelve weeks;
getting better I was carried downstairs one afternoon and in the evening
there being no food in the house, and the work my Mother was doing not
being finished, she had no money to get food with. So she sent my elder
brother with her wedding ring to sell and he lost it in the deep snow that
covered the roads at that time. This is the earliest thing in my life that I can
remember." (1)
Soon after his 8th birthday Len was a farm labourer then with long periods
of unemployment worked in Iron Foundries becoming a skilled Iron
Moulder.
A Sunday School Teacher and teetotaller he became increasingly
influenced by his brother Harry (1858-1913), who having left for London became active in
the Social Democratic Federation , the first socialist party.(2) Harry became
General Secretary, editing the newspaper, Justice sharing an office in
Clerkenwell Green with Lenin. Harry Quelch stood as a socialist
candidate in the Reading by-election in 1898, where he gained 270 votes, he was
the first ever socialist standing in a Reading Parliamentary election.
In 1891 LEQ was elected General Secretary of the Berkshire Agricultural
Workers Union following a period of touring the County organising farm
workers from 'Red Vans' belonging to the English Land Restoration
League.(3) In 1893 Union Headquarters were established in Addington Road,
Reading. A decade of activity as a 'Socialist Missionary', representing the
unemployed against the Boards of Guardians and rural workers against
'Sweating' followed, including being drafted to Gibraltar to establish and
run a Union for Coal-Porters, where one of his predecessors had been shot
by the employers. However Quelch had some experience of being threatened
by Farmers and Landowners, as well as defending the unemployed against
the Magistrate and the Guardians so this task was achieved and today
Gibraltar has the largest Branch of our Transport and General Workers
Union. It became difficult for socialists to gain work in Reading not least
because of the hostility of the Palmers, "the hydra-headed monster of
capitalism", as they were known to SDF activists. They were frequently dismissed from
the 'Biscuit Factory' for public opposition to their employer, even on
election to public office. The SDF opened a shop in the Queens Road to try
to support members refused work locally.
In the period leading to the 'Great War' Len combined working in Foundries
around Reading, Newbury, Guildford with socialist agitation, frequently
being dismissed upon identification. He travelled as far as Scotland speaking
at SDF meetings and working in elections as socialists sought to become
members of School Boards, Boards of Guardians, Councillors and Members
of Parliament.
In May 1914 LEQ was elected as a Councillor at a bye-election as a
Socialist. The SDF having become the British Socialist Party split in 1916
over support for the War with Quelch and friend Ben Russell, (Secretary of
the Gas and General Workers, the Biscuit Factory Union) forming the
Reading pro-war section of the National Socialist Party.
As secretary of the Trades and Labour Council in 1918 Len Quelch
convened the meeting, which was chaired by Councillor J Rabson, that
founded Reading Labour Party on April 16th.(4) It brought together trades union
representatives with members of the BSP, NSP and ILP. Among those
elected to the first executive committee was J.F. Hodgson of the BSP, a
Tailors Cutter, President of the first Workers Educational Association Branch
that had been formed in Reading by the Reading Industrial Co-operative
Society members. He went on to become a founding member of the
Communist Party of Great Britain in 1920.(5)
After the War Len carried on working for the unemployed and in increasingly
acrimonious disputes: "On one occasion it was stated that the 'Labour Party
was a washout and the only way to secure the emancipation of the working
class was by a physical force revolution and the dictatorship of the
proletariat'. Strange as it may seem today that statement was loudly cheered
by a majority of the Labour Party Council.(6)
Len Quelch died in May 1937, aged 75, after long periods of illness no
doubt attributable to his earlier deprivation. He is buried in Reading
Cemetery with his wife, Harriet died 1942 aged 80 and only son, Albert
James, died 1918 aged 19.
- Quelch L, Old Fashioned Socialist : Autobiography (Reading 1992)
- Crick, M., The History of the Social Democratic Federation (Keele 1994)
- Annual Reports of the ELRL are in Museum of Rural Life at the University of Reading
- See Jerrome, EK., Labour in Biscuit Town (MA dissertation. University of Reading, Unpublished 2001)
- See Klugman, J., History of the Communist Party of Great Britain Vol.1 1919-1924 (London 1968)
- Old Fashioned Socialist, p. 88
A copy of Lorenzo Quelch's book Old Fashioned Socialist : Autobiography
can be found in Local studies.
Other External Links to more information:
Harry Quelch - Biography of Len's brother at Spartacus School Net
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