Harry
Quelch,
the son of a blacksmith, was born in Hungerford, Berkshire, on 30th
January, 1858. The Quelch's were very poor and at the age of ten Harry
was forced to leave school to help increase the family income. Harry
found work in an upholster's shop and this was followed by spells
working for a dairyman and a cattle dealer.
At the age of fourteen, Quelch left Berkshire for London
and successively worked as a factory worker producing biscuits, a
tanyard, an iron foundry, and a wholesale paper warehouse. Although
Quelch left school early he retained an interest in education and
in his twenties he taught himself French.
Quelch read numerous books on politics including a French edition
of Das Capital
by Karl Marx. The book converted him to revolutionary
socialism and after hearing H. M. Hyndman
lecture on Marx in 1881, Quelch joined the Social
Democratic Federation.
Quelch was elected to the executive of the SDF in 1883 and remained
a loyal supporter of H. H. Hyndman when
William Morris, Ernest
Belfort Bax, Eleanor Marx and Edward
Aveling left the party in 1884 to form the Socialist
League. Quelch now became an increasing important member of the
Social Democratic Federation and in 1886
he left his job in the warehouse and became the paid editor of the
party's journal, Justice.
Along with H. H. Hyndman, John
Burns and Robert Cunninghame Graham,
Harry Quelch played an important role
in organising the protest meeting on 13th February, 1887, in Trafalgar
Square that led to the events that became known as Bloody
Sunday.
Despite attempts by Ben Tillett and Tom
Mann to keep the Social Democratic Federation
away from the London Dockers' Strike in
1889, Quelch worked with Will Thorne on
the South Side Strike Committee that organised strikers south of the
Thames.
Quelch represented the Social Democratic Federation
at the Trade Union Congress in the early 1890s.
Quelch, who had also taught himself German as well as French, attended
several conferences held by European socialist groups. He also
regularly represented the SDF at the annual congress of the German
Social Democratic Party.
On 27th February 1900, Quelch represented the Social
Democratic Federation at the meeting in London that established
a Labour Representation Committee (LRC).
However, the following year Quelch led the campaign that resulted
in the SDF withdrawing from the LRC. Despite his hostility to what
he considered to be the non-socialist policies of the LRC, Quelch
continued the attend their conferences as a delegate of the London
Trades Council.
Quelch made several attempts to enter the House
of Commons. In January 1902 he was the defeated SDF candidate
at the Dewsbury by-election. In the 1906 General
Election Quelch came bottom of the poll in Southampton.
He was also badly defeated at Northampton
in the 1910 General Election.
Quelch was a strong opponent of the idea of women's suffrage based
on property qualifications. Quelch, like most socialists, favoured
universal adult suffrage and when the WSPU
agreed to a plan that would give the vote to women householders, he
denounced the organisation as "anti-proletarian, anti-Socialist
and anti-democratic.
In April 1913, ill-health forced Quelch to retire from his full-time
post with Justice, the journal he
had edited for twenty-seven years. However, Harry
Quelch continued to write for the journal until his
death on 17th September, 1913.
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