Noah Ablett
Noah Ablett | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | 4 October 1883 Porth, Rhondda, Wales |
| Died | 31 October 1935 (aged 52) |
| Education | Ruskin College, Oxford |
| Occupation(s) | Coal miner, Trade unionist, Political theorist, Educator
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| Organisation | |
| Known for | Co-author of The Miners' Next Step Founding member of Plebs' League |
| Spouse |
Annie Howells (m. 1912) |
| Children | 2 (one son, one daughter) |
| Parent(s) | John Ablett (father) Jane Ablett (mother) |
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| Outline |
Noah Ablett (4 October 1883 – 31 October 1935) was a Welsh trade unionist and political theorist. He is noted as a key contributor to The Miners' Next Step, a syndicalist treatise which Ablett described as "scientific trade unionism". A prominent figure in Welsh labour education, he was instrumental in establishing Marxist educational programmes in the Rhondda valleys and played a significant role in the Plebs' League, an independent working-class educational movement.[1]
Biography
[edit]Ablett was born in 1883 in Porth, Rhondda to John and Jane Ablett; he was the tenth child of eleven.[2] He left school at age 12 to work in the coal mines. Originally intending to join the ministry, Ablett was a lay preacher with the Baptists during the Wales religious revival.[3][4]
Ablett suffered a serious work accident that caused compound fractures to his leg bones. He had been studying for civil service examinations as a means of escaping underground work, but since the civil service did not employ people with physical disabilities at the time, his dreams of alternative employment were ended and he remained in the coal mines.[4] At age 16, Ablett participated in the 1898 South Wales miners' strike, which led to the workers' defeat through a six-month lockout. Following this lockout, the miners formed the South Wales Miners' Federation. The strike and formation of the Federation had a major influence on Ablett's political attitudes.[4]
However, he became concerned with the poor pay and working conditions of the Rhondda coal miners and joined the Independent Labour Party. A keen learner, he won a scholarship to Ruskin College, Oxford in 1907. Ablett was dissatisfied with the education he received at Ruskin, feeling that the college's connection to Oxford University was an example of the establishment attempting to control working-class knowledge and opinion.[5] He organised alternative lectures on Marxist economics and history for his fellow students to promote different ideas from the college's more traditional offerings.[5] While at Ruskin, Ablett was significantly influenced by the ideas of American socialist writer Daniel De Leon, whose theories on industrial unionism and workers' control would later shape Ablett's syndicalist philosophy.[6] In March 1909, when the college authorities dismissed Principal Dennis Hird for supporting student Marxist activities, Ablett organised a student strike in protest.[7]
On returning to the valleys he established Marxist educational classes and took part in campaigns for a minimum wage.
In 1910, Ablett became a checkweighman at Mardy Colliery in Maerdy and the following year was one of the founders of the Unofficial Reform Committee.[8] Ablett played a central role in the Cambrian Combine strike of 1910-11, a major industrial dispute that involved over 30,000 miners and led to the Tonypandy riots.[9] In 1912 he married Annie Howells, with whom he had one son and one daughter.[10] In 1912 he was the main author of The Miners' Next Step, a pamphlet demanding a minimum wage for miners and advocating for workers' control of the mines. The pamphlet opposed nationalisation of the coal mines, instead favouring direct worker control of mining operations.[4] By 1919 Ablett was an executive of the South Wales Miners' Federation and was chairman of the board of governors of the Central Labour College, where he had served on the board of management representing the Rhondda district from 1911 to 1915.[7] He also represented South Wales miners at the Leeds Convention of 1917, a significant socialist gathering that expressed solidarity with the Russian Revolution.[11]
In 1919 Ablett was approached by the Labour Party to contest the Pembrokeshire constituency ahead of the 1922 general election. Ablett turned down the invitation, citing the demands of his other responsibilities.[12] Also in 1919, Ablett's sole book Easy Outline of Economics was published through the Plebs' League. Between 1921 and 1926 he served as an executive member of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain.[8]
Later career difficulties
[edit]Twice in the early 1920s, Ablett narrowly failed to win nominations in South Wales that could have led to him becoming General Secretary of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain, positions that could have provided the different step he needed to allow his considerable talents and energy to develop further.[4]
The period after the war proved difficult for the mining areas, and the Merthyr area suffered severely in the 1920s. When the miners were locked out by employers in 1921 and 1926, things went from bad to worse. At the end of the 1926 lockout, Ablett made a deal with the managers to try to keep the Plymouth Hill pits open, contrary to his lifelong belief of not yielding an inch to employers. This caused him to be mocked by radical elements of the union and labour movement.[4]
In addition to his industrial, political and cultural difficulties, Ablett had also developed a close relationship with alcohol that was having a detrimental effect on his work. He was fined in 1927 for being drunk and disorderly in London when he was supposed to be attending a committee meeting.[13] Between all these issues, he lost his influence on the Labour movement and lost his seats on the executive committee of the South Wales Miners' Federation, the management committee of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain, and the board of governors of the Central Labour College.[4]
In later life Ablett struggled with alcoholism. He died of cancer in 1935, at home in Merthyr Tydfil.[14]
Legacy
[edit]Aneurin Bevan, Labour politician and founder of the National Health Service, described Ablett as "a leader of great intellectual power and immense influence."[15] Will Lawther, a prominent miners' union leader, referred to Ablett as "the greatest pre-war Marxist."[16] Ablett's most significant contribution, The Miners' Next Step, became a landmark document in British labour history.[17]
His educational philosophy, embodied through the Plebs' League, helped establish independent working-class education programmes that countered mainstream liberal educational approaches.[18] His textbook Easy Outline of Economics became an important resource for popularising Marxist economics within the labour movement.[10]
Ablett played the major role in the political education of Arthur Horner, who later served as Secretary General of the National Union of Mineworkers.[19]
Notes
[edit]- ^ The Welsh Academy Encyclopaedia of Wales. John Davies, Nigel Jenkins, Menna Baines and Peredur Lynch (2008) pg11 ISBN 978-0-7083-1953-6
- ^ Lloyd (1958), pg 1113.
- ^ "The origin of the Plebs League: "The Burning Question of Education"". Workers' Liberty. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ a b c d e f g Egan, David (1986). "Noah Ablett 1883-1935". Llafur. 4 (3): 19–30.
- ^ a b Lewis, Richard (1976). "The South Wales Miners and the Ruskin College Strike of 1909". Llafur. 2 (1): 19–30.
- ^ "Noah Ablett". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ a b "Central Labour College". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ a b "Noah Ablett". Coalfield Web Materials. Agor. Retrieved 29 June 2014.
- ^ "The Tonypandy miners' strike 1910: Inspiring unrest". Socialist Worker. 12 March 2013. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ a b "Ablett, Noah". New Ruskin Archives. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ "Soviets in Britain: The Leeds Convention of 1917". International Review of Social History. 19 (2): 165–193. 1974. doi:10.1017/S0020859000004600. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ "Mr Ablett and Parliament". Merthyr Pioneer. 1 November 1919. Retrieved 29 June 2014.
- ^ "Miners' Agent Fined". The Manchester Guardian. 27 July 1927.
- ^ Francis, Hywel. "Ablett, Noah (1883–1935)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/47319. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.)
- ^ "Welsh Journals - Llafur: The Journal of the Society for the Study of Welsh Labour History". Llafur. 4 (3). 1986. Retrieved 29 June 2014.
- ^ "Noah Ablett - Miners Next Step - 1912 - Lost Leader". Hayes Peoples History. 19 March 2012. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ "The Miners' Next Step: being a suggested scheme for the reorganization of the Federation". National Library of Wales. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ "The Plebs League". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 25 August 2025.
- ^ Mates, Lewis (2021). "The "most revolutionary" banner in British trade union history? Political identities and the birth, life, purgatory, and rebirth of the "red" Follonsby miners' banner". International Labor and Working-Class History. 100: 109–135. doi:10.1017/S0147547921000107.
References
[edit]- Lloyd, John Edward; Jenkins, R.T. (1958). Dictionary of Welsh Biography Down to 1940. Cardiff: William Lewis.
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