Batley Liberal Club

Batley Liberal Club

In 1877 a meeting of Liberals was held in Batley Town Hall to discuss the formation of a Liberal club in Batley under the presidency of the mayor of the town, Alderman James Joshua Carter, later Mayor of Batley,   John Jubb JP, also a Batley Mayor,   proposed that it was 

“desirable to form a representative Liberal Association for the borough of Batley.”  Huddersfield Chronicle 11 July 1877

The club held a bazaar in the club premises on Easter Monday, April 1884, with the intention of raising funds to reduce the debt on the premises. The building was decorated inside and out with bunting and the good were displayed inside. The president of the club, E. Balmforth introduced Councillor F. W. Reuss who opened the bazaar.  There were also a range of amusements provided in the form of “dramatic entertainments”, a “museum” and art gallery.  Mr Hainsworth gave a demonstration of electricity by putting in motion an electric motor. Huddersfield Chronicle 15 April 1884

Later in 1905 the formation of a new Liberal Club in Batley was discussed at a meeting in July which would lead me to think that the earlier club was either Batley Carr Liberal Club or Carlinghow Liberal Club rather than Batley.   
The Batley Liberal Club was to acquire the building known as “Bank House” which was in the centre of the town at the top of Hick Lane, and adapt the building for club use. The plan had been under consideration by a specially formed committee for some months and at the meeting it was recommended that the time was right to move forward on the project.  A new committee was formed to negotiate the acquisition of the property and its development and to make all the necessary arrangements with the Dewsbury and Batley Liberal Club Buildings Company Ltd, under whose auspices the project would be carried out.  Members would be asked to take up a substantial numbers of shares and it was hoped that the project would be successful and that members would be enthusiastic.  The club would contain rooms for billiards, reading, and conversation plus others and would also have a restaurant in addition to these. One of the features of the new club was to be that there would be no “intoxicants” allowed to be sold or consumed on the premises.  Leeds Mercury 7 June 1905.  
By October the club had raised £1200 of the required sum towards

 “the transformation of Bank House, Batley into an up to date Liberal Club” 

and a further £960 had been promised.  The committee were given permission to proceed and it was hoped that the building would be ready by Christmas and provide billiards with four tables, conversation, card, music and dining rooms.  Leeds Mercury 21 Oct 1905

The transformation of the building was obviously a success as the first general meeting of “the recently formed Batley Liberal Club” was reported in Leeds Mercury 21 April 1906 with C E Carter being first president and a membership of 400.  Also a Junior Liberal Club had been formed by 1907.  The club had sold £1000 worth of shares  and there were another £300 still to be issued.   William James Ineson, a founding member of the club and Lord Mayor of Batley in 1907, Alderman John Blackburn and Joseph Auty were elected as vice presidents of the club and Ineson suggested that a reference library should be established at the club and promised a full copy of “Chambers Encyclopaedia.” Generous promises were also made by Messrs Carter, Blackburn and Talbot.  Leeds Mercury 21 April 1906.

1907 was to see a

 “Riotous meeting” 

held under the auspices of the Batley Junior Liberal Club in the Victoria Hall.  Lewis Vernon  Harcourt, First Commissioner of Works who had the nickname “Lou Lou” was to speak at the meeting. An immaculately dressed man who was seen as the rising hope of the Liberal party had been heckled by “suffragettes” at a recent meeting in Haslington and he had been hoping to avoid a repeat at the Batley meeting.  The suffragettes had sent him a telegram stating that if he would withdraw his opposition to Parliamentary votes being given to women and pledge his influence to press the Government then they would not disrupt his meetings.  He had not answered their request 

“preferring to run the risk of a public conflict with these skirted politicians rather than acquiesce.”   

The suffragettes had been gathering in Batley prior to the meeting. The meeting was ticket only with eight policeman guarding the doors and 

“scrutinising every lady visitor” 

as if they expected them to have a bomb concealed upon their person. Still the women activists managed to get into the hall and spread themselves throughout the audience.   Five or ten minutes into “Lou Lou" Harcourt’s speech the voice of a 

“diminutive Metropolitan suffragette”, Mrs Ley was heard.  

She was positioned about a dozen seats from the front of the hall and inquired 

“Will you give votes to women in the near future?”  

The interruption caused “hubbub” in the crowd with people straining to see who was speaking and cries of “Chuck her out.”  Harcourt calmed the crowd and remained good humoured

 “there need be no disturbance. Some of these ladies like the poor are always with us,"        he quipped.  

The audience quietened all but briefly as Adela Pankhurst spoke out.  At first Harcourt ignored her but as the crowd got more vocal shouting out “Put her out” and “Show the cat out!” he was forced to respond and urged the ladies to 

“observe the decencies of public discussion.”  

However they were not to be quietened and continued to shout. The chairman, Lieutenant Colonel Blackburn intervened and said that if they insisted on disturbing the meeting he trusted that 

“our Batley friends will know how to deal with them.” 

Thus preparing the audience to take the task of throwing the women out of the meeting into their own hands!   Blackburn went on to say that 

“he wished that these ladies were angels because then their visits would be far and few between!” 

  

 “If we were we shouldn’t pay taxes!” shouted Adela Pankhurst in reply. 

The police seemed to be enjoying the hilarity of the exchange and were reluctant to start removing the ladies so two of the stewards aided by members of the audience began to try to move the women bodily.  Mrs Ley was lifted out of her seat and carried 

“gently but firmly” 

down the stairs and out of the hall.  Adela Pankhurst was not so easy to move.  She dropped down onto the floor and it required a strong grip to lift her upright again.  She kicked and wriggled and vowed 

“vengeance on the Liberal Government and all who sympathised with it” 

as they carried her down the steps. A gentleman dressed in “clerical garb” came to the defence of the women and appealed to the police not to let them be ejected from the hall.  The man was Reverend W. B.  Graham who was a well-known figure on the Socialist platform in the Colne Valley by-election.   The attention of the excited audience turned to Graham and someone seized his hat and hurled it across the room.  Then someone grabbed hold of him and at that moment the whole reason for being there was forgotten as was “Lou Lou” Harcourt who stood on the platform with his right hand resting on the table and a sheet of notepaper in the other whilst 

“serenely surveying the scene.”  

 The more Graham struggled with his tormentors the more they tugged at him until hatless, with his clothes “disarranged” and his hair dishevelled he was forcibly removed from the hall in the same way as the suffragettes. Although there were no more forcible removals there were still two more suffragettes in the gallery and another near the front of the hall who were intent on annoying Harcourt.  He however continued unperturbed.   Still the suffragettes continued with the

 “little stranger”, 

as she had been called, at the front of the hall tried to negate the vote of thanks given to Harcourt.   Lou Lou managed to remain good humoured and thanked the audience for a 

“pleasant evening!”

The suffragettes who had been removed and Reverend Graham had gathered a meeting together in Batley Market Place and had a crowd much larger than the one in Victoria Hall had been.  Rev Graham, still hatless and bedraggled asserted that he was a complete innocent saying that he had not said one word other than to ask for police protection for the women.  

“I did not offer resistance or violence, but they threw me out -----------they threw me down the steps without my hat or stick.” 

 Mrs Ley and Adela Pankhurst gave interviews to the Yorkshire Evening Post reporter about the events of the evening.  Later in the evening a second meeting of suffragettes gathered outside Batley Town Hall and the whole of the Market Place became “pandemonium.” Yorkshire Evening Post 8 November 1907.

Suffragettes in Batley

In 1907 the club was crowded to see a billiard exhibition given by F W Hughes, a well-known Leeds billiards player.  He took part in four exhibition games with members of the club and concluded with a demonstration of trick shots.  Leeds Mercury, 8 May 1907

The club established its own “glee and madrigal” society which competed in a variety of local competitions.   The society competed in a “male glee” choir contest at the Annual gala of the Batley Branch National Commercial Temperance League in 1909 held at Mount Pleasant in Batley. The competition was restricted to choirs in Yorkshire with the prize a Challenge Shield to be held for a year and a cheque for £5.   Each choir had to sing the test piece “How sweet thy modest light” (Burrows” and then in the evening their own piece which was “Music all powerful” (Sullivan) for the Batley Club.  The contest took place is unsuitable conditions, singing in the open air in front of the judges whilst races, wrestling competition, tug of war and other amusements went on all around them as they performed.   Additionally the shouts of ice cream sellers and children   mingled with the sounds and voices of the choirs!   Luckily the Batley Brass Band were placed on the other side of the field and kept quiet while the choirs performed!  The test piece apparently had many beautiful, soft passages which could hardly be heard by any who gathered to listen to the choirs. A huge crowd gathered in the evening after all pieces had been completed to hear the results announced. Before this was made all the choirs sang a piece together, a total of around 120 voices joined in “Here’s Life and Health” (Hollingworth) under the direction of Sam Smith who was the conductor of the Morley Vocal Union, who had held the challenge shield for the previous twelve months.

The results of the contest were 1^st Todmorden Male Voice Choir; 2^nd Batley Liberal Club Glee and Madrigal Society. The presentation was made by the Mayoress of Batley.  The conductor of the Batley Liberal Club Glee Society collected the second prize of a silver mounted baton plus £2 5s and received loud applause from the crowds.  Shipley Time & Express & Todmorden Advertiser, 27 Aug 1909. They competed at the same event held in Saltaire 1923 but did not achieve a win.

The club were involved in other competitions and events including billiard tournaments. They played a return match at Batley Club between Batley & Shipley Liberal Clubs in February. Afterwards there was supper in the reading room with the remainder of the evening 

“being given over to conviviality” 

including songs sung by Messrs J W Hill, T Dennett (Bradford) and H Rix a “humourist”.  Shipley Times 13 Feb 1914.

Later that year at the annual meeting, Samuel Ward was elected president. The club secretary and reported that there was a slightly increased membership and that they had written off £21 off the debt of the club premises. Leeds Mercury 29 April 1914.  By 1918 the membership of the club stood at 433.

The club held a successful garden party in August 1923 which was organised by the officials of Batley Liberal Club in order to raise funds.  The garden party took place in the grounds adjoining Sunny Bank, Batley by kind permission of Mr Theodore C Taylor.  Leeds Mercury 13 August 1923

The club was still going strong in 1928 and held a variety of political lectures and talks as well as more social events.  In January of that year Walter Forrest spoke at the club about 

“The youth and issues of today.” 

This was followed in April by a talk from Ronald F Walker prospective Liberal candidate spoke at the club on 

“The Liberal Industrial policy”. 

 Yorkshire Evening Post 4 Jan 1928.  Leeds Mercury 4 April 1928.  

Then in December Mr J B Hobman prospective Liberal candidate for North Bradford, spoke on the subject 

“Is Labour Socialist or Liberal” 

to the Yorkshire Council of the National League for Young Liberals when they met at Batley Liberal Club.  He said that although the trade union movement was not a Socialist movement it had been “captured” by the Socialists and they were liberalising the Labour party.  Leeds Mercury 17 December 1928

Another garden party was held that year which was attended by Walter Forrest accompanied by his wife.  He joked that 

“the talking machine in London was silent, the doors of Parliament closed, and yet amazingly the country was still carrying on.”

 Leeds Mercury 13 Aug 1928

A Bazaar was held over a number of days in February 1929 and had raised a total of £247 18s 6d for club funds.  Hamilton Crothers had deputised for his brother Montague Crothers and reopened the bazaar on the Monday. Yorkshire Evening Post 5 February 1929

The club premises were let out for other organisations to use, one of which was the Batley German Church. This had been founded in 1933 by the German Circle. It was devoted to the study of German language, literature and manners and had around 100 members. Sunday services are held every month in a room at the Batley Liberal Club which is transformed into a small chapel with a table for an altar and a piano for an organ.  Leeds Mercury 26 Jan 1934