Tickets now on sale

We're delighted to tell you that tickets are now on sale for our special, one-off reading of Strikers! The Vale Rawlings Story, a new play written and produced by Elaine Pritchard.

A cast made up of actors and members of the public from the Burton upon Trent community will tell Vale's story on Friday December 6, 2024, at Burton Town Hall.

The performance begins at 7.30pm and tickets can be bought online at Strikers-The Vale Rawlings Story. You can also book your seats by going in person to the Brewhouse Arts Centre box office, in Burton town centre or by calling the box office on 01283 508100. All profits from the night will be split between Burton YMCA and SARAC.

A standard ticket costs £11. Tickets for seniors, children and the unwaged are £7 and we also offer a pay-it-forward ticket at £15. If you can afford to pay that little extra it will boost the amount of money we are able to raise for our two nominated charities, which work so hard for the community of Burton upon Trent and district.

Elaine explained: "We want to raise as much money as we can for two important Burton-based charities that need help to support families and people in crisis. I realise that the cost of living crisis and other pressures make money tight for many local families and so I hope that the £7 ticket for the unwaged, seniors and children makes it possible for many people to attend and hear this incredible forgotten story from Burton's past."

The fight for a minimum wage

The cast will be standing on the main stage at Burton Town Hall, in the very spot where we know Vale himself stood on at least one occasion more than 110 years ago. He spoke to 1,500 people in September 1913 and proposed the following resolution:

• 'That this mass meeting of trade unionists is of the opinion that the wages of the lowest-paid labourer in Burton-on-Trent should not be less than 25 shillings per week, and hereby resolves to take steps to secure this wage as a minimum standard, and to do its utmost to obtain improved conditions to all grades of workers in the brewing and other industries of the town. This meeting also considers the brutality of the police in Cornwall and Dublin deserving of the severest condemnation, and calls upon the Home Secretary to carry out a searching inquiry into the reported actions of the police'.

Vale's good friend, Mr. Austin Smith, seconded the resolution and it was carried without opposition. A few months later, the brewery workers were awarded a minimum wage of 23 shillings for a 54-hour working week, which at the time was a big success.

Many of the characters in the play are real people who lived and worked in the town. Others, such as MP Arnold Ward, who opposed giving the vote to women, and Captain Arthur Nickerson of the National Service League, are real people who visited the town to speak at public meetings.

The 'Flycatcher Girls' strike

One of the key elements in the play is Vale's support for the 'Flycatcher Girls', who went on strike in the long, hot summer of 1914 for better pay and conditions. Many of these girls were 13-17 years old. They had been employed at a factory on Mosley Street, just down the road from the railway station, to make sticky flypapers to catch and kill insects. The company behind the factory ran a manufacturing chemist business at The Silk Mill, in Derby, and flypapers were one of the products they produced. The long, hot summer of 1914 led to massive demand for flypapers and this led to them opening a new factory in Burton that summer to produce this one product.

The girls were paid 'piece work' rates for what they could produce and said it was physically impossible to work fast enough to earn the weekly wages they had been promised when they were first recruited. Some were earning as little as 2/6 for a 55-hour work. Handling the toxic chemicals and glues that were used in the flypapers made them feel sick and gave them headaches, they claimed. So two-thirds of the girls went on strike, and Vale, a member of the local branch of the Workers' Union, supported them.

One Friday afternoon in June 1914, Vale was talking to the girls on the picket line on Mosley Street when he was arrested by a local police inspector, who later claimed that Vale had punched him in the chest in an unprovoked assault. This was despite the fact that Vale was a slightly-built man, just four ft 11 inches tall and the Inspector was six foot.

The court case that followed became a 'cause celebre' across the country. Newspapers in virtually every town and city reported on the case and Vale's subsequent jailing. Labour leader Keir Hardie led calls in Parliament for a retrial and came to Burton to speak outside the Town Hall about what he called 'a scandalous case' and 'a gross miscarriage of justice'.

Elaine said: "The play covers this court case and its aftermath, including more dramatic twists of fate that occurred during World War One. We also learn a bit about Vale's family life and his other campaigning work before and after 1914.

"I first came across Vale's story, while I was researching the story of Lily Thomas, I realised that hardly anyone alive today remembered Vale, except his descendants. It was an honour to meet them and to have their support for my mission to bring his story to a wider audience."

She added: "I would like to thank William Walker, who co-founded The Vale Rawlings Project Community Interest Company with me to make this event happen. In 2025, our CIC will also publish a book about Vale Rawlings and all profits will again go to SARAC and Burton YMCA."