Red Clydeside

Key political figures of the Red Clydeside period

Letter to Sissie McCallum

18 Apr 1916

On 26 March 1916, a large demonstration to oppose the Munitions Act was held at Glasgow Green. Feelings were already running high in the city as two days previously seven Clyde Workers' Committee shop stewards had been deported to Edinburgh by government authorities. At this demonstration, James Maxton, James McDougall and an anarchist shop steward from Weirs munitions factory, Jack Smith, all gave speeches advocating strike action by Glasgow's workers to ensure the non-implementation of the Munitions Act.

Four days later, Maxton was arrested and charged with sedition along with McDougall and Smith. All three were ordered to be held in Duke Street prison in Glasgow without bail until a date for their trial could be fixed. At the subsequent trial in Edinburgh on 25 April 1916, Maxton and MacDougall were sentenced to 12 months' imprisonment and Jack Smith was sentenced to 18 months' imprisonment.

Maxton wrote this letter while on remand at Duke Street prison to his fiancee, Sissie McCallum, whom he married in 1919. The Maxtons had one child, John, born in 1921. Their son fell seriously ill soon after he was born and remained in need of round-the-clock care for the first year of his life. This care was provided by his mother and it is thought that the sheer physical exertion of nursing her son back to full health was a major contributor in her premature death in 1923.

Source: Maxton Papers, Glasgow City Archives