Len McCluskey, General Secretary of Unite, to unveil plaque on August 18th to 1911 Rail strikers shot in Liverpool

Striking workers at spot where John Sutcliffe was shot on August 15th, 1911 during rail strike, which  also involved rail workers in Ireland

In the week following Liverpool’s Bloody Sunday of 13 August 1911, with a national railway strike spreading rapidly and dockers, seamen and others locked out, Liverpool and the whole of Britain was on the edge of catastrophe. In response, 58,000 troops were mobilised across the country, and police were despatched wherever the Home Secretary, Winston Churchill, thought they were needed. Brutal force was employed. In Liverpool, troops opened fire on several occasions, and on Tuesday 15 August two men, John Sutcliffe and Michael Prendergast, were shot dead by the military in a disturbance onVauxhall Road.

As a permanent memorial to these two little-known martyrs of the Liverpooltrade union and labour movement, the North West TUC and the Casa have sponsored a plaque commemorating their sacrifice, situated on the site of the shootings.

MEET AT THE ELDONIAN VILLAGE HALL, VAUXHALL ROAD AT 10am SATURDAY 18 AUGUST 2012. TO BE FOLLOWED BY UNVEILING OF THEPLAQUE ON VAUXHALL ROAD