The Henson Journals

[196]

Wednesday, October 27th, 1920.

Still the fortunes of the great effort to arrange a settlement of the miners' strike hang in the balance, but the tone of the morning papers is hopeful. The general feeling here seems to hesitate between a desire for peace, & a conviction that lasting peace can only follow a fight to a finish. It is evident enough that the railwaymen will not back the miners, whom they envy as men better paid than themselves, and whom they look down upon as their social and intellectual inferiors. There is, however, a considerable section of railway men, who wd be prepared to go all lengths with the miners: and they are mainly the younger men, whose is the future. The fate of the country turns on the point, whether or not they are powerful enough to "call the tune".

I lunched with The Archdeacon & Mrs Watkins to meet the Crewe Trustees – Lord Armstrong, Mr Priestman, the Archdeacon of Northumberland, Watson of S. Margaret's, Durham, Bayley, the Archdeacon of Sedgefield & Rowlandson.

Cruickshank had tea with me. I showed him what I propose to say in the Cathedral on Saturday & he took away the MS. as he has undertaken to write something for the Y.P.

That most kindly & generous of men, Wilson came to bring an engraving of Auckland Castle framed for Ella. He undertook to make some enquiries about a suitable ex–service man for the Lodge & gardens. He suggested that he and I might combine in a Secretary.

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