The Henson Journals
Sat 1 May 1926
Volume 40, Page 267
[267]
Saturday, May 1st, 1926.
The blow has fallen. Once more the country is immersed in the confusion, recrimination, widely–ramifying commercial dislocation, & incalculable national loss of a great strike. The subsidy, indefensible in theory & extravagant in cost, has failed to effect what was its only excuse. After spending over £20.000.000, stimulating the appetite of the poor, and providing a precedent of the worst conceivable character, we have to face in May the disaster which we feared to face last July. The policy of paying blackmail to the revolutionary Power has failed, as every thoughtful student of history & human nature know that it would. Meanwhile, the economic recovery of Great Britain is indefinitely postponed and the door opened to the worst possibilities.
[Lord Halifax sends me another letter, expressing almost ardently his approval of my Tyndale lecture!
My guest went into Durham, & saw the great buildings. In the afternoon I walked round the Park with George Lawrence.]
The evening papers announced that a great strike will take place on Tuesday next unless in the interval peace is secured. The Government has issued a proclamation stating that a state of emergency exists. We seem suddenly to have got back to the old dreadful days of War. Everything has suddenly become uncertain.