BRITISH WEST INDIES – MAY 13, 1934
Numerous struggles occurred in the British Caribbean during the 1930s, which led to the introduction of many trade union rights across the region. On 13 May 1935 a strike of workers loading bananas at Oracabessa in St. Mary, Jamaica, developed into what the newspaper Plain Talk, a new voice of protest edited by former Garveyite Alfred Mends, described as a riot. The workers blocked the roads to prevent strike breakers from being brought in and cut power lines. Armed police were sent to the town from Kingston. On 21 May there was a strike of port workers in the town of Falmouth in Trelawny. This also developed into a riot when the use of strike breakers was threatened and one worker was killed by police gunshot. In Kingston, in that same month, banana loaders in the port went on strike and organised a march. On the second day of the strike the police opened fire on the crowd, wounding a woman..In May 1935 there was a strike of Railway workers at Stan Creek, in the organisation with which Soberanis was involved. Police reinforcements were brought in from Belize City and the intimidated strikers returned to work. Soberanis was prosecuted for using seditious language at a public meeting on 1 October in Corozal…(read more from source below).
