THE LABOUR WAR.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 10234, 17 August 1911, Page 1

THE LABOUR WAR.

ffHE SITUATION AT LIVERPOOL

MILITARY CONVOY FIRES ON CROWD.

TWO MEN KILLED

DESPERATE STREET FIGHTING. United Press Association— By Electric Telegraph—Copyright. LONDON, August 16. The police report that yesterday's riot was purely an attack on the police in a district where disorder is chronic, and liable to outbursts m times of abnormal excitement. . , Five prison-vans, conveying sentenced rioters, escorted by Hussars and Scots Greys were traversing Vauxhall Road, inhabited by seamen and dockers. Then progress was barred by an excited ibod, and ° bricks and stones were hurled at the convoy from side streets and housetops. Many were struck. Six were unseated. , The crowd were so menacing that the convoy fired six shots. Prendergast, a carter, "was shot dead. Sntcliffe, a carter, died later. Three others, with bullet wounds, were taken to the hospital. • The Warwickshire s and mounted police hurried to Vauxhall Road. Meanwhile, the vans reached the prison. The arrival of the infantry was the signal for desperate street fighting, lasting an tour, the rioters facing the batons of the police with coolness and courage. The police were badly mauled.

THE RAILWAY MEN. ULTIMATUM TO THE COMPANIES. PASSENGER SERVICES DISLOCATED. LONDON, August 16. A joint congress of the Railway Servants' Locomotive Engineers and Fire inen, Signalmen, Pointsmen and General Workers' Unions met at Liverpool and considered the. position. Tt was unanimously decided to give the railway companies twenty-four hours' to negotiate a settlement, otherwise there r would be a general strike on Thursday morning. The conference also passed resolutions condemning the companies' method of working the conciliation scheme, the action of the police and the employment of the military at Liverpool. A general strike will involve three hundred and sixty thousand men. Passenger services are becoming dislocated. Goods traffic is at a standstill.

The mob _at Sheffield is turbulent to actual -rioting. A provision cart was upset, and there was some stone throwin& IFwenty-five thousand men are idle atManchester. The police are escorting cotton from the docks to the mills unjnolpsted.