'Lawless Coal Miners' and the Lingan Strike of 1882-1883: Remaking Political Order on Cape Breton's Sydney Coalfield

The Lingan strike of 1882-83 was the last in a series of strikes over a two-decade period on Cape Breton Island's Sydney coalfield. With the use of untapped local sources, this article reconstructs the history of this understudied strike within a broader history of social relations on the coalfield. The migration of labourers from the island's backland farms--predominantly from Highland enclave settlements--to the coal mines played a decisive role in shaping the era's new coal mining villages and the character of social conflict. By the early 1880s, structural change associated with National Policy industrialism was eroding the old authority of the coal operators, and miners embraced the Provincial Workmen's Association (pwa) to advance their claims in long-standing and highly localized contestations. Ultimately the coal communities themselves imposed the emergent trade unionism. The Lingan strike marked a transition to a new political order on the coalfield, structured by the place of the coal mines within the wider Cape Breton countryside and built upon a powerful localism and moral economy that recast the public sphere and the miners' place in it. Keywords: coal, mining, labour, strikes, riots, moral economy, capitalism, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia La greve de Lingan de 1882-1883 etait la derniere d'une serie de greves sur une periode de deux decennies dans le bassin houiller de Sydney, sur l'ile du Cap-Breton. S'appuyant sur des sources locales inexploitees, cet article reconstruit l'histoire de cette greve peu etudiee dans une histoire plus large des relations sociales sur le bassin houiller. La migration des ouvriers des fermes de l'arriere-pays de l'ile--principalement des colonies d'enclaves des Highlands--vers les mines de charbon a joue un role decisif dans la formation des nouveaux villages miniers de l'epoque et le caractere du conflit social. Au debut des annees 1880, le changement structurel associe a l'industrialisme de la politique nationale erodait l'ancienne autorite des exploitants de charbon, et les mineurs ont adopte la Provincial Workmen's Association (pwa) pour faire valoir leurs revendications dans le cadre de contestations de longue date et tres localisees. En fin de compte, les communautes charbonnieres elles-memes ont impose le syndicalisme naissant. La greve de Lingan a marque une transition vers un nouvel ordre politique sur le bassin houiller, structure par la place des mines de charbon dans la campagne elargie du Cap-Breton et construit sur un localisme puissant et une economie morale qui refondent la sphere publique et la place des mineurs dans celle-ci. Mots clefs : charbon, mines, travail, greves, emeutes, economie morale, capitalisme, Cape Breton, Nouvelle-Ecosse
ON 19 MARCH 1883, UNION MINERS from various collieries across Cape Breton Island's Sydney coalfield descended upon the mining village of Lingan, where the London-based General Mining Association (GMA) had [...]