Yorkshire Day. Engels in Bridlington
Bridlington Quay 1872
August 1st is Yorkshire Day. One can think of some great and good people associated with the County and some who perhaps don’t fall into the category. One name that rarely comes up is that of Engels
Bridlington is a Yorkshire seaside resort known at least by labour movement veterans as the location of the 1939 Bridlington Agreement which aimed to stop trade unions ‘poaching’ members from each other.
Well before that it had become a favoured summer holiday destination for Engels, his partner and others.
He appears to have first visited in 1868(perhaps before however). He was still visiting in the early 1880s.
He wrote to Kugelmann from York on 31st July 1868 that he was on his way to Bridlington with his spouse, Lizzie Burns. He added in brackets ‘I bet you couldn’t guess how the name is pronounced’.
By 6th August, Engels was back in Manchester writing that he had been to Bridlington for the weekend and planned to return and take a holiday. Unfortunately an employee at the Manchester mill where Engels worked had gout and he had to stand in for him.
Engels wrote again to Marx from Manchester on 12th August noting that he had been again in Bridlington from 7th to 10th August 1868 and had made some ‘quite interesting’ geological studies. He now planned to return for 10 days from 14th August, the employee with gout being on the road to recovery. He gave Marx the address of Mr Burns, 3 Burlington Place, Bridlington Quay, Yorkshire.
In fact the stay was rather longer as Engels wrote to Marx from Bridlington Quay on 22nd August that he planned to return to Manchester on 26th or 27th August.
Unlike some of the resorts in the South of England visited by Marx or Engels or both of them in the 1850s,60s, 70s and 80s, Bridlington doesn’t appear to have recognised Engels visits there.
With Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden’s enthusiasm for putting up statues perhaps this is the moment for a statue of Engels on Bridlington Quay?
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