A bibliography

I hope this will be of help to future researchers and historians interested in Grayson.  It is an attempt to list all known works (books and pamphlets) that are either written by, about, or mention Grayson.  In addition are archives with papers relating to Grayson.  This is a work in progress and new items will be added when I come across them.  Suggestions and additions welcome as always.

Note: I have quoted the publisher and year of the editions I have. Others editions may be available.

Works by Grayson:

The Appeal for Socialism, People’s Press, Stockport, 1909

The Destiny of the Mob, Workers’ Press, Huddersfield, 1908

God’s Country, Socialist Press, Stockport, 1908

Infantile Mortality and the Birth Rate, Duggan, (with G. Simpson)

The Problem of Parliament, New Age, London, 1909 (with G.R.S. Taylor)

Socialism: A verbatim report of the debate at the Free Trade Hall, Manchester, Daily Dispatch, 1908

Works about Grayson:

D. Clark, Victor Grayson: Labour’s Lost Leader, Quartet, London, 1985

D. Clark, Victor Grayson: The Man and the Mystery, Quartet, London, 2016

R. Groves, The Mystery of Victor Grayson, Pendulum, London, 1946

R. Groves, The Strange Case of Victor Grayson, Pluto, London, 1975

H. Taylor, Victor Grayson: In Search of Britain’s Lost Revolutionary, Pluto, London, 2021

W. Thompson, A. Victor Grayson: His History, Speeches and Future, Workers’ Press, Huddersfield, 1910

W. Thompson, The Life of Victor Grayson, J.H. Bennett, Sheffield, 1910 (includes pictures and Socialism: It’s Aim and Object by Grayson)

 

Memoirs by Grayson’s contemporaries in which he is mentioned:

F. Bower, Rolling Stonemason, Merlin, 2015

F. Brockway, Inside the Left, Spokesman, 2010

F. Brockway, Towards Tomorrow, Harper Collins, London, 1977

S. Desmond, Labour: The Giant with the Feet of Clay, Collins, London, 1921

S.G. Hobson, Pilgrim to the Left, Arnold, London, 1938

H. M. Hyndman, Further Reminiscences, Macmillan & Co, 1912

R. Kenney, Westering, J. M. Dent, 1939

H. Mitchell, Hard Way Up, Faber and Faber, London, 1968

P. Redfern, Journey to Undertsanding, Allen & Unwin, London, 1946

M. Shinwell, Lead with the Left, Cassell, London, 1981

Snell (Lord), Men, Movements and Myself, J.M. Dent, London, 1936

P. Snowdon, An Autobiography (Two volumes), Nicholson & Watson, London, 1934

W. Southgate, That’s the Way it Was, New Clarion Press, 1982

A. Thompson, Here I Lie, G. Routledge & Sons, London, 1937

B. Thompson, Hyde Park Orator, Jarrolds, 1936

W. Thorne, My Life’s Battles, Lawrence & Wishart, London, 2014

F. Warwick (Countess), Life’s Ebb and Flow, Hutchinson & Co, 1929

 

Other Studies which mention Grayson:

G. J. Barnsby, Birmingham Working People, Integrated, Wolverhampton, 1989

J. Beckett, Autobiography (unpublished) – held by Francis Beckett

H. Belloc & C. Chesterton, The Party System, Swift, London, 1911

C. Benn, Keir Hardie, Hutchinson, 1992

F. Brockway, Socialism Over Sixty Years: The Life of Jowett of Bradford, Allen & Unwin, London, 1946

P. Bryan (Ed), What Would Keir Hardie Say?, Luath Press, 2015

D. Clark, Colne Valley, Radicalism to Socialism, Longman, London, 1981

T. Cliff & D. Gluckstein, The Labour Party: A Marxist History, Bookmarks, 1996

A. Cook, Cash for Honours: The Story of Maundy Gregory, The History Press, Stroud, 2008

M. Crick, The History of the Social Democratic Federation, Keele University Press, 1994

J. Dickenson, Renegades and Rats, Melbourne University Press, 2006

W. Kendall, The Revolutionary Movement in Britain 1900 – 1921, Littlehampton, 1969

K. Laybourn, Philip Snowden: A Biography, Gregg Revivals, 1988

J. Liddington, Rebel Girls: How votes for women changed Edwardian lives, Virago, 2006

H. W. Lee & Archbold, Social Democracy in Britain, Social Democratic Federation, 1935

J. Mann, Woman in Parliament, Odhams, 1962

T. McCarthy, A Short History of the British Labour Movement, Amazon, 2017

T. McCarthy, Labour V. Sinn Fein. the Dublin General Strike 1913/14 – The Lost Revolution, T McCarthy, 2008

D. McCormick, Murder by Perfection, Long, London, 1970 (CAUTION: Treat as fiction)

R. Miliband, Parliamentary Socialism, Merlin Press, 2009

E. O’Connor, Big Jim Larkin, University College Dublin Press, 2015

S. Pankhurst, The Suffragette: The History of the Women’s Militant Suffrage Movement, Dover, 2015

S. Pankhurst, The Suffragette Movement, Longman, 1931

S. Pierson, British Socialists: The Journey from Fantasy to Politics, Harvard University Press, 1979

M. Pugh, Speak for England: A New History of the Labour Party, Vintage, 2011

D. Renton, Horatio Bottomley and the Far-Right before Fascism, Routledge, London, 2022

S. Rowbotham, Edward Carpenter: A Life of Liberty and Love, Verso, 2011

P. Salveson, Socialism with a Northern Accent, Lawrence & Wishart, 2012

P. Salveson, Lancastrians: Mills, Mines, and Minarets; A New History, C Hurst & Co., 2023

E. Shinwell, The Labour Party, MacDonald, 1963

L. Smith, Unitarian to the Core, Unitarian College Manchester, 2004

W. Stewart, J. Keir Hardie: A Biography, Cassell & Co, 1921

L. Thompson, Robert Blatchford,: Portrait of an Englishman, Gollancz, 1951

P. Thompson, Socialists, Liberals and Labour: The Struggle for London 1885 – 1914, Routledge & Kegan, 1967

Tsuzuki, Hyndman and British Socialism, Oxford University Press, 1961

Watts & Davies, Cunninghame Graham: A Critical Biography, Cambridge University Press, 2009

 

Dictionary of Labour Biography:

Volumes

 

Archives:

LSE – British Socialist Party papers plus some letters among Keir Hardie and George Lansbury papers.

Warwick Modern Records Centre – Reg Groves and Tom Mann papers.  The Groves papers contain extensive notes from his own research and letters from some who knew Grayson.

Sydney Jones Library (University of Liverpool) – Glasier papers in the special collections.  Some relevant letters from 1906-1910.

Labour Archive Manchester – Should be the starting point. A vast collection.

John Rylands Library, Manchester – Papers relating to Grayson’s connection with the Unitarian College, Manchester.

Working Class Movement Library, Salford – In particular some of Grayson’s fictional short stories plus some election material and photos.

Lambeth Records Office – Some cuttings and local newspaper archives useful for Grayson’s Kennington campaign.

Liverpool Central Library – Records of the Bethel Mission which mention Grayson plus some useful newspaper cuttings.

Marx Memorial Library, London – a copy of Infantile Mortality and the Birth Rate, Duggan, (Grayson with G. Simpson).

University of Illinois Library – Letters from Grayson in the Grant Richards archive plus a letter from Augusta Greenwood to H.G. Wells.

National Archives at Kew – Letters and financial information relating to Grayson’s employment by the National War Aims Committee.