William Harold Hutchinson

British trade unionist/labor party activist

Hutchinson in 1920

William Harold Hutchinson (25 April 1878[1] – 19 May 1965) was a British trade unionist and Labour Party activist.

Educated to secondary school level, Hutchinson became active in the Amalgamated Society of Engineers, and was first elected to its Executive Council in 1913. The following year, he was also elected to the National Executive Committee of the Labour Party, becoming its chairman in 1920. He stood for the party in Bolton at the 1924 general election, but was not successful.[2]

Unusually for a trade union official, Hutchinson was a supporter of guild socialism,[3] and was close to G. D. H. Cole and the Fabian Society.[4]

In 1925, Hutchinson was elected to London County Council in Woolwich East, although he did not defend his seat at the following election. From 1930 to 1933, he was President of the renamed Amalgamated Engineering Union, and he served the union until his retirement in 1943. He then briefly worked as an organiser for the Industrial Orthopaedic Society, before retiring fully in 1946.[2]

He died in Cardiff, aged 87.[5]

References

  1. ^ 1939 England and Wales Register
  2. ^ a b "HUTCHINSON, William H", Who Was Who
  3. ^ Ed. Norman Mackenzie, The Letters of Sidney and Beatrice Webb: Volume III, p.91
  4. ^ Margaret Cole, The Story of Fabian Socialism, p.181
  5. ^ England & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007
Party political offices
Preceded by
John McGurk
 Chair of the Labour Party
1919–1920 		Succeeded by
Alexander Gordon Cameron
Trade union offices
Preceded by
James Thomas Brownlie
 President of the Amalgamated Engineering Union
1930–1933 		Succeeded by
John C. Little
Preceded by
Arthur Deakin and Robert Openshaw
 Trades Union Congress representative to the American Federation of Labour
1948
With: Herbert Bullock 		Succeeded by