Page 187 - The_story_of_the_C._W._S._The_jubilee_history_of_the_cooperative_wholesale_society,_limited._1863-1913_(IA_storyofcwsjubill00redf) (1)_Neat

At Bristol.
and mercantile centre of the West, for Joseph Clay, of Gloucester,
told the conference when it met at Bristol in 1875:
There were two towns in England that had not taken up the co-operative
movement, viz., Birmingham and Bristol, and these were the towns they would
naturally have expected would be the foremost in the movement. They had
always striven for reforms, but they had not reformed themselves.
The same unavailing desire for a Bristol Branch was expressed
successively at Mountain Ash, Gloucester again, Dowlais, and
Maesteg during the years 1876-7. In the latter year the C.W.S.
Committee still did not see their way, but Joseph Clay, then
possessing a seat on the C.W.S. London Board, gave assurances to
the patient Westerners. Very soon after, however, the C.W.S.
reluctance found justification. Bad trade and prolonged strikes
made havoc of all but the strongest South Wales Societies. The
failiu"e, in 1878, of the important West of England Bank, intensified
distrust of all except primitive methods of doing business. It was
believed in Glamorganshire that even the Post Office Savings Bank
was going to break. The conferences practically ceased to meet,
and co-operation relapsed into a purely local interest.
The idea of a C.W.S. Bristol Branch lay dormant until 1882,
when the Plymouth Society made inquiries, and were informed that
"
the time has not yet arrived." Not content, the Plymouth
co-operators entertained a Western Conference at Plymouth on
February 10th, 1883, with their stores manager in the chair, when
Mr. P. Wright, of Plymouth, read a paper on the necessity of a
C.W.S. branch in the West. The Severn tunnel then under con-
struction was said to make the project more feasible. At Newport,
six months later, the mood became imperative. The Plymouth,
Radstock, and other English delegates were supported by survivors
from the previous agitation, like Mr. Edwards, of Mountain Ash.
The resolution declared that " a Wholesale must be formed at
Bristol, if not by the Wholesale Society, by some other organisation."
Mr. Ben Jones, although speaking only as a servant, hinted at a
decision to make a moderate beginning, and nine months later the
C.W.S. Committee announced an intention of opening " a sale and
sample room in Bristol, under the London Branch Committee."
The new depot began at 106, Victoria Street, Bristol, with six
employees, and was formally opened on October 8th, 1884. Mr. Hines
admitted that the federation had been " perhaps unduly cautious,"
and, at any rate, the sales soon proved the depot's necessity. For
the few months of 1884 the English and Welsh shares in its grocery
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