Beiträge zur Geschichte der Arbeiterbewegung Internet-Supplement ...

Richard Croucher
BzG-Supplement No. 1/2000 15
1996, pp.24670 and p.268. Dartmann contends that ‘The TUC did not institutionalise any links with
the German unions apart from fraternal attendance at Congresses, invitations to the newly emergent
international bodies or the Trade Union Marshall Plan conference, or individual relief actions...’ (p.246)
Having somewhat undermined his initial assertion by providing evidence of links, Dartmann dealt with
the appointment of Gottfurcht as liaison officer by saying that it was ‘the only concrete attempt.....the
effectiveness of which was doomed to be very limited from the start, though’ but without explaining
why he considered it so ‘doomed’. (p.246) Dartmann’s view of Gottfurcht’s work differs from that taken
by Boeckler (see note 8 below) and Tewson (see note 19 below). Dartmann also argued that those
parts of the Allied Control Commission for Germany concerned with economic matters were more
creative in developing codetermination than Manpower Division. (p.268).
7 Law 22 is examined in P.Weiler, British Labour and the Cold War, Stanford University Press, Stanford:
1988, p. 167.
8 Tewson to Gottfurcht, 4 June, 1947. MRC: 292/943/12. All documents referred to are from the TUC’s
archive deposited in the Modern Records Centre, University of Warwick and are prefixed ‘MRC’. In September
1947, Tewson and Boeckler had a long conversation when the latter visited the TUC Congress
in Southport, during which the latter expressed ‘considerable satisfaction’ with Gottfurcht’s liaison work
between the two movements. [Tewson to Bell, 18 September, 1947. MRC: 292/943/12]
9 Gottfurcht’s Report on Germany, May, 1949. MRC: 292/943/118.
10 514/PC/10: ‘Law No.22-Works Council’, 28 February, 1947. MRC: 292/943/12. Property Control
remained in control of many important enterprises as late as 1951. (Public Record Office [PRO]: FO
1023/342)
11 Kenny to Carthy, 20 May, 1947. MRC: 292/943/12.
12 IR Branch Monthly Bulletin, 47/2. PRO: FO 1051/433.
13 Luce to Gottfurcht, 26 June, 1947. MRC: 292/943/12.
14 The speech had explained that British policy had been to obtain a sound growth from below, and that
although this had resulted in a large number of small unions, Luce would not intervene to prevent larger
bodies being formed. He encouraged the creation of a co-ordinating body. ‘Speech made by Mr. R.W.
Luce to the Trade Union Zonal Council at Bielefeld on 4 October, 1946’. MRC: 292/943/12.
15 Gottfurcht to Luce, 7 July, 1947. MRC: 292/943/12.
16 Gottfurcht’s Report of May 1949. MRC:292/943/118.
17 Gottfurcht thanked Ernest Bell and Albert Carthy of the TUC’s International Department, as well as
Tewson and Walter Citrine, General Secretary and ex-General Secretary of the TUC respectively, in a
letter informing them that he had been successful in his application for British nationality: ‘To express
my gratitude to all of you is my deep-felt desire at this juncture’. Gottfurcht to Bell, 11 February, 1948.
MRC: 292/943/12.
18 M. Schneider, op.cit., p.259.
19 R. Steininger, op.cit., pp. 69-90.
Steininger’s view that ‘die Briten’ of the TUC and Foreign Office need hardly be differentiated between
has been challenged by evidence produced by Weiler, who shows that the Foreign Office complained
in late 1947 that the TUC was giving insufficient active support to the Foreign Office in its attempts to
combat both Communist and American Federation of Labour influence in Germany.(P. Weiler, op.cit.,
p.178). D. McShane, op.cit., p.226.
20 D. McShane, op.cit., p.219.
21 Gottfurcht’s report of May 1949. MRC: 292/943/118.
22 Tewson to Rosenberg, 18 March, 1950. MRC: 292/943/17. Gottfurcht was succeeded as liaison officer
by his old colleague Richard Broh, who held the position for much of the 1950s.
23 Gottfurcht to Boeckler, 27 January, 1950. MRC: 292/943/12.
24 Sir Thomas Hutton to Sir Vincent Tewson, 13 March, 1953. MRC: 242/943/18. The German employers’
attitudes on this occasion seem to support Gottfurcht’s view of them as fundamentally hostile to cooperation
with trade unions.
25 Tewson to Hutton, 14 March, 1952. MRC: 242/943/18.
ends