George Sholto Gordon Douglas-Pennant, 2nd Baron Penrhyn
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George Sholto Gordon Douglas-Pennant, 2nd Baron Penrhyn (1836- 10 March 1907), was a landowner who played a prominent part in the Welsh slate industry as the owner of the Penrhyn Quarry in North Wales.
Douglas-Pennant was the son of Colonel Edward Gordon Douglas (1800-1886), brother of Sholto George Douglas, 19th Earl of Morton, who, through his wife, Juliana, elder daughter and co-heir of George Hay Dawkins-Pennant, of Penrhyn Castle, Caernarvon, had large estates in Wales and elsewhere, and was created Baron Penrhyn in 1866. Dawkins had inherited the estates from Richard Penrhyn, who was created Baron Penryn in 1763, the title becoming extinct on his death in 1808.
George Douglas-Pennant was Conservative Member of Parliament for Caernarvonshire in 1866-1868 and 1874-1880, and succeeded his father in the title in 1886. He was a complex character, seen by his tenant farmers and estate workers as benevolent as he maintained the tradition of noblesse oblige but by his quarry workers as an antiquated tyrant unable to face the growing power of labour forces. He came prominently before the public in 1897 and subsequent years in connection with the famous strike at his Welsh slate-quarries.
During his father's lifetime the management of the Penrhyn quarry had been left practically to an elective committee of the operatives as laid out by the Pennant-Lloyd agreement, something with which George wholly disagreed. Upon assuming control of the quarry in 1886, two years before his father's death, he abolished the committee, and with the help of E. A. Young, whom he brought in from London as manager, he reorganized the business so as to increase profits from the slate quarry to something like £150,000 a year. The new men and new methods met with resistance from the trade unionist leaders of the quarrymen, and in 1897, when the "new unionism" was spreading throughout the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, a strike took place.
Lord Penrhyn refused to recognize the union or its officials, though he was willing to consider any grievances from individual quarrymen, and a protracted struggle ensued, which he was determined to win. He became the object of bitter political hostility, and the trade unions unsuccessfully sought some form of government intervention. Penrhyn strikers travelled the country, singing and collecting contributions to their funds. On the grounds that several strikers who had gone to the coal mines of south Wales continued to draw strike pay from the union, thereby limiting considerably available funds for the destitute, the union withdrew all strike pay in 1903, having paid out nearly two years beyond its constitutional obligations.
The strike went beyond a dispute between owner and worker to have international consequence as the world watched to see whether the traditional power of the aristocracy could hold sway against the might of growing trades unions. A timely slump in the demand for Welsh slate ensured that Penrhyn had enough men working for the quarry to satisfy all orders: he did not need to concede on a single one of the strikers' demands. The strike collapsed pitifully with Penrhyn's manager E. A. Young maintaining a blacklist of strikers which was used to gauge whether those wishing to return to work should be offered a position. Many were refused.
Lord Penrhyn was married twice, and had fifteen surviving children. He was succeeded in the title by his eldest son, Edward Sholto (b. 1864), who was Unionist M.P. for South Northamptonshire from 1895 to 1900.
This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
