1922 Encyclopædia Britannica/Smillie, Robert

SMILLIE, ROBERT (1859-), British labour politician, was born in Belfast in 1859 of Scottish parents. He was sent to a primary school but left at the age of 14 years to work in a shipyard at Govan. Two years later he went into the mining industry of Lanarkshire and worked underground for 16 years. From 1878 onwards he was an active trade unionist, although in the earlier years of this period he was earning only 18s. 6d. a week. In 1890 he was elected paid organizer for the Larkhall district and owing to his activity the Lanarkshire Miners' Union soon reached a membership of 30,000. He took a prominent part in the formation of the Scottish Coal Trade Conciliation Board and its satisfactory results were largely attributable to his efforts. His abilities as a leader caused him to rise steadily from the chairmanship of the Scottish Trade Union Congress to the first presidency of the parliamentary committee of the Scottish Trade Union Congress and in 1894 he became permanent president of the Scottish Miners' Federation. In 1912 he was elected to the presidency of the Miners' Federation of Great Britain and the building up of this body has been the great work of his life. Politically his success has not been so great as on the industrial field and although he stood as a candidate for Parliament seven times he was never elected. His greatest poll was 3,847 in a three-cornered fight at Mid-Lanark in 1910. In 1885 he was elected a member of the district school board for Larkhall, a position which he filled for 20 years. His work on the Coal Industry Commission from March till June 1919 brought him into greater prominence, but he became very ill in Nov. 1919. In March 1920, as his health was no better, he tendered his resignation from the presidency of the Miners' Federation, but the Federation refused to accept it and gave him leave of absence instead. In March 1921 ill-health compelled him to resign from the Federation and retire from public life.