Fire Brigades Union

Rules, minutes, reports, accounts, subject files, publications, regional and branch records, etc.

The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) was founded in 1918 as the Firemen's Trade Union. The union began its life as a body very much based around the London area but soon expanded to include provincial brigades. In 1930 the union changed its name to the Fire Brigades Union. Just prior to the Second World War, local authorities anticipated hostilities by recruiting for the Auxiliary Fire Service (AFS). The reaction of the FBU was initially hostile to this development as members feared that the AFS would adversely affect their pay and conditions.

The FBU's General Secretary, John Horner, persuaded the union to incorporate the AFS, however, thus forming the AFS section of the FBU. Since the war the union has established for itself a radical political identity. The archive includes papers of David Shephard, who was a member of the Executive Council of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU), 1975-94. David Shephard belonged to the East Sussex Fire Brigade and, in addition to his membership of the Executive Council and numerous sub-committees, he was a prominent and active member of the union at a regional level. He was Regional Education Officer, Press and Firefighter Representative, and Brigade Secretary inter alia.

Reference: G.V. Blackstone, A history of the British Fire Service (1957) Frederick Radford, Fetch the engine: The official history of the Fire Brigades Union. (1951) Victor Bailey (ed.), Forged in Fire: The history of the Fire Brigades Union. (1992)