Jim Larkin died in Dublin on January 30, 1947, at the age of sixty-nine. Along with his associate, James Connolly, he was one of the outstanding leaders of the Irish working class in the early years of this century. He and Connolly played major roles in the organization and development of the Irish trade union movement. He reached a great peak of his career in the great Dublin transport strike of 1913 and in the lockout which followed it. Thousands of Irish workers lived in misery and squalor, scarcely different from the conditions of life of the workers during the time of Marx and Engels.

Larkin was intimately associated with the militant struggles to better the workers’ lot. With the aid of his inspiration and example they lifted their heads, and they set out to act like men rather than slaves. Under his leadership, the militant Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union became a menace to the Dublin employers. The year 1913 was a period of labor unrest all over Europe. In Dublin there were at least thirty strikes from January to August 1913. The climax of labor militancy and unrest was reached in August 1913.

William Martin Murphy, head of the Dublin employers’ group, and the bitterest enemy of Jim Larkin, informed dispatch workers of the Irish Independent that they must choose between Larkin, “the strike organizer,” and their jobs. A similar ultimatum was given to the tramway workers, during Horse Show Week in August — the time when the biggest social events of Dublin are held — the tramway workers went out on strike. The employers began a war of extermination against the unions, and against Larkin. The most bloody and bitter class warfare in the history of modern Ireland broke out. Connolly came down from Belfast to participate in the leadership of the strike.