George Fletcher (communist)

George Henry Fletcher (7 September 1879 – 8 June 1958) was a British communist activist and baker.

Born in Horncastle in Lincolnshire, Fletcher completed an apprenticeship as a baker and, after a short period working as a miner, found work at Simmersons bakery in Sheffield. There, he started a branch of the Amalgamated Union of Operative Bakers, and became its chair.

In 1898, Fletcher joined the Sheffield Socialist Society (SSS), and around this time, he also started a small bakery of his own. In 1902, he worked with other SSS members to form a branch of the Social Democratic Federation (SDF). He was an agreed joint Labour candidate in the 1905 local elections in Burngreave, losing by only four votes. He also began speaking regularly at open air meetings for the party. In 1910, he was fined 40 shillings for speaking in High Hazels Park; soon after, he was sentenced to 56 days in prison for speaking in Hillsborough Park.

Fletcher was elected to the executive committee of the Sheffield Trades and Labour Council in 1914, and as vice-chair in 1915. He organised anti-war rallies, and was prominent in the No Conscription Fellowship. He also played a role in supporting the Sheffield Workers' Committee, and was prominent in the bakers' national strike of 1919.

In 1920, Fletcher was a founder of both the Communist Party of Great Britain (CPGB) and the Sheffield National Unemployed Workers Movement. In 1921, he was sentenced to three months in prison on charges of sedition for speaking in favour of a miners' strike. Fletcher was later appointed as the treasurer of the National Minority Movement.

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