On this day, 21 January 1921, striking workers in Santa Cruz, Argentina, seized the La Anita and La Primavera ranches, taking their owners and the deputy police commissioner hostage. The strikers, mostly wool workers and rural labourers, were demanding better pay and conditions, including Saturdays off work, better food, and a pack of candles per month each.
The workers had organised themselves into columns and were marching from workplace to workplace, seizing food and weapons. Subsequently some clashes took place with police, but after the arrival of the army, the workers agreed to give up their weapons and release their hostages in return for most of their demands being met.
However, later that year, authorities raided union offices, and when workers launched a general strike in response, Colonel Varela arrived with 200 troops and set about trying to crush the strike with brute force. By January 1922, up to 1,500 workers had been killed.
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