Did the 1918 police strike start in Fairfax Road, Harringay?

Well, no, not exactly but local activist Edward Hennem's recollection of a November evening in 1917 when he and his young friends tried to start the revolution in Harringay suggests a possible catalyst:

and one or two other youngsters [from the NLHL*] took an apple box to Fairfax Road, Harringay, outside the baker's shop** at 8 pm one murky November evening, to proclaim our baptism for the Red Flag - one chairman, one heckler, plus me -17 years of age.

We got no audience, a cat sitting on the hot grills of the bakehouse, and a policeman. . . . after a speech lasting 25 minutes. . . the copper asked us if we were going home - we were depressed that we had not influenced the nation. But, that policeman became the local leader of the police strike and an active worker in the movement. I like to think that my speech started him thinking.

*The North London Herald League based in Grand Parade Harringay

**Note the reference to a bakery in Fairfax Road

taken from The Police Strikes by Ken Weller