Jerry,

The Musical Maggie May was written by Lionel Bart and Alun Owen. In the Sixties I think.

It's about a girl who falls in love with a boy in her class at school.
They grow up and he joins the Merchant Navy and leaves her.
She becomes a prostitute.
He returns from sea some years later and finally notices her. They get together
He is working in the docks and discovers a shipment of arms being sent to somewhere in the empire to be used to opress the natives.
He gets the guys to go out on strike.
He gets killed trying to dump the crates in the dock.
She goes back on the game.

Some of the tunes were Maggie May of course, Ranzo Ranzo, & Leave Her Johnny, leave her.

One memorable scene was when the union's district delegate came to the strike meeting and tried to get them to go back to work.

I've searched the web but can't find much more than just a mention of it.

Bert.