Stockton was hit hard by the economic recession following the Great Depression. In June 1933, Oswald Mosley announced an offensive, aiming to expand the BUF beyond its headquarters in London and base in Manchester. George Short, the Communist Party District Organiser for Teesside, had spent almost three years at the International Lenin School in Moscow. On his return, in late 1931, he threw himself into political activism on Teesside.
Whilst the Stockton contingent of the NUWM were on the 1932 National Hunger March, the Stockton magistrates banned Short's NUWM Saturday evening surgeries that were held at the Market Cross on Stockton High Street. These were to assist the unemployed, especially fighting the despised Means Test. In response Short relocated, helping the unemployed in the churchyard of Holy Trinity Church and holding his political meetings at the Five Lamps in Thornaby. As only the NUWM and CPGB were barred from holding meetings at the Market Cross, Short and his wife Phyllis organised a series of demonstrations, culminating in a march up and down Stockton's High Street.
On 30 March 1933, Short, his wife Phyllis, David Catterick, Patrick O'Neil and Henry Walker were arrested for defying the ban and marching up and down the High Street. The men were charged with resisting the police, disturbance of the peace and the very serious charge of inciting others to commit violence (which held a minimum sentence of 10 yrs and could go up to a life sentence). Phyllis was charged with obstructing the police.
"Despite her size my grandmother was a formidable woman: whilst being roughly manhandled by a big policeman she bit him on the hand She was charged with assaulting the policeman. Mind you, as George said, 'she did get through to the bone.'"[1]
On 3 April 1933 at the Magistrates Court, although found not guilty of inciting others to commit violence, Short and Catterick refused to be bound over to keep the peace and were sentenced to three months in Durham Prison, where Short would be later joined by his close friend Wilf Jobling. When the 5-foot-tall Phyllis was asked if she had assaulted the 6 foot 6 inch Superintendent Hammond standing next to her, her shrug reduced everyone in the magistrates court to fits of laughter. The judge reluctantly found Phyllis guilty. She, for the sake of their children, agreed to be bound over and to pay 10 shillings.[2]
On 5 April 1933, 'considerable commotion was cause on the High Street' when the NUWM protested against the imprisonment of George Short and David Catterick.[3]
"I was in prison when the first attempt by the Mosley fascists to organise their first meeting on Teesside happened, and that was in Stockton. They held a meeting on Stockton's Cross, and whilst it was a rowdy meeting, they carried it off."[4]
On George's release, he and Phyllis planned and organised 'real resistance' to the next BUF meeting. The BUF delayed their meeting until after George was released. The suggestion was that this was an attempt to have him arrested and charged with inciting others to commit violence. If charged for a second time, this would very likely result in a lengthy prison term for George.
Events
The BUF's North East Organiser, Michael Jordan, planned to speak at the Market Cross on Sunday 10 September 1933. As there were only a handful of local members London sent the London based BUF speaker; Captain Vincent Collier; who would shortly after become the North East Propaganda Officer, they also sent to Stockton a dozen Tyneside members and a ominously a dozen from Manchester's newly formed 'Defence Force', these latter had been involved in a number of violent altercations in Cheetham Hill, they wore the black shirt as a uniform, which was later used by the BUF as a whole. When Collier and his 30 men arrived at Stockton's High Street they found the Market Cross occupied by George Short and a peaceful crowd of up to 3000 supporters. Surrounded as soon as they stepped off the bus Collier was prevented from speaking by the hecklers – the police report states "The hecklers were exclusively CP and NUWM members."[5] The Police immediately ordered the meeting to be abandoned and escorted the BUF back to their two buses parked on the High Street.
As the BUF withdrew, a handful of the Blackshirts attacked individuals in the crowd, which resulted in isolated pockets of fighting which Collier elaborated upon for the newspapers, who eagerly repeated his fabrications.
"The Fascists appeared to be keen on fighting and we had to give them a sharp reminder to get moving and get away out of the town before any further damage was done."[6]
Michael Jordan in his later report places the blame for the fighting firmly on the Manchester Defence Force, and one leader in particular.
"I was approached by an officer who told me our men had come for a fight and it would break their hearts if they were allowed to go back to Manchester without one. He stated he was from London Headquarters and would take the responsibility. I informed him that I was in charge of the area and would not stand for innocent people being bludgeoned, He deliberately attacked one of the crowd with the result that a riot started in a few seconds."[7]
George Short's grandson gives an indication as to why the Teesside Communists were so successful; in contrast to the BUF, George ensured that the anti-fascist protesters were seen as non-violent.
"A group of comrades captured one of Mosley's Blackshirts and were heading towards the river with the intention of throwing him in. My grandfather persuaded them that if he died it would create a martyr, so they let him go."[8]
There is an account of this incident written from a fascists' perspective, John Charnley, a Blackshirt originally from Hull, in his 1990 account of his time in the BUF:
"It was in one of these sweeps that Ned Warburton was felled. he was cut off and carried struggling by a group of Reds who were going to 'chuck him in the river'. Fortunately, a group of uncommitted locals outside a pub saw the incident, attacked the Reds and rescued him, bandaged his head and got him back to the Blackshirts during a lull in the fighting."[9]
TWO MEN INJURED Fascist and Communist Clash Two young men, John Frank Rushford of Greytower, Durham and Thomas Edmond Warburton. of Unsworth, Berwick, sustained head injuries when stones were thrown during a clash between Fascists and Communists at Stockton, last night. A party of 30 Fascists from surrounding towns were holding a meeting in Stockton High Street, when, it is alleged, Communists created a disturbance. Both Rushford and Warburton were able to go home after treatment at hospital. Shields Daily News 11 September 1933
A modern version of the event claims that as the Fascist meeting started two thousand or more anti fascists appeared from the narrow streets roundabout and a fight started. The police ordered the crowd to disperse and ordered the Fascists back to their buses, and that the two thousand were made up exclusively of Trade Unionists and not communists[10]
Contemporary reports of the event show vast differences between the police and press reports; The police were naturally keen to demonstrate that they competently and successfully handled a difficult situation, while the press were keen to sell papers and sensationalise the events. Vincent Collier supplied the press with sensational reports. Edward 'Ned' Warburton was one of the two Blackshirts injured at Stockton, losing the sight in one eye. Collier claimed the injury was due to being struck by a potato which had a cutthroat razor blade embedded in it, but Ned's brother John stated it was a stone. The myth was further elaborated upon in Richard Bellamy's We Marched with Mosley.[11] The contemporary newspaper accounts and Bellamy's accounts have been, until very recently, the only sources; leading to a number of implausible misinterpretations which glorify the violence.[12]
Aftermath
The day afterwards a Communist Party demonstration was joined by the local Christian, Co-operative society and representatives of the small local Jewish community. One of the speakers was Rabbi Miller from Middlesbrough who said Britain was in danger from jeopardising liberty by Fascism and Hitlerism which needed to be nipped in the bud.
The Battle of Stockton was a hugely significant setback for the BUF on Teesside; resulting in Michael Jordan, who had been with Mosley in the New Party, submitting a long and rather acrimonious resignation letter. He left the movement taking a number of experienced activists with him. The diminished BUF relocated to Middlesbrough; in an interview recorded shortly before his death, George Short says:
"In Middlesbrough they learnt their lesson, they held no outdoor meeting, instead they held them in Middlesbrough Town Hall."[13]
Short's continued anti-fascist campaign ensured that, despite relocating, the BUF never established a foothold on Teesside. Communists continued to disrupt BUF meetings; after Mosley himself tried to speak at Middlesbrough Town Hall in February 1935, which resulted in damage to the Town Hall, local councillors objected to ratepayers footing the bill for policing. Thereafter the local authorities prevented the BUF from hiring halls anywhere on Teesside.
Three years later, Short was still resisting fascism, not just locally and nationally, but now internationally; he vetted and organised the twenty-one Volunteers for Liberty from Teesside who fought in the XV International Brigade for the Spanish Republican government during the Spanish Civil War.
"My job became a very difficult job because comrades who wanted to go to Spain had to report to me. When these lads fell, it was my job to go and visit their relatives and explain to them that they had fallen, and it was a very hard job."[14]
Commemoration
in 2012, local folk trio The Young'uns released "The Battle of Stockton" on their album When Our Grandfathers Said No.
Inspired by the 2011 article by David Walsh, in August 2017 an organisation called The Battle of Stockton Campaign (BoS) was founded in order to commemorate the event. On 9 September 2018, a plaque marking the battle was unveiled at the Market Cross by the town's mayor, Eileen Johnson. Other speakers at the commemoration were Stockton North MP Alex Cunningham, North-East MEP Jude Kirton-Darling, actress and president of the International Brigade Memorial TrustMarlene Sidaway, the convener of Cable Street 80; David Rosenberg and Unison's Claire Williams.
Sir Oswald Ernald Mosley, 6th Baronet, was a British politician who rose to fame during the 1920s and 1930s when, having become disillusioned with mainstream politics, he turned to fascism. Mosley was the son of a baronet. He was a member of parliament and later founded and led the British Union of Fascists (BUF).
The Battle of Cable Street was a series of clashes that took place at several locations in the East End of London, most notably Cable Street, on Sunday 4 October 1936. It was a clash between the Metropolitan Police, sent to protect a march by members of the British Union of Fascists led by Sir Oswald Mosley, and various anti-fascist demonstrators including local trade unionists, communists, anarchists, British Jews, and socialist groups. The anti-fascist counter-demonstration included both organised and unaffiliated participants.
The British Union of Fascists (BUF) was a British fascist political party formed in 1932 by Oswald Mosley. Mosley changed its name to the British Union of Fascists and National Socialists in 1936 and, in 1937, to the British Union. In 1939, following the start of the Second World War, the party was proscribed by the British government and in 1940 it was disbanded.
Arthur Kenneth Chesterton was a British journalist and political activist. From 1933 to 1938, he was a member of the British Union of Fascists (BUF). Disillusioned with Oswald Mosley, he left the BUF in 1938. Chesterton established the League of Empire Loyalists in 1954, which merged with a short-lived British National Party in 1967 to become the National Front. He founded and edited the magazine Candour in 1954 as the successor of Truth, of which he had been co-editor.
The Imperial Fascist League (IFL) was a British fascist political movement founded by Arnold Leese in 1929 after he broke away from the British Fascists. It included a blackshirted paramilitary arm called the Fascists Legion, modelled after the Italian Fascists. The group espoused antisemitism and the dominance of the 'Aryan race' in a 'Racial Fascist Corporate State', especially after Leese met Nazi Party propagandist Julius Streicher, the virulently racist publisher of Der Stürmer; the group later indirectly received funding from the Nazis. Although it had only between 150 and 500 members at maximum, its public profile was higher than its membership numbers would indicate.
The National Socialist League (NSL) was a short-lived Nazi political movement in the United Kingdom immediately prior to the Second World War.
Rotha Beryl Lintorn Lintorn-Orman was a British political activist and World War I veteran who founded the British Fascisti, the first avowedly fascist movement to appear in British politics.
Thomas P. Moran was a leading member of the British Union of Fascists and a close associate of Oswald Mosley. Initially a miner, Moran later became a qualified engineer. He joined the Royal Air Force at 17 and later served in the Royal Naval Reserve as an engine room artificer.
Alexander Raven Thomson, usually referred to as Raven, was a Scottish politician and philosopher. He joined the British Union of Fascists in 1933 and remained a follower of Oswald Mosley for the rest of his life. Thomson was considered to be the party's chief ideologue and has been described as the "Alfred Rosenberg of British fascism".
British fascism is the form of fascism which is promoted by some political parties and movements in the United Kingdom. It is based on British ultranationalism and imperialism and had aspects of Italian fascism and Nazism both before and after World War II.
The British Fascists were the first political organisation in the United Kingdom to claim the label of fascism, formed in 1923. The group had lacked much ideological unity apart from anti-socialism for most of its existence, and was strongly associated with British conservatism. William Joyce, Neil Francis Hawkins, Maxwell Knight and Arnold Leese were amongst those to have passed through the movement as members and activists.
James Larratt Battersby was a British fascist and pacifist, and a member of the Battersby family of hatmakers of Stockport, Greater Manchester, England. He was forced to retire from the family firm due to his politics and was interned by the British government during the Second World War along with other British fascists. During his detention he came to believe that Adolf Hitler was Christ returned, and after the war wrote The Holy Book and Testament of Adolf Hitler. He committed suicide by leaping into the paddle wheels of a ferry.
Victor Cecil Burgess was a British fascist who was one of the principal figures in the British League of Ex-Servicemen and Women (BLESMAW).
The Friends of Oswald Mosley (FOM) is the last vestige of Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists (BUF) and its successors, the Union Movement and the Action Party.
John Warburton was an English fascist and press photographer. He was an assistant district leader for the Clapham branch of Sir Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists (BUF) before the Second World War, and afterwards was a key member of the Union Movement, the founder editor of Comrade, and the senior Council member of Friends of Oswald Mosley.
The Battle of South Street was a riot that took place on 9 October 1934 in Worthing, Sussex, England. The riot took place as members of the British Union of Fascists and various anti-fascist protesters clashed following a meeting of Fascists at the Pier Pavilion. The riot involved a series of clashes along and close to the length of South Street from the Pier Pavilion and the Royal Arcade at its southern end to the junctions with Warwick Street and Market Street further north.
Charles Frederick Watts was a member of the British Union of Fascists who was interned during the Second World War.
The Battle of Holbeck Moor was a clash between the British Union of Fascists and various anti-fascist demonstrators that took place in Holbeck, Leeds, on 27 September 1936.
The Battle of De Winton Field was a clash between the British Union of Fascists and various anti-fascist demonstrators that took place in Tonypandy, Wales, on 11 June 1936. It was the BUF's last attempt to hold a rally in Wales.
The Battle of Carfax (1936) was a violent skirmish in the city of Oxford between the British Union of Fascists (BUF) and local anti-fascists, trade unionists, and supporters of the Labour Party and the Communist Party of Great Britain. The battle took place inside Oxford's Carfax Assembly Rooms, a once popular meeting hall owned by Oxford City Council which was used for public events and located on Cornmarket Street.
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British Union of Fascists (Blackshirts)
