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Workers' Dreadnought

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Workers' Dreadnought was a communist newspaper based in London and led by Sylvia Pankhurst.

Workers' Dreadnought
For International Socialism
TypeWeekly newspaper
FormatBroadsheet
Owner(s)Workers' Socialist Federation
Founder(s)Sylvia Pankhurst
PublisherDreadnought Publications
EditorSylvia Pankhurst
General managerHarold Burgess
Founded8 March 1914 (1914-03-08)
Political alignment
Ceased publication14 June 1924 (1924-06-14)
Headquarters152 Fleet Street, London
CountryUnited Kingdom
Circulation10,000 (as of 1917)[1]

The paper was started by Pankhurst at the suggestion of Zelie Emerson,[2] after Pankhurst had been expelled from the Women's Social and Political Union by her mother and sister. The paper was published on behalf of the newly formed East London Federation of Suffragettes.

Provisionally titled Workers' Mate, the newspaper first appeared on 8 March 1914[3] (14 March according to another source[4] or 21 March according to yet another[5]), the day of a suffragette rally at which Pankhurst was due to speak, in Trafalgar Square, as The Woman's Dreadnought, with a circulation of 30,000,[citation needed], subsequently (at number 10, in May 1914) stated as 20,000.[6]

When the editor was imprisoned, Norah Smyth alternated as acting editor with Jack O'Sullivan.[7] For many years, Smyth had used her skills as a photographer to provide pictures for the newspaper of East End life, particularly of women and children living in poverty.[8]

In July 1917, the name was changed to Workers' Dreadnought,[9] which initially had a circulation of 10,000. Its slogan changed to "Socialism, Internationalism, Votes for All", and then in July 1918 to "For International Socialism", reflecting increasing opposition to Parliamentarism in the party.[10]

The paper took a strong stance against to the First World War, calling for Britain to begin peace negotiations, and speaking positively of Russia's exit from the war.[11][12] The paper's first issue for October 1917 advocated for a peace referendum among the British Army, but before it could enter circulation the Metropolitan Police raided offices of Workers Dreadnought and destroyed the copies of the issue.[12][13]

On 19 June 1920, Workers' Dreadnought was adopted as the official weekly organ of the Communist Party (British Section of the Third International).[14]

I write because I feel that the ultimate result of your propaganda will be further strife and blood-spilling between whites and the many members of my race... who have been dumped down on the English docks since the ending of the European war... Bourbons of the United States will thank you, and the proletarian underworld of London will certainly gloat over the scoop of the Christian-Socialist pacifist Daily Herald.[15]

Claude McKay, "A Black Man Replies" in Workers' Dreadnought (24 April 1920)

During the Post-war French occupation of the Rhineland, German communists attempted to retake the region. France employed the use of black colonial troops to halt them. Reporting on the events, the Daily Herald referred to the soldiers using terms such as "Black Scourge in Europe," and "Black Menace of 40,000 Troops".[16] Jamaican writer Claude McKay considered the papers' focus on the Black soldiers to be illogical prejudice, and a distraction from the communists' efforts against French occupation.[17][18] McKay wrote a letter adressed to the Daily Herald's editor George Lansbury expressing these concerns. Landsbury refused to print the response, while writing back privately claiming to not be personally prejudice against black people.[16][19] Instead, he was encoraged by a friend to send it to Sylvia Pankhurst and have it printed in Workers' Dreadnought, and did so.[16][15]

The paper warned of fascism in Italy, condemned the white labourism in South Africa's Rand Rebellion,[20]

Sylvia Pankhurst was arrested under the Defence of the Realm Act for publishing articles "calculated and likely to cause sedition among His Majesty's forces, in the Navy, and among the civilian population". Claude McKay had his rooms searched. He is likely to have been the author of "The Yellow Peril and the Dockers" attributed to "Leon Lopez", which was one of the articles cited by the government in its case against Workers' Dreadnought.[21]

On 14 June 1924, Workers' Dreadnought ceased publication.[22]

References

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  1. ^ Davis, Mary (1999). Sylvia Pankhurst: A Life in Radical Politics. London: Pluto Press. p. 55. ISBN 0745315232.
  2. ^ "Workers' Dreadnought". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 29 January 2018.
  3. ^ "Date: 8 March 1914 (1) Newspaper: Woman's Dreadnought]". British Newspaper Archive. Retrieved 29 February 2020.
  4. ^ "The Woman's Dreadnought March 14 1914". LSE Digital Library. Retrieved 29 February 2020.
  5. ^ "First World War > War Literature > Workers' Dreadnought". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 29 February 2020.
  6. ^ Discovering the unsung heros of the suffragette movement in the heart of the East End Image of paper number 10, 23 May 1914, www.riversidecares.co.uk, accessed 29 February 2020
  7. ^ Ian Bullock. Romancing the Revolution: The Myth of Soviet Democracy and the British Left. p. 239.
  8. ^ Rosemary Betterton. An Intimate Distance: Women, Artists and the Body. p. 73.
  9. ^ M. A. S. Shipway, Anti-Parliamentary Communism in Britain 1917-1945, vol.1, p.26
  10. ^ M. A. S. Shipway. Anti-Parliamentary Communism in Britain 1917-1945. Vol. 1. p. 31-32.
  11. ^ Taylor, J. H. (2021). The Fight to a Finish: War-resisters in South London and Beyond 1917-19. pp. 16, 46, 83, 96, 108, 109 – via www.academia.edu.
  12. ^ a b "SYLVIA PANKHURST". menwhosaidno.org. Retrieved 12 October 2024.
  13. ^ "The Women's Peace Crusade". Labour Leader. 18 October 1917 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  14. ^ "Communist Party (British Section of the Third International". Workers' Dreadnought. VII (14). 26 June 1919.
  15. ^ a b Reinders, Robert C. (April 1968). "Racialism on the Left E.D. Morel and the "Black Horror on the Rhine"". International Review of Social History. 13 (1): 17. doi:10.1017/S0020859000000419. ISSN 0020-8590.
  16. ^ a b c Nickels, Joel (2014). "Claude Mckay and Dissident Internationalism". Cultural Critique. 87: 1–37. doi:10.5749/culturalcritique.87.2014.0001. ISSN 0882-4371. JSTOR 10.5749/culturalcritique.87.2014.0001.
  17. ^ McKay, Claude (1985) [1937]. "Radical London and the Workers Dreadnought in the early 1920s". A Long Way From Home. London: Pluto Press – via libcom.org.
  18. ^ James, Winston (2017). "In the Nest of Extreme Radicalism: Radical Networks and the Bolshevization of Claude McKay in London". Comparative American Studies. 15 (3–4): 174–203. doi:10.1080/14775700.2017.1551604. ISSN 1477-5700. S2CID 165264898.
  19. ^ Donlon, Anne (2016). "'A Black Man Replies': Claude McKay's Challenge to the British Left". Lateral. 5 (1). doi:10.25158/L5.1.2. Retrieved 16 June 2016.
  20. ^ Béliard, Yann (2016). "A "Labour War" in South Africa: the 1922 Rand Revolution in Sylvia Pankhurst's Workers' Dreadnought". Labor History. 57 (1): 20–34. doi:10.1080/0023656X.2016.1140621. ISSN 0023-656X. S2CID 146939070.
  21. ^ Cooper, Wayne F. (1996). Claude McKay, Rebel Sojourner in the Harlem Renaissance: A Biography. LSU Press. p. 123. ISBN 080712074X.
  22. ^ M. A. S. Shipway. Anti-Parliamentary Communism in Britain 1917-1945. Vol. 1. p. 191.

Further reading

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