British Social Democracy

1916-1920

Note by Transcriber — Ted Crawford

The journal of the BSP after the split on the issue of the war, the weekly The Call, lasted from 24 Feb.1916 – 29 July 1920 when it transmuted into The Communist. (It has been microfilmed and is thus available elsewhere but some of the paper copies in the British Newspaper Library which I consulted are in very poor condition. It is also available in Hull University and the National Library of Scotland while there are microfilm copies at the LSE.) It was started in anticipation of a split in the BSP which eventuated two months later at Easter 1916 – 24-25 April. Despite the success of the split from Hyndman, since the slaughter of the war went on and the mood of Britain was still very patriotic, the mood of the paper is gloomy, indeed the battle of the Somme started in July 1916 while the Irish rebellion was crushed during its opening conference. One has the impression that an immense change in optimism occurred after the first Russian Revolution which was warmly greeted in the paper on the 22 March 1917. There was a huge growth in all the Marxist currents in Britain without much direct Russian involvement through instructions or money. Still the BSP, as in the pre-Hyndman era, up to the end of 1918 though its members were often exceedingly active in the Trade Unions did not try to organise their members in groups and develop a line therein in the Bolshevik style.

Walter Kendall in his book, The Revolutionary Movement in Britain, 1900-21: the Origins of British Communism, 1969, deals with The Call, the BSP and its evolution into the Communist party. Most of his material about The Call is in Chapters 6 and 9. Kendall’s thesis seems to be that there was an organic growth until some point between early 1918 and early in 1919 when the changes that occurred were increasingly pushed through with Russian money and agents and did not arise out of British conditions and so were, in a sense, artificial, all of which is dealt with in great detail in the Part 2 of the book. Studies since the archives have been opened up have tended to confirm Kendall’s thesis as regards the amounts and frequency of Russian subventions though whether the CP was simply an artificial creation of the Russians is a much more debatable point.

A number of the leading members wrote articles for the paper, Dora Montefiore for instance, the other prominent woman is Zelda Kahan and apart from these two there is Fairchild, the editor, Walton Newbold MP, Fineburg, Dukes, Watson, Ward, Tom Quelch, and last but not least Theo Rothstein who also writes under the name John Bryan and the initials W.A.M.M. Many articles and editorials are anonymous.

Index of articles

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