Desmond Buckle
Desmond Buckle | |
---|---|
Gold Coast (present day Ghana) | |
Died | 25 October 1964 | (aged 54)
Occupation(s) | Political activist, journalist, trade unionist |
James Desmond Buckle (29 March 1910 – 25 October 1964) was a political activist, journalist, trade unionist and Communist born in the British colony of the
Early life and family
James Desmond Buckle was born on 29 March 1910 to Vidal James Buckle and Ellen Konadu Buckle in
In 1920, his father died at the age of 33, when Desmond was just 10 years old. Following this, Ellen Buckle sent all her children to Britain to boarding-school.
Political activism
Buckle has been described by comrades as a "Lifelong fighter for colonial freedom" and was well renowned among African and West Indian revolutionaries.[1] Despite not being well known in the public sphere, Buckle's activism was internationally recognised. At the time of Buckle's death, the then President of Nigeria, Nnamdi Azikiwe, sent a message to his funeral stating that Buckle was someone who "passionately believed in human freedom and devoted his life to its realization, not only in Africa but in all corners of the earth".[1]
Work with the Gold Coast Students' Association
During the 1930s Buckle began to become involved in student and black political organizations, including the League of Coloured Peoples (LCP) and the Gold Coast Students' Association (GCSA).[1] The GCSA was a West African student organization formed in London in the mid 1920s, alongside other West African student organisations such as the West African Students' Union (WASU).[1] Through the GSCA, Buckle became heavily involved in the politics of the time.[1] Buckle greatly opposed the Sedition placed upon the Gold Coast and supporting the views of African politicians arriving in Britain to oppose such restrictions.[1] Buckle also supported the 1937–1938 Gold Coast "cocoa hold-up", in which a coalition of farmers on the Gold Coast refused to sell their cocoa produce to large trading firms.[5] On occasion the GCSA was antagonistic to the WASU on various issues Buckle was involved in, such as the dispute over Aggrey House. At this time the GCSA viewed the WASU not as an organisation that represented West African students, but as one dominated by Nigerians.[1] Buckle gave his support of Aggrey House, a hostel designed for African students, being part of the GCSA delegation that helped establish its rules in 1934.[1] The WASU, on the contrary, saw the house as a means for the British Government to control African students.[6] Buckle was a prominent member of the GCSA, being appointed as its secretary from 1936 to 1937 and its president in 1937–38.[1] During this time Buckle's radicalism increased, with him proposing the notion "this Association refuses to fight for the British Empire" at a GCSA debate in October 1937.[1] The next month Buckle was the primary opponent of the motion "that the salvation of the Gold Coast lies in close cooperation with the British Labour Party", showing his refusal to cooperate with British Imperialism.[1]
Around this time, Buckle worked in collaboration with the
Communism and the Communist Party of Great Britain
In July 1939 Buckle, was one of the major organizers on a conference called "African Peoples, Democracy and World Peace".[1] This was organized by the NWA, CPGB and the Coloured Film Artistes Association. Around this time Buckle became "intellectually convinced" by the values of the Communist Party which he had joined in 1937.[1][7]
Regardless of background, African students, like Buckle, were subject to being treated as second class citizens in Britain, often facing verbal racial abuse and discrimination.
Buckle worked as a journalist for the CPGB, specialising in African affairs and colonialism. This skills in writing were swiftly observed, and he was a member of the CPGB's Colonial Committee by 1943.[1] In 1947 and 1949, he presented reports on Africa and the West Indies at conferences for the Communist Parties of nations under the British Empire.[1] Buckle's reports were anti-capitalist and anti-colonialist, linking the hardships under colonialism with the international struggle against Capitalism.[1] Regarding liberation, Buckle proposed that colonies striving for independence must dispose of monopolies in order to "advance to real freedom".[1][8] In the 1949 conference, Buckle again critiques "monopoly capitalism" as being a major obstacle in the development of colonies.[1] He also made clear the importance of the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU).[1]
Buckle was a member of the CPGB's International Affairs Committee (IAC) and secretary of the Africa Committee, a subsect of the IAC.
Other forms of activism
Buckle was also part of various anti-racist movements in Britain as well as being part of trade union and peace movements internationally, with connections to the Pan-African movement in Britain.
Post
Buckle continued his journalism working for the
Death
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/1/1a/Buckle%2C_Desmond_1964.jpg/150px-Buckle%2C_Desmond_1964.jpg)
Buckle died of stomach cancer at St George's Hospital in London, aged 54, and his ashes were buried at Highgate Cemetery.[4]
Publications
- Imperialist Terror in Kenya, published by World News (1952)
- Africa in Ferment, published by The Trinity Trust (1953)
- "Africa in Ferment" by Desmond Buckle, pp. 19–22, Labour Monthly, January 1953
- "Civil Liberty in the Empire", Labour Monthly (1941)
- "North Africa Shakes France", Labour Monthly, April 1958, pp. 175–179
- "Colour Bar." World News and Views, November 1942, pp. 453–454
References
- ^ Science and Society, Vol. 70, No. 1 (2006).
- ^ Oxford Biography Index
- ^ Adi, Hakim, Abstract "Forgotten comrade? Desmond Buckle: an African Communist in Britain", Science and Society, Vol. 70, No. 1 (2006).
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Adi, Hakim, "Buckle, (James) Desmond (1910–1964)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004.
- ^ Alence, Rod. "The 1937–1938 Gold Coast Cocoa Crisis: The Political Economy of Commercial Stalemate". African Economic History, no. 19, African Studies Program, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1990, pp. 77–104.
- ^ The Truth About Aggrey House – An Exposure of the Government Plan to Control African Students in Great Britain. London: West African Students' Union. 1934.
- ^ Communist Party Archives, n.d. Labour History Archive and Study Centre at The John Rylands University of Manchester Library. CPGB/CENT/PERS/1/03. Daily Worker. 26 October 1924.
- ^ Buckle, Desmond. 1947. "Analyzing World Imperialism Today and the Fight Against It - The Conference of Communist Parties of the British Empire" New Africa (April).
- ^ Howe, Stephen. 1993. Anticolonialism in British Politics: The Left and the End of Empire 1918–64. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press.
- ^ Civil Liberty. 1950. 10:3 (February–March)
- ^ World Peace Congress. Peace: A World Review - Special Number of the Second World Peace Congress Warsaw (1950).
- ^ Duberman, Martin Bauml. Paul Robeson. London: Pan Books (1989).