Guy Aldred
Guy Aldred | |
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Born | Clerkenwell, London | 5 November 1886
Died | 16 October 1963 | (aged 76)
Organizations | |
Spouse | Rose Witcop |
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Guy Alfred Aldred (often Guy A. Aldred; 5 November 1886 – 16 October 1963) was a British
Early life
Aldred was born in
His grandfather, an
At the age of 15 (1902), he was made aware of his London
The Rajah's god was a substantial fact. It had invaded my petty little world. It had brought home to me the realities of other cities and of other religions. It had made known to me, as no mere study could have done, the fact that Christianity was not the religion of the world. It had brought home to my understanding the fact that there was an Oriental theology beyond the pale of Christian orthodoxy.[1]
Later that year he gained a reputation as a "Boy Preacher", printing and handing out his own leaflets, which were often received with ridicule and disdain. He found employment as an office boy with the National Press Agency in Whitefriars House, where he was promoted to sub-editor. Working with an evangelist named McMasters, he co-founded the "Christian Social Mission", opening shortly after his 16th birthday as the Holloway Boy Preacher. His non-conformist approach aroused concern following his first sermon.
After contacting Charles Voysey, Guy was eventually granted an audience on 20 December 1902. The 74-year-old well-to-do Voysey was surprised to be confronted with a coarse-dressed 16-year-old working-class boy. After careful preliminaries on the part of Voysey, the meeting lasted three hours. Their friendship was to continue until Voysey's death in 1912.
In January 1903 the Reverend George Martin, an Anglican priest, visited Guy with one of his leaflets, asking to meet the Holloway Boy Preacher. Martin worked in London's worst slums, and Guy joined him in his work with London's poorest. His friendship with Martin lasted six years and influenced Guy strongly. He soon gave his last sermon from the pulpit and left the "Christian Social Mission".
Agnosticism
Guy became a speaker at the Institute of . It was at the Journal's office that he met another Scotsman, John Morrison Davidson, and Guy became more interested in Scottish affairs.
Indian Sedition Trial, 1907
In the execution of Dhingra that cloak will be publicly worn, that secret language spoken, that solemn veil employed to conceal the sword of Imperialism by which we are sacrificed to the insatiable idol of modern despotism, whose ministers are
Chicago martyrs. Who is more reprehensible than the murderers of these martyrs? The police spies who threw the bomb at Chicago; the ad-hoc tribunal which murdered innocent Egyptians at Denshawai; the Asquithwho assumed full responsibility for the murder of the workers at Featherstone; the assassins of Robert Emmett? Yet these murderers have not been executed! Why then should Dhingra be executed? Because he is not a time-serving executioner, but a Nationalist patriot, who, though his ideals are not their ideals, is worthy of the admiration of those workers at home, who have as little to gain from the lick-spittle crew of Imperialistic blood-sucking, capitalist parasites at as what the Nationalists have in India.
Aldred also remarked that the Sepoy Mutiny, or Indian Mutiny, would be described as
.Socialism and anarchism
Aldred joined the
In 1932 he split with the APCF and later founded the
Free love
Aldred worked closely with his partner Rose Witcop (9 April 1890 – 4 July 1932), a pioneer of birth control and sister of Milly Witkop (who was, in turn, partner of anarchist Rudolf Rocker).[3]
Together they published an edition of Margaret Sanger's Family Limitation, an action which saw them denounced by a London magistrate for "indiscriminate" publication[4] and, despite expert testimony from a consultant to Guy's Hospital and evidence at the appeal that the book had only been sold to those aged over twenty-one, the stock was ordered to be destroyed.[5] Their case had been strongly supported by Dora Russell[6] who, with her husband Bertrand Russell and John Maynard Keynes, paid the legal costs of the appeal.[7]
Aldred and Witcop had a son, Annesley, in 1909. Although they were drifting apart by the time Aldred settled permanently in Glasgow in 1922, finally parting in 1924, they had a legal marriage on 2 February 1926, when it seemed possible Witcop might be deported for her continuing work on family planning.[8]
Death and legacy
After initially refusing hospital treatment for a heart condition, Guy Aldred died, almost penniless, in the
Aldred's long-time associate and
Work
Some of Aldred's pamphlets can be found online as part of the Jo Labadie Collection.
- The Last Days - War of Peace?, 1902
- The Safety of Unbelief, 1904
- The Case for Anarchism, 1906
- The Possibility and Philosophy of Anarchist Communism, 1906
- Logics and Economics of the Class Struggle, 1907
- Open Letter to a Constitutional Imbecile, 1907
- The Basis and Exodus of Bourgeois Sectarianism, 1907
- Sex Oppression, 1907
- Anarchism, Socialism and Social Revolution, 1908
- From Anglican Boy-Preacher to Anarchist Socialist Impossibilist, 1908
- Representation and the State, 1910
- Trade Unionism and the Class War, 1911
- Richard Carlile: His Battle for the Free Press: How Defiance Created Government Terrorism , The Bukunin Press, 1912 (The Revolt Library, No. 2)
- Bakunin's Writings (ed), 1913
- Socialism and Marriage
- The Socialism and Anti-Parliamentarism of William Morris, 1915
- Michael Bakunin, Communist, 1920
- Communism and Religion, 1920
- Socialism and Parliament, 1924
- Socialism and Parliament Part I: The Burning Question of Today (revised edition, 1928)
- Socialism and Parliament Part II: Government by Labour, 1928
- At Grips with War, 1929
- John Maclean, 1932
- Life of Bakunin (Revised Edition), 1933
- Towards Social Revolution?: Whither the ILP?, 1934
- Socialism and the Pope, 1934
- For Communism, 1935
- Against Terrorism in the Workers' Struggle, 1938
- The Rebel and his Disciples, 1940
- Historical and Traditional Christianity 1940
- Studies in Communism, 1940
- Bakunin, 1940
- Dogmas Discarded, 1940
- Pioneers of Anti-Parliamentarianism, 1940
- Why Jesus Wept, 1940
- The Conscientious Objector, The Tribunal and After, 1940
- Communism: The Story of the Communist Party, 1943
- Convict 9653 - Eugene Debs, 1942
- A Call to Manhood: 26 Essays, 1944
- Sown in Dishonour, 1945
- Peace Now and Forever, 1945
- Rex v. Aldred - Report of Trials for Sedition, 1909 and 1912, 1948
- No Traitors' Gait! - The Life and Times of Guy A. Aldred, (Issued in 19 parts between December 1955 and June 1963), unfinished.
- Two Nations, 1963
References
- ^ Dogmas Discarded: An Autobiography of Thought 1886 - 1908, by Guy Aldred, Part 1, page 16, The Strickland Press, Glasgow 1904
- ^ Rex v. Aldred by Guy Aldred, The Strickland Press, Glasgow, 1948
- ^ Nicolas Walter, ‘Witcop, Rose Lillian (1890–1932)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/58610, accessed 4 Sept 2007
- ^ The Times, 11 January 1923, p.7
- ^ The Times, 12 February 1923, p.5
- ^ "Dora Russell". Spartacus Educational. Retrieved 17 May 2021.
- ^ Russell, Dora, (1975) The Tamarisk Tree
- ISBN 0-946487-19-7
- ^ Bob Jones, ‘Aldred, Guy Alfred (1886–1963)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, Sept 2004; online edn, May 2006 http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/40278, accessed 10 Sept 2007
Bibliography
- OCLC 500079933. Archived from the originalon 1 April 2006.
- Hayes, Mark (2005). The British Communist Left: a contribution to the history of the revolutionary movement 1914-1945. OCLC 642281773.
- Jones, Rob (October 1991) [1989]. "Anti-Parliamentarism and Communism in Britain, 1917-1921". Discussion Bulletin. OCLC 13302352. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
- S2CID 143538923.
- OCLC 33948800.
- Shipway, Mark (1988). Anti Parliamentary Communism: the movement for workers' councils in Britain, 1917-45. OCLC 468642120.
External links
- Class war on the Home Front at the Wayback Machine (archived 27 October 2009), articles from the pages of Solidarity, the paper of the Anti-Parliamentary Communist Federation
- Anarchist Encyclopedia entry
- A Brief History of the APCF
- Against the War: Guy Aldred, BBC World Service radio programme broadcast 1989
- "Guy Aldred: Rebel With a Cause", Ruth Kinna, Berfrois, 30 September 2011