Jeffrey Hamm
Jeffrey Hamm | |
---|---|
Personal details | |
Born | Edward Jeffrey Hamm 15 September 1915 Ebbw Vale, Wales |
Died | 4 May 1992 | (aged 76)
Political party | British Union of Fascists, Union Movement |
Edward Jeffrey Hamm (15 September 1915 – 4 May 1992) was a leading British
Early life
Hamm was born in
British Union of Fascists
He joined the BUF in 1935 when he relocated to London to take up a teaching role at King's School, Harrow.[2] A young member, Hamm did not rise above the rank and file in the BUF. In 1939 he moved to the Falkland Islands to work as a teacher, where he was arrested in 1940 under Defence Regulation 18B after he had been accused of encouraging fascism to his pupils.[2] He was transferred to Leeuwkop, South Africa, where he was involved in an attempt to tunnel out of the camp.[3] The camp also contained some German Nazi prisoners, and a contemporary MI5 report suggested Hamm had been indoctrinated by Nazi propaganda by his fellow inmates.[2] He was returned to Britain in 1941 and enlisted in the Royal Tank Regiment, but during his service, he was identified as a disruptive influence and was taken off the front before his discharge in 1944.[2][4] He found work at the Royal Coach Works in Acton after his discharge,[2] and he subsequently was a bookkeeper at a milliner shop.[5]
Around then, Hamm converted to the
Return to politics
Hamm had been a minor figure in the BUF, but his time in the prison camps had increased his support for Mosley.[7] Indeed, such had been his low standing in the movement that Mosley did not know who Hamm was and for a time struggled to spell Hamm's surname properly.[2] Nonetheless, Hamm quickly became the most vigorous and vocal of Mosley's post-internment supporters.[8]
After his discharge, Hamm joined and then took over the
Hamm's increasing profile did not go unnoticed by both supporters and opponents, and in 1946, he and his ally Victor Burgess suffered a severe beating from antifascists.[10] (A similar incident in Brighton in 1948 resulted in Hamm spending time in hospital.)[11] Mosley was initially unsure of Hamm, but at a secret meeting in Bethnal Green on 22 December 1946, he endorsed Hamm's leadership and declared him his "East End representative", East London being traditionally the centre of Mosleyite activity.[10] In 1947, however, Mosley censured Hamm for the violent and inflammatory nature of much of his propaganda, which forced him to tone down his rhetoric.[12]
Union Movement
Hamm soon began calling on Mosley to return to the leadership of British fascism.[13] Hamm incorporated his British League into the Union Movement (UM) immediately upon the latter's foundation in 1948.[7] Hamm became a leading member of the new UM but was considered a spiky figure and was so unpopular at UM headquarters that Mosley sent him to Manchester in 1949. Hamm failed to revitalise the northern branch and contemplated leaving the UM altogether until he was recalled by Mosley in 1952.[14] Returning to London, Hamm became a central figure in the new anti-black campaign of the UM, which won it some support in Brixton and other areas into which new West Indies immigrants were settling.[15] He gained widespread press coverage when, in the immediate aftermath of the 1958 Notting Hill race riots, he made a speech outside Latimer Road tube station.[16]
Hamm served as Mosley's personal secretary during the later years of the UM and succeeded to the post upon the death of
Mosley was officially UM leader until 1973, when he formally retired, and Hamm, who had become the effective leader, formally succeeded him.[19] Under Hamm the party relaunched as the Action Party and under that name contested the 1973 Greater London Council elections without success.[20] The party transformed itself into the Action Society in 1978 and gave up party politics to become a publishing house.[20]
Hamm published his autobiography, Action Replay, in 1983, and in 1988 his second book, The Evil Good Men Do. After Mosley's death in December 1980, Hamm published and edited a quarterly pro-Mosley magazine, Lodestar, which included contributions by
Elections contested
Date of election | Constituency | Party | Votes | % |
---|---|---|---|---|
14 March 1962 | Middlesbrough East | Union Movement | 550 | 1.7 |
31 March 1966 | Birmingham Handsworth | Union Movement | 1337 | 4.1 |
References
- ^ a b Biography at Friends of Oswald Mosley site
- ^ a b c d e f g Macklin 2007, p. 38.
- ^ Thurlow 1987, p. 224.
- ^ Dorril 2007, p. 542.
- ^ Dorril 2007, p. 547.
- ^ a b Macklin 2007, p. 39.
- ^ a b c Thurlow 1987, p. 243.
- ^ Macklin 2007, pp. 15–16.
- ^ Thurlow 1987, p. 231.
- ^ a b c d Macklin 2007, p. 40.
- ^ Macklin 2007, p. 53.
- ^ Macklin 2007, p. 48.
- ^ Dorril 2007, p. 553.
- ^ Macklin 2007, p. 58.
- ^ Macklin 2007, p. 71.
- ^ Skidelsky 1981, p. 510.
- ^ Skidelsky 1981, p. 513.
- ^ Dorril 2007, p. 630.
- ^ Taylor 1982, p. 17.
- ^ a b Boothroyd 2001, p. 3.
Bibliography
- Boothroyd, David (2001). The History of British Political Parties. London: ISBN 9781902301594.
- ISBN 978-0140258219.
- Macklin, Graham (2007). Very Deeply Dyed in Black. London / New York: IB Tauris. ISBN 978-1845112844.
- Skidelsky, Robert (1981). Oswald Mosley. Macmillan Publishers. p. 510.
- Taylor, Stan (1982). The National Front in English Politics. London / New York: MacMillan Holmes & Meier. ISBN 9780333277416.
- Thurlow, Richard (1987). Fascism in Britain A History, 1918-1985. Oxford / New York: ISBN 0631136185.
Archives
Papers of Edward Jeffrey Hamm are held at the Cadbury Research Library, University of Birmingham.[1]
External links
- Papers of Jeffrey Hamm at the University of Birmingham.
- Jeffrey Hamm interview in 1989 about his political activity
- Friends of Oswald Mosley
- ^ "UoB Calmview5: Search results". calmview.bham.ac.uk. Retrieved 26 February 2021.