Fascist in the Family

John Beckett was a political chameleon: first at one with the fist- clenching left, then in awe of the goose-stepping fascists. He was also a Walter Mitty so who really knows? This author does. Francis Beckett’s personal partiality doesn’t blunt his fine journalist’s pen nor cloud his judgement and integrity; but the pain shines through. He writes with compelling candour about his father. It is as moving for the reader as it must have been painful for the author. Alastair Stewart OBE, ITV News The youngest Labour MP in 1925, by 1940 John Beckett was in prison as a danger to the war effort. His son has written a coura- geously honest, moving and sensitive account of a socialist who ended up despising the workers, a Jew who ended up hating Jews, a democrat who became contemptuous of democracy. It is a pene- trating analysis of the political times in which he lived, not least because it illuminates the conditions that can – if freedom is not strong, vigilant and purposeful – breed bigotry and fascism. It is a valuable history as well as an instructive biography. Neil Kinnock, Leader of the Labour Party 1983–92 A fascinating insight into the unsavoury practices of the security services, and a moving portrait of a talented, wayward father who denied his Jewishness at great cost to himself and all around him. Paul Routledge, political biographer and commentator for the Daily Mirror and Tribune magazine, UK John Beckett was a Labour MP who later took up with fascism. In Fascist in the Family his son Francis, journalist, historian and playwright, engages in the difficult task of tracing his father’s tempestu- ous and ultimately unfulfilled life. His readable, well-researched, questioning and honest biography serves as a British equivalent of My Nazi Legacy. Colin Holmes, Emeritus Professor of History, University of Sheffield, UK This page intentionally left bank FASCIST IN THE FAMILY John Beckett was a rising political star. Elected as Labour’s youngest MP in 1924, he was constantly in the news and tipped for greatness. But ten years later he was propaganda chief for Mosley’s fascists, and one of Britain’s three best-known anti- Semites. Yet his mother, whom he loved, was a Jew. Her ancestors were Solomons, Isaacs and Jacobsons, originally from Prussia. He successfully hid his Jewish ancestry all his life – he said his mother’s family were “fisher folk from the east coast”. His son, the author of this book, acclaimed political biographer and journalist Francis Beckett, did not discover the truth until John Beckett had been dead for years. John Beckett left Mosley and founded the National Socialist League with William Joyce, later Lord Haw- Haw, and spent the war years in prison, considered a danger to the war effort. For the rest of his life, and all of Francis Beckett’s childhood, John Beckett and his family were closely watched by the security services. Their devious machinations, traced in records only recently released, damaged chiefly his young family. This is a fascinating and brutally honest account of a troubled man in tur- bulent times. Francis Beckett is an author, journalist, playwright and contemporary historian. His eighteen books include biographies of four Prime Ministers, the first of which is about his own political hero, Clement Attlee. He has written for several national newspapers, but mostly for the Guardian, for which he was a regular feature writer and reviewer for many years. His plays have been performed on radio and at the London Fringe. He is a former president of the National Union of Journalists and a Labour Party and trade union press officer and editor, and is currently editor of Third Age Matters, the national magazine published by the University of the Third Age. Routledge Studies in Fascism and the Far Right Series editors: Nigel Copsey, Teesside University, and Graham Macklin, Teesside University This book series examines fascist, far right and right-wing politics within a historical context. Fascism falls within the far right but the far right also extends to so-called ‘radical-right populism’. Boundaries are not fixed and it is important to recognise points of convergence and exchange with the mainstream right. The series will include books with a broad thematic or biographi- cal focus suitable for students, teachers and general readers. These will be available in hardback, paperback and e-book. The series will also include books aimed largely at subject specialists which will appear in hardback and e-book format only. Titles include: Cultures of Post-War Fascist in the Family British Fascism The Tragedy of Nigel Copsey and John Beckett MP John E. Richardson Francis Beckett France and Fascism What Did You Do During February 1934 and the the War? Dynamics of Political Crisis The Last Throes of the British Brian Jenkins and Pro-Nazi Right 1940–45 Chris Millington Richard Griffiths Anti-Fascism in Britain Searching for Lord (2nd Edition) Haw-Haw Nigel Copsey The Political Lives of William Joyce Right-Wing Terrorism in Colin Holmes the 21st Century The ‘National Socialist Farming, Fascism and Underground’ and the History Ecology of Terror from the Far-Right A Life of Jorian Jenks in Germany Philip M. Coupland Daniel Koehler FASCIST IN THE FAMILY The tragedy of John Beckett MP Francis Beckett First published 2017 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2017 Francis Beckett The right of Francis Beckett to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Names: Beckett, Francis, 1945– author. Title: Fascist in the family : the tragedy of John Beckett M.P. / Francis Beckett. Other titles: Rebel who lost his cause Description: Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2017. | Includes bibliographical references. Identifiers: LCCN 2016012317| ISBN 9781138907669 (hardback) | ISBN 9781138907874 (paperback) | ISBN 9781315686738 (e-book) Subjects: LCSH: Beckett, John, 1894–1964. | Great Britain–Politics and government–1910–1936. | Great Britain–Politics and government–1936–1945. | Fascism–Great Britain–History– 20th century. | Right-wing extremists–Great Britain–Biography. | British Union of Fascists–Biography. | Political prisoners–Great Britain–Biography. | Politicians–Great Britain–Biography. | World War, 1939-1945–Great Britain. Classification: LCC DA566.9.B375 B43 2017 | DDC 941.082092 [B] –dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016012317 ISBN: 978-1-138-90766-9 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-138-90787-4 (pbk) ISBN: 978-1-315-68673-8 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by Wearset Ltd, Boldon, Tyne and Wear CONTENTS Introduction 1 1 Eva Solomon and the Yeomen of Cheshire 8 2 The legacy of war 20 3 Major Attlee and Corporal Beckett 33 4 The theatre and the general election 52 5 Labour’s youngest MP 63 6 The 1926 general strike 77 7 A complicated life 89 8 The death of hope 109 9 Lifting the mace and playing to the gallery 123 viii Contents 10 1931 136 11 Dying on stage 146 12 A life in ruins 156 13 Anne 170 14 The streetfighter 191 15 Following the bleeder 204 16 Jew- baiting and standing by the king 217 17 The National Socialist League 228 18 The anti- war faction 238 19 Prison 254 20 Mr Morrison’s prisoner 271 21 A birth and a hanging 288 22 Indian summer 309 23 The Catholic Church and the soul of the far right 320 24 A family in freefall 340 25 Struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more 353 26 Legacy of a Jewish anti- Semite 362 For further reading 373 Index 376 INTRODUCTION John Beckett was just 30 when he became Labour’s youngest MP in 1924, and he was seen as one of the Party’s brightest rising stars. He was on intimate terms with the greatest political names in the land, as well as the friend and confidant of all those who, two decades later, were to run the 1945 government, especially its Prime Minister, Clement Attlee. By 1929 he had become the most extreme, most newsworthy left- wing Labour rebel of his day. He was more than once physically thrown out of the House of Commons, and in 1930 he seized the Mace from the Speaker’s table and ran off with it, the first person to do so since Cromwell. In the early 1930s he managed London’s Strand Theatre, knew all the leading actors of his day, made money and went bankrupt. And then he became a fascist. His career, which had looked so promising in 1924, ended in the squalid wastelands of neo- Nazi politics, and in prison for nearly four years, for fascists were interned during the war. It’s the stuff of fiction, and at least two popular novels contain characters based on him. In 1922 Mary Agnes Hamilton modelled one of her political agitators in her novel Follow My Leader on the 2 Introduction young John Beckett.

Load more