THE MYTH OF "THE BATTLE OF CABLE STREET"

by Kevin Scott

Every 4th of October the Far Left in the United Kingdom "celebrates" the so-called "Battle of Cable Street," a series of riots which happened on the 4th of October 1936 in east London.  

Like any event propagandized by the Left, the "battle" has been completely mythologised out of all recognition with what actually took place on the day. This example of historical illiteracy would not be particularly important except for the the fact that the mainstream media sometimes also focuses on this event and, in doing so, lazily takes its cues from the Far Left. 

According to the false narrative coming from these extremists, a spontaneous alliance of Jews, Communists and "anti-fascist" working-class east Londoners came together to stop Sir Oswald Mosley's British Union of Fascists (BUF) marching across a united and harmonious multicultural east London. This massive demonstration, supposedly involving tens of thousands of protesters, then later clashed with thousands of police officers, some of them on horseback, an in the process effectively ended the political appeal of the Blackshirt movement.

In reality, the 'anti-fascist' riot was much less broad-based than presented, being mainly the work of immigrant Jewish gangsters, led by the notorious Jack Spot, and Jewish elements in the Communist party, many of them bused in for the day to fight with the police. As for the Blackshirts, Mosley himself agreed with the police to lead his three thousand supporters away from the barricades illegally erected in the area around Cable Street to stop the totally legal and law-abiding march in order to prevent unnecessary violence.

The only clash reported between BUF supporters and the alien far-left mob occurred when the real hero of Cable Street, the Newcastle-born activist Tommy Moran, was attacked while leading a small group of Geordie Blackshirts to a rendezvous point before the planned march. Despite knocking out about a dozen of the mob, with some of the fighting captured by a newsreel camera, Moran was eventually floored by a chair wrapped in barbed wire hitting the back of his head, sustaining an injury which required medical treatment, another incident captured by the cameras. 

In the newsreel report later broadcast, the commentary declared: "Communists, Labourites and Jews jam the fascist route, resisting the peaceful efforts of the outnumbered police to clear the way," showing young Jewish men clenching their fists in the communist salute and chanting "One, two, three, four, five - we want Mosley, dead or alive".

Tommy Moran, one-man army

However, in the weeks that followed the battle, the British Union of Fascists organised numerous other events across east London. On the 11th of October, just a week after the battle that supposedly ended the Blackshirt movement, Mosley spoke at a meeting in nearby Bethnal Green that was attended by over twelve thousand "manifestly pro-fascist" local people. He then led a march to Limehouse, with local people leaning out of their downstairs windows trying to shake his hand, while shouting "Good old Mosley!" 

The next year in March, in the London County Councils, BUF candidates went on to poll around 20% of the vote in three east London constituencies.

In response to the 'anti-fascist' violence, the political establishment took advantage of the situation to quickly pass the 1936 Public Order Act, which outlawed political uniforms, restricted what could be said at political meetings, and gave the Home Secretary the power to ban marches. The Conservative coalition government claimed at the time that the legislation was not directly aimed at the BUF, but it clearly was. So the "Reds" were merely serving as the anti-democratic shock troops of the political establishment.

'Hurrah for the Blackshirts'

But it's not just right-wing and informed neutral sources that support this view of events. The left-wing author, Stephen Dorril, in his book Blackshirt tells a similar tale:

"Part of the Cable Street mythology is that it 'effectively checked Mosley's campaign in east London'. The police, in fact, argued it threw 'out of perspective the events of the month as a whole'. The BUF was 'steadily gaining ground' in Stepney, Bow, Shoreditch, Bethnal Green and Hackney. 'A definite pro-fascist feeling has manifested itself throughout the districts mentioned, and the alleged Fascist defeat is in reality a Fascist advance.' In the following week, Mosley addressed a series of successful meetings in Stepney, Shoreditch, Bethnal Green and Stoke Newington, without any interference, in front of 'manifestly pro-fascist' working class audiences. Police said the BUF's London membership had 'increased by 2,000'."

Likewise former Newcastle University academic, Martin Pugh in his book about British Fascism, Hurrah for the Blackshirts concludes his account of the battle as follows:

"In this way Cable Street went down in history as a decisive check to fascism. In reality it was nothing of the sort. Almost all the fighting took place between the police and anti-fascist demonstrators. More importantly, Cable Street did nothing to dampen anti-Semitic agitation in the East End."

Back in the Thirties, thanks to mass immigration mainly from eastern Europe, the population in the area around Cable Street was more than 50% Jewish. In the post-war years, the Jews largely moved north, into Hackney, Stamford Hill, and Golders Green. Now very few Jews remain in the area. Instead, more than half the population of the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, where Cable Street is situated, is either black or other ethnic minority, with 32% of Bangladeshi Muslim origin. 

Needless to say, some of these are even more anti-Jewish than the original native inhabitants of the old East End. And according to the 2011 census, white English/British residents form only 30% of the local population, against more than 80% nationally.

The shape of things to come?

Mosley had strong popularity among many working-class Londoners

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