Phillipines: Stop Encouraging Murder

When comparing yourself to world leaders or historical figures, there are perhaps less controversial choices than Adolf Hitler. Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte last Friday likened himself to the Nazi leader, saying he wants to kill millions of drug addicts, just as Hitler killed Jews during the Holocaust.

"Hitler massacred 3 million Jews. Now there is 3 million, what is it, 3 million drug addicts (in the Philippines), there are," he said in a speech in his hometown of Davao City.

"I'd be happy to slaughter them. At least if Germany had Hitler, the Philippines would have (me). You know my victims, I would like (them) to be all criminals, to finish the problem of my country and save the next generation from perdition."

History counts the cost of Hitler's purges against "undesirables" at 11 million, 6 million of whom were Jews.

World Jewish Congress President Ronald Lauder, in Israel to attend the funeral of former Prime Minister Simone Peres, condemned the remarks.

"These statements are revolting, and President Duterte must retract them and apologize," Lauder said. "We just marked the 75th anniversary of Babi Yar, the massacre of more than 33,000 Jews in Ukraine by Nazi Germany. ... Now, the elected leader of the Philippines openly calls for the mass murder of people who are addicted to drugs.

"Drug abuse is a serious issue. But what President Duterte said is not only profoundly inhumane, but it demonstrates an appalling disrespect for human life."

 Amnesty International said that Duterte "has sunk to new depths" and urged governments around the world to condemn his "extremely dangerous outburst."

On Sunday  Duterte issued an  his apology saying  it was intended only for the Jewish community. He lashed out again at Western critics and human rights advocates who have raised concerns over his brutal crackdown, which is estimated to have left more than 3,000 suspected drug dealers and users dead in just three months. Duterte said in a speech in the central city of Bacolod that he never had any intention "to derogate the memory of the 6 million Jews murdered by the Germans." "I apologize profoundly and deeply to the Jewish community," Duterte said.
A little to late methinks.The controversial leader campaigned on a hard line against crime, particularly drug offenses, and has in the past uttered statements which have caused many in the international community to recoil.Since winning the presidential election, President Duterte triggered widespread alarm by calling for the restoration of the death penalty, vowing to preside over a wave of extrajudicial executions, threatening journalists, and intimidating human rights defenders.
This is in a context where a climate of impunity for human rights violations prevails in the Philippines, including for torture and other ill-treatment by the police. Only one police officer has ever been brought to justice under laws criminalising torture, and few have been held accountable for killings of journalists.  A growing number of critics, including U.N. officials, the European Union and the United States, have voiced concerns over the widespread killings and human rights violations.

The country’s new president is running a ‘war on drugs’ that involves a deadly crackdown on anyone believed to be connected to the drugs trade. He has suggested there might be monetary rewards for those who murder people and is seemingly encouraging the police to kill.

Call on authorities in the Philippines to stop sanctioning murder and to protect the right to life for all citizens. Tell this man he has to stop:

You can take action via Amnesty International  here:-

https://www.amnesty.org.uk/actions/philippines-stop-murder-drugs-president-duterte

Roy Bailey - The Ballad of Vic Williams

The right to conscientious objection has also been recognised in the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention on Human Rights. Recently, the legal right to act in accordance with one's conscience has been placed on the statute book by the Government through the Human Rights Act 1998.
In the First World War, about 16,000 British men were recorded as conscientious objectors after conscription started in 1916, In the Second World War, there were 61,000. Conscription was abolished in 1960, so all British soldiers are now volunteers – although in 1991 Vic Williams a soldier  was jailed for 14 months for desertion and conduct prejudicial to the good order of discipline, after he went absent without leave during the Gulf War. Vic Williams said he left the regiment because he did not believe that a military solution to the Gulf crisis was justified, and because he had decided that his conscience could not allow him to take part in any such action.  He had served in the British Army for five years as a trained radar operator before his departure, and had a clean conduct record.  Before giving himself up to the police at the end of the Gulf War in early March, Vic Williams made public statements opposing the war for oil in a Hyde Park demonstration and on a BBC television programme . Amnesty International at the time considered him to be a prisoner of conscience, imprisoned because he acted in accordance with his conscientiously held beliefs.
He began serving his prison sentence on 2 October 1991. The above video is of Roy Bailey singing “The Ballad of Vic Williams.”

Growing stronger with momentum.

( As the Tory's meet for their conference in Birmingham this weekend, a reminder that better forces are growing stronger outside)

The sound of hope rings in the air
shouting loudly in the breeze,
giving back elements of power
to the powerless and forgotten,
moving mountains with thought
releasing strength to force change
for equality,peace and justice for all,
to take away the chains of privilege
but watch as some try to push our dreams
                                 out of reach;
but revolutions of the mind run deep
sharing the same ideals people unite,
in solidarity together will stand
growing stronger with momentum,
joining forces with others pushing
there's no better way of getting things done.

Waldo (Goronwy) Williams (30/9/04 -20/5/71 ) - Blessed are the Peacemakers

Waldo Goronwy Williams is regarded as a mythical figure, here in Wales. No one who knew him bore a grudge towards him , and to many  he is seen as one of the greatest Welsh language poets of the twentieth century.

He was also a Quaker, a notable pacifist , anti-war campaigner and Welsh Nationalist. Born on the 30th September 1904 in Haverfordwest the third of five children of John Edwal Williams (1863-1934) and Angharad Williams (née Jones, 1875-1932). His father was headmaster of Prendergast School in Haverfordwest and English was the language spoken within the family. Following periods of nervous illness which left a lasting impression on his young son, in 1911 J. Edwal Williams was appointed headmaster of Mynachlog-ddu School, located in the same county but in a Welsh-speaking community in the shadow of the Preseli hills. This move was of great significance in Waldo Williams's development. Waldo (he is often referred to by his first name only) stated that he learnt Welsh playing on Mynachlog-ddu schoolyard, an experience recorded in an early poem, 'Yr Iaith a Garaf' (The language I love). The family moved again in 1915 to Clunderwen on the border with Carmarthenshire; a few months later the family's eldest child, Morvydd Moneg, died.

At some point after this and during the Great War Waldo had an experience or vision in the gap between two fields, Weun Parc y Blawd and Parc y Blawd, on Cross farm, Clunderwen. He later described it as a realisation 'sudden and vivid, that men were above all things brothers to each other'. This event would have confirmed the pacifist convictions held and expressed by his parents and inspiring one of his most loved poems ‘The Two Fields’/‘Mewn dau gae’.Waldo Williams was brought up Baptist but became a Quaker in the 1950s, joining Milford Haven Meeting.. 

Towards the end of his life he recollected listening to his father in 1916 reading T.E,Nicholas's anti-war poem 'Gweriniaeth a Rhyfel' (Democracy and War) to his mother in their home. It seems that the young boy began to write poetry in Morvydd's company; in doing so he was following in an uncle's footsteps. His father's brother William 'Gwilamus' Williams (1867-1920) published a volume of poetry and was a pioneer of vers libre in Welsh.

Waldo went to Narberth County School and from there to the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth in 1923 to study English and History. He played an active part in student life, editing The Dragon during the 1926-7 session. As well as writing editorial pieces he published his own English and Welsh poems anonymously in the magazine. After graduating he worked as a supply teacher in his native county for some years, without ever constructing an orthodox and successful professional career. This can be attributed in part to periods of mental illness, and later in his career to his pacifist commitments.

He was a conscientious objector during the Second World War which led to his dismissal from a headmastership. . The strength of his convictions also led to him breaking the law by refusing to pay his income tax in protest against the role of the British Government in the Korean War. He continued his protest until the end of compulsory military service. During this period his campaigning earned him time in prison.

His work was touched by romanticism  but also often carried a political message.The horror of war is evident in his poems during World War 11 and he wrote his most poignant  poetry during the years that followed the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Williams belonged first of all to the Welsh tradition of the Cerdd Gwlad (folk poets) a poet who served his locality by celebrating its life and people in verse. A poet of considerable ability in Cynghaned and free verse, with delicate use of alliteration,a delicate weaver of wisdom . But he was also inspired by the mystical revelation he had as a youth about the unity of the whole of mankind.His faith in the brotherhood  off all men. This revelation was realised in the cooperative and harmonious living he witnessed among the farming communities in the Preseli Hills and reflected in the feeling of belonging, knowing and desire that people should live together in peace expressed in his memorable poetry. It was also a threatened society the Governments establishment of a firing range (so reminiscent of the decision to set up a bombing school at LLyn in the late 30's) was the catalyst for the production of a small group of powerful poems about Welsh nationhood, with the will to resist as the central theme

Personal tragedy marked his life too following the death of his wife Linda from tuberculosis in 1943, and the strength of his convictions would lead to periods of intense mental suffering, his questioning of humanity's frequent inhumanities. He never remarried. Later he would describe his two-year marriage as "fy mlynyddoedd mawr" – "my great years"

He stood  as the Plaid Cymru candidate for Pembrokeshire in 1959, where he won a 4.52% share of the votes and and used his poetry to express his nationalism, which had considerable influence on the younger generation of activists in particular.  His major volume of poetry is Dail pren/The leaves of the tree, published in 1956.

He died  on tthe twentieth of May in 1971 at St Thomas's Hospital Haverfordwest and is buried at Blanconin Chapel Burial ground in Llandisillio. Known for his kindness and unassuming manner, this visionary pacifist leaves a moral and cultural legacy that is immense. A poet who remains of national importance. Blessed are the peacemakers.  

Many of Waldo's poems can be read in translation. The most comprehensive being ' The Peacemakers : Selected Poems , Gomer, 1997, in which I reproduce the following poems. There is a memorial monolith dedicated to him and the upright bluestone is situated on Rhos Fach near Mynachlogddu..

Pa Beth yw Dyn?

Beth yw byw? Cael neuadd fawr
Rhwng cyfyng furiau.
Beth yw abnabod? Cael un gwraidd
Dan y canghennau.

Beth yw credu? Gwarched tref
Nes dyfod derbyn.
Beth yw maddau? Cael  fford trwy'r drain
At ochr hen elyn.

Beth yw canu? Cael o'r creu
Ei hen athrylith.
Beth yw gweithio ond gwneud can
O'r coed a'r gwenith?

Beth yw trefnu terynas? Crefft
Sydd eto'n cropian.
A'i harfogi? Rhoi'r cyllyll
Yn llaw'r baban.

Beth yw bod yn genedl? Dawn
Yn  nwfn y galon.
Beth yw gwladgarwch? Cadw ty
Mewn cwmwl tystion.

Beth yw'r byd i'r nerthol mawr?
Cylch yn treiglo.
Beth yw'r byd i blant y llawr?
Crud yn siglo. 

What is Man ?

To live, what is it? It's having
A great hall between cramped walls.
To know another, what's that? Having
The same root under the branches.

To believe, what is it? Guarding a town
Until acceptance comes.
Forgiveness, what's that? A way through thorns
To an old enemy's  side.

Singing, what is it? The ancient
Genius of the creation.
What's work but making a song
Of the trees and the wheat?

To rule a kingdom, what's that? A craft
That is crawling still.
And to arm it? You put a knife
In a baby's hand.

Being a nation, what is it? A gift
In the depths of the heart.
Patriotism, what's that? Keeping house
In a cloud of witnesses.

What's the world to the strong?
Hoop a-rolling.
To the children of earth, what is it?
A cradle rocking.

Rememberance/Cofio

Un funud fach cyn elo’r haul o’r wybren,
Un funud fwyn cyn delo’r hwyr i’w hynt,
I gofio am y pethau anghofiedig
Ar goll yn awr yn llwch yr amser gynt.
 
Fel ewyn ton a dyr ar draethell unig,
Fel cân y gwynt lle nid oes glust a glyw,
Mì wn eu bod yn galw’n ofer arnom –
Hen bethau anghofiedig dynol ryw.
 
Camp a chelfyddyd y cenhedloedd cynnar,
Aneddau bychain a neuaddau mawr,
Y chwedlau cain a chwalwyd ers canrifoedd
Y duwiau na ŵyr neb amdanynt ‘nawr.
 
A geiriau bach hen ieithoedd diflanedig,
Hoyw yng ngenau dynion oeddynt hwy,
A thlws i’r clust ym mharabl plant bychaìn,
Ond tafod neb ni eilw arnynt mwy.
 
O, genedlaethau dirifedi daear,
A’u breuddwyd dwyfol a’u dwyfoldeb brau,
A erys ond tawelwch i’r calonnau
Fu gynt yn llawenychu a thristáu?
 
Mynych ym mrig yr hwyr, a mi yn unig,
Daw hiraeth am eich ‘nabod chwi bob un;
A oes a’ch deil o hyd mewn Cof a Chalon,
Hen bethau anghofiedig teulu dyn?

One fleeting moment as the sun is setting,
One gentle moment as the night falls fast
To bring to mind the things that are forgotten,
Now scattered in the dust ages of the past.

Like white-foamed waves that break on lonely beaches,
Like the win's song where no one hears the wind,
They beckon us, I know, but to no pupose-
The old forgotten things of humankind..

The artistry and skills of early peoples,
Small dwelling-places and enormous halls,
Old well-told tales that have been lost for ages,
The gods that now no mortal could recall.

And little words of languages long-vanished,
Lithe words once lively on the lips of men,
And pretty in the prattle of small children,
No tongue will ever utter them again.

Oh, earth’s innumerable generations,
Their sacred dreams and fragile sanctity,
Is the heart silent that was once acquainted
With sadness and with gladness and with glee ?

Often at close of day, when I am lonely,
Ilong to know you all, bring all to mind;
Is there a heart or memory still to cherish
The old forgotten things of humankind?

One fleeting moment as the sun is setting,
One gentle moment as the night falls fast,
To bring to mind the things that are forgotten,
Now scattered in the dust of ages past.

Like white-foamed waves that break on lonely beaches,
Lke the wind’s song where no one hears the wind,
They beckon us, I know, but to no purpose –
The old forgotten things of humankind.

The artistry and skills of early peoples,
Small dwelling-places and enormous halls,
Old well-told tales that have been lost for ages,
The gods that now no mortal could recall.

And little words of languages long-vanished,
Lithe words once lively on the lips of men,
And pretty in the prattle of small children,
No tongue will ever utter them again.

Oh, earth’s innumerable generations,
Their sacred dreams and fragile sanctity,
Is the heart silent that was once acquainted
With sadness and with gladness and with glee ?

Often at close of day, when I am lonely,
I long to know you all, bring all to mind;
Is there a heart or memory still to cherish
The old forgotten things of humankind?

translated by Alan Llwyd 

 

Gwyn (Alf) Williams ((30 /09/25 -16/11/95) - The People's Rememberancer

Gwyn Alfred Williams better known as Gwyn 'Alf ' Williams was born this day, 1925  at 11 Lower Row, Pen-y-wern, Dowlais, near Merthyr Tydfil, Glamorgan. He was one of three children born to Thomas John Williams and Gwladys Williams nee Morgan, both of whom were schoolteachers.

Gwyn Alf would become a.Socialist historian and broadcaster, of powerful force who I recognise as an early informing political influence when I first read his brilliant  books and subsequently saw his spellbinding documentaries he produced in the 1980's for  television in which he used his stammer to brilliant effect. Which was living proof also that speech impediments are no bar to acquiring great oratorical skills. I am grateful to him for helping me rediscover my peoples history, not the English history that was forced down our throats when we were at school, who is regarded as  an important influence on the way we now think about our country and people.

Educated firstly, at Cyarthfa Grammar School in Merhyr he went on to study history at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, He formed his political opinions during the dark days of the Depression and the Spanish Civil War, and his left wing parents plied him with books that nurtured him in the radical working class community that was now riddled with poverty and unemployment. The opinions he fostered at this time were firmly retained throughout his life. He became a Marxist,  who was driven by a dynamic and heartfelt concern about his own people, the Welsh.

Like many others at the time of the Spanish Civil War he joined the Young Communist League . He did not mange to get to Spain but did serve in the army and fought in the Normandy campaign following the D-Day landings in 1944. After his discharge he went on to read history at Aberystwyth University, and became Lecturer in Welsh history there in 1954 He was such an entertaining speaker that students from other departments, regularly sat in on his lectures, for the  passionate way he spoke about industrial Wales, after which he would often adjourn to the nearest pub to continue the flow of his lectures..By now he had found himself opposing the party line on Tito, and left the party
He left Aberystwyth to take up a Readership at York University and spent from 1964 to 1974 as Chair of history. During this period he became a member of the Labour Party for a spell, then rejoined the Communist party in 1979 but left again to become an uneasy home in the Labour Party but eventually found a political home on the left wing  of Plaid Cymru, for a while he was a leading member of the editorial board of the magazine Radical Wales and served on the party's Executive Committee.
He had  learnt Italian and Spanish for his study of the history of Communism in Italy and his study of the life and works of Antonio Gramsci and Goya and the impossible Revolution. His wife, Maria, belonged to the community of steelworkers from northern Spain who were long established in Dowlais. Returning to Wales in 1974 he became  Professor of History at University College, Cardiff,
But it was with his books on Welsh history that made the most impact " The Merthyr Rising" inspired by ten years of class struggle, stands as a classic of Marxist historical writing and was the first full account of the workers' revolt of 1831 and the execution of Dic Penderyn, one of the earliest martyrs of the Welsh working class https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/cofiwch-dic-penderyn-remember-dic.html.  In Madoc; the making of the myth,  he critically examined the evidence for the discovery of America by Prince Madog ab Owain Gwynedd in about 1170 and in particular, for the existence of a tribe of Indians , known as the Mandans, who were said to be his descenants who were said to speak Welsh, then there was "When was Wales?", which was perhaps his most popular and influential work, an excellent book which demolishes all the myths that are the stock in trade of Welsh nationalism. The 1980s also spawned his career as a broadcaster with the television series, The Dragon Has Two Tongues, which brought his passionate wit to a wider audience, as he sparred with Wynford Vaughan-Thomas, a typically puffed up specimen of the Welsh establishment.who was diametrically opposed to nearly everything  dear Gwyn stood for  It had a huge impact on me as a teenager, marvellous stuff, that I sadly can't share due to copyright issues.

In 1983 Williams took early retirement at the age of 58 from his Chair at Cardiff (he was fond of describing himself as "a redundant historian") and after  he and his wife parted began making films with Teliesyn, one of the independent companies on which the reputation of Welsh broadcasting now largely depends.Among the people about whom he made fascinating films were James Gillray, Sylvia Pankhurst, Pushkin, Mary Shelley, and the Welsh writers Saunders Lewis, T.E. Nicholas and Iolo Morganwg, showing of his impressive range.He cast a  marvellous figure, a unique cross of a Welsh revivalist preacher, revolutionary communist, distinctive with his shock of flowing white hair and obvious stutter.He moved from Cardiff to the village of Drefach Felindre, in Dyfed, where he shared a home with his partner Sian Lloyd zt Ty Dyffryn.
Gwyn Alf was not content with scholarly work that was not backed up by political engagement. He tried to influence public opinion and in all his work the capitalist, centralist, British State (and English hegemony) had to be undone if Wales was.to survive and prosper I wonder what he would have thought of the state of Wales post Brexit , perhaps he would passionately remind us to us that the poorest communities across Wales will get sympathy from Conservative governments we are now face an onslaught more devastating than back when Gwyn Alf roared so passionately in the 1980's. Do we never learn from our historians or do we simply ignore them.
Gwyn Alf Williams saw himself as “a people's remembrancer”, attempting to influence contemporary opinion by a dramatic presentation of Welsh history. More than anyone of his generation Gwyn A. Williams infused scholary history with immediate concerns, and his books, in range and content, reflect both his rooted particularity and his international perspective.
He died on 16 November 1995 at the age of 70 in Drefach Felindre of cancer, he was a heavy chain smoker and was cremated at Parc Gwyn crematorium, Narberth, on 22 November after a ceremony in which ‘The Internationale’ was sung together with a Welsh hymn. Even after death, he remains one of Wales’s greatest and most influential historians. 

Andre Breton (19/2/1896-28/9/66) - Revolutionary, Poet and founder of Surrealism.

 
" In the world we live in everything militates in favour of things that have not yet happened, of things that will never happen again"

It is living and ceasing to live that are imaginary solutions. Existence is elsewhere"

"No one who has lived even for a fleeting moment for something other than life in its conventional sense and has experienced the exaltation that this feeling produces can then renounce his new freedom so easily."

"Beauty will be convulsive or will not be at all" - Quotes by Andre Breton

Aptly described by playwright Eugene Ionesco as "one of the four or five great reformers of modern thought", Andre Breton (1896-1966) was the founder and prime mover of Surrealism, the most influential artistic and literary movement of the 20th century. Poet and theorist, artistic impresario anti-fascist and political agitator, Breton was a man of paradoxical character: inspiring one moment, crushingly tyrannical the next; embracing friends like Brunuel, Dali, Duchamp, Miro, Man Ray, Aragon and Eluard, only to exile them as enemies later. From its emergence from Dada after World War I through its culmination in the 1960s, here is his  Surrealist world..
André Breton was born  into a working-class family on February 19, 1896, in Tinchebray, a small town in Normandy, France, although his family relocated to a Parisian suburb soon after. He excelled in school and developed literary interests quite early. Breton read the French Decadents, such as Charles Baudelaire, J.K. Huysmans, Stephane Mallarme, and the German Romantic writers, all of whom informed his early thoughts on Avant-Gardism. By 1912, Breton had a cultivated knowledge of Contemporary art and begun to study Anarchism as a political movement. While he loved the French Decadent artists, such as Gustave Moreau, he began to separate himself from their belief in "art for art's sake," in favor of art that appealed to the masses.In 1916, Breton joined the group of artists associated with the subversive Dada movement in Paris, including Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray.
But he  moved away from Dadaism, which itself began during World War One as an irrational, nonsensical expression of anti-war rhetoric and along with Louis Aragon and Phillippe Soupault, Breton  in 1919 co-founded a journal called Littérature to showcase the first surrealist writing. His definition of surrealism was summed up as:" psychic automation in its pure state, by which one  proposes to express - verbally, by means of the written word, or in any other manner - The actual functioning of thought."  In 1924, he published Le Manifeste du Surréalisme (The Manifesto of Surrealism), a document announcing the new movement's embrace of all forms of liberated expression and its rejection of social and moral conventions.
Breton studied medicine and psychiatry and showed a particular interest in mental illnesses.His early interest was in being a psychoanalyst and met Freud in Vienna in 1921. During the first world war Breton served in the neurological ward in Nantes,as a nurse but never qualified as a psychoanalyst. But  no doubt this experience laid the foundations for his theories on the concept of the unconsciousness. His first poems, Decembre and Age, were written while he worked there.He developed a passion for psychiatric art, which informed his interest in Dada, and later surrealism. Here he met the devotee of Alfred Jarry,https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2011/06/alfed-jarry-891877-11107-life-as-riot.html Jacques Vache whose anti-social attitude and disdain for established artistic tradition influenced Breton considerably. Vaché committed suicide at the age 24 in 1919. Somewhat later Breton conducted his first experiments with the insane at a psychiatric center in aint-Dezier. He drew pictures of their dreams and committed their free associations to paper in order to nalyse the patients by Freudian methods. In 1919 he published a slim volume Les Chants magnifique, consisting of texts developed together with Phillipe Soupalt  by the free association method that is automatically.
He married Simone Kahn in 1921 and while they lived in Paris he amassed a massive collection of artwork, photographs and books. He went on to marry a further two times.
His Surrealist Manifesto, the first of three, was produced in 1924. This explained his definition of surrealism and sought to highlight the importance of dreams and the merging of realities in an absurdist way,which outlines surrealist preoccupations and is considered to be the beginning of the Surrealist Movement. It also established Breton as the spearhead of Surrealism, a role he would maintain for the entire duration of the movement. Breton credited several contemporaries in the work including Louis Aragon, Paul Eluard and others.And he became associated with a number of writers including Benjamin Peret, Antonin Artaud,https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/antonin-artaud-18961948-revolt-against.html
Robert Desnos https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/robert-desnos-47-00-paris-8645-some.html Louis Aragon and Paul Eluard https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/paul-eluard-14121895-261152-poetic.html.and also associated with the Dadaist Tristan Tzara.https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/tristan-tzara-441896-251263-radical.html

                                 Breton third on left pictured will fellow Surrealists

  
His second Manifesto came in 1930 but the third was never published. After writing his Manifestos he published poems and novels throughout the 1920s and 30s. His most acclaimed novel, from 1928, is Nadia, believed to be a semi-autobiographical story of his relationship with a mad woman who was a patient of Pierre Janet. It begins with the question “Who Am I” and ends with “beauty will be CONVULSIVE or will not be at all.”L'Amour Fou (Mad Love), published in 1937, is a poetic meditation on obsessive love.
Anxious to combine the themes of personal transformation found in the works of Arthur Rimbaud with the politics of Karl Marx, Breton joined the French Communist Party in 1927.The revolutionary aspiration is at the very source of Surrealism,it is not by accident that one of the movement’s first collective texts, written in 1925, is called “Revolution First and Always.” That same year, the desire to break with Western civilization led Breton to investigate the ideas of the October Revolution, for example, Trotsky’s  essay  Lenin. .In 1933 however Breton and Eluard were expelled from the party due to nonconformist behaviour. In 1935, there was a conflict between Breton and the Soviet writer and journalist Ilya Ehrenburg during the first "International Congress of Writers for the Defense of Culture" which opened in Paris in June. Breton had been insulted by Ehrenburg—along with  fellow surrealists—in a pamphlet which said, among other things, that surrealists were "pederasts". Breton slapped Ehrenburg several times on the street, which resulted in the  surrealists being expelled from the Congress.He also criticised Stalins repression of public opinion, and quoted from Lenin (1905) ; " Everyone is free to say and write whatever he pleases; freedom of the press must remain unimpeded."
Breton considered everything else reactionary, " Whether we move in the realm of politics or of art, there are always these two forces; the refusal to accept conditions as they are and the irresistable need to change them, on the one hand, there must be lasting loyalty to the moral precepts that have stood for progress. No one can suppress these forces for years, or fight against them in the name of messianic idea of what the Soviet Union is doing."
Now the break with the Soviet Union was official, Lenin and Trotsky had become the new heroes of the movement, not Stalin. A Militant Federation of Revolutionary Intellectuals , by a group that included Breton, Eluard and Peret. It was called Contre-Attaque and its aim was class struggle and the nationalisation of the means of production.
In April 1938 Breton accepted a cultural commission from the French government to travel to Mexico with his wife the painter Jacquline Lamba. After a conference  about surrealism, Breton told a story about getting lost in Mexico City (as no one was waiting for him at the airport) "I don't know why I came here. Mexico is the most surrealist country in the world". They stay with Guadalupe Marin, Diego Rivera's previous wife, and meet the Kahlo-Riveras. When Breton sees Kahlo's unfinished "What the Water Gave Me", the metaphorical self-portrait of what life had given her - floating on the water of her bathtub - he immediately labels her an innate "surrealist", and offers to show her work in Paris.

                                              Frida Kahlo's - What the Water Gave Me                                       

Immediately he circumscribed her as one part the essence of the surrealist movement and wrote an essay to her „a strip of silk around a pump”. This label of surrealism of the work of Frida Kahlo is one of the “mistakes” that have been continued between the massive public with respect to their classification and understanding.In her own words she said " They thought I was a surrealist , but I was not, I never painted my dreams, I only painted my own reality."
Visiting Mexico also provided the opportunity to meet Leon Trotsky. Breton and other surrealists traveled via a long boat ride from Patzcuaro to the town of Frongaricuaro. He Diego Riviera and Frida Kahlo were among the visitors to the hidden community of intellectuals and artists. Together, Breton and Trotsky wrote a manifesto for an Independent Revolutionary Art (published under the names of Breton and Diego Rivera) calling for "complete freedom of art", a call to arms, pens and brushes addressed to radical artists and writers. It denounced fascism and Stalinism, two dictatorships suffocating artistic expression as they were drowning workers’ opposition in blood. It was also a comment on the role of art and culture in class society, it contains  this famous passage:
The revolution must, from the very start, establish and assure an anarchist regime of individual liberty for cultural creation.  No authority, no constraint, not the slightest trace of commandment! On this issue Marxists can march hand in hand with anarchists…. https://www.marxists.org/subject/art/lit_crit/works/rivera/manifesto.htm 
The result was a manifesto that would be of  great importance for both Trotsky and  Breton . Communist and Surrealist met on their common ground of their reaction to Stalinism and their interest in the revolutionary function of art.

                                            Breton, Riviera and Trotsky            

 
At the start of the 1940s Breton had returned briefly to work in the medical wards in French hospitals but when the Nazis invaded and occupied France he fled to America along with his friends Marcel Duchamp and Max Ernst. He lived in New York City at this time, and managed a Surrealist exhibition at Yale in 1942.In 1945 he married Elisa Bindhorf in Reno, Nevada.
He returned to Paris after the war in 1946, where he opposed French colonialism (for example as a signatory of the  Manifesto of the 121 against the Algerian war) and continued, until his death, to foster a second group of surrealists in the form of expositions or reviews (La Breche, 1961–1965). In 1959, he organized an exhibit in Paris.
 Breton’s anarchist sympathies manifested more clearly in the postwar years.By the end of World War11 the surrealist group led by Breton had decided to explicitly embrace anarchism. In the 1947 book Arcanum 17, he describes the emotion he felt when, still a child, he discovered in a cemetery a headstone with the simple inscription, “Neither God Nor Master.”  Commenting on these words, he raises a general reflection:  “Above art and poetry, whether we wish it or no, flies a flag alternately red and black”—two colors between which he refused to choose."
From October 1951 to January 1953, the Surrealist group in Paris regularly contributed articles and leaflets to the journal Le Libertaire, the organ of the French Anarchist Federation. Their principal correspondent in the Federation was, at that time, the libertarian communist George Fontenis.  It was during this time that Breton wrote the flamboyant 1952 text entitled “La claire tour/The Light Tower,” which gives the libertarian origins of Surrealism:
Surrealism first came into being in the black mirror of anarchism, well before it defined itself, when it was nothing more than a free association among individuals rejecting spontaneously and outright the social and moral constraints of their time. Breton was consistent in his support for the francophone Anarchist Federation and he continued to offer his solidarity after the Platformists  around Fontenis transformed the FA into the Federation Communiste Libertaire. He was one of the few intellectuals who continued to offer his support to the FCL during the  Algerian War (1954-1962) when the FCL suffered severe repression and was forced underground. He sheltered Fontenis whilst he was in hiding. He refused to take sides on the splits in the French anarchist movement and both he and Peret expressed solidarity as well with the new FA set up by the synthesist anarchists, and worked in the Antifascist Committees of the 1960s alongside the FA. His apartment at la Rue Fontaine #42 became the heart of Paris’s anarchist writers and artists, and home to his collection of over 5000 artworks, manuscripts, African masks and objects of Oceanic art.
This interest and active sympathy for anarchism did not at all  lead Breton to renounce his adhesion to the October Revolution and the ideas of Leon Trotsky.  In an intervention on November 17, 1957, André Breton insisted and signed, " Against winds and tides, I am among those who still find, in the memory of the October Revolution, a high degree of that unconditional enthusiasm which I bore toward it in my youth and which implies total self-sacrifice."
Finally, in 1962, in an homage to Natalia Sedova Trotsky, who had just died, he hoped that one day history would  accord Leon Trotsky “not only justice…but will be called to accept, in all their vigor and amplitude, the ideas to which his life was given.”
During his lifetime, Breton produced a tremendous body of work that contained poetry, novels, criticism, and theory. Of his oeuvre, the collection of poems Mad Love (1937), the novel Nadja (1928) and the critical text Communicating Vessels (1932) are considered to be his most valuable contributions to the literary world.He published three books of poetry, in all Arcane 17 in 1945, and a further Surrealist work in 1953 called The key to the fields. He also mentored young surrealist writers and artists.
Andre Breton died in Paris on September 28th 1966 at the age of 70 and was buried in the Cimetière des Batignolles in Paris. He remains  one of the most outstanding literary representatives of surrealism, who tried to link art with revolutionary politics. Who with single mindedness clung to his idea of Surrealism and the revolution of the mind.His rich contribution  to the idea of surrealism, art, and the meaningful poetry, that he left means his legacy lives on.After coming to New York during World War II, his ideas on Surrealism were essential to early Abstract Expressionists, like Arshile Gorky, Roberto Matta, and Yves Tanguy, as well as second generation Surrealists, like Joseph Cornell. He pioneered the concept of fusing art and culture, which became a basic tenet in Pop Art. Breton's use of the media as a tool of art practice also helped shape many contemporary artists who build personas as part of their work. In this way, he foresaw Performance Art, Fluxus, Conceptualism, and what has followed on from those movements. Perhaps above all, Breton's love of absurdist humor continues to inspire artists to the present day..
Here's a link to a previous post about him :-

https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/andre-breton-1896-1966-surreallism-and.html

Freedom of Love

(Translated from the French by Edouard Rodti)

My wife with the hair of a wood fire
With the thoughts of heat lightning
With the waist of an hourglass
With the waist of an otter in the teeth of a tiger
My wife with the lips of a cockade and of a bunch of stars of the last magnitude
With the teeth of tracks of white mice on the white earth
With the tongue of rubbed amber and glass
My wife with the tongue of a stabbed host
With the tongue of a doll that opens and closes its eyes
With the tongue of an unbelievable stone
My wife with the eyelashes of strokes of a child's writing
With brows of the edge of a swallow's nest
My wife with the brow of slates of a hothouse roof
And of steam on the panes
My wife with shoulders of champagne
And of a fountain with dolphin-heads beneath the ice
My wife with wrists of matches
My wife with fingers of luck and ace of hearts
With fingers of mown hay
My wife with armpits of marten and of beechnut
And of Midsummer Night
Of privet and of an angelfish nest
With arms of seafoam and of riverlocks
And of a mingling of the wheat and the mill
My wife with legs of flares
With the movements of clockwork and despair
My wife with calves of eldertree pith
My wife with feet of initials
With feet of rings of keys and Java sparrows drinking
My wife with a neck of unpearled barley
My wife with a throat of the valley of gold
Of a tryst in the very bed of the torrent
With breasts of night
My wife with breasts of a marine molehill
My wife with breasts of the ruby's crucible
With breasts of the rose's spectre beneath the dew
My wife with the belly of an unfolding of the fan of days
With the belly of a gigantic claw
My wife with the back of a bird fleeing vertically
With a back of quicksilver
With a back of light
With a nape of rolled stone and wet chalk
And of the drop of a glass where one has just been drinking
My wife with hips of a skiff
With hips of a chandelier and of arrow-feathers
And of shafts of white peacock plumes
Of an insensible pendulum
My wife with buttocks of sandstone and asbestos
My wife with buttocks of swans' backs
My wife with buttocks of spring
With the sex of an iris
My wife with the sex of a mining-placer and of a platypus
My wife with a sex of seaweed and ancient sweetmeat
My wife with a sex of mirror
My wife with eyes full of tears
With eyes of purple panoply and of a magnetic needle
My wife with savanna eyes
My wife with eyes of water to he drunk in prison
My wife with eyes of wood always under the axe
My wife with eyes of water-level of level of air earth and fire

The Spectral Attitudes

I attach no importance to life
I pin not the least of life's butterflies to importance
I do not matter to life
But the branches of salt the white branches
All the shadow bubbles
And the sea-anemones
Come down and breathe within my thoughts
They come from tears that are not mine
From steps I do not take that are steps twice
And of which the sand remembers the flood-tide
The bars are in the cage
And the birds come down from far above to sing before these bars
A subterranean passage unites all perfumes
A woman pledged herself there one day
This woman became so bright that I could no longer see her
With these eyes which have seen my own self burning
I was then already as old as I am now
And I watched over myself and my thoughts like a night watchman in an immense factory Keeping watch alone
The circus always enchants the same tramlines
The plaster figures have lost nothing of their expression
They who bit the smile's fig
I know of a drapery in a forgotten town
If it pleased me to appear to you wrapped in this drapery
You would think that your end was approaching
Like mine
At last the fountains would understand that you must not say Fountain
The wolves are clothed in mirrors of snow
I have a boat detached from all climates
I am dragged along by an ice-pack with teeth of flame
I cut and cleave the wood of this tree that will always be green
A musician is caught up in the strings of his instrument
The skull and crossbones of the time of any childhood story
Goes on board a ship that is as yet its own ghost only
Perhaps there is a hilt to this sword
But already there is a duel in this hilt
During the duel the combatants are unarmed
Death is the least offence
The future never comes

The curtains that have never been raised
Float to the windows of houses that are to be built
The beds made of lilies
Slide beneath the lamps of dew
There will come an evening
The nuggets of light become still underneath the blue moss
The hands that tie and untie the knots of love and of air
Keep all their transparency for those who have eyes to see
They see the palms of hands
The crowns in eyes
But the brazier of crown and palms
Can scarcely be lit in the deepest part of the forest
There where the stags bend their heads to examine the years
Nothing more than a feeble beating is heard
From which sound a thousand louder or softer sounds proceed
And the beating goes on and on
There are dresses that vibrate
And their vibration is in unison with the beating
When I wish to see the faces of those that wear them
A great fog rises from the ground
At the bottom of the steeples behind the most elegant reservoirs of life and of wealth
In the gorges which hide themselves between two mountains
On the sea at the hour when the sun cools down
Those who make signs to me are separated by stars
And yet the carriage overturned at full speed
Carries as far as my last hesitation
That awaits me down there in the town where the statues of bronze
and of stone have changed places with statues of wax Banyans banyans.

  
Link to Less Time - Andre Breton

https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/less-time-andre-breton-1921896-2891966.html

Further reading :-

Breton, “Homage to Natalia Sedova-Trotsky,” in What is Surrealism, pp.306-308.

Surrealism- Uwe M. Schneede ; Harry N Abrams, New York,

Surrealism -Patrick Waldberg ; Thames and Hudson

dada; art and anti art - Hans Richter; Thames and Hudson

The Poetry of Surrealism: An Anthology, ed. Michael Benedikt (Boston & Toronto: Little, Brown and Co., 1974).

Solidarity is so nourishing, but action needed too.

My partner currently very ill, but still carries so much strength, it's left me feeling rather wobbly, but this morning  I have got on laptop to find so many positive messages.
It really is so moving  to see so much humanity, to see so much kindness. Solidarity is so nourishing.
However despite this  and my gratitude please keep pressuring your Governments to acknowledge the plight of refugees, facing incredible difficulties too at this moment in time. This is after all what makes us human. Doing nothing is simply not an option anymore.It is more than time that our lazy Governments find some humanity too, so keep up the pressure.
At the end of the day, all the compassion and empathy in the bloody world, is useless without any actual change taking place. It is our duty as humans to achieve real change, not just for ourselves, but for every future generation. Collectively we have the power to do this, to shape the world and make sure better policies are actually put in place.
This winter will be especially cold and conditions enormously difficult for  people basically fleeing for their lives, we have to continue to speak out, defend and protect. This crisis that our own Govenments have created must be defeated. Everyday now because of no fault of their own thousands of ordinary people like you and me are forced to flee their homes, in search for a better future, escaping violence, they leave everything behind,everything except their hopes and dreams.
It is so important to continue to share the reality of the inherent violence and repression  that comes with the current existence of states and borders, so please continue to amplify your voices for those affected as active agents in the struggle for freedom and justice. Many thanks.

Well done Jeremy Corbyn: The fight continues

Like many people up and down the country I have been inspired by Jeremy Corbyn's radical vision. Today he has once again  won the Labour leadership election, winning convincingly by a large margin, taking 333,000 votes compared to rival Owen Smith's 193,000 votes, picking up .61.8% of the votes cast to beat his rival despite a media onslaught against him, and dirty tricks that saw many members losing their right to vote.An increase by the way  on the 59.5 percent he won last year in a crushing victory.
With this result comes an increased mandate for his leadership, who has won in every single group and sees the complete demolishment of the ideas of the Labour right from its grassroots movement. In the following speech he has vowed to wipe the slate clean, calling for unity. I wish him success in this endeavor, and hope people will  be energised by this victory, and sees people getting  behind his clear voice and continuing the job of opposition to the Tory's toxic policies and building a movement that continues to change society for the better, not just for the privileged few. That will continue to drive forth the complete opposition to the politics of austerity and spread the message of social justice at home and abroad and harness the energy and enthusiasm for real change for  the people across this land, that is so  needed in the current climate.

.
Here is his victory speech in full :-


"Thank you all for being here today. 
I want to thank the more than 300,000 supporters, who’ve given me their support and trust in this Labour leadership election.  
I’m honoured to have won the results of a majority of members, affiliated supporters and registered supporters, who’ve given me the second mandate in a year to lead our party.
I want to thank all the volunteers in our amazing campaign. The tens of thousands who’ve helped all over the country in my campaign. 
I also want to thank all those volunteers and worked so hard and helped in Owen Smith’s campaign as well.Volunteers and the work they put in are the very life blood of democracy and we both had amazing sets of volunteers. So I say thank you, to all of them, for all the work they did over the summer. 
And I want to say thank you to Owen Smith as well. Owen, we’ve had an interesting summer of debates all over the country, thank you very much for all of that, for the good discussions and good humoured debates that we’ve had. And no doubt it will continue, because we’re part of the same Labour family and that’s how it’s always going to be. Thank you. 
And it has been an amazing summer, we’ve had good weather of course, and we’ve had events and rallies and hustings all over the place. 
But it’s been about our Labour family facing the future of how we do things together in the future.
 I will do everything I can, to repay the trust and the support, to bring our party together. To make it an engine of progress for our country and the people that depend on the Labour party, to protect their interests and win power to deliver real change in this country. 
Elections are passionate and often partisan affairs and things are sometimes said in the heat of the debate on all sides which we sometimes later come to regret. 
But always remember in our party: We have much more in common than that which divides us. 
As far as I’m concerned, let’s wipe that slate clean, from today, and get on with the work we’ve got to do as a party together.
We are proud as a party to that we’re not afraid to discuss openly, to debate and disagree. That is essential for a party that wants to change people’s lives for the better. That isn’t prepared to accept things as they are. 
It’s also an essential part of what has drawn half a million people into membership of what is now the largest political party anywhere in Western Europe. We have almost tripled our membership since last spring. 
Those new members are part of a nationwide movement who can now take our message into ever community in the country. To win support for the election of a Labour government.  
Our party has a duty of care to our members. That means intervening to stop personal abuse and also abiding by the principles of natural justice in the way that we handle it. 
Politics is demeaned and corroded by intimidation and abuse. It’s not my way and it’s not the Labour way and never will be. 
Now, friends, is the time for all of us to focus every ounce of our energy on exposing and defeating the Tories and the damage they are doing to our country. 
Theresa May’s government isn’t a new government. It’s David Cameron’s government with a hard right edge, repacked with progressive slogans, but threatening to take the country backwards and dithering as we face the historic challenges of Brexit.
So, if you believe that education is better than segregation; that we need an NHS that isn’t threatened with breakdown and loaded with debt; that older people deserve dignity and  care they need in their own home; that we have a duty as a country to refugees and promote peace, rather than conflict; if like me, you believe that it’s a scandal that here in Britain, the sixth largest economy in the world, four million children are in poverty, six million workers are paid less than the living wage; and if like me, you believe we can do things far better, then help us build support for a genuine alternative that would invest in our future. 
A more prosperous future, in which the wealth we all create is shared more equally. 
Together, arguing for the real change this country needs, I’ve no doubt that this party can win the next general election, whenever the Prime Minister calls it, and form the next government.
To do that, we need to work together. This time next week, we’re all going to hit the streets, united as a party. I’m calling on Labour party members, all over the country, to join us in a national campaign for inclusive education for all, next Saturday. 
The Tories’ plans for grammar school segregation of our children exposed their divisive and damaging agenda for our country. 
My responsibility as Labour leader is to unite this party - at conference this week, here, in the wonderful city of Liverpool, in Parliament and in every community around the country. 
But it’s also the responsibility of the whole party - MPs, councillors, party members and our wonderful supporters across the country - to work together and respect the democratic choice that's been made.
Labour is a party brimming full of ideas, of talent, of creativity. And so is this country. Unleashing that potential is the job of all of us. 
Let us work together for real change in Britain. 
Thank you very much 

Solidarity Forever - Ralph Chaplin (1887-1961)

The  Labour Song ' Solidarity Forever' was  written by Industrial Workers of the World songwriter and their poet Laureatte Ralph Chaplin,wrote the song after a  big march by some 1,300  people against hunger and unemployment  which was led by IWW  organiser  Lucy Parsons in Chicago on  January17, 1915.,

He had begun writing the song back in 1914 during a miners strike in Huntington West Virginia, He wrote of the songs origins in Wobbly an IWW journal, ' I wanted the song to be full of revolutionary fervour and to have a chorus that was ringing and defiant.  It was sung to the tune of 'John Brown's Body'  and was inspired by 'the Battle Hymn of the Republic'. 

Ralph Chaplin was born in Ames, Kansas in 1887. The family moved to Chicago 1893, he did a variety of low-paid jobs before moving to Mexico  where he became a supporter of Emilliano Zapata He  joined the International Workers in 1913,but got distracted  after converting to Roman Catlolicism but  continued to back grass-roots activism and libertarian radicalism and to publish poetry. He died in Tacoma in 1961.
The following version of  his song was recorded in 1941 by Pete Seeger and the Almanac Singers  and is contained on their album ' Talking Union'. It is still probably one of the most well known union anthems after the Internationale.
It is still being sung by people still at war against capitalism's tyranny, and by those who are convinced in nothing less than the solidarity of freedom. As austerity grips, its message resonates even more,as  the greedy still try to lay the blame at the doors of the ordinary man. The song still chimes today because it describes the realization that collective power of workers and unions is greater than those with armies or hoarded gold etc.
The wobblies and the IWW still going strong, standing as a dedicated force for social change, internationally across the globe. It is still a member led union, for all workers, (whatever your job, whether unemployed or not.) Their motto being 'an injury to one is an injury to all.
.

Solidarity Forever

When the union's inspiration through the workers' blood shall run
There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun;
Yest what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one,
But the union makes us strong.

CHORUS:

Solidarity forever,
Solidarity forever,
Solidarity forever,
For the Union makes us strong.

Is there aught we hold in common with the greedy parasite,
Who would lash us into serfdom and would crush us with his might?
Is there anything left to us but to organise and fight?
For the union makes us strong.

Chorus

It is we who plowed the prairies, built the cities where they  trade;
Dug the mines and built the workshops, endless miles of railroad laid;
Now we stand outcast and starving midst the wonders we have made;
But the union makes  us strong.

Chorus

All the world that's owned by idle drones is ours and ours alone.
We have laid the wide foundations; built it skyward stone by stone.
It is ours, not to slave in, but to master and to own.
While the union makes us strong.

Chorus

They have taken untold millions that they never toiled to earn,
But without our brain and muscle not a single whell can turn,
We can break their haughty power, gain our freedom when we learn
That the union makes us strong.

Chorus

In our hands is placed a power greater than their hoarded gold,
Greater than the might of armies, magnified a thousand-fold,
We can bring to birth a new world from the ashes of the old
For the union makes us strong.

Click on following to enlarge:-

you can connect at following link:-

http://www.iww.org/

Gresford Colliery Disaster

The Gresford  disaster took place this morning on September 22, 1934, at Gresford colliery near Wrexham, Denbighshire, Wales,  owned by the Westminster and United Collieries Group. which employed 2,220 men., with 1850 working underground and 350 on the surface.Some 19th century working practices were still in evidence in the pit although some mechanisation had been introduced.

At the time, 500 men were working down the mine on a night shift.men which was unusually high because some men had worked double shifts that night in order to be able to attend a carnival and football match the following day.

The mine operated in two main sections, the Dennis and the Slant. The explosion occurred in the Dennis, one of the deepest pits in the North Wales coalfields.

At 2.08 am, a violent explosion  occurred through the Dennis Section of the Gresford Collier mine one of the deepest pits in the North Wales coalfields.The Dennis Main Deep was ruptured by the explosions, and many miners would have been flung across the pit roads, some of them dying instantly. Others were burnt alive, gassed, asphyxiated or crushed to death. There is no doubt that there were others trapped alive with no means of escape who were the victims of later explosions and the release of more gas, and who were dead before they were entombed forever by the sealing of the mine by their colleagues.

In total 266 men and boys were killed with only 6 men surviving, caused by poor safety standards combined with poor management.Only eleven bodies were recovered from the mine. Inquests recorded the cause of death as carbon monoxide poisoning.
After a few hours of the first explosion, more than 1,000 men had assembled around the pithead standing silently in the cold and pouring rain, waiting to help their comrades who were trapped down below.For two days brave men fought to reach their entrapped colleagues, until came the terrible inhuman decision to withdraw and seal the pit shaft, with men still trapped inside. The roads and shafts were burnt and collapsed forever entombing the bodies of the victims closed.
With this some 800 children lost their fathers and more than 200 women lost their husbands and loved ones. It was not to be the worst mining disaster in the  history of  British mining though, Senghennyd holds that dubious privilege,https://teifidancer-teifidancer.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/100th-anniversary-of-senghenydd-mine.html but still serves as a tragic reminder of how in a single day a community was to see and witness and feel the real price of coal, with every  member of the  community in Wrexham losing someone on this day. . 

Following the disaster there was a huge cover up,plus the wages of over 1,000 miners were docked by the owners adding further insult and injustice that would add much further pain and bringing muchf urther untold hardship to the area, with the result being that by the end of autumn, an estimated 1,100 Gresford men thrown on the dole. This combined with the fact that the management were never prosecuted,  because they  destroyed all records of this disaster was  an absolute betrayal of the men who perished. 
In its aftermath however following an inquiry numerous breaches of law were eventually exposed, The pit, it turned out, had a very erratic safety record and high levels of firedamp (methane gas) had been recorded and ignored. The enquiry that followed used the words, "neglect", "incompetence", "inadequate ventilation" and "lack of monthly reports". However, most of the blame centred on the management and colliery manager, William Bonsall, was branded the "villain", so deflecting the wrath originally directed at the owners, including Henry Dyke Dennis, who had not employed a mining engineer to check safety in the pit since 1932. Bonsall was fined £140, with costs of £350 and most of the other charges made against the colliery company were either withdrawn or dropped. Part of the problem had been that the miners themselves, the only really worthwhile witnesses, were reluctant to appear in court to give testimony against their bosses, fearing this would result in their instant dismissal and being thrown on the dole to add to an already swollen labour market. Furthermore, they would also have been blacklisted by all the other mine owners from ever working in the industry again.

However, the disaster became a symbol that, eventually, resulted in better and safer working conditions in the coal mining industry throughout the UK but it would be yet another twenty years before the lessons learned would bring fresh legislation in the form of the 1954 Mines and Quarries Act, but it all came too late for the Gresford dead

The colliery reopened after the disaster with coal production resuming in January 1936, but was to eventually be closed down for good for economic reasons in November 1973. Eventually in 1982 a memorial to the victims was erected nearby, constructed by using a wheel from the old pit-head winding gear. We should remember the desperate situation of those who were trapped, and their darkest hours just before dawn. An incident of national importance that should never be forgotten.As the late, great Ewan McColl put it, in his iconic song, The Gresford Disaster, it was "the terrible price that was paid" by your ancestors to keep the home fires burning. Cofiwch Gresffordd/ Remember Gresford.

Ewan Mac Coll - The Gresford Disaster

The Gresford Disaster

#

 

The names of the 266 men who died in the mining disaster in Wrexham on 22 September 1934.

Anders, John Thomas; Repairer; 31

Anders, John; Beltman; 27

Anderson, George; Repairer; 67

Andrews, Alfred (Owen); Cutter; 43

Archibald, Joseph (John)*; Metal; 47

Archibald, Thomas; Cutter; 30

Baines, David; Haulage; 26

Bateman, Maldwyn; Haulage; 15

Bather, (Edward) Wynne; Collier; 36

Beddoe(w)s, Edward; Collier; 63

Bew(d)ley, Thomas Lloyd; Collier; 58

Bow, (Bew) Arthur; Cutter; 45

Bowen, Alf (F); Borer; 53

Boycott, Henry; Packer; 38

Brain, Herbert; Repairer; 31

Bramwell, George; Haulage; 30

Brannan, John; Collier; 32

Brown, George*; Rescuer; 53

Brown, William Arthur; Rider Haulage; 22

Bryan, John A.H.; Packer; 20

Buckley, A.; Haulage; 21

Burns, Fred; Collier; 41

Capper John A.; Packer; 35

Cartwright, Albert Edward; Packer; 24

Cartwright, Charles; Filler; 25

Chadwick, Stephen; Filler; 21

Chesters, Edwin*; Fireman; 67

Clutton, Arthur; Packer; 29

Clutton, George (Albert); Packer; 20

Clutton, John Thomas*; Rider Haulage; 35

Collins, John ( Jos.); Shot Firer; 62

Cornwall, Thomas R.; Haulage; 30

Crump, William; Cutter-man; 36

Darlington, Thomas; Ripper; 28

Davies, Arthur; Filler; 24

Davies, Edward; Packer; 53

Davies, George (William); Haulage; 26

Davies, Hugh T.; Borer; 26

Davies, James; Repairer; 31

Davies, James; Repairer; 37

Davies, James (Edward); Filler; 21

Davies, John; Collier; 64

Davies, John; Repairer; 45

Davies, John E.; Collier; 32

Davies, E. R. (John R.); Repairer; 69

Davies, Matthias; Filler; 24

Davies, D. (Peter); Repairer; 50

Davies, Peter; Filler; 25

Davies, Peter; Borer; 21

Davies, Robert Thomas; Collier; 34

Davies, Samuel; Filler; 35

Davies, Thomas; Repairer; 31

Davies, William; Repairer; 33

Dodd, Thomas; Ripper; 39

Duckett, Fred; Collier; 29

Edge, Joseph (John); Haulage; 28

Edge, S. (T. Samuel); Collier; 30

Edwards, Albert; Repairer; 62

Edwards, Ernest; Haulage; 16

Edwards, I. (E. Glyn); Haulage; 23

Edwards, Ernest Thomas; Ripper; 53

Edwards, Frank; Pipe-man; 23

Edwards, James Sam; Haulage; -

Edwards E. (John Edward); Collier; 39

Edwards, John C.; Packer; 30

Edwards E. T. (Thomas David); Ripper; 40

Edwards, William; Ripper; 32

Edwardson, John; Beltman; 41

Ellis, George (Edward); Collier; 43

Evans, Fred; Collier; 50

Evans, Jos. (John); Cutterman; 32

Evans, Norman; Doggie; 45

Evans, Ralph; Cutter; 37

Fisher, Len; Haulage; 30

Foulkes, H. (Irwin); Haulage; 21

Gabriel, Richard George; Collier; 61

Gittens, Joseph (John Henry); Repairer; 42

Goodwin, John; Packer; 51

Griffiths, Edward; Filler; 21

Griffiths, Ellis; Packer; 50

Griffiths, Emmanuel; Packer; 53

Griffiths (E.) C.; Repairer; 25

Griffiths, Frank (John Francis); Repairer; 57

Griffiths, Walter; Repairer; 50

Hall, Walter; Packer; 49

Hallam, Thomas W.; Packer; 32

Hamlington, Arthur; Repairer; 62

Hampson, Frank (A.); Repairer; 32

Harrison, Arthur; Collier; 21

Harrison, Charles Edward; Haulage; 15

Hewitt, P. (Phillip J.); Repairer; 56

Higgins, W. (William Henry); Haulage; 27

Holt, Alfred (F); Cutter; 31

Hold (Houlden) John Henry; Haulage; 21

Hughes, Cecil; Packer; 23

Hughes, Daniel; Rescuer; 56

Hughes, Francis O.; Repairer; 60

Hughes, G. (Harry); Cutter-man; 44

Hughes, John; Repairer; 58

Hughes, Peter Joseph; Collier; 27

Hughes, Robert John; Collier; 29

Hughes, Walter Ellis; Packer; 24

Hughes, William; Collier; 43

Hughes, William; Rescuer; 54

Humphries, Ben; Collier; 34

Humphreys, Joseph (John); Cutter-man; 30

Husbands, Thomas; Collier; 40

Jarvis, Ernest; Cutter-man; 41

Jenkins, William T.; Collier; 25

Johns, Percy; Packer; 27

Jones, Albert Edward; Borer; 31

Jones, Azariah; Header; 37

Jones, Cyril; Collier; 26

Jones, Daniel; Repairer; 33

Jones, David L.; Cutter-man; 36

Jones, Edward; Repairer; 64

Jones, Edward; Repairer; 56

Jones, Edward George*; Haulage; 23

Jones, Eric; Filler; 23

Jones, Ernest; Packer; 36

Jones, Evan Hugh; Repairer; 55

Jones, Francis O.; Haulage; 27

Jones, Fred; Packer; 30

Jones, Frederick H.C.; Borer; 31

Jones, George; Beltman; 47

Jones, J. (George Humphrey); Haulage; 22

Jones, Gwilym; Repairer; 52

Jones, Henry; Collier; 59

Jones, Idris; Haulage; 37

Jones, Iorwerth; Haulage; 52

Jones, Jabez (James); Haulage; 43

Jones, John Dan; Repairer; 42

Jones, John Richard; Repairer; 33

Jones, John Robert; Repairer; 55

Jones, Llewellyn; Haulage; 40

Jones, Llewellyn; Repairer; 49

Jones, Llewellyn; Collier; 38

Jones, Neville; Beltman; 30

Jones, Richard Henry; Haulage; 21

Jones, Richard James ; Repairer; 34

Jones, Robert; Packer; 49

Jones, Robert; Deputy Fireman; 57

Jones, Thomas; Packer; 55

Jones, Thomas E.; Collier; -

Jones, Thomas John; Haulage; 58

Jones, Thomas O.; Collier; 59

Jones, William; Filler; 21

Jones, William; Haulage; 51

Kelsall, John (Jack); Packer; 37

Kelsall, James; Haulage; 30

Lawrence, William*; Haulage; 40 (43

Lee, John Thomas; Repairer; 30

Lee, Thomas; Repairer; 16

Lewis, David; Repairer; 44

Lewis, David Thomas; Cutter-man; 46

Lewis, Jack (John); Rescuer; 48

Lilly, Joel; Repairer; 41

Lloyd, Thomas; Packer; 55

Lloyd, William; Collier; 59

Lloyd, William Sydney; Haulage; 17

Lucas, John; Collier; 59

McKean, Joseph (John); Repairer; 30

Maggs, Colin V.; Haulage; 17

Mannion, Albert; Filler; 29

Manuel, S.A. (Thomas A.); Repairer; 33

Martin, William Henry; Ripper; 37

Mathews, William V.; Haulage; 18

Mathias, Samuel; Fireman; 42

Meades, William; Packer; 39

Mitchell, George; Haulage; 23

Monks, Ernest; Haulage; 23

Morley, Edward; Repairer; 57

Morris, Alfred; Haulage; 20

Nichols, Harry; Repairer; 32

Nichols, John; Collier; 29

Nichols, William (Henry); Collier; 25

Owens, Evan Henry; Packer; 54

Palmer, Alexander*; Haulage; 20

Parry, I. S. (Isaac); Repairer; 40

Parry, Joseph; Repairer; 65

Parry, John E.; Haulage; 31

Parry, F. J. (John Richard.); Haulage; 21

Penny, Stephen; Filler; 23

Penny, William H.; Ambulanceman; 32

Perrin, Frank C.; Haulage; 23

Peters, Henry; Packer; 38

Phillips, George; Haulage; 22

Phillips, Herbert; Filler; 30

Phillips, John; Filler; 40

Pickering, John Frederick; Haulage; 22

Powell, Charles; Railman; 57

Price, (Prince) Ernest; Cutter-man; 27

Price, Samuel; Cutter-man; 37

Prydding, John; Haulage; 32

Prince, Mark; Repairer; 59

Prince, William; Repairer; 30

Pritchard, I. S. (Isiah); Repairer; 54

Pugh, Ernest; Doggie; 49

Pugh, Thomas; Collier; 54

Ralphs, John; Cutter-man; 53

Rance, Thomas R.; Haulage; 21

Rees, Albert; Pipeman; 56

Reid, Lloyd; Haulage; 20

Roberts, Arthur A.; Repairer; 63

Roberts, Edward; Collier; 35

Roberts, Edward C.; Collier; 42

Roberts, Ernest; Filler; 26

Roberts, Frank; Haulage; 26

Roberts, George W.*; Repairer Filler; 28

Roberts, Idris; Haulage; 16

Roberts, John David; Collier; 47

Roberts, H. (John); Packer; 33

Roberts, Olwyn; Filler; 24

Roberts, Percy; Haulage; 26

Roberts, Robert John; Filler; -

Roberts, Robert Thomas; Railman; 57

Roberts, Robert William; Packer; 38

Roberts, Robert; Repairer; 33

Roberts Thomas James; Filler; 19

Roberts, William; Packer; 45

Roberts, William H. (T.); Collier; 40

Robertson, William; Cutter-man; 41

Rogers, Edward Llew.; Haulage; 20

Rogers, Grenville; Repairer; 29

Ross, Harry; Collier; 34

Rowland, John David; Haulage; 17 

 

Rowlands, John. Cutter-man; 36

Salisbury, William; Fireman; 36

Shaw, George; Collier; 63

Shone, James (John); Packer; 34

Shone, Richard; Doggie; 49

Slawson, Arthur; Haulage; 22

Smith, Leonard; Haulage; 20

Stratford, Stanley; Packer; 39

Stevens, Richard T.; Haulage; 22

Strange, Albert; Collier; 35

Tarran, John; Repairer; 50

Taylor, William Henry; Cutter; 53

Thomas, Berwyn; Haulage; 26

Thomas, John Elias; Repairer; 29

Thomas, Robert; Haulage; 22

Thomas, Tec; Collier; 26

Thornton, John; Repairer; 24

Tittle, Edward; Repairer; 44

Trow(e), Ernest; Collier; 41

Valentine S. (Fred) A; Haulage; 24

Vaughan John Edward; Repairer; 28

White John; Beltman; 38

Williams, George; Collier; 31

Williams, Harold; Collier; 37

Williams, Hugh (L. l.); Collier; 43

Williams, John; Repairer; 62

Williams, John Thos.; Packer; 33

Williams, J. T. (John D.); Repairer; 29

Williams, John; Repairer; 44

Williams, John; Collier; 29

Williams, Joseph (James); Collier; 66

Williams, N (Morris); Electrician; 24

Williams, Reg; Electrician; 29

Williams, Thomas; Repairer; 57

Williams, William A.; Cutter-man; 29

Wilson, John Walter; Haulage; 32

Witter, Henry; Repairer; 56

Wynn, Edward; Repairer; 68

Winyard, William Walter; Collier; -

Wynneyard; Repairer; 47

Yemm, Morgan (J.); Repairer; 28

* Indicates body recovered. All others, apart from rescuers, were sealed in the pit.