Sunday, October 4, was the 88th anniversary of the Battle of Cable Street.
In Magdalene, the third novel in the series The Addlestone Chronicles, James Harcourt-Heath is invited to attend a mass rally organized by the British Union of Fascists (BUF). As an agent within MI5, the British Secret Service, he had infiltrated the allied fascist right-wing group, The Nordic League. He, along with other members of the executive council, was seated on a podium raised outside Tower Hill Tube Station. Also present were Kim Philby, Guy Burgess, and Anthony Blunt, all of whom were later convicted of treason against the British government.
A crowd of some 15,000 men, all wearing black pseudo-uniforms, gathered to greet the leader of the BUF, Sir Oswald Mosley. It is notable that funding for these uniforms came from Benito Mussolini, who sought to echo his own black-shirted fascist supporters, the Squadrismo (also known as Camicie Nere), within the allied UK fascist movement. After speeches by William Joyce (later known as Lord Haw-Haw) and Mosley, the crowd divided into four groups to march through various parts of the East End of London. Their goal was to harass the predominantly Jewish refugees and working-class Irish dockworkers living in the area.
Because their plans were leaked—and as the Metropolitan Police had granted formal permission for the march—they were met with staunch resistance from tens of thousands of locals bolstered by an equal number of anti-fascist supporters from across the country.
The march descended into chaos and was eventually suspended as the resistance proved too strong for even the 15,000 marchers and the 6,000 police assigned to control the crowds. This marked the effective end of organized fascism in the UK.
In 1937, as a direct consequence of the events of this day, Parliament passed the Public Order Act, which banned the wearing of political uniforms in public. In 1940, Mosley and his supporters were imprisoned in Holloway Gaol under the provisions of Defence Regulation 18B. He remained there until December 1943, after which he became a key pioneer of Holocaust denial.
In 1983, a large mural commemorating the Battle of Cable Street was painted on the side of St. George’s Town Hall in Stepney, East London. It remains there today. You can view it here: The Guardian article about the Cable Street mural.