Library:Black Bolshevik

Black Bolshevik is the autobiography of Harry Haywood, the son of former slaves who became a leading member of the Communist Part USA and a pioneering theoretician on the Afro-American struggle.

The author's first-hand accounts of the Chicago race riot of 1919, the Scottsboro Boys' defense, communist work in the South, the Spanish Civil War, the battle against the revisionist betrayal of the Party, and other history-shaping events are must reading for all who are interested in Black history and the working class struggle.

It was dedicated to his family; his third wife, son and daughter.

"To My Family,

Gwen, Haywood, Jr., and Becky"

Acknowledgement

There have been many friends and comrades who have, directly or indirectly, helped me with the writing of this book. Unfortunately, they are too numerous to all be named here.

There are a number of young people who have helped with the editorial, research and typing tasks and helped the project along through political discussions. Special thanks to Ernie Allen, who gave yeoman help with the early chapters. Others whose assistance was indispensable include Jody and Susan Chandler, Paula Cohen, Stu Dowty and Janet Goldwasser, Paul Elitzik, Pat Fry, Gary Goff, Sherman Miller, John Schwartz, Lyn Wells and Carl Davidson. Others who gave me assistance are Renee Blakkan and Nathalie Garcia.

Over the past years, I have had discussions with several veteran comrades and friends who have helped immeasurably in jogging my memory and filling in the gaps where my own experience was lacking, I extend my warmest appreciation to Jesse Gray, Josh Lawrence, Arthur and Maude (White) Katz, John Killens, Ruth Hamlin, Frances Loman, Al Murphy, Joan Sandler, Delia Page and Jack and Ruth Shulman.

A political autobiography is necessarily shaped by experiences over the years and by comrades who helped and influenced me in the long battle for self-determination and against revisionism. My earliest political debts are to the first core of Black cadres in the CPUSA: Cyril Briggs, Edward Doty, Richard B. Moore and to my brother Otto Hall, all former members of the African Blood Brotherhood.

To Harrison George, outstanding son of the working class, charter member of the CPUSA, former editor of the Daily Worker and the Peoples' World, who gave his all to the Communist movement and died alone, victimized for his “premature" anti- revisionism.

A special tribute to my comrades in the battles against revisionism within the CPUSA and after: Al Lannon, veteran director of the Waterfront Section and member of the Central Committee of the CPUSA; Charles Loman, executive secretary of the Brooklyn Party Organization; Isidore Beagun, executive secretary of the Bronx Party Organization; Allen and Pearl Lawes, Al and Ruth Hamlin, Olga and Victor Agosto. And to my wife, Gwendolyn Midlo Hall, my closest collaborator from 1953 through 1964 in the writing of manuscripts as well as in the Apolitical battles, who has since established her own reputation as historian and essayist.

A tribute to Ed Strong, former communist youth leader and director of the Southern Negro Youth Congress, whose premature death in the mid-fifties cut short his uncompromising stand within the Central Committee for the right of self-determination for the Black nation.

To the editors of Soulbook Magazine, who published my writings in 1965-66 and invited me to Oakland, California, in the spring of 1966 during the formative stages of the Black Panther movement.

To Vincent Harding, who provided me with funds to return to the U.S. from Mexico in 1970 and gave me technical and material assistance to begin this autobiography.

Thanks to John Henrik Clarke and Francisco and Elizabeth Cattlett de Mora for their enthusiasm and moral support.

To Robert Warner, Director of the Michigan Historical Collections, for his help and his sensitivity to the need to collect and preserve historically relevant materials from the Black movement in the United States.