BUF Membership - was your 'card marked'?

Hallo all

I was wondering if any helpful Pals had any information regarding
the way former members of the British Union of Fascists were
viewed or treated during WW2 conscription.



Were their 'cards marked' in some way which would point
them out as being 'sympathetic' to the Fascist cause?

I presume the pre-War Secret Services had plenty of files
on BUF members and wonder if that 'tallied over' somehow?

Would a former BUF member be thought of as 'potential trouble' if fighting the German and Italians, but suitable for fighting the Japanese, ie stuck out with the 'Forgotten Army'?

Was there any official policy regarding treatment of former BUF members?


Many thanks for any assistance or insights

 

just bouncing this back up, if anyone has info

 

That is a very good question and you raised quite valid points.

Unfortunately I have never come across this topic before and cannot be of any help but will be interested in any replies to your post.

Let us hope that someone has come upon this before.

Regards
Tom

 

AHD
a story here from the Beeb
BBC - WW2 People's War - Arrested for Being a (British Union) Traitor

History of British fascism, from the British Union of Fascists (BUF) to the British National Party (BNP)
Quote below

Whatever the previous history of the British establishment, now Britain was at war with Germany. Germany was the world's major Fascist power. Britain's Fascists advocated peace with Germany. The state was obliged to act against them. From 22 May 1940, the authorities began to intern prominent fascist, under Defence Regulation 18B. Between 750 and 800 were finally detained. Brian Simpson's In The Highest Degree Odious suggests that the detentions were unwarranted, and a blot on British civil liberties. Other historians have pointed to Simpson's reliance on fascist sources, and his unwillingness to treat seriously the far more brutal detention of Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany: 27,000 'enemy aliens' were held in detention camps in 1940.
Some historians have argued that internment dealt a terminal blow to British fascism. Colin Cross argues that 'British Fascism ended in May 1940, and has not been revived under that name'. (Cross, 195) Others have pointed to the effects of internment, in shaping a generation of fascists with common experiences, and an even greater belief in Mosley's mission.
Most fascists were released in 1941 and 1942. Mosley was let out in September 1943, on grounds of ill health. His release sparked the largest protest movement of the war years. Arnold Leese left detention in 1944. By 1945, and with the end of the war, there were a plethora of tiny competing Fascist grouplets. Local leaders included Jeffrey Hamm, Alexander Raven Thomson, Edward Godfrey and James Preen (all Mosleyites), Chesterton, Leese, and the Duke of Bedford. According to the Communist Party's paper, the Daily Worker,

 

Hallo all

I was wondering if any helpful Pals had any information regarding
the way former members of the British Union of Fascists were
viewed or treated during WW2 conscription.

I don't think the British authorities applied any consistent policy. Bear in mind that by 1939 the BUF was a spent force with at most only a few hundred active members left, although the nominal membership rolls were longer. It seems as though lapsed rank-and-file members were not scrutinised to any great degree, their pre-war support of the BUF being considered one of the forgiveable indiscretions of youth. Senior members of the party were of course monitored much more seriously by the government, and in many cases were eventually interned under Section 18B of the Emergency Powers Act.

I hope this helps,

Best, Alan

 

very helpful, thanks guys, especially the History of British Fascism page

 

Hallo all

I was wondering if any helpful Pals had any information regarding the way former members of the British Union of Fascists were viewed or treated during WW2 conscription.

Were their 'cards marked' in some way which would point them out as being 'sympathetic' to the Fascist cause?

I presume the pre-War Secret Services had plenty of files on BUF members and wonder if that 'tallied over' somehow?

Would a former BUF member be thought of as 'potential trouble' if fighting the German and Italians, but suitable for fighting the Japanese, ie stuck out with the 'Forgotten Army'?

Was there any official policy regarding treatment of former BUF members?

One of the problems was the sheer number of British Fascists. Membership of the BUF peaked in August 1934 when it reached just under 50,000. Only the most prominent were interned under Section 18B. Quite a few members of the BUF and of the more extreme far-right splinter groups served in the forces. Two of the most notorious were Francis Maton and Francis George MacLardy.

Maton, an extreme fascist, joined the Territorial Army in 1938 and later served in Norway and in North Africa until joining 50 Middle East Commando in 1941. He was captured in the battle for Crete. As a PoW in Germany he quickly learnt German and volunteered to work as a propaganda broadcaster, and in 1943 was part of the recruiting team for the British Free Corps. He was allowed to live as a civilian in Berlin complete with a German false name and a German passport.

MacLardy was an active district leader in the BUF. At the outbreak of war, having originally trained as a pharmacist, he joined the RAMC and rose to the rank of sergeant. He was captured in Belgium in May 1940. From his PoW camp in Poland he wrote a letter, care of the camp's commanding officer, to the Waffen SS saying that he wanted to volunteer to fight Bolshevism. More than a fascist, he was fiercely pro-Nazi. While awaiting a decision on his application to join the SS he wrote propaganda leaflets for distribution in PoW camps and became a chief recruiter for the British Free Corps.

Both survived the war and were court-marshalled under Section 4(5) of the Army Act 1881 which carried the death penalty. Francis Maton was sentenced to 10 years; Francis MacLardy was sentenced to life imprisonment, later commuted on appeal to 15 years.

source: 'Letting the Side Down: British Traitors in the Second World War', by Sean Murphy (Sutton Publishing, 2003).

 

Thank you very much, Peter. I had heard of the Free Corps but not of those chaps.

Interesting in that it poses another question: was Maton, in particular, very open about his views? To be sent on the Norway mission and then on to Nth Africa, eventually becoming a Commando, he must surely have been a most obvious security risk. Did he give any defence at his trial, do you know? Like, "they set me up!"

I'm no John LeCarré, but it's almost as if his military career was shaped in some clandestine way, knowing that he'd up up doing what he eventually did.

Many thanks again, I'll look out for the Sean Murphy book

 

Interesting in that it poses another question: was Maton, in particular, very open about his views? To be sent on the Norway mission and then on to Nth Africa, eventually becoming a Commando, he must surely have been a most obvious security risk. Did he give any defence at his trial, do you know? Like, "they set me up!"
I don't know whether any of them openly expressed their views other than being openly anti-Semitic. As to pleading that they were set up, L/Cpl Nicholas Courlander, a particularly ardent Nazi sympathiser (although not a member of the BU) and in Sean Murphy's opinion "perhaps the most ruthless of the BFC [British Free Corps] members" did try it on, telling the court thatI am anxious to point out that I had no interest in politics whatever before the war and that during my imprisonment my politics were purely camouflage for my attempts to escape. I do not share the views of the ex-BUF men who formed the foundation of the BFC. - quoted in Letting the Side Down, page 220
But that didn't wash and he got 15 years.

The title The British Union of Fascists is a bit misleading as it seems to associate them with Mussolini's fascism. The party's official title was changed in early 1936 to The British Union of Fascists and National Socialists, abbreviated to BU; but this was largely ignored by the press and they continued to be referred to as the BUF, as now do many historians.

In my previous post I put the BU membership at a peak of just under 50,000, I got this figure from Letting the Side Down, page 9. However, Stephen Dorril in Black Shirt - Sir Oswald Mosley and British Fascism, at page 368, states that in 1935 "Paying membership had fallen but it recovered at the end of the year, tripling to around 15,000, at which level it remained for the next fifteen months." When war was declared the membership dropped, in early 1940 (i.e., during the Phoney War) "Home Office figures put it at 9,000 ..." (page 489). Such a rounded figure suggests to me that this was a guesstimate.

Right wing groups are now claiming on the Internet that over a thousand BUF party members died in the forces in what they term the 'brother against brother' war. No doubt there was a large number, but 1,000 seems to me to be way over the top. One BU member and activist was Private James Fogg, 1st Battalion, East Lancashire Regiment, killed on 11 February 1945.

The only additional details I know of Maton and MacLardy are these:

Francis Paul Maton, BU Coventry Branch. British Free Corps - SS PK Standarte "Kurt Eggars"

Francis George MacLardy (spelt McLardy by Stephen Dorrril), born 1915, District Secretary, BU Formby-Liverpool Branch. British Free Corps - SS Medical Depot Lichtenberg.

The attached photo is of Mason in Berlin posing in his Gestapo style dress, complete with Nazi party lapel badge.

 

fascinating Peter, thank you very much, that's a second book you've placed on my to-read-list