Vintage Red
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Jim Mitchell - Photo courtesy The Adelaide Advertiser
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Jim Mitchell joined the Communist Party in
1930 at the age of 17, and maintained his membership until his death. His is
the 72 year history of a dedicated Communist.
David Pemberthy writing a feature article in The Advertiser (4/12/95) quoted
from Jim's ASIO files: "completely indoctrinated with a shrewd mind and
determined character, and his propagandist skills pose a threat to our national
security."
That is what the Secret Intelligence Organisation thinks of
a man who still regards being RED as a badge of honour and communism the one
true faith, Penberthy remarked.
The article was headed "A Vintage Red". Jim was then
82. He liked the article and framed it.
Comrades, it is impossible to write about Jim's political life
without first mentioning his suffragette mother (Eva), for she was to play a
tremendously important role in shaping his political philosophy.
Eva was also active in the British Labor Movement. Had the
family remained in England instead of migrating to Australia it was highly likely
that she would have been elected the first woman member of the House of Commons.
Jim joined the Communist Party when he met Ernie Thornton in
Melbourne. He was 17 and a special arrangement was made to allow his membership.
He began work as a cub reporter on the Melbourne Herald and
later transferred to the Party newspaper Workers Voice.
Jim was involved in the Anti-Fascist struggles and was on the
waterfront in Melbourne when Egon Kisch, who was refused permission to come
ashore to address a meeting on the war, jumped to the wharf from the ship, breaking
his legs.
During the war Jim did his bit. Rumour has it that one moonlit
night on the beach they formed a branch of the Communist Party in the Army.
After serving their country, Jim, Graham Smith and other comrades were expelled
from the RSL.
The Party asked Jim to transfer to South Australia to set up
and become Editor of The Tribune. He always remained a financial member of the
Australian Journalists' Association.
The Tribune, thanks to people like Jim, played a leading role
in the education of workers and recruitment to the party.
Workers returning from the war and migrants were determined
that Australia could be a better place and they demanded a greater share in
the wealth of the country. Jim, like many other comrades, was in the thick of
it.
Reactionary forces in Australia attacked the working class
and its leaders. The Menzies Government tried to ban the Party. Comrades were
forced to hide Marxist libraries in ceilings, under houses, in the bush, and
anywhere they would be safe. The Party press was in danger of being confiscated
so it had to be dismantled and taken to a safer place.
Menzies was defeated in the High Court by a brilliant Dr Evatt
who was later to lead the Australian Labor Party. So he introduced a referendum
to ban the Party. But in a campaign in which the Party press played a leading
role, he was defeated again.
McCarthyism stalked every free thinker and democrat. Famous
artists including Paul Robeson and the Hollywood Ten were persecuted. The Rosenbergs
were executed.
In Australia, Communists and trade union leaders were jailed.
The Miners Union was crippled by the 1949 strike so the Menzies Government set
its sights on the destruction of the Waterside Workers Federation and the Seamen's
Union of Australia.
It was at this time that the Party decided that Jim should
become a wharfie in Port Adelaide. Jim's leadership and ability to organise
were soon being noticed around the wharf.
At one time the Party branch consisted of about 30 members
and its influence in union matters extended into the broad community. It could
truly be said that the head office of the Wharf branch was the Mitchell's lounge
room.
Jim was elected to the union executive despite the efforts
of the right-wing forces known as the Groupers or the DLP, because of the tremendous
support he enjoyed on the wharf and in the community.
He was joined by Peter Symon and their work changed the whole
direction and thinking on the wharf in Port Adelaide. Hardly a week went by
during the 50's into the 60's that we were not in some kind of struggle on the
wharf.
Attacks on wharfies and seafarers were relentless but ably
led by great Communists Jim Healy and E.V. Elliot we defied them all until the
big strike in 1956.
The reactionary press and its stooges never let up. We set
up our own propaganda group to get our message out. Jim wrote the material,
the gestetners worked all night and we took it out to the factories and rural
areas.
The ACTU of the day led by Albert Monk ratted on us, but under
good leadership and advice we returned to work united, and lived to fight another
day. We eventually won all the conditions we had sought.
Jim served on the State Committee of the CPA and SPA, the Central
Committee of SPA, the State Executive of Soviet Friendship Society and the National
Committee of the Soviet Friendship Society. He was a delegate to party and trade
union conferences, served on the policy committees and was an honoured guest
at Socialist Party Conferences in Europe.
While in the Soviet Union he contributed to both the Guardian
and Tribune as well as contributing articles and research work for the New Zealand
Tribune and Soviet Magazines.
He travelled to the Soviet Union on at least six occasions,
leading a large delegation to the Soviet Union in 1963, visiting Italy, Sri
Lanka, India and Indonesia on his way home. He made life long relationships
with comrades in Indonesia and India.
In Australia Jim was active on many committees - including
the Vietnam Moratorium, the Woodville Council, the Peace Committee, School Committees,
Semaphore Park Football Club, Soviet Friendship Society, Cuban Friendship Society,
Anti-Apartheid Movement, Trades and Labor Council Delegate for MUA, Czechoslovakian
Friendship Society, Committee for 1967 Aboriginal Referendum and the establishment
of TAFE in Port Adelaide.
He died in August and celebration of his life was held at the
Semaphore Workers' Club.
A comrade who will be sadly missed by the working class.
"Man's dearest possession is life, and it is given to
him to live but once; he must live so as to feel no torturing regrets for years
without purpose, never know the burning shame of a mean and petty past.
So live that, dying, he can say: All my life, all my strength,
were given to the finest cause in all the world - The fight for the liberation
of mankind."
(How the steel was tempered -- Nicholi Ostrovsky)
Rex Munn
Life Member
Adelaide
Socialist & Pacifist
Dad was born James Mitchell in November 1913 in Liverpool England,
the eldest son of Eva and George Mitchell.
In 1924, the family decided to move as assisted migrants to
Australia. It cost £10 per person. They sailed out of Tilbury, London
on on the SS Baradine, a coal burning P&O ship of about 10,000 tons.
They settled in Hamilton, Victoria. Jim went to school with
Phillip Law the renowned Antarctic explorer and Frank Crean, treasurer in the
Whitlam Government.
As a boy Dad already had a collection of socialist literature.
He was expelled from school for a time for questioning the meaning of the crucifixion,
and his father worried that his politics was affecting grand-dad getting work
(this being the depression).
Dad secured a teachers' scholarship. But the last position
was taken by the principal's son. So Jim took to the track with his trumpet.
(He played in the school band.) He worked the fruit-picking trail, moved from
town to town, greasing tracks to jump the train, and snow dropping, but only
at rich peoples houses. He was in and out of a few lock ups.
The trumpet got him out of at least one of these lock ups on
the condition that he stay in town and play in the local police band in a regional
competition! His trumpet also got him a few meals especially in Sydney were
people threw pennies out of the windows!
Around 1938 the family moved to Melbourne where work prospects
were greater. Dad joined the Communist Party and began to write and develop
a passion for journalism. He read the paper every day until the day he died,
always with a pen in his hand. He would edit every word he read!
At this time the hidden bust of Lenin came out from the shed
and Dad made a crown for it, put it on the mantle piece and from then on everyone
pretended it was King George!
It was also at this time that Dad was to form life long friendships
with many of Australia's great writers, musicians and artists. He didn't just
hear about the 'angry penguins', he lived that time!
At the Friends of the Soviet Union Organisation he met Ann,
who was a teacher and involved in the 'sheep skins for Russia' campaign. They
married in November 1937. To supplement his income while working for the party
press Dad went to work in the textile industry where he became a shop steward.
In 1941 he led a statewide textile workers strike in Victoria. He was also a
delegate to the Victorian Trades Hall Council.
Dad joined the Army in 1943 and saw over 1000 days of service.
He was made sergeant and a specialist in jungle warfare. It takes a brave man
to stand in the open and direct his flamethrower into a foxhole with snipers
all around and a 50-pound tank of highly inflammable liquid on your back! Dad
never spoke about it except to say that he couldn't stand the smell of burning
flesh. He took no pleasure in the death of any person and forever more he would
be a staunch activist for peace.
He moved to Adelaide to work for The Tribune and remarried.
Mum (his second wife) told me how he went and stood on the
lawn in Sorrento the night the first Soviet Sputnik went up and he watched it
go over. Later he would always remember with pride meeting Yuri Gagarin and
Valentina Tereshkova --the first man and woman in space.
We knew that our parents politics set us apart from our neighbours;
we didn't always understand why, but we learnt about respect of others and compassion
and a collective approach to family life. We knew about this book called the
Communist Manifesto and the saying that was above the kitchen table that said
'he who does not work neither shall he eat'!
We also knew about a bloke called Lenin and that Dad thought
he was pretty cool! We did different things than our friends. We went on Russian
ships, our parents travelled overseas and we also got to go to some great Russian
shows like the ballet and the Moscow Circus. Dad was very big on a cultural
education.
Dad retired from the wharf in 1974 or, as he put it, the shipowners
finally released him from their clutches. He worked as the resident correspondent
in Moscow for two years for the Guardian and The New Zealand Tribune. It was
in the USSR he met his third wife Nellie whom he married in March 1980.
Dad worked all his life for world peace and tried to change
things for the betterment of all people, attending his final peace march in
a wheel chair. Through all this he never lost faith in the working class and
their ability to overcome.
May Kivubiro
Daughter
Tony Thomson: Passionate
It is with great sadness that I write of the passing of Anthony
James Thomson (Tomo). Tony was passionate about life at sea and strongly believed
in the Maritime Union and all that it stood for. He was always up for a laugh
and a joke and his smiling face will be remembered by many. Tragically, his
life was cut short, but he will not be forgotten. His love of the sea and his
belief in others will be with us forever. Condolences to family and friends
everywhere. Sail free Comrade.
Garry Van Hoek
Union No. 30058
Dampier
Bill Page: Staunch Unionist
We mourn a good character off the Coast. Bill passed away in
August, aged 53 years, after a lengthy illness.
Bill was a staunch unionist starting a career on the Melbourne
Harbour Trust working on the Old Hoppers, then on to the coast. His sense of
humour and character will be sadly missed by all who knew him -- a great shipmate.
Condolences to Ellie, Sharron, Brian, Jeff and George.
Anyway, it's calm waters and smooth sailing now Bill. 'Till
next time.
R. Goldie
Union No. 6960
Joe McGinness: "Uncle Joe"
Joe was an active unionist on the northern Australian waterfront.
He was a founding member of the Federal Council for the Advancement of Aborigines
and Torres Strait Islanders in the late 1950's and one of Australia's most prominent
land rights campaigners. He was also one of the leaders in the 1967 referendum
campaign.
He died in July and was honoured at the ACTU Congress.
Terry O'Shane
ATSIC Councillor & MUA member
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