The Daily Worker Newspaper, July 10, 1926, Page 12

| ET PRAISED ee GH n intiPiesmamenen a3 SS SS SECS? By FLORENCE PARKER. “The rich man in his castle, The poor man at his gate, God made them, high and lowly And ordered their estate,” HAT inspiring little verse from a very popular hymn of the Church of England was in the main what kept Alice Johnson, the heroine of this story (and a few million other people who are not heroes or heroines of this particular story) from taking her place in the emancipation of her class and kept her also in a half doped state of serfdom, She was elderly, servile, convinced that the “‘upper classes” were rightly on top—and she was religious. In short, the above quoted little piece of information summed up Alice John- son’s philosophy in pre-strike days. Not that she was quite unacquainted with the class struggle. Her mother had been left a widow with seven young children to rear somehow. All of them had gone to work very young and endured in their various trades all the exploitation of youth which is so essential a part of life under the capi- talist system. Alice had for years worked early and late, always honest and conscien- tious, and unfailingly respectful to the “upper” class by which she was em- ployed—and exploited—as a domestic worker. At 15 a kitchen maid, I met her at 51 a skilled cook general, still reli- gious and still able to hear, and to sing, the above little hymn verse without experiencing the slightest de- sire to knock sense into god, hell out of the rich man or even to move from the lowly gate to the castle, ” e * HEN Alice went to work for some Bolsheviks! Perhaps you imagine that she saw some advertisement like the follow- ing: “Bolshevik family, tired of mur- der and their digestions ruined with eating human flesh, require the ser- vices of respectful, Christian cook.” Perhaps you imagine that full of the missionary zeal of her religious sect, Alice decided that it was her god-sent duty to go out among the heathen bol- sheviks and bring them to the paths of righteousness. But no! Alice had no idea whatso- ever that her new employers were -Bol- sheviks. It happened this way. Alice had married an old railway- man, who, fat, asthmatic and a bit rheumatic in the feet, was finishing, at the age of 63, his last two years as a ticket collector on the London Met- ropolitan’ Railways, after which he would go on the magnificent pension of £1 3d a week. As may be imagined, by adding up the weekly wage of Johnson and sub- tracting the ameliorations of life, say, of the Russian worker in regard es- pecially to rent, food, holidays and health, savings had not been consid- erable, so Alice had turned out to work again at 46 to make as gure as possible of financial security for them both, for the present and for the fu- ture, And that is how she fell into the clutches of the Red Terror! *> © « N° one could possible blame Alice for failing to realize the danger into which God (for Alice knew from her childhood that it was God who had been responsible for the arrange- ment of her life) ‘had led her, Tho there were signs from the very beginning that things were a bit un- usual at her new place, still there were mostly such very pleasant un- usualnesses that Alice never spotted them as Bolshevism—which only goes to show what subtle, snake-like people these British Bolsheviks are! For instance, she was definitely en- gaged at so many hours a day and was told not to stay after the time was up, as the Bolshevik family were too hard up to pay overtime and would not let her work beyond her timo un- less she received overtime pay. Then they were not a bit religious. Sometimes they even laughed about God ,and sometimes they were defi- nitely rude about people who went to GA I I SR id et The Russian Woman in Industry. nny church, And the man Bolshevik swore horribly to the vicar when he, unsuc- cessfully, tried to visit them once. Then they asked her not to call them “Sir” and “Madam;” they said it took their appetite away. You see what queer people they were! Then they read the strangest papers, none of those which Alice’s former employers had been accustomed to read, And they offered to lend them to Alice and nearly always pointed out to her the cartoons, which even respectful, un-class-conscious Alice had to admit were funny. The woman Bolshevik did not lounge on a sofa in the drawing room reading a novel, and giving small tea parties to elegantly-dressed women friends. No, her typewriter tapped from morn- ing to night, and her room, which could hardly be compared with the drawing rooms of Alice’s former “mis- tresses,” was full of papers and books, and pictures pinned on to the walls. And these pictures gave Alice the creeps, until they were explained to her, after which she began to think about one or two things, but still in the foggy, halting, frightened way of those who have for years been ex- ploited by the bourgeoisie. There were constant meetings to which came few or many men and women of all ages’and types.: Some of these people ‘stayed 'to- ‘meals. » Jolly people they were, too, tho queer. They helped Alice to lay the table and to clear the things away, they talked to her when she brought in the food and once a good-looking young man said to her: “Well, comrade, what are the domes- tic workers thinking about the coming strike?” Alice thought that was a queer ques- tion. He seemed to think that she would know what the other people en- gaged in work like hers would be thinking. And whatever did he mean about a strike? Were the workmen going to make trouble again? Still, the young man had such beau- tiful curly black hair and asked his question in such a serious, friendly way that it was no wonder Alice failed to recognize him as a Bolshevik, tho, as she confided to her stolid British husband later, he did look a bit like a foreigner and probably that was what made him seem different, It was while Alice was dallying with the word “comrade” which the hand- some young “foreigner” had used, that the General Strike broke out, IFE at the Bolsheviks became more frenzied than ever. Machines called duplicators arrived; typewriters chirped_in nearly every part of the house. People,’ all 6f them callea “comrades,” arrived at all times of the day and night, argued together, held meetings and departed carrying knap- sacks on their shoulders, full of funny little daily papers, called the “Work, ers’ Bulletin.” Some of the “com- rades” slept at the Bolshevik house and most days work went on from 6 a, m. right round the clock till 3 or even 4a.m. Alice was fairly engulfed in the class struggle now, The strike went on, Daily and nightly Johnson attended his strike committee, even forgetting to take adequate time off for the meals which he had hitherto treated with such de- ference, saying to Alice, in those far- away pre-strike days: “At my age, my dear, it is of the greatest importance what one eats and absolutely essential for 7 have perfect quiet during those meals that I can get in my own hotline.” Now he esked for a sandwich or two and had even once or’ been The Story of a British Domestic Worker Who Fell Into the Clutches of Bolsheviks found by Alice munching an apple dur- ing an urgent meeting of the strike committee, just like an errand boy and not a bit like “the oldest ticket collector on the line.” At the home of the Bolsheviks work went on unceasingly daily and nightly, and one night at the tiresome hour of 2a. m., when people were really tired and when Alice was sleepily boiling up some hot soup for some newly-arrived comrades, there came the news that “the young foreigner” from Liverpool had been arrested, Alice couldn’t believe it. Then the woman Bolshevik was arrested and fined £50 for merely carrying about a packet of the little daily papers which Alice had begun to read regu- larly and was learning to appreciate. Alice’s blood began to boil. She was too shy to ask for information and yet she really longed to know more of all that was happening around her and which had caught stolid, unimagina- tive old Johnson in its grip no less than the Bolshevik family, The last day before he went to jail Alice met “the young foreigner” in the still surging, ever busy house of the Bolsheviks. “Eh, Mr. Alec, whatever have they arrested you for? I’m sure you haven’t done anything bad enough to be put in prison for. I wish I understood what it’s all about. Johnson’s too busy and everyone else is either writing news- papers or going to jail.” Now young Alec was a-good propa- gandist, and altho somewhat busy, \as one is apt to be the day before going to jail for three months, he looked at Alice and seeing quite clearly the sin- cerity of her question, dived without further hesitation into the strike, the arrests and the class struggle. Alice was a good and rapt audience and his efforts were not wasted. To stand by the workers, to take one’s place with one’s own class, to know what*they ought-t¢/have and to be able to rouse them frdm their apathy of suppr>ssed ind aimless hostility, to see ahead the path to freedom “for our class” and to know beforehand the difficultie sand dangers likely to be encountered on the way—it was for such work as this that Alec and a thousand other workers were being sentenced. Alice began to see daylight. And her church? Alec bravely tackled that question for her, too, and gave her a new outlook on this as on practically every other question. Stil, on religion he did seem terribly drastic and tho forced im debate to agree with him, still Alice felt that she would wait tft Johnson confirmed these strange views before she really faced up to -them. ‘ Alec went to jail—so did a thousang other class-conscious workers. Johnson was disgruntled at the call to stop the strike and saw clearly thru the betrayal of the “leaders.” Soe did thousands of other workers, The Bolshevik family dug into a re- cruiting campaign for the Communist Party, pointing out clearly and un- ceasingly the lessons of the general strike—and so did a few thousand other members of the ©,-P. G, B, And Alice did a number of strange things. She lost her faith in the little hymn verse, began to hate “the rich man in his castle;” to develop a “‘shoulder to shoulder” complex about “the poor man at his gate’ and had an ever- increasing suspicion that God had en- tirely mismanaged the position of the “high and the lowly.” She even began to doubt whether it was the function of God to arrange these matters at all. Most significant of all, she no longer got in a flutter when the Bolshevik family and their visitors called her “comrade.” She joined the co-opera- tive stores, for Johnson felt and said that no striker should shop anywhere else, for he said “you never know when we shall need the co-ops behind us.” By’ the time that Comrade Alec, look- ing pale and “more like a foreigner than ever,” came straight to,.the house of her Bolshevik family on Wis release from jail, Alice knew well enough to realize what he had been put in for,! and what the strike had been for, and’ what her duty was to these things which she had ignored so long. She had joined the women’s section of her! local labor party and she now read the | papers the Bolsheyik family lent her | So that when ‘ot. k is holiday as RAE eg Ot { majesty’s government. she wag sure} | wa of their mew relationship, ~ igi “Hullo, comrade,” he said. “Welcome home, comrade,” she re- plied, *ese by osm me going about calling peo- ple ‘comrade’,” she said to John-: son late that night. “What are things coming to?” “What indeed, my dear?” replied Johnson, puffing as he bent down to put on his bedroom slippers, London, May 31, 1926, THE TINY WORKER. A Weekly Edited by Charmion Oliver Vol, 1. Saturday, July 9, 1926 No. 7 EXTRA! EXTRA! THE TALE Charmion Oliver Edits this Issue. This tttle com- rade whose fairy OF A CAT (A fairy tale) by Charmion Oliv- er, San Francisco, Mra, Van Hogit~ tale is in this is- all haa taken ie sue ie again honor- $12,000 a year she ary editor. Send has been spending in a story, poem or on two cats and is anything snappy now spending it on and zip goes your a school for work. name to ‘the very ers’ children to pe ah TINY . ene them the : e. John Red's father picked up this! ret works ra Pet i POEMS story by Johnny Red: > | publics of -s. | Tetee's a gu li. ‘ ‘ - pro bra ag twill } Coo- 8 is serv. We Mickey Moss.| ridcum Ie wtpng “eek Cee WIth Coos) me milk and tHe tan on] Many of them nearly froze to death.| cream dai , But In the summer the rich guys neice cam, |S Raat eeeeeicce Me ae a] onl Mesias Another One, ight it sak tlten thks Reqs, cnthig cekime ples, (on, boy!) LL ‘g “hag as oo eed, 8 “| well Gad Peach bee te tel wit a wasn't tha’ The head of Fred| to fhe woods where the Pres Is} a clever little fa ts not muoh good, wit st re could really “Keep le—op prize | — witn “Goelidge. Tre Ces only th abo President In hie eticeae , workers “ry ‘ete unked Stee as of Re sharp sense dumb, len’t wy . v, t ~~ ernment me tencintelt nie money he put on ice,” doh Ri i ge] one : % 1 * \' vs o~ + wi ir: Wi ir fr wns Ss Ste