Briggs reports on Angelo Herndon’s press conference hosted by the I.L.D. on arriving in New York City after a year and a half in prison, freed on $15,000 bail while awaiting appeal for the charge of ‘inciting Negroes to insurrection.’

‘Herndon, Ravaged by Torture, Fights On’ by Cyril Briggs from The Daily Worker. Vol. 11 No. 190. August 9, 1934.

HEROIC NEGRO IN APPEAL FOR SCOTTSBORO 9

Will Speak In Harlem Aug. 15; In Bronx Aug. 22

The ravages of 19 months of hideous torture in an Atlanta, Georgia, prison hell plainly showing in his delicate physical condition, heroic Angelo Herndon yesterday hurled anew his defiance at the Southern lynch lords, at a press conference in the national office of the International Labor Defense!

“I am more determined than ever to carry on the struggle for the oppressed working class and the Negro people,” he said.

Plainly worn out by his prison ordeal and the excitement of the first days of his newly won freedom, with enthusiastic mass welcomes in New York City and the cities he passed through on his way from the South, Herndon again displayed the high fortitude and courage which marked his conduct in the court of the class enemy in the quiet, prompt manner in which he answered the questions with which he was plied by both the representatives of the revolutionary press and of the capitalist press.

Unemployed Victory Enraged Rulers

Asked of his arrest and treatment in prison, he told of being jailed a week after an unemployed demonstration of Negro and white workers in Atlanta. Herndon had led that demonstration in protest against inadequate relief, discrimination against Negroes, and the threat of Atlanta city authorities to cut off all relief on the pretext that they had no funds. The day following the demonstration, they were forced to appropriate $6,000 for relief. This magnificent victory of Atlanta unemployed enraged the ruling class, and Herndon’s arrest followed.

“They took me to the death cell and tried to force me to sit in the electric chair. I refused and they finally gave up the attempt to torture me then and there. Later, although I was subjected to mental torture, frequent solitary confinement and indignities, and my health deliberately endangered by unsanitary conditions, they were afraid to beat me up because of the tremendous mass protests of white and Negro workers.

“However, I was subjected to unspeakable mental tortures in an e fort to drive me insane. For example, when a prisoner died in my cell, they left the corpse there for many hours. The dead man, a Negro, had been sick for three days and was denied any medical attention whatever.

“A month after my conviction, I was put in solitary, charged with attempting to escape. I was again placed in the death cell, and removed only after mass protests mobilized by the International Labor Defense and the Communist Party. I was then placed in a filthy, unsanitary cell. Hardened criminals were housed with me. The jailers threatened to put homosexuals in the cell, as well, but were deterred by the angry protests of the workers. Eight or ten of the prisoners placed in my cell were later electrocuted, and the jailers would gloatingly taunt me that I would soon be finished off on the chain gang.”

Denied Medical Aid in Prison

In answer to a question on his present physical condition, Herndon told of being sick for a long time in prison, and denied medical attention.

“I was finally given a medical examination as a result of the demands of workers and intellectuals in response of the call of the I.L.D. The results of the examination were concealed, however, and my condition whitewashed.”

“Were you deprived of papers, cigarettes and other comforts sent you by workers and sympathizers?”

“Books and papers were rarely delivered to me. When cigarettes were delivered, the packages would be rifled of part of their contents. Copies of the Daily Worker would be splotched with ink, or torn into shreds before being given to me.”

Only Mass Protests Saved Him

At this point, Herndon was asked by a reporter for the capitalist press if he was helped any by the mass protests of workers and intellectuals, and if he ever got any news of the protest movement in his behalf.

“The jailers would frequently tell me they were getting thousands of protest letters and telegrams ‘threatening’ them, and would angrily threaten to take it out on me, but they never dared to beat me, thus clearly showing their fear of the anger of the masses of white and Negro workers and intellectuals who were rallying to my defense. Occasionally I would be allowed to receive letters and telegrams and even newspapers from which I got an inkling of what was happening on the outside.”

“Do you see any connection between your case and that of the Scottsboro boys?” he was next asked.

Makes Appeal for Scottsboro Boys

“Most certainly. The Scottsboro case is part of the systematic persecution of the Negro people. The frame-up of the Scottsboro boys reveals the fear of the white ruling class confronted by the growing solidarity of white and Negro toilers. It is an attempt to smash this solidarity, and isolate the Negro masses. Faced by the world-wide fight for the Scottsboro boys, the ruling class is gripped by fear and are resorting to the utmost terror in order to maintain their plunder rule, which is threatened by the rising resistance of white and Negro toilers throughout the country. They are trying to clamp the lid down. The Scottsboro case and mine are interconnected.

“For the first time in the South, lynch justice has been challenged by white and Negro attorneys of the I.L.D., by workers and intellectuals throughout the country and the whole world.

Confident Workers Will Carry On Fight

“But in spite of this terror, organized struggles are going on. Good work is being done by the revolutionary forces in the South. The lynch lords are not successful in terrorizing the Negro people. The firm solidarity of Negro and white workers is shown in numerous strike struggles and in the angry protests of Southern white and Negro workers against my frame-up.”

Herndon here stressed the necessity of raising the $15,000 necessary to carry the appeal for himself and the Scottsboro boys to the U.S. Supreme Court, and expressed the confidence that the workers and intellectuals who furnished the money for his bail would support the campaign of the I.L.D. for the $15,000 Appeal Fund. He declared that he would throw himself into that campaign as far as his physical condition permitted.

To Speak In Harlem August 15

Two meetings have already been arranged for him in this city, Rockland Palace, Wednesday night, August 15, and the Bronx Coliseum, August 22.

Asked what he thought of the opportunity to address the Negro people of Harlem, he declared he would use the opportunity “to bring home to the Negro masses the lessons of the partial victory won by the workers in my case. With the Negro reformist misleaders actively betraying the liberation struggles of the Negro people, it is our task to convince the Negro masses that the only way to free themselves is through the close unity of white and Negro toilers in struggle against mass unemployment, misery, lynching, fascist terror, and imperialist war. They must get a clear picture of the cause of their oppression and of the class responsible for that oppression.”

I.L.D. Warns of Fascism, Pledges Fight

Following the press conference with Herndon, Richard B. Moore, national field organizer of the I.L.D., pledged that organization to continue the struggle to smash the chain gang verdict against Herndon and to rescue the Scottsboro boys and Ernst Thaelmann from the clutches of the ruling class murderers.

“This attack upon Angelo Herndon, following the Scottsboro frame-up and the murder of Negro and white strikers in Alabama, the Gulf Coast, etc., is an evidence of rising fascist terror which strives to destroy all the constitutional rights not only of the Negro people, but of the white masses, as well,” Moore pointed out.

“The fight to free Herndon symbolizes the fight against fascism, for the freedom of Ernst Thaelmann and all class war prisoners.

“The I.L.D. will continue to mobilize the masses for the fight against fascism, for the freedom of Thaelmann, Herndon, Herndon, the Scottsboro boys, and Tom Mooney, for the defense of the persecuted Negro people and oppressed white workers.”

The Daily Worker began in 1924 and was published in New York City by the Communist Party US and its predecessor organizations. Among the most long-lasting and important left publications in US history, it had a circulation of 35,000 at its peak. The Daily Worker came from The Ohio Socialist, published by the Left Wing-dominated Socialist Party of Ohio in Cleveland from 1917 to November 1919, when it became became The Toiler, paper of the Communist Labor Party. In December 1921 the above-ground Workers Party of America merged the Toiler with the paper Workers Council to found The Worker, which became The Daily Worker beginning January 13, 1924. National and City (New York and environs) editions exist.

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