| For International Socialism | |
 | |
| Type | Weekly newspaper |
|---|---|
| Format | Broadsheet |
| Owner | Workers' Socialist Federation |
| Founder | Sylvia Pankhurst |
| Publisher | Dreadnought Publications |
| Editor | Sylvia Pankhurst |
General manager | Harold Burgess |
| Founded | 8 March 1914 |
Ceased publication | 14 June 1924 |
Political alignment | |
| Headquarters | 152 Fleet Street, London |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Circulation | 10,000 (as of 1917) |
Workers' Dreadnought was a communist newspaper based in London led by Sylvia Pankhurst that ran from 1914 to 1924. It was the official paper of the East London Federation of Suffragettes before being the official paper of the Communist Party (British Section of the Third International).
The paper was started by Pankhurst at the suggestion of American suffragette Zelie Emerson, after Pankhurst had been expelled from the Women's Social and Political Union by her mother and sister for forming the East London Federation of Suffragettes. Provisionally titled Workers' Mate, "mate" being a familiar term of address in East London, the newspaper first appeared on 8 March 1914, as The Woman's Dreadnought, a title suggested by Mary Patterson. Its initial stated circulation was 20,000. In 1914, suffragettes would hawk the paper and hold meetings near the East End docks.
In August 1914, Pankhurst reported firsthand from Dublin about the Bachelor's Walk massacre, in which British troops had fired into a crowd of Irish people. The paper took a strong stance against the First World War, calling for Britain to begin peace negotiations, and speaking positively of Russia's exit from the war. The paper's first issue for October 1917 advocated for a peace referendum among the British Army, but before it could enter circulation the Metropolitan Police raided offices of Workers Dreadnought and destroyed the copies of the issue. When food shortages afflicted the country, the paper called for a No Rent Strike.
When Pankhurst was imprisoned, Norah Smyth alternated as acting editor with Jack O'Sullivan. For many years, Smyth had used her skills as a photographer to provide pictures for the newspaper of East End life, particularly of women and children living in poverty.
On 28 July 1917, the name was changed to Workers' Dreadnought, which initially had a circulation of 10,000. Its slogan changed to "Socialism, Internationalism, Votes for All", and then in July 1918 to "For International Socialism", reflecting increasing opposition to Parliamentarism in the party. By 1918, Irish suffragette and communist May O'Callaghan was serving as the subeditor of the Workers' Dreadnought. In May 1919, in an effort to stem efforts at intervention in the Soviet Union, the paper republished Lenin's "Appeal to the Toiling Masses." That year, Pankhurst met Italian anarchist and writer Silvio Corio and allowed him to oversee the newspaper's publication.
In 1920, Workers' Dreadnought ran Clara Zetkin's The Life and Times of Rosa Luxemburg dictated to Pankhurst personally on one of her tours of communist circles in Europe. On 19 June 1920, the paper was adopted as the official weekly organ of the Communist Party (British Section of the Third International).
I write because I feel that the ultimate result of your propaganda will be further strife and blood-spilling between whites and the many members of my race... who have been dumped down on the English docks since the ending of the European war... Bourbons of the United States will thank you, and the proletarian underworld of London will certainly gloat over the scoop of the Christian-Socialist pacifist Daily Herald.
During the Post-war French occupation of the Rhineland, German communists attempted to retake the region. France employed the use of black colonial troops to halt them. Reporting on the events, the Daily Herald referred to the soldiers using terms such as "Black Scourge in Europe," and "Black Menace of 40,000 Troops". Jamaican writer Claude McKay considered the papers' focus on the Black soldiers to be illogical prejudice, and a distraction from the communists' efforts against French occupation. McKay wrote a letter addressed to the Daily Herald's editor George Lansbury expressing these concerns. Lansbury refused to print the response, while writing back privately claiming to not be personally prejudice against black people. Instead, he was encouraged by a friend to send it to Sylvia Pankhurst and have it printed in Workers' Dreadnought, and did so.
The paper warned of fascism in Italy, condemned the white labourism in South Africa's Rand Rebellion. It discoursed for the causes of Indian and Irish independence.
Sylvia Pankhurst was arrested under the Defence of the Realm Act for publishing articles "calculated and likely to cause sedition among His Majesty's forces, in the Navy, and among the civilian population". Claude McKay had his rooms searched. He is likely to have been the author of "The Yellow Peril and the Dockers" attributed to "Leon Lopez", which was one of the articles cited by the government in its case against Workers' Dreadnought.
The paper was heavily in debt by January 1921 and relied on revolutionaries outside the country for funding. On 14 June 1924, Workers' Dreadnought ceased publication when Smythe, Pankhurst, and Corio moved to a cottage in Woodford Wells, just outside of London.
