Claudia Jones
Encyclopedia
Claudia Cumberbatch Jones (15 February 1915—24 December 1964) was a Trinidadian
Trinidad
Trinidad is the larger and more populous of the two major islands and numerous landforms which make up the island nation of Trinidad and Tobago. It is the southernmost island in the Caribbean and lies just off the northeastern coast of Venezuela. With an area of it is also the fifth largest in...

 journalist
Journalist
A journalist collects and distributes news and other information. A journalist's work is referred to as journalism.A reporter is a type of journalist who researchs, writes, and reports on information to be presented in mass media, including print media , electronic media , and digital media A...

, who applied her skills to becoming a political activist and black nationalist
Black nationalism
Black nationalism advocates a racial definition of indigenous national identity, as opposed to multiculturalism. There are different indigenous nationalist philosophies but the principles of all African nationalist ideologies are unity, and self-determination or independence from European society...

 through Communisum.

After her family emmigrated to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 when she was aged 9, she graduated from high school, and then trained as a journalist. Deported from the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 as a result of communist political activism during the period of McCarthyism
McCarthyism
McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from the late 1940s to the late 1950s and characterized by...

 political witch hunts, she eventually found a base in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

. There she founded and organised various black nationalist activities, including the Notting Hill Carnival
Notting Hill Carnival
The Notting Hill Carnival is an annual event which since 1964 has taken place on the streets of Notting Hill, Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea , London, UK each August, over two days...

. She is buried in Highgate Cemetery
Highgate Cemetery
Highgate Cemetery is a cemetery located in north London, England. It is designated Grade I on the English Heritage Register of Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in England. It is divided into two parts, named the East and West cemetery....

, next to and left of her hero, Karl Marx
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...

.

Early life

Born in Belmont, Port of Spain
Port of Spain
Port of Spain, also written as Port-of-Spain, is the capital of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago and the country's third-largest municipality, after San Fernando and Chaguanas. The city has a municipal population of 49,031 , a metropolitan population of 128,026 and a transient daily population...

, Trinidad
Trinidad
Trinidad is the larger and more populous of the two major islands and numerous landforms which make up the island nation of Trinidad and Tobago. It is the southernmost island in the Caribbean and lies just off the northeastern coast of Venezuela. With an area of it is also the fifth largest in...

, aged nine her family were economically motivated to emigrate to Harlem
Harlem
Harlem is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Manhattan, which since the 1920s has been a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Originally a Dutch village, formally organized in 1658, it is named after the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands...

, New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, by the post-war cocoa price crash in Trinidad. Her mother died five years later, and her father eventually found work to support the family. Jones went on to win the Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt was the 26th President of the United States . He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his "cowboy" persona and robust masculinity...

 Award for Good Citizenship at her junior high school. Due to poor living conditions, in 1932 she was struck with tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...

, a condition that irreparably damaged her lungs and plagued her for the rest of her life. Although she gained enough credits to graduate, her family were so poor that they could not afford to attend the ceremony.

United States career

Despite being accademically bright, classed as an immigrant women her career choices were severely limited, and so instead of going to college Jones began working in a laundry
Laundry
Laundry is a noun that refers to the act of washing clothing and linens, the place where that washing is done, and/or that which needs to be, is being, or has been laundered...

, followed later by other retail work in Harlem. During this time she joined a drama group, and began to write a column called “Claudia Comments” for a Harlem journal.

In 1936, in light of trying to find organisations supporting the Scottsboro Boys
Scottsboro Boys
The Scottsboro Boys were nine black teenage boys accused of rape in Alabama in 1931. The landmark set of legal cases from this incident dealt with racism and the right to a fair trial...

, she joined the American Communist Party (ACP). As a result, in 1937 she joined the editorial staff of the Daily Worker
Daily Worker
The Daily Worker was a newspaper published in New York City by the Communist Party USA, a formerly Comintern-affiliated organization. Publication began in 1924. While it generally reflected the prevailing views of the party, some attempts were made to make it appear that the paper reflected a...

, rising by 1938 to became editor of the Weekly Review. After the Young Communist League became American Youth for Democracy during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

, Jones became editor of its monthly journal, Spotlight. Post war, Jones became executive secretary of the National Women's Commission, secretary for the Women's Commission of the CPUSA, and in 1952 took the same position at the National Peace Commission. In 1953, she took over the editorship of Negro Affairs.

An End to the Neglect of the Problems of the Negro Woman!

Jones' most well known piece of writing, "An End to the Neglect of the Problems of the Negro Woman!" appeared in 1949 in Political Affairs, and today is collected in several anthologies. It exhibits Jones' development of what would decades later come to be termed "intersectional"
Intersectionality
Intersectionality is a feminist sociological theory first highlighted by Kimberlé Crenshaw . Intersectionality is a methodology of studying "the relationships among multiple dimensions and modalities of social relationships and subject formations"...

 analysis within a Marxist framework. In it, Jones wrote:

Deportation

Post World War II, during the period referred to at the time as the Second Red Scare, or today popularly known as "McCarthyism" after its most famous supporter and namesake, Senator Joseph McCarthy
Joseph McCarthy
Joseph Raymond "Joe" McCarthy was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957...

; United States popular fear rose of communist espionage
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...

 consequent to a Soviet
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...

, the Berlin Blockade
Berlin Blockade
The Berlin Blockade was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War and the first resulting in casualties. During the multinational occupation of post-World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway and road access to the sectors of Berlin under Allied...

 (1948–49), the Chinese Civil War
Chinese Civil War
The Chinese Civil War was a civil war fought between the Kuomintang , the governing party of the Republic of China, and the Communist Party of China , for the control of China which eventually led to China's division into two Chinas, Republic of China and People's Republic of...

, and the confessions of spying for the Soviet Union given by several high-ranking U.S. government officials, and the Korean War
Korean War
The Korean War was a conventional war between South Korea, supported by the United Nations, and North Korea, supported by the People's Republic of China , with military material aid from the Soviet Union...

.

An elected member of the National Committee of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA)
Communist Party USA
The Communist Party USA is a Marxist political party in the United States, established in 1919. It has a long, complex history that is closely related to the histories of similar communist parties worldwide and the U.S. labor movement....

, she also organised and spoke at events. As a result of her membership of CPUSA and various associated activities, in 1948 Jones was arrested and sentenced to the first of four spells in prison. Incarcerated on Ellis Island
Ellis Island
Ellis Island in New York Harbor was the gateway for millions of immigrants to the United States. It was the nation's busiest immigrant inspection station from 1892 until 1954. The island was greatly expanded with landfill between 1892 and 1934. Before that, the much smaller original island was the...

, she was threatened with being deported to Trinidad, which was then still a Crown Colony.

In 1951, aged only 36, she suffered her first heart attack in prison. That same year, she was tried and convicted with 11 others of "un-American activities", specifically communist activities against the people of the United States under the Smith Act
Smith Act
The Alien Registration Act or Smith Act of 1940 is a United States federal statute that set criminal penalties for advocating the overthrow of the U.S...

, alongside her friend Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
Elizabeth Gurley Flynn was a labor leader, activist, and feminist who played a leading role in the Industrial Workers of the World . Flynn was a founding member of the American Civil Liberties Union and a visible proponent of women's rights, birth control, and women's suffrage...

. The Supreme Court
Supreme court
A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of many legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, instance court, judgment court, high court, or apex court...

 refused to hear their appeal against conviction. In 1955, Jones began her sentence of a year and a day at the Federal Reformatory for Women at Alderson, West Virginia
Alderson, West Virginia
Alderson, a town in the US State of West Virginia, is split geographically by the Greenbrier River, with portions in both Greenbrier and Monroe Counties. Although split physically by the river, the town functions as one entity, including that of town government...

, after which she was scheduled to be deported.

Refused entry to Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago is an archipelagic state in the southern Caribbean, lying just off the coast of northeastern Venezuela and south of Grenada in the Lesser Antilles...

, in part because the British colonial governor
Governor
A governor is a governing official, usually the executive of a non-sovereign level of government, ranking under the head of state...

 Major General Sir Hubert Elvin Rance
Hubert Rance
Major General Sir Hubert Elvin Rance GCMG GBE CB was the last British Governor of Burma between 1946 and 1948, while the country moved towards independence. Later he became Governor of Trinidad and Tobago.-Career to 1945:...

 refused to have her on the grounds that "she may prove troublesome", and in part that as she had been resident in the United States so long that she technically had equal US citizenship; she was eventually offered on humanitarian grounds residency within the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

. Now able to be served with a deportation order, on 7 December 1955 at Harlem's Hotel Theresa
Hotel Theresa
The Hotel Theresa was a vibrant center of black life in Harlem, New York City, in the mid-20th century. The hotel sits at the intersection of Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard and West 125th Street . The hotel was built by German-born stockbroker Gustavus Sidenberg , and designed by the firm of...

, 350 people met at a social gathering (she was banned from parties) to say farewell to Jones.

United Kingdom career

Arriving in London two weeks later, Jones arrived at the time of the build of the Empire Windrush community, and vast expansion of the British African-Caribbean community
British African-Caribbean community
The British African Caribbean communities are residents of the United Kingdom who are of West Indian background and whose ancestors were primarily indigenous to Africa...

. But on engaging the political community that she had just left in the United States, she was disappointed to find that many British communists were hostile to a black woman.

Activism

At a time in England when many landlords, shops and even some government establishments displayed signs which said "No Irish, No Blacks", Jones landed in a country with a community which needed active organisation. She began to get involved in the British African-Caribbean community
British African-Caribbean community
The British African Caribbean communities are residents of the United Kingdom who are of West Indian background and whose ancestors were primarily indigenous to Africa...

 to organise both access to basic facilities, as well as the early movement for equal rights.

Supported by her friends Trevor Carter, Nadia Cattouse
Nadia Cattouse
Nadia Cattouse is an actress, singer and songwriter....

, Amy Ashwood Garvey
Amy Ashwood Garvey
Amy Ashwood Garvey was a Jamaican Pan-Africanist activist and the first wife of Marcus Garvey.Garvey was born in Port Antonio, Jamaica, she spent some years living in Panama. As a child, she was told by grandmother that she was of Ashanti descent...

, Beryl Macburnie, Pearl Prescod and her life long mentor Paul Robeson
Paul Robeson
Paul Leroy Robeson was an American concert singer , recording artist, actor, athlete, scholar who was an advocate for the Civil Rights Movement in the first half of the twentieth century...

, Jones campaigned against racism in housing, education and employment. She addressed peace rallies and the Trade Union Congress, and visited Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, and China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

 where she met with Mao Tse Tung.

In the early 1960s, despite failing health, Jones helped organise campaigns against the 1962 Immigration Act, which would make it harder for non-Whites to migrate to Britain. She also campaigned for the release of Nelson Mandela
Nelson Mandela
Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, and was the first South African president to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Before his presidency, Mandela was an anti-apartheid activist, and the leader of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing...

, and spoke out against racism in the workplace.

The West Indian Gazette And Afro-Asian Caribbean News

From her experiences in the United States, Jones knew that "people without a voice were as lambs to the slaughter." Therefore, in 1958 above a Barber
Barber
A barber is someone whose occupation is to cut any type of hair, and to shave or trim the beards of men. The place of work of a barber is generally called a barbershop....

's shop in Brixton
Brixton
Brixton is a district in the London Borough of Lambeth in south London, England. It is south south-east of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London....

, she founded and thereafter edited the anti-imperialist, anti-racist paper, The West Indian Gazette And Afro-Asian Caribbean News (WIG). The paper became a key contributor to the rise of consciousness within the Black British community.

Jones wrote in her last published essay, The Caribbean Community in Britain, in Freedomways
Freedomways
Freedomways was the leading African-American theoretical, political and cultural journal of the 1960s-1980s. It began publishing in 1961 and ceased in 1985....

:
Always strapped for cash, WIG folded eight months and four editions after Jones's own death, in December 1964.

Notting Hill Carnival

Jones's most well-known lasting contribution in the UK is the Notting Hill Carnival
Notting Hill Carnival
The Notting Hill Carnival is an annual event which since 1964 has taken place on the streets of Notting Hill, Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea , London, UK each August, over two days...

. Four months after launching WIG, racial riots broke out in Nottinghill, London and Robin Hood Chase, Nottingham
Nottingham
Nottingham is a city and unitary authority in the East Midlands of England. It is located in the ceremonial county of Nottinghamshire and represents one of eight members of the English Core Cities Group...

; followed a few months later by the murder of young West Indian carpenter Kelso Cochrane
Kelso Cochrane
Kelso Cochrane was an Antiguan immigrant to Britain whose unsolved murder sparked tensions in London.Cochrane had moved to London in 1954, where he had settled in Notting Hill and worked as a carpenter. He aimed to save sufficient money to study law. After fracturing his thumb in a work accident,...

 by six white youths in a racially motivated attack.

In light of the "black on white" racially driven analysis by the existing British daily newspapers, Jones began receiving visits from both members of the black British community, as well as various national leaders responding to the concern of their citizens, including: Cheddi Jagan
Cheddi Jagan
Cheddi Berret Jagan was a Guyanese politician who was first elected Chief Minister in 1953 and later Premier of British Guiana from 1961 to 1964, prior to independence. He later served as President of Guyana from 1992 to 1997.- Biography :The son of ethnic Indian sugar plantation workers, Jagan...

 of British Guiana
British Guiana
British Guiana was the name of the British colony on the northern coast of South America, now the independent nation of Guyana.The area was originally settled by the Dutch at the start of the 17th century as the colonies of Essequibo, Demerara, and Berbice...

; Norman Manley
Norman Manley
Norman Washington Manley MM QC National Hero of Jamaica , was a Jamaican statesman. A Rhodes Scholar, Manley became one of Jamaica's leading lawyers in the 1920s...

 of Jamaica; Eric Williams
Eric Williams
Eric Eustace Williams served as the first Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago. He served from 1956 until his death in 1981. He was also a noted Caribbean historian, and is widely regarded as "The Father of The Nation."...

 of Trinidad and Tobago; plus Phyllis Allfrey and Carl La Corbinière of the West Indian Federation.

As a result, Jones identified the need to "wash the taste of Notting Hill and Nottingham out of our mouths". To which it was suggested, that the British black community should have a carnival; it was December 1958, to which the next question was "In the winter?" Jones used her connections to gain use of St Pancras
St Pancras
-Saints:* Pancras of Taormina, martyred in 40 AD in Sicily* Pancras of Rome, the saint martyred c.304 AD after whom the following are directly or indirectly named-United Kingdom:* St Pancras, London, a district of London...

 town hall in January 1959 for the first Mardi-Gras-based carnival, which headlined the Boscoe Holder Dance Troupe, jazz guitarist Fitzroy Coleman and singer Cleo Laine
Cleo Laine
Dame Cleo Laine, Lady Dankworth, DBE is a jazz singer and an actress, noted for her scat singing and vocal range...

; and was televised nationally by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

. These early celebrations were epitomised by the slogan "A people's art is the genesis of their freedom".

Funds raised from the event were used to pay the court fees and fines of convicted young black men.

Death

Jones died on Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve refers to the evening or entire day preceding Christmas Day, a widely celebrated festival commemorating the birth of Jesus of Nazareth that takes place on December 25...

, 1964, aged 49. Found on Christmas Day at her flat, a post-mortem declared that she had died of a massive heart attack, due to heart disease and tuberculosis.

Her funeral on 9 January, 1965, was a large and political ceremony, with her burial plot selected to be that to the left of her hero, Karl Marx
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...

, in Highgate Cemetery, North London. A message from Paul Robeson was read out:

Legacy

The National Union of Journalists
National Union of Journalists
The National Union of Journalists is a trade union for journalists in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland. It was founded in 1907 and has 38,000 members. It is a member of the International Federation of Journalists .-Structure:...

' Black Members Council holds a prestigious annual Claudia Jones Memorial Lecture every October, during Black History Month
Black History Month
Black History Month is an observance of the history of the African diaspora in a number of countries outside of Africa. Since 1976, it is observed annually in the United States and Canada in February, while in the United Kingdom it is observed in October...

, to honour Jones and celebrate her contribution to Black-British journalism.

In October 2008, Britain's Royal Mail
Royal Mail
Royal Mail is the government-owned postal service in the United Kingdom. Royal Mail Holdings plc owns Royal Mail Group Limited, which in turn operates the brands Royal Mail and Parcelforce Worldwide...

 commemorated Jones with a special postage stamp.

External links

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