Robert "Robin"Page Arnot (15 December 1890 – 18 May 1986), best known asR. Page Arnot, was a BritishCommunist journalist and politician.
Robert Page Arnot | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1890-12-15)15 December 1890 |
| Died | 18 May 1986(1986-05-18) (aged 95) |
| Other names | Robin |
| Citizenship | United Kingdom |
| Education | Glasgow University |
| Known for | Founding member of theCommunist Party of Great Britain (CPGB). Conscientious objector |
| Notable work | Labour Monthly (co-founder). |
| Criminal charges | Refusing conscription –Conscientious objector (1917). Mutiny – charged under theIncitement to Mutiny Act 1797 (1925). |
| Criminal penalty | Refusing conscription – forced labour (1917-1919). Attempted mutiny – 6 months prison (1925-1926). |
| Spouse | Violet (wife) |
Robert Page Arnot, known to his friends as "Robin", was born in 1890 atGreenock, the son of a newspaper editor. He attendedGlasgow University where he helped to form the University Socialist Federation in 1912, along withG.D.H. Cole and others. He also wrote for theLabour Leader, publication of theIndependent Labour Party, using thepseudonym "Jack Cade."[1]
In 1912 theFabian socialistBeatrice Webb established a Committee of Enquiry into the future control of industry. Out of this sprang the Fabian Research Department, which later evolved into theLabour Research Department. One of the volunteers attracted by the project was Robin Page Arnot, who became its full-time head in 1914 – a position which he retained until 1926.[2]
In 1916 Arnot refusedconscription to theBritish army and was imprisoned as aconscientious objector; he accepted transfer to the Home Office Scheme, and served some two years in theWakefield Work Centre. When he was freed in 1919, he returned to his post as the Secretary of the Labour Research Department. In 1919, in response to labour unrest in thecoal mines, the British government established a Committee of Inquiry. The Miners' Federation sought the aid of the Labour Research Department in marshalling evidence on behalf of the workers' demand for higher wages, shorter hours, and government ownership of the mines.[citation needed]
Arnot was a foundation member of theCommunist Party of Great Britain in 1920. Coming as he did from a background as aguild socialist, Arnot favoured close integration of the Communist Party with the broader labour movement, including affiliation as a member organisation under theLabour Party's umbrella.[3]
He was a co-founder, along withR. Palme Dutt and W.N. Ewer, of theLabour Monthly, and a regular contributor and assistant editor for that journal throughout its long history.
In 1925 Arnot was among the 12 Communists charged under theIncitement to Mutiny Act 1797. He was found guilty and jailed for six months, to be released on the eve of the1926 General Strike. During the General Strike he helped to form the Northumberland and Durham Joint Strike Committee. After the failure of the strike, Arnot returned to the Labour Research Department as its Director of Research and wrote a book on the general strike.[4]
R. Page Arnot was a fixture on the governing Central Committee of the CPGB. He was elected to the Central Committee by the party's 9th Congress in 1927, and returned by the 10th Congress of January 1929, the 11th Congress of December 1929, the 12th Congress of 1932, the 13th Congress of 1935, and the 14th Congress of 1937. However, he was not among the 24 members elected by the 15th Congress of 1938.[5]
Arnot was elected as a delegate to the 6th World Congress of theCommunist International ("Comintern"), held inMoscow in 1928.
Arnot defended theMoscow Trials inLabour Monthly and chastised both theManchester Guardian and the politicianEmrys Hughes for their criticism of the Trials.[6]
Arnot was a prolific pamphleteer and author and wrote a six-volume history of the British mineworkers from 1949 to 1975.
He was elected to the LRD's Executive in 1938 and was re-elected every year until 1976 when he was made Honorary President. He wrote six volumes of miners' history between 1949 and 1975. Arnot died in 1986 aged 96, from 1984 publicly and openly fighting the revisionist trend that was taking control of the CPGB even to the end.[7]
Although he now no longer held a post in either the Communist Party or the N.U.M., he continued to pour his enormous energy, breadth of interests and encyclopaedic knowledge intoThe Labour Monthly, which continued to maintain more influence than number of members on the thinking of the British Communist. His private collection of Labour Movement documents was astounding: for example, a hand-written notebook which had once belonged to David Moffatt, grandfather of Alex and Abe Moffatt (the Scottish trades union leaders) who had been hounded from coal-mine to coal-mine down the northeastern coast of Britain by one vinctive mine-owner after another. On one side of the notebook were the accounts of whichever branch of the N.U.M. he happened to be working at, while on the reverse side there were extensive notes not only fromMarx andEngels but also fromRuskin,John Stuart Mill,Charles Darwin,T.H. Huxley,Herbert Spencer andH. G. Wells, to name but a few. Robin cherished the volume which he pulled out from time to time to demonstrate to his guest precisely what the self-educating, culturally aspiring working-men of the 19th century – the founders of the Labour Party – were like.Arnot was also arrested in 1986 and accused of being a spy for the Soviet Union. He was released in what seemed to many as a cover-up and a bribe. He was seen meeting with a Soviet Intelligence Officer multiple times. He denied the accusations and M15 (British Counter-Intelligence agency) conducted an Investigation the results of which are still Classified and not set to be released until 2056.[8]
Arnot died in 1986 at the age of 95, leaving behind his lifelong comrade, companion and wife, Violet.
