Sir Oswald Mosley and the Blackshirts
Sir Oswald and Blackshits of both sexes in 1936 / melbourneblogger.blogspot.com
Oswald Ernald Mosley was born in 1896 into a family with a baronetcy. He came from ‘the ruling classes’ and later used his knightly title and high connections as a political tool. He entered the game as a Conservative Member of Parliament in 1918 after serving in the Great War, became an Independent in 1922 and crossed the floor in 1924 to join the British Labour Party, not without some risible comment from members of that rising party.
He joined Ramsay Macdonald’s government in 1929, heavily under the influence of the writings of John Maynard Keynes. He thought, for example, that one could reduce unemployment by restricting foreign imports, making purchasing power more elastic, and relying on the nation’s banks to finance industrial development. These plans may have made sense but they were rejected. so he resigned in 1930 to set up his own ‘New Party’. Mosley had not failed to note the rapid upward mobility of a Bavarian ex-corporal called Hitler in the floundering, nearly starving Germany of the early Thirties. Then there was an election and all the New Party’s candidates including Mosley himself lost their deposits dreaming in vain of parliamentary seats. (more…)
