1. MAX AND HIS FATHER ‘THE LEADER’ SECONDS BEFORE VIOLENCE EXPLODED
SIR Oswald Mosley, with his son Max (circled) at his shoulder, leads a gang of neo-fascist bully boys into the Jewish East End in 1962 in an act of rank provocation. Moments later, a melee broke out.
Mosley Senior was the aristocratic leader of the post-war UM. After serving as both a Tory and Labour MP, he was, in the early 1930s, the founder and leader of the violent British Union of Fascists, also known as the Blackshirts after their military-style uniforms, which were later banned.
The BUF was extremely anti-Semitic, reflecting the views of its leader. Sir Oswald had close ties with Nazi Germany and fascist Italy. His 1936 wedding to diehard fascist Diana Mitford, mother of Max, took place in Berlin at the home of Joseph Goebbels. Adolf Hitler was guest of honour. Following the outbreak of World War II, Sir Oswald and his wife were interned in Holloway prison for posing possible threats to national security.
After the war, Sir Oswald returned to national politics with the UM, which focused on forming a pan-European white superstate and deporting black immigrants.
He supported apartheid South Africa and said of the Sharpeville massacre of dozens of unarmed blacks: ‘Shootings of this sort are a common occurrence all over Africa and Asia. Why so much fuss about this one?’
He stood in Kensington North in the 1959 General Election, and in speeches used highly derogatory terms such as ‘wog’ and ‘spade’ when talking about black residents. He stepped down from frontline politics in 1966.