Battle of Cable Street
Battle of Cable Street
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Battle of Cable Street

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Battle of Cable Street

The Battle of Cable Street was a series of clashes that took place at several locations in the East End of London, most famously Cable Street, on Sunday 4 October 1936. It was a clash between the Metropolitan Police, sent to protect a march by the British Union of Fascists, led by Oswald Mosley, and anti-fascist demonstrators, including local trade unionists, communists, British Jews and socialist groups. The anti-fascist counter-demonstration included both organised and unaffiliated participants. The battle resulted in the British Union of Fascists having thousands of new members, and a large wave of anti-Semitic violence took place throughout the UK.

On 26 September 1936, the British Union of Fascists (BUF) advertised a march to take place the following weekend, on Sunday 4 October, the fourth anniversary of their organisation. Thousands of BUF followers, dressed in their Blackshirt uniform, were to march through the heart of the East End. The BUF had been founded in Chelsea and was headquartered in Westminster, so the decision to celebrate their anniversary with a march in East London, an area that then had a large Jewish population, rather than at their West London HQ was seen as an intentional provocation.

The BUF planned to march from Tower Hill and divide into four columns, each heading for one of four open-air public meetings where Mosley and other speakers would address gatherings of BUF supporters. The meetings were to be at Limehouse, Bow, Bethnal Green and Hoxton.

The Jewish People's Council organised a petition calling for the march to be banned, which gathered the signatures of 100,000 East Londoners, including the Mayors of the five East London Boroughs (Hackney, Shoreditch, Stepney, Bethnal Green and Poplar) in two days.

On 1 October 1936, the five East London mayors, led by Helena Roberts, the Mayor of Stepney, visited the Home Office, and had a one hour meeting in which they expressed their fear at the consequences of the march. But despite the Home Secretary John Simon's known opposition to the BUF political approach "this dressing up in fancy uniforms and this aping of military organisation for political purposes", the Home Office did not agree to ban the march.

The following day, 2 October 1936, The petition was presented to the Home Office by representatives of a broad coalition of local groups:

Labour MP for Whitechapel and St Georges

Trade Unionist, Secretary of the London Trades Council

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