Abstract
Mosley regarded himself as a man of destiny. On closing down Action in December 1931, he revamped his resignation speech of May 1930 to declare:
Better the great adventure, better the great attempt for England’s sake, better defeat, disaster, better for the end of that trivial thing called a political career, than stifling in a uniform of blue and gold, strutting and posturing on the stage of Little England amid the scenery of decadence, until history, in turning over an historic page of the human story, writes of us in contemptuous script: ‘These were the men to whom was entrusted the Empire of Great Britain, and whose idleness, ignorance and cowardice left it a Spain’. We shall win; or at least we shall return upon our shields.1
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Notes
Nicolson (ed.), Diaries, 27 April 1931. Leslie Grundy later recalled Mosley speaking in Manchester. He ‘strode briskly’ around the platform, Grundy wrote, hypnotising the audience with words that ‘seemed to bounce off the hall like a golf ball’. MS 190, L. Grundy ‘Don’t Let Conscience Be Your Guide’, unpublished manuscript (Sheffield University).
For a collection of essays on masculinity and British politics, see M. McCormack (ed.), Public Men: Masculinity and Politics in Modern Britain (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
See also, T. Collins, ‘Return to Manhood: The Cult of Masculinity and the British Union of Fascists’, International Journal of the History of Sport, 3/1 (1999), 145–62.
This Homos fascistus has been recognised as a European-wide phenomenon. See G. L. Mosse, The Image of Man: The Creation of Modern Masculinity (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999).
I. Zweiniger-Bargielowska, ‘Building a British Superman: Culture in Interwar Britain’, Journal of Contemporary History, 41/4 (2006), 595–610.
Nicolson (ed.), Diaries, 6 May 1931; de Courcy, The Viceroy’s Daughters, p. 188; J. Dalley, Diana Mosley: A Life (London: Faber & Faber, 2000), p. 153.
For warm and positive comments of Cynthia, see Simmons, Soap-Box Evangelist, p. 69; Jones, Unfinished Journey, p. 267; Wilkinson, Peeps at Politicians, pp. 39–40; Meynell, My Lives, p. 199; Shinwell, Conflict Without Malice, p. 136; L. Manning, A Life for Education: An Autobiography (London: Gollancz, 1970), p. 91. According to Patric Dickinson (Robert Forgan’s son), Cimmie was a source of attraction for Forgan and many others in Mosley’s circle. My thanks go to Patric for his hospitality and his fascinating insights into Forgan and others in and around the New Party. See also OMN/A/2/21, Letter from Allan Young to Cynthia Mosley, 10 March 1932 (Mosley Papers), which reveals an obvious fondness for his former comrade, and Allen’s book, The BUF, which was dedicated to ‘C. M.’ Allen described Cynthia as a ‘heroic figure’ (p. 157).
P. Graves, Labour Women: Women in British Working Class Politics, 1918–39 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994);
G. E. Maguire, Conservative Women: A History of Women and the Conservative Party, 1874–1997 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1998).
For a sample of the literature, see K. Passmore (ed.), Women, Gender and Fascism in Europe, 1919–45 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2003);
J. Gottlieb, Feminine Fascism: Women in Britain’s Fascist Movement, 1923–45 (London: I. B. Tauris, 2000);
M. Durham, Women and Fascism (London: Routledge, 1998).
Also, D. Renton, ‘Women and Fascism: A Critique’, Socialist History, 20 (2001), 71–82.
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© 2010 Matthew Worley
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Worley, M. (2010). Leaders of Men: Masculinity and the Promise of a New Life. In: Oswald Mosley and the New Party. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230276529_9
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