I happened to be in Berlin at the time of all the controversy over the Rathenau murder. It will be remembered that Walter Rathenau, a German industrialist and Liberal Minister of the Government, was sent to Russia to negotiate trade between the two countries. Rathenau com­pleted his mission and returned to Berlin, only to be murdered by the Monarchist Party. This set the Left-wing movements in that town and suburbs in flame- Mass demonstrations were held in the Lustgarten, the wide-open space off Unter den Linden. Resolution of protest were then framed by the Social Democrats, the Independent Socialists and the Communist Party, all having strong representation in the Reichstag.

As the meetings assembled it was found that the whole crowd swung towards the Communist platforms, possibly because they thought more news would come from there about Rathenau's mission, being affiliated with Russia. The Social Democrats and Independent Socialists, noting this, approached the Communists with a view to having a combined resolution from the Communist platform. This was granted them and resolutions damning the Monarchist Party and upholding the Russian Trade Mission were unanimous. Hence we had such evidence only twenty-five years ago of Rathenau, a Jew, being murdered and what appeared to be nearly all Berlin in sympathy and tears, also the equally unanimous support of their association with Russia. A bit more of mass psychology which, in comparison with the German treatment of the Jew and the war on Russia, is a remarkable contrast to to-day

However, that did not finish the Communists' say about the matter, not because they differed from the purpose and enthusiasm of every­body condemning the murder and supporting Russia, but the old feud between the Left sections made some of the supposed arch-reds feel a little hurt about getting so near to those whom they had so recently opposed-the Social Democrats and Independent Socialists.

They asserted that they ought to have had the meeting all to themselves and not compromise the position with such pink stuff as Socialists Democrats and Independent Socialists. Therefore they demanded that a special meeting be called of all the executive authorities of the Communist Parties in and around Berlin to decide. The meeting was then called and held in the hall of the Communist Party Fraktion in Reichstag. They gave me a complimentary ticket to attend. I have it before me and it is dated "Sonntag den 23 Juli 1922. They do not speak from the floor hut from a rostrum, both in the Reichstag and at such important meetings, therefore the leading speakers were picked holding the different points of view. Pieck was chairman. Among the speaks were Meyer, Klein. Hendricks, editor of the Rote Fahne (Red Flag), Ruth Fischer, Rammale and Koonin.

The result of the voting, to the disgust of the arch-reds, went in favour of the combined resolution, which was evidence again of the more moderates winning when a mass vote is taken of the whole party.

My stay in Berlin was prolonged by the tact mat the Russian was postponed, we were told, from June till October. I met many Africans there; wealthy ones, of course, or they couldn't take such lung holiday trips. Amongst them was W. Kerowsky, a member of the Cape Town Labour Party, who was also anxious to get to Russia, and he asked me to use my influence as a credentialed delegate to get him there, so we made several visits to the Russian Mission for that purpose. But in those days it was not easy, and as he had no credentials they would not recommend him, in spite of my assertion that he was a bona fide member of the S.A.L.P. At that nine names and credentials were sent from Berlin and delegates sent for from Russia it approved by them. This was then necessary, as many counter revolutionaries were making efforts to gain admission to Russia at that time.

Bunting subsequently arrived with his wife, and by that time I had made the acquaintance of most of the leading members of the party, especially Comrade Welhelm Koonin, Parliamentary Leader of the Communist Party Fraktion in the Reichstag, who spoke English fluently. He was later concerned with, and, I believe, accused of, setting the Reichstag on fire. The historical record of that incident at the trial afterwards exonerates all the Communists. Comrade Koonin showed me over the interior of the Reichstag, which I thought had more of a theatrical appearance - All the seats were in a semi-circle, close together and close behind each other, and they addressed the Assembly not from their seats but from the rostrum. So it is not a question there of just the "Speaker's eye" and plunging into your oration.

With the inflated currency we were all having a made a point of meeting at Baur's Cafe, Unter den Linden, and inviting our friends to 1,000 mark suppers. Looking round one day at the various art galleries and museums I saw a lady on the stoep new art gallery as I came out I wanted then to see the old gal in my best broken German I said. "Kennen Sie die Alten Malden she directed me, but a further statement she made I could not stand. I then asked if she could speak English that I may understand her. It was rather strange that I should have asked that because I had not done so any other German person spoken to. She replied that she could, hut that she came from South Africa. "Oh!" I said, "so do I." She said, "Then are you Mr. Harrison : I saw Bunting last evening and he said you were here." It transpired then that she was Mrs. Kuper, wife of a Johannesburg financier, who was a Labour Mayor in a Johannesburg suburb. Mrs. Kuper to visit Russia, but, like Kerowsky, failed to get her wish satisfied while I was in Berlin.

During our stay there Bunting received a letter from Ivan Jones, who was then living - permanently in Russia, since, I think, 1920. He regretted the fact that two of us were attending as delegates from South Africa because he wanted to represent South Africa by proxy. Bunting, like myself, could hardly understand his objection. The more the merrier", said Bunting. However, his wish was gratified, as I shall presently show.

Bunting and I made continual visits to the party offices in Rottenstal Strasse, and the editorial offices of the Rote Fahne, then the Communist daily paper, and they invited us to write up something on our position in South Africa. The growth of the Communist Party at that time in Germany was phenomenal. They subsequently had eighty seats, in the Reichstag. Amongst the old members then was old Comrade Ledebour. I sat in the seat of Stinnes, then a member and one of Germany's greatest industrialists, who has since died. His business was found so involved in obligations that his sons could restore it.

Fritz Thyssen, the great Rhine industrialist, was also there. It was he who organised the passive resistance movement, against the French invaders, which rendered them impotent and was another proof that the pacifists' methods are the effective and the humane. Fritz Thyssen, like most of the big German capitalists, seems to have jaded out. There have been many different rumours as to his where­abouts. In his book, / Paid Hitler, and because of it, he afterwards said: "Ein Dummkopf war ich" (What a fool I have been!) Hitler, at the time I was in Germany, was in Munich a member of, with half a dozen other a "Workers' Party," or similarly worded.

The Trade Hall, or Gewerkschafthaus, where I was staying was full of visitors from the various trade unions in England, and a lot of students from the Ruskin College, amongst whom was W. W. Henderson, son of the late famous Arthur, I also met Harry Pollitt there for the first time. With the delay of the Russian Congress I decided to go to my homeland in England, having been away over ten years from there I thought to go to Russia. I called at Rotterdam, in Holland, on my way home and met Dr. Ravensteyn, then a leader of the Communist Party there and a Member of Parliament, who was also en route for Russia and did not express any difficulty about being able to make the journey.

Obstacles in England

England, however, seemed to view things quite differently. Coining across from the Hook of Holland I landed at Harwich and trained to London, thence to my village home, Abinger Hammer, about 28 miles on the other side. A day or two alter my arrival there was a detective in the village from the adjoining small town of Dorking, making enquiries as to my whereabouts and what I was doing. This, of course, set the villagers wagging their tongues. I was obviously a criminal who watched. Even if they were told many of them would not have what a political offence meant or differentiate ordinary criminality.

Here was I debasing the name of my highly respected family. My father. Henry, was the village postmaster and an overseer of the local Parish Council. My father's brother, Robert, was the schoolmaster, and another brother, Joseph, the clerk of the Parish Council, and I, home to visit them from South Africa, a branded criminal. I returned to London the next day and called at South Africa House to find out what it all meant, and if my political convictions in Africa were to brand me for ever a criminal. I did not see the High Commissioner for South Africa, but his secretary. His reply was: "You know you have been very prominent in South Africa, therefore when you come here we want to know what you are doing."

I gave him all details of my home surrounding He then sent me a letter with his compliments and said there would be no more about it. He knew the boat I came by every place I had been and when I landed in England, as with a passport these days in foreign countries one must get a visa signed every so often. The right of asylum is no longer a virtue of the English Constitution. I came to South Africa as a civilian in 1903 without a passport or questioning by anybody. We suffer new restrictions these days make great boasts of our "liberties."

My Failure to get to Russia

The time arrived later for me to make preparation to Russia, but here I found innumerable obstacles. I forget now much of the details. One of them was that in addition to my fare I was to travel through half a dozen different States and each one would cost £2 for a visa. My passport was worded to admit me to Russia, hence on those grounds I could not be deliberately prosecuted, but weighing up all the obstacles and noting the reluctancy to give me any information; I gathered that the authorities were behind the obstructions. Owing to that and the delay I decided to cut the visit out, a decision I have regretted ever since, but I am not sure if I could through in any case.

I then got in touch with the various Socialist bodies and exchanged visits with Tom Mann, whom I had met in South Africa when he called on his way from Australia, where he had spent eight years. That was in the year 1910. The S.D.F. hired the Opera House on that occasion and he gave us I rousing address. His family stayed in Cape Town while Tom went up to Johannesburg, where his torrential orations induced the trade union bodies there to invite him again in 1914, after the general strikes there, to help again solidify labour.

While I was in England in 1922-following the 1922 upheaval in Johannesburg in January of that year-Tom Mann received a further invitation. On the eve of his departure he invited a few of us South Africans, who happened to be in London at the time, to a farewell supper at his home in Brockley, London, to aid him, he said, in the manner in which he ought to conduct his future campaign in South Africa. Dave Kendall, one of a family of Kendalls, active trade unionists in South Africa, the organiser of the Labour Party in England, I believe, suggested that Tom Mann ought to deal with the Colour question. I advised him to leave the Colour question out, as if he took that up he would have nothing but their grievances to deal with.