| This
tale of my unjust arrest was originally published in July
1971 in "Come Together", GLF's first regular newspaper |
The
day before Remembrance Sunday last year I happened to walk through
the gardens of Westminster Abbey where a field of remembrance
crosses had been set out. Many of them were for specific named
groups and the field did its job: that is, it set me remembering.
I thought in particular of the thousands of homosexuals who
were interned and executed by the Nazis. No one knows exactly
how many because no one has ever bothered to count. Like the
Jews, they were made to wear special identifying marks. Here
is a complete list of them. It makes grim reading: |
 |
The
following passage, from a book called The Theory and Practice
of Hell by Eugen Kogon gives an idea of what it was like for
homosexual internees: |
|
“Homosexual
practices were actually very widespread in the camps. The prisoners,
however, ostracized only those whom the SS marked with the pink
triangle.
The fate of the homosexuals in the concentration
camps can only be described as ghastly. They were often segregated
in special barracks and work details. Such segregation offered
ample opportunity to unscrupulous elements in positions of power
to engage in extortion and maltreatment… In October 1938
they (the homosexuals in Buchenwald) were transferred to the
penal colony in a body and had to slave in the quarry. This
consigned them to the lowest caste in camp during the most difficult
years. In shipments to extermination camps, such as Nordhausen,
Natzweiler and Gross-Rosen, they furnished the highest proportionate
share, for the camp had an understandable tendency to slough
off all elements considered least valuable or worthless. If
anything could save them at all, it was to enter into sordid
relationships within the camp, but this was as likely to endanger
their lives as to save them. Theirs was an insoluble predicament
and virtually all of them perished.” |
|
Unlike
the Jews, these victims of Nazi persecution have no memorials*
and are not remembered or mourned by society. Indeed there has
been such a conspiracy of silence that few people even know
that these events ever occurred. |
On
this particular November Saturday, thinking about all these
things, I was moved to buy a cross with a poppy on it, like
the hundreds of others that had already been set down. If I
had had a pink triangle, I would have put that on it, but this
was a spontaneous act and all I had with me to identify the
cross with the victims it specially commemorated, was a GLF
badge. I fixed this to it and put it in the ground. |
Later
that day I discovered the cross had been removed by a policeman.
I found him and asked him why. He wouldn’t answer and
I began to explain my reasons for putting the cross there. He
said that I should go to Cannon Row if I had any complaints
and then began to walk away. I said I was trying to speak to
him as one human being to another, not as a citizen to a policeman.
I’m not sure why, but at this moment, I got out my notebook
and began to write down what had just happened and while I was
doing this, he came back and arrested me. When I asked on what
charge, he said: “Indecent behaviour.” |
I
was taken to Cannon Row in one of their lovely black vans and
locked up in a cell. From time to time six or seven different
policemen came to stare at me with obvious contempt. All done
to intimidate, no doubt, but I happened to have my embroidery
with me and this served the dual purpose of soothing me and
disconcerting them. I recommend embroidery for police stations.
Eventually I was marched into the station sergeant’s office
and waited while about half a dozen of them offered one another
tea and idle banter and completely ignored me as one searched
through all my things, including reading every single page of
my private diary and notebook. I asked if they had the right
to do this and received the reply: “Every right in the
world.” After I had been held like this for about three
quarters of an hour, the station sergeant asked me to listen
carefully while the man who had arrested me made a statement.
I asked if I might make notes but was ignored as before. I made
notes anyway. It was only as I listened to this statement that
I began to realise the full force of what was happening to me
for every single thing he said was untrue both in substance
and in detail and I realised I had no witnesses. Even so, at
this stage, they were not suggesting that I had insulted anyone
in particular – they were relying on the fact that the
placing of the cross with the badge was itself sufficient grounds
for the charge which read: “Using insulting behaviour
whereby a breach of the peace may have been occasioned…
Contrary to section 54 (13) Metropolitan Police Act 1839.”
|
I
appeared at Bow Street the following Monday, pleaded not guilty
and asked for an adjournment, which I got. Some of the events
of this day may be of interest. After “surrendering to
bail” I was locked up in a room like a dirty public lavatory
with about 30 other men. (Women and men prisoners have to be
kept apart or who knows what they might get up to?) At intervals
policemen of varying ranks came in and bellowed out people’s
names as if they were being summoned to the last judgement.
But when “my” policeman came in, he called me Alan
and was friendly and polite. Later, while we were waiting to
go into court, he took me on one side and as good as said he
was sorry and he wished he hadn’t done it.
|
By
the time the case was heard in January this year (1972), the
police had changed their story completely. They were now claiming
I had insulted the policeman who arrested me and that I “shouted
and waved my arms about so much that persons who were praying
in the churchyard (!) had risen from their knees to threaten
me with clenched fists. I don’t believe there was a single
person in the court who believed this preposterous concocted
story, least of all the police. Anyway, when I gave my evidence
I was again feeling very calm and peaceable and I sincerely
tried to tell the truth as well as I could remember it. The
magistrates duly retired to consider their verdict (they use
expressions like that – it means they went out to have
a think) and when they reappeared they literally apologised
to me for finding the case “proven”. They conditionally
discharged me and refused an application from the police for
costs. Legal friends tell me this means they knew very well
the police were lying but were not prepared for such a minor
charge to have it officially put on the record. So, my legal
friends tell me, it’s a moral victory, whatever that may
mean. |
A
few friends have suggested this is not enough and that I should
appeal; but I’ve had enough of playing at their idiot
courtroom games. I have better things to do with my time and
my energy. |
| Postscript
Summer 1973 |
A
year has passed since I wrote this article and during this year
I’ve not only been “of good behaviour” but
have also been able to view the whole episode more objectively.
I now believe the policeman arrested me when he saw me taking
notes because he felt threatened. I’m also sure he was
uncomfortable going along with the story concocted in the police
station. During the routine part of his evidence he spoke clearly
and loudly with his head held high but when he came to the invented
part he dropped his eyes, shuffled his feet and mumbled. Clearly
lying wasn’t something he’d expected to have to
do when he joined the police force. I’m not trying to
excuse him. The fact remains he did lie and I was found guilty
of something I didn’t do. But which of us can truthfully
say we’ve never failed to live up to our own personal
concept of morality? Besides, I felt pretty good as I was carried
shoulder-high from the courtroom (where Oscar Wilde was tried!)
by a crowd of gay activist friends who’d come to give
me moral support. And, guess what? In the street outside the
young policeman who’d originally arrested me, came over
and presented me with the little wooden cross with its GLF badge
still on it, saying: “Alan – I thought you’d
like to keep this.” It helped that he was dishy. |
*In
2010 the pink triangle is widely known and there are now several
memorials to the thousands of homosexuals murdered by the Nazis,
including a commemorative plaque in Berlin and a moving memorial
in Amsterdam. |
