Obituary from the November 1946 issue of the Socialist Standard
We regret to inform readers of the death of A. E. Jacomb, who had suffered from heart trouble for many years. He was an active member of the Social Democratic Federation at the end of the last century and the beginning of this, and was a member of the group which came out of that organisation to form the Socialist Party of Great Britain in 1904, helping to shape the Party’s fundamental principles and policy. He was a compositor by trade and in the early years of the Party, in fact up to the beginning of the ’twenties, he was responsible for the printing of the Socialist Standard and pamphlets. In this work he was a tower of strength, for the job was certainly not a sinecure. Often enough there were not sufficient articles to fill the paper and Jacomb had to make up the rest, under various pseudonyms, as he was doing the composing.
For many years, up to the end of the first Great War, Jacomb was a member of the Executive Committee and the Editorial Committee. He was a fine writer with a keen and caustic humour, contributing many excellent articles to the Socialist Standard. He also drafted two of the Party pamphlets : “Socialism” and "The Socialist Party: Its Principles and Policy.” He gave the best he could do to the Party although his life was one long struggle against financial difficulties.
It was a pitiful business that, towards the end of his life, Jacomb found himself in opposition to the Party about his attitude to the Spanish upheaval and to the last Great War, which led him to make a number of extravagant statements in the heat of controversy. But although he believed the policy of the Party was wrong, he still held fast to his fundamental socialist convictions. The vehemence of his criticism was due to his belief that the Party was on a wrong and fatal track, and to his anxiety to put it back again on what he thought was the right track.
Jacomb was a very fine character; simple and sincere, and a genuine and earnest champion of socialist principles for the whole of his long life. The good that he has done will live long after him.
1 comment:
Without a shadow of a doubt one of my favourite SPGBer's of all time. An absolute shocker that a founder member of the SPGB who served the Party so well for thirty plus years would merit only a third of a page obituary in the Socialist Standard. An obituary, I hastened to add, that was penned anonymously. They should have given over half that month's Standard to writing a full obituary to a true servant of the SPGB. (Trust me, most of the material from that month's Standard would not have been missed. It was not a vintage issue.)
I won't attribute the damning with feint praise obituary down to the fact that Jacomb ended up being a renegade from the Party - he was expelled in 1942 for his opposition to the Party's line on the war, I think the SPGB has just always been crap with obituaries - even for the 'leading members' of the SPGB down the years.
Keith Scholey a few years back put together an excellent document,where he sought to flesh out - where he could - the details about the founding members of the SPGB. Here's his entry for Jacomb:
Jacomb, Albert E
West Ham, later Becontree branch. Originally with his brother Josiah, Jacomb ran a printing shop in Stratford where he produced much early Party literature, including the Socialist Standard from 1904-14, as well as doing work for trade unions. In the early years Jacomb was involved in a ‘scandal’. In 1906 the Jacomb Brothers printed and sold Womanhood. Although this book probably dealt with contraception and the like, it was deemed obscene. The brothers were arrested and charged with selling indecent literature (The Times, 4th October 1906). Jacomb wrote two Party pamphlets, Socialism (1920) and The Socialist Party: Its Principles and Policies (1934), and was a prolific writer for Socialist Standard. He was an Executive Committee member 1909-19 and was also on the Editorial Committee. At a local level he was branch secretary for East London in 1905 and East Ham in 1906. Around 1930 Jacomb took a poultry farm in Essex. Towards the end of the Thirties he came into conflict with the Party, primarily over the Spanish Civil War. Essentially Jacomb thought the Party should support the Republican side in a ‘war for democracy’. During the Second World War his differences became stronger, and in a letter of 25th April 1942 stated that he intended to publicly attack the SPGB as “a hindrance to the revolution”. This was too much and on 30th June he was charged with action detrimental. The results of the Party Poll on his expulsion (207 votes in favour, 1 against) were announced on 15th December 1942. Subsequently he produced two pamphlets, AE Jacomb’s case against the Socialist Party and Jacomb Again. He died in 1946 aged 73 (obituary in the Standard of November 1946).
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