David John Nicoll (8 December 1859 – 2 March 1919) was a British
anarchist
Anarchism is a political philosophy and movement that is skeptical of all justifications for authority and seeks to abolish the institutions it claims maintain unnecessary coercion and hierarchy, typically including, though not necessar ...
newspaper editor, writer, poet and public speaker. Nicoll replaced
William Morris
William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He ...
as the editor of the
Socialist League's newspaper ''
Commonweal
Commonweal or common weal may refer to:
* Common good, what is shared and beneficial for members of a given community
* Common Weal, a Scottish think tank and advocacy group
* ''Commonweal'' (magazine), an American lay-Catholic-oriented magazin ...
'' in 1890 until 1892 when Nicoll was imprisoned for incitement to murder a police inspector, a judge and the
Home Secretary
The secretary of state for the Home Department, otherwise known as the home secretary, is a senior minister of the Crown in the Government of the United Kingdom. The home secretary leads the Home Office, and is responsible for all national ...
. Nicoll produced a series of pamphlets critical of the police and singling out those in the anarchist movement he believed to be
police spies. Following his imprisonment Nicoll's mental health deteriorated and he died in poverty.
Biography
Nicoll was born in
Houndsditch
Houndsditch is a street running through parts of the Portsoken and Bishopsgate Without wards of the City of London; areas which are also a part of the East End of London. The road follows the line of the outside edge of the ditch which once ran ...
in
East London
East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth.
Etymology
As in other languages, the word is formed from the fac ...
to a relatively wealthy family. His mother, Sarah (née Malpass) died while he was a child. His father, David Nicoll was a shoe factor and died in 1878. Nicoll spent his inheritance and became a journalist.
Nicoll was a member of the Social Democratic Federation, but In 1884 he joined the newly forming
Socialist League becoming the League's librarian and propaganda secretary.
He also began contributing articles and poetry to the League's newspaper ''
Commonweal
Commonweal or common weal may refer to:
* Common good, what is shared and beneficial for members of a given community
* Common Weal, a Scottish think tank and advocacy group
* ''Commonweal'' (magazine), an American lay-Catholic-oriented magazin ...
'' and gradually became an anarchist.
In 1887 he was elected to the council of the Socialist League.
In October 1887 Nicoll was violently attacked by a crowd of hundreds while trying to speak in
Lowestoft
Lowestoft ( ) is a coastal town and civil parish in the East Suffolk district of Suffolk, England.OS Explorer Map OL40: The Broads: (1:25 000) : . As the most easterly UK settlement, it is north-east of London, north-east of Ipswich and so ...
with A J Houghton. Nicoll and Houghton had to be escorted away under police protection.
Differences within the League sharpened, particularly over the use of violence in the immediate struggle.
At the 1890 annual conference of the Socialist League,
William Morris
William Morris (24 March 1834 – 3 October 1896) was a British textile designer, poet, artist, novelist, architectural conservationist, printer, translator and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He ...
was ousted as editor of ''Commonweal'' and was replaced by Nicoll and
Frank Kitz
Frank Kitz (1849 – 8 January 1923) was an English anarchist.
Life
Born in the Kentish Town area of London as Francis Platt, he was illegitimate and grew up in poverty.E. P. Thompson and Peter Linebaugh, ''William Morris: Romantic to Revo ...
with
Charles Mowbray
Charles Wilfred Mowbray (1857 – December 1910) was an English anarcho-communist agitator, tailor, trade unionist and public speaker. Mowbray was an active orator and agitator in the Labour Emancipation League, and then the Socialist League, ...
as publisher.
Morris left the League later in the same year, but the removal of his moderating influence and substantial funding shook morale.
There was also an increase in violent rhetoric in ''Commonweal'' under Nicoll's editorship, with him arguing that "Individual assaults on the system will lead to riots, riots to revolts, revolts to insurrection, insurrection to revolution."
''Commonweal'' Trial
From 1892 Nicoll used his platform to take a leading role in supporting the defence of the
Walsall anarchists
The Walsall Anarchists were a group of anarchism, anarchists arrested on explosive charges in Walsall, present-day West Midlands (county), West Midlands, England in 1892.
Recent research into police files has revealed that the bombings were inst ...
– a group charged with manufacturing explosives. Nicoll published the pamphlet ''The Walsall Anarchists'' in which he argued that they had been framed by the French anarchist
Auguste Coulon who Nicoll accused of being a paid
agent-provocateur working for Inspector
William Melville at
Special Branch
Special Branch is a label customarily used to identify units responsible for matters of national security and intelligence in British, Commonwealth, Irish, and other police forces. A Special Branch unit acquires and develops intelligence, usua ...
.
In an article in ''Commonweal'' in April 1892 Nicoll criticised Justice
Henry Hawkins, who had presided over the Walsall anarchist trial, and asked whether Hawkins, the Home Secretary
Henry Matthews or Melville were "fit to live". Nicoll and ''Commonweal's'' publisher Charles Mowbray were arrested for
incitement
In criminal law, incitement is the encouragement of another person to commit a crime. Depending on the jurisdiction, some or all types of incitement may be illegal. Where illegal, it is known as an inchoate offense, where harm is intended but ...
to murder Matthews, Hawkins and Melville. Nicoll denied he intended to incite murder, stating that the article had been written in "hot blood".
The prosecutor in the trial was the Attorney General Sir
Richard Webster, while Nicoll chose to defend himself, later publishing his closing speech as a pamphlet. On 6 May 1892 Nicoll was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment with
hard labour.
Mowbray was found not guilty on the same charges on the basis that he was not involved in producing the paper at that time.
Research published in 2004 confirmed Nicoll's accusations that the Walsall anarchists were framed. Coulon had indeed been an agent-provocateur working under the direct orders of Melville.
Nicoll served his sentence at
Chelmsford prison, some of which was spent under
medical supervision.
He later spoke publicly about his experiences in prison and wrote the pamphlet ''Life in English Prisons''. Upon his release he was met in London by a large welcoming party which resulted in clashes with the police.
In Nicoll's absence the anarchist tailor
H. B. Samuels took over as editor of ''Commonweal''.
However, after Nicoll's release the ''Commonweal'' group did not return the editorship of the paper to Nicoll.
Under Samuels's and
Frank Kitz's editorship the paper fell into decline and ceased publication.
The experience of prison and his removal from the paper caused Nicoll significant anguish and his mental health declined significantly as he became beset by paranoia.
The trial also demonstrated the level of visible and undercover
police surveillance Nicoll and others at the paper were under, with police watching the office, following individuals, studying the paper, and attending talks and meetings – with some of the notes taken being used as evidence in court.
Later life
Nicoll became more socially isolated. From 1894 until 1897 he edited the ''Anarchist'' newspaper while living in
Sheffield
Sheffield is a city in South Yorkshire, England, whose name derives from the River Sheaf which runs through it. The city serves as the administrative centre of the City of Sheffield. It is historically part of the West Riding of Yorkshire ...
.
He also began intermittently self-publishing a paper under the name ''Commonweal'' from 1896 to 1901.
In 1897 Nicoll authored and self-published the pamphlet ''The Greenwich Mystery: Letters from the Dead'' about the death of
Martial Bourdin
Martial Bourdin (1868 – 15 February 1894) was a French anarchist, who died on 15 February 1894 when chemical explosives that he was carrying prematurely detonated outside the Royal Observatory in Greenwich Park, London.
Although Bourdin sus ...
, in which he accused Samuels of being a police spy. The pamphlet is believed to have heavily influenced
Joseph Conrad's novel ''
The Secret Agent
''The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale'' is a novel by Joseph Conrad, first published in 1907.. The story is set in London in 1886 and deals with Mr. Adolf Verloc and his work as a spy for an unnamed country (presumably Russia). ''The Secret Agent' ...
'' and
Olivia Rossetti Agresti fictionalised memoir ''A Girl Among the Anarchists'' (written under the pen name Isabel Meredith).
Nicoll spent the rest of life in poverty, suffering poor mental health, working as a street vendor and selling pamphlets.
He died on 2 March 1919 in
St Pancras Hospital, London, and was buried in an unmarked grave in
St Pancras and Islington Cemetery
St Pancras and Islington Cemetery is a cemetery in East Finchley, North London. Although it is situated in the London Borough of Barnet, it is run as two cemeteries, owned by two other London Boroughs, Camden (formerly St Pancras) and Isli ...
.
Pamphlets
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Bibliography
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References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Nicoll, David
Socialist League (UK, 1885) members
1859 births
1919 deaths
English writers
English anarchists
English newspaper editors
English poets
People from London
Pamphleteers