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| Harry Pollitt, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Great Britain 1929 - 1956 (with an unfortunate interruption, 1939/1941) |
Harry Pollitt was General Secretary of the CPGB from 1929 until 1939, when he was forced to resign his position after breaching "the Party line" on the outbreak of WW2. Pollitt then supported Britain's Anti-Nazi struggle, publishing a pamphlet entitled "How to Win the War", but the Comintern's subsequent line (with the Molotov - Ribbentrop Pact in their back pocket, and then half of Poland as a result) was that "the war is an imperialist and unjust war for which the bourgeoisie of all the belligerent states bear equal responsibility". Stalin's line on Poland was that it was simply another "bourgeois Fascist state" that had been "eliminated", and that the war was "a robber war kindled from all sides by the hands of two imperialist groups of powers".
The "Party line" changed - whoops! - when Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941.
Pollitt was then reinstated as General Secretary of the CPGB, remaining in that position until 1956, when illness forced him from office, and he became Chairman of the Party. Always a slavishly convinced Stalinist (he called the Moscow Show Trials of 1937 "a new triumph in the history of progress"), he became disillusioned with Kruschev's attacks on Stalin and his record, saying of his favourite Stalin portrait: "he's staying there as long as I'm alive". Pollitt died in June 1960.
The origins of the "Ballad of Harry Pollitt" are lost to history, but it may have started during the 1940/1941 period, and grown organically in the ensuing years. The precise tune we can leave to later (you have to know the words first!) but apparently the singing must be loud and lusty, there must have been a large amount of beer consumed, and it is best accompanied by marching around enthusiastically but somewhat haphazardly :
THE BALLAD OF HARRY POLLITT
Harry was a bolshie and one of Lenin's lads
Was foully murdered by counter revolutionary cads
Counter revolutionary cads, counter revolutionary cads
Was foully murdered by counter revolutionary cads
He landed up in heaven trembling at the knees
'May I speak to God I am Mr. Pollitt please
Mr. Pollitt please, Mr. Pollitt please,
May I speak to God I am Mr. Pollitt please'
'Who are you' said God, 'if you're humble and contrite
And a friend of Lady Astor, then OK. you'll be alright
Then OK. you'll be alright, then OK. you'll be alright
And a friend of Lady Astor, then OK. you'll be alright'
They dressed him in a nightie, put a harp into his hand
And he played the Internationale in the hallelujah band
In the hallelujah band, in the hallelujah band
He played the Internationale in the hallelujah band
They put him in the choir, the hymns he did not like
So he organized the angels and he fetched them out on strike
Fetched them out on strike, fetched them out on strike
He organized the angels and he fetched them out on strike
One day as God was walking around the heavenly state
Who should he see but Harry, chalking slogans on the gate
Slogans on the gate, slogans on the gate
Who should he see but Harry chalking slogans on the gate
They put him up for trial before the Holy Ghost
Charged with disaffection amongst the heavenly host
Amongst the heavenly host, amongst the heavenly host
Charged with disaffection amongst the heavenly host
The verdict it was guilty, said Harry 'That is swell!'
And he tucked his nightie 'round his knees and he floated down to hell
Floated down to hell, floated down to hell
He tucked his nightie 'round his knees and he floated down to hell
A few more years have ended, now Harry's doing well
He's just been made the People's Commissar for Soviet hell
Commissar for Soviet hell, Commissar for Soviet hell
He's just been made the People's Commissar for Soviet hell
Now the moral of this story is easy for to tell,
If you want to be a Bolshevik, you'll have to go to hell,
You'll have to go to hell, Yes, you'll have to go to hell,
If you want to be a Bolshevik, You'll have to go to HELL!"
Various versions of the Ballad exist, all with slightly different wording. For an English folk rendition ("My Darling Party Line"), check out Joe Glazer's version HERE. For an American take, check THIS LINK, courtesy of "The Limeliters". And if you want to see Harry Pollitt propounding the Party line at the General Election of 1945, courtesy of British Pathe, you can see the man himself HERE.
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