Description:Image: Oswald Mosley at the Town Hall. (Birmingham Newspaper Cuttings Political History 1930-1932)
It is important to remember that at the time people like Rev Cohen were making speeches against the persecutions beginning to take place in Germany, Britain itself was far from being free from racism and anti-jewish feeling. The early twentieth century would feature the rise of British right wings groups and political figures who would try to capitalise on underlying social fears of 'outsiders'. Oswald Mosley was one such figure.
A political opportunist, Mosley rose to public visibility in the 1930's, a man driven by the spectre of depression and unemployment after the first world war. However, Mosley's views would become increasingly right wing, and his learning from the Italian dictator Mussolini eventually culminate in the creation of his own violent minded band of fascist 'blackshirt' military youths.
Appealing to the white unemployed and conservative middle classes, these blackshirts re-ignited anti-Jewish prejudice up and down the country. The social tensions they roused would culminated in the 'Battle of Cable Street' in London in which Mosley's supporters and anti-fascist demonstrators fought battles in the street (see link below).
Mosley had an ongoing relationship with Birmingham. He was supported in his early career as a Member of Parliament for Smethwick between 1926 and 1931. However, during his later appearences in the town, he was frequently heckled by large gatherings of antifascist working classes who fought to resist his right wing ideologies. For more information, visit the 'Papers of Oswald Mosley', housed at the University of Birmingham Special Collections.