Blood and Honour

Blood & Honour is a neo-Nazi music promotion network, founded in 1987, that is comprised of white power skinheads and other white nationalists. The group organises white power concerts by Rock Against Communism (RAC) bands and distributes a magazine of the same name. [http://www.bloodandhonourworldwide.co.uk/mags1.html] Ian Stuart Donaldson, singer of the band Skrewdriver, was the founder and one of the prominent leaders until his death in 1993. Blood & Honour took its name from the motto of the Hitler Youth, "Blut und Ehre". Sometimes the code "28" stands for Blood & Honour, derived from the second and eighth letters of the Latin alphabet, B and H.

Blood & Honour accepts bands with neo-Nazi, white nationalist or white power views. There are official divisions in several different countries around the world. [http://www.bloodandhonourworldwide.co.uk/] It is listed as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

History

The origins of the group go back to the United Kingdom in 1977, with the creation of the Anti-Nazi League's "Rock Against Racism" music organisation. The National Front (NF) responded with its" Rock Against Communism" (RAC) movement, and, by 1980, the reformed former punk rock band Skrewdriver relaunched the RAC movement.

With the aid of the National Front (NF), the White Noise Club (WNC) organized concerts under the RAC name. The Rock Against Communism movement grew throughout 1983 and 1984. Despite the absence of formal advertising, concert attendance averaged about 600 people (Marshall, 1990). Bands that performed at the concerts include Skrewdriver, Brutal Attack, No Remorse, The Ovaltinees, Peter & The Wolves and Skullhead. In 1984, white power skinheads from Britain and Europe attended several outdoor RAC festivals organized by the WNC and the NF. The WNC gained garnered an even larger audience with the release of Skrewdriver's "Hail The New Dawn" album on the German label Rock-O-Rama. The National Front split into two different fractions in 1986, which effectively severed the link between the WNC and Rock-O-Rama. Around the same time it was discovered that the WNC had been defrauding bands and concert-goers. Several bands left the WNC, including Skrewdriver, No Remorse, Sudden Impact and Brutal Attack. This, together with the internal bickering in the National Front and mismanagement of White Noise, convinced Ian Stuart of Skrewdriver to break away and organize concerts for the National Front.

Stuart created a new, independent expression of Rock Against Communism called Blood & Honour. By June 1987, with the help of other breakaway bands, Blood & Honour was officially launched together with a magazine of the same name. A concert was organized in Morden, Surrey to commemorate this launch on September 5. Skrewdriver, Brutal Attack, Sudden Impact and No Remorse playing in front of a 500-strong crowd that included French, Italian and German supporters. ["Skrewdriver Rockumentary 1977 to 1993 - From Punk to Patriotism, Midgard Records (Sweden) 2000 MIDCD016] [ "Diamond In The Dust" http://www.skrewdriver.net/diamond.html]

By the end of 1988, "Blood & Honour" magazine was a regular, quarterly magazine that had grown from eight to 16 pages in the space of only a few issues. The magazine included regular features such as concert reports, band interviews, readers' letters, RAC charts and a "White Whispers" column. A mail order service called "Skrewdriver Services" soon formed within its pages, selling white nationalist albums, flags, Loyalist tapes, T-shirts and Swastika pendants, amongst other items. [Skrewdriver Rockumentary 1977 to 1993]

The back page of "Blood & Honour" Issue Number 13 advertised a Skrewdriver concert in London on Saturday, September 12, 1992. A publicity offensive was arranged; posters and fliers were displayed on walls and buildings up and down the country advertising the concert and the Waterloo Rail Station redirection point. The concert caught the attention of the mainstream media. Newspapers ran articles on Blood & Honour, and Ian Stuart was invited to a radio interview that concluded with the interviewer wishing him well. The publicity campaign seemed to be working. Over 2000 people were expected to attend the concert, with Blood & Honour supporters traveling in from all over Europe.

The night before the concert, however, Stuart was attacked in a Burton pub. The next day police closed down Waterloo Station and the tube station, preventing a lot of people from reaching the rendezvous point. Hundreds more Blood & Honour supporters who had journeyed from abroad were turned back at ports in Folkestone and Dover. These few were outnumbered and clashed with anti-Nazi protesters. Missiles such as bricks and champagne bottles taken from bins outside of South Bank restaurants were used to attack the Blood & Honour supporters. Battles ensued for about two hours, and then the concert proceeded in the function hall of the Yorkshire Grey pub in Eltham, Kent. The media termed the concert the "Battle of Waterloo," and it made international news in newspapers and on television.

In 1992, the newly formed Blood & Honour Midlands Division was in charge of organising the annual "White Xmas" concert. On December 19, over 400 Blood & Honour supporters gathered at a working men's club in Mansfield to watch No Remorse, Razors Edge and Skrewdriver perform. In 1993, Blood & Honour East Midlands Division planned to stage an outdoor festival for July 31. Ian Stuart Donaldson was arrested and served with an injunction order not to perform at the concert. The venue was blockaded by the police, who seized amplifiers and confiscated sound equipment.

Later that year, the Blood & Honour East Midlands Division organised a concert for the September 25, and plans were made for Skrewdriver to play at the largest white nationalist festival ever in Europe. Three days before the concert, Stuart, Cat and a few friends traveled to nearby Burton-upon-Trent for a night out. On the way back home on the A38 dual carriageway, the steering wheel suddenly snapped from the driver's hands, and the car spun out of control into a ditch. Some of the passengers endured minor wounds, but Stephen Flint was killed instantly. Stuart was cut from the wreckage and rushed to the local hospital with multiple injuries. He was later taken to the Queens Medical Center in Nottingham, and September 24, 1993, he was pronounced dead. The following day, 100 Skrewdriver supporters traveled to the Blood & Honour social in the Midlands, unaware of the deaths. When Stigger informed the crowd of the news, one concertgoer passed out and lay unconscious on the ground for over five minutes. [Skrewdriver Rockumentary 1977 to 1993] The German Blood & Honour division was prohibited on September 14, 2000, as was the Spanish division in 2005 after the arrest and imprisonment of many of its main leaders. Several other countries continue to investigate their respective Blood & Honour divisions in relation to hate speech.

Each year, on or near the anniversary of the Ian Stuart's death, a large memorial concert is held. In 2008, a concert in Redhill, Somerset attracted widespread BBC, radio and newspaper coverage. [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7632507.stm] [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/somerset/7632053.stm] [http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b00dkxbl] [http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1731899.ece]

Footnotes

References

* "White Noise: Inside the International Nazi Skinhead Scene". Edited by Nick Lowles and Steve Silver, London 1998. ISBN 0-9522038-3-9
* "Nazi Rock Star: A Biography of Ian Stuart" By Paul London (aka Paul Burnley)
* "Spirit of '69: A Skinhead Bible". George Marshall, Dunoon, Scotland: ST Publishing, 1990. ISBN 1-898927-10-3
* "Skinhead Nation". George Marshall. S.T. Publishing, 1996. ISBN 978-1898927457
* "Blood & Honour Magazine" http://www.bloodandhonourworldwide.co.uk/mags1.html

ee also

* Combat 18
* Bloed-Bodem-Eer en Trouw (Flemish splinter group of Blood & Honour Vlaanderen)
* Nazi punk
* Rock Against Communism
* Vlaamse Militanten Orde
* White power skinhead

External links

* [http://www.bloodandhonourworldwide.co.uk/ Blood & Honour Worldwide]
* [http://www.adl.org/poisoning_web/racist_rock.asp Neo-Nazi Skinheads and Racist Rock: Youth Subculture of Hate] (Anti-Defamation League)
* [http://www.adl.org/hate_symbols/groups_blood_honour.asp Blood & Honour symbol] , in the ADL's "Hate On Display" database.
* [http://www.searchlightmagazine.com/features/century/cbf.php?include=page8 1980-1989: "Blood & Honour - Britain's fascists split] " by Steve Silver (a chapter in "Searchlight" magazine's "A Century of British Fascism")
* [http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/orgs/american/adl/skinhead-international/skins-united-kingdom.html The Skinhead International: United Kingdom] (Nizkor)