Football Poets

The Battle of Cable Street. amended

¶ 1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 As the black flag of fascism unfurled over Europe
There came racism on streets that were dour
The Battle of Cable Street is still looked upon, even today
As a united working class community’s finest hour

¶ 2 Leave a comment on verse 2 0 With their Nazi idea’s built on terror and fear
Where the poor are insulted and spurned
Mosley along with his blackshirts had dreams
That from him, Adolph Hitler could learn

¶ 3 Leave a comment on verse 3 0 The march that was set for October the 4th 1936
Was to scare the poor immigrants out of their wits
Would the Jews and the Irish who’d fled poverty and hate
Be left unprotected, exposed and adrift?

¶ 4 Leave a comment on verse 4 0 The news travelled quick that an army so sick
Would try to drive the immigrant’s from London’s East End
But a united front of all creeds, did indeed
Build blockades, that each one to man did defend

¶ 5 Leave a comment on verse 5 0 As home made barricades were furbished
From paving stones, timber and beds
The cry went up proudly from the Spanish civil war
“No pasaran”(they shall not pass) all the immigrants said

¶ 6 Leave a comment on verse 6 0 On the Whitechapel Road as the blackshirts on strode
Almost three hundred thousand people stood strong
The goose-stepping fascists and Mosley,
Thought the Jews and the Irish would roll over and run
It just goes to show they were wrong

¶ 7 Leave a comment on verse 7 0 The police cauldron that covered the fascists
Was pelted with marbles and pepper and stones
Tis even said that the Irish girls emptied chamber pots
On the heads of the police, in the streets down below

¶ 8 Leave a comment on verse 8 0 The Jewish Chronicle warned all it’s readers
“To please stay away from their route
And if you’re in doubt, stay indoors don’t go out
Please don’t annoy the Jew beaters”!

¶ 9 Leave a comment on verse 9 0 But the East End is not full of cowards
As “The Battle of Cable Street” proved
Why should any one be made to cower from racists,
Be they Negro or Irish or Jew?

¶ 10 Leave a comment on verse 10 0 As the police horses stumbled on marbles
That the immigrant young had put down
“The blackshirts are heading for Cable Street”
Was the cry that was bandied around

¶ 11 Leave a comment on verse 11 0 In the streets there was mayhem and fighting
As the working class defended their plots
It all sounds as if right handers were flying
With the poor folks giving as good as they got

¶ 12 Leave a comment on verse 12 0 As orthordox Jews and Irish boys too
Stood side by side in the breech
The facist march had to be cancelled
As the police feared there’d be blood on the streets

¶ 13 Leave a comment on verse 13 0 As the old ones who defied, now look back with great pride
To say “I fought the facists by giving my all
I wasn’t leaving my new home with my family
I stood up to racism and anti-semitism
And with my working class neighbours stood tall”

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