Letter to Ludwig Kugelmann, October 3, 1871

Author(s) Jenny Marx Longuet
Written 3 October 1871


First published, in Italian, in Movimento operaio, No. 2, Milan, 1955. Reproduced from the original. Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 44


To Ludwig Kugelmann in Hanover

[London,] 3 October 1871

My dear Doctor,

My best thanks for the portraits you have been kind enough to send us. They are excellent copies. I quite agree with you as to illustrated paper; but as unfortunately we only had two votes between us and as there were many votes against us, I assure you I had to fight many a hard battle, and at length only succeeded in effecting a compromise—that is to say, both copies have been sent to the artist who is going to publish the portrait, and he is to decide between them, or to make use of both.

I am happy to say it has been possible to persuade Mohr to give up work for five days, and to go to the seaside.[1] To-day he will have to return, as there is a sitting of the International[2] : mama who is with him, writes, that the few days' rest have done him much good. And he was sadly in want of rest! To me it is a marvel how he has been able to bear all the toil and trouble of these last months.

The work has been, and still is, fearful. Take this day for an example. Early this morning there came a letter from an Italian section of the International—stating, that the Association is making wonderful progress in Italy (I suppose you have seen Garibaldi's letter on the International[3] ), and asking for advice and assistance. Then arrived letters from different parts of France, and finally a crazy epistle from a Swede, who it seems has run mad. 'He calls upon' le grand maître 'to light torches upon the mountains in Sweden' etc. Close upon the postman's rap follows a ring. An arrival from France—Russia—or Hong Kong! The number of refugees here is daily increasing. These poor people are in the most heartrending misery—they have not learnt the art of Badinguet,[4] d'Orléans, Gambetta and Co. of providing for the rainy day—they have come over here without clothes on their backs or a farthing in their hands. The winter here will be terrible.

Your fears with regard to the importation from France of mouchards[5] are but too well founded. Happily, the Council has taken its precautions. To give you a proof of the success of those precautionary measures, I need only tell you that the International held a conference from the 17th to the 23rd,[6] and not a single paper knew of it. On the 24th a banquet wound up the proceedings. Mohr was made to preside on the occasion (much against his will, as you may imagine), and he had the honour of having on his right hand the heroic Polish general Wrôblewski. On the other side sat the brother of Dombrowski.[7] A great many members of the Commune were present. From Switzerland, Outine and Perret had arrived as delegates, from Belgium, De Paepe and five others, from Spain, Lorenzo—a most earnest devoted man—Liebknecht and Bebel could not come for want of cash. The Conference has transacted very much business. Among other questions of course the eternal Swiss squabble cropped up. A special Committee[8] was selected to examine the difference. The resolutions it has arrived at, will, it is to be hoped, put an end to the underhand machinations of the clique Bakounine-Guillaume-Robin.—The following are some of the resolutions on the Swiss affair—

'Considering

'That the Alliance de la démocratie socialiste has declared itself dissolved;

'That in its sitting of the 18th September the Conference has decided that all existing organisations of the International Association shall henceforth be obliged to designate and constitute themselves simply and exclusively as branches, sections, federations, etc., of the International Association with the names of their respective localities attached;

'That the existing branches and societies shall therefore no longer be allowed to designate themselves by sectarian names such as Mutualists, Positivists, Collectivists, Communists, etc.;

'That no branch or society already admitted shall any longer be permitted to form a separatist body under the name of "section of propaganda", alliance, etc., pretending to accomplish special missions distinct from the purpose common to the mass of militant proletariat united within the Association, etc.;

'That henceforth the General Council of the International Association will in this sense have to interpret the resolution of the Basle Congress "The General Council has the right either to accept or to refuse the affiliation of any new society or group pending appeal to the next Congress", etc., etc.'[9]

Tussy is calling me—so I must bring this letter to a close. I wished to write also to dear Trautchen,[10] but find I cannot do so to-day. Will you therefore ask her to excuse me, and tell her that every word of the report (in the German paper) concerning our arrest is untrue. Instead of our having proclaimed our names at Luchon, every letter was sent to us to the name of Williams or Lafargue. We lived in utter retirement, seeing no one but the doctor, of whom alas, we had need during the whole of our stay. The stay was sad indeed, for Laura's youngest child was ill during the whole time, and after fearful sufferings, died, towards the end of July—on the 26th.—A few days after the child's death, just as the Lafargues were able to go out a little, M. de Kératry commenced his guerre à outrance[11] against us. Laura who had joined her husband at Bosost (in Spain) suffered much—her eldest child[12] fell ill, so ill that she thought it would die—it was suffering from dysentery, so prevalent in that part of Spain—and she could not move away, as the Spanish and French police were waiting to arrest her. The child is a little better now. Paul, meanwhile, had escaped by unknown paths into the centre of Spain. Tussy and I had been caught on our return from Bosost, arrested, kept close prisoners for several days in our house and then taken to the gendarmerie-barracks. The letter found on me I had written to O'Donovan Rossa. It was an answer to his shamefull condemnation in The Irishman of the Communal movement. I expressed my surprise that he, of all men, should believe the infamous calumnies against the Communists, invented by the wretched police organs Le Figaro, Paris-Journal etc. I claimed his sympathy (he is a power at New York at this moment) and that of his fellow-countrymen, for the heroic champions of a better society—for, I said, Irishmen, less than all others, can be interested in the continuation of the present state of things, etc.

With best love to Trautchen and Fränzchen[13]

Believe me, dear Doctor,

Very sincerely yours,

Jenny Marx

  1. ↑ Lavrov's letter of 29 September and this one by Engels refer to a consignment of books for Lavrov (see this volume, p. 218) and also discuss in a coded form the organisation of assistance to the French refugees.
  2. ↑ A meeting of the General Council
  3. ↑ Garibaldi's letter to Arthur Arnold published in Der Volksstaat, Nos. 80 and 81, 4 and 7 October 1871.
  4. ↑ Nickname of Louis Bonaparte (Napoleon III), who, in 1846, fled from prison in Ham in the clothes of a mason by the name of Badinguet.
  5. ↑ police spies
  6. ↑ An allusion to the preliminary conference held in London on 25-29 September 1865 instead of the congress of the International Working Men's Association planned for Brussels. In line with a resolution of the Basle Congress (1869), the next congress of the International Working Men's Association was to be held in Paris. However, the persecution of the International's sections by the police in France compelled the General Council to move the next congress to Mainz (see Note 40). The outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War made the congress impossible; nor was it possible to hold it in the atmosphere of severe reprisals against the members of the International during the civil war in France, especially after the suppression of the Paris Commune. In these circumstances, the majority of national federations agreed that the congress be postponed and the General Council be empowered to fix the date of its convocation. At the same time the urgent tasks to be undertaken in the struggle against the Bakuninists and other sectarian elements, as well as other pressing problems, demanded the adoption of collective decisions. At its meeting on 25 July 1871 the General Council, at Engels' suggestion, resolved to convene a private conference of the International in London on the third Sunday of September. The majority of the federations agreed to the proposal. The London Conference was held from 17 to 23 September 1871. Twenty-two voting, and ten non-voting, delegates took part in its work. The countries unable to send delegates were represented by the corresponding secretaries. Marx represented Germany, Engels—Italy. In all, nine sessions were held. The most important decision of the Conference was formulated in Resolution IX, 'Political Action of the Working Class', which declared the need to found, in each country, an independent proletarian party whose ultimate goal was the conquest of political power by the working class.
  7. ↑ Theophil Dombrowski
  8. ↑ The case of Gustave Durand, who tricked his way into the International as a leader of the French Section of 1871 and then was discovered to be a police agent, was considered at the special meeting of the General Council on 7 October 1871. Durand's correspondence with police officers was brought before the Council. The resolution on Durand's expulsion was drawn up and submitted to the General Council meeting by Engels (see present edition, Vol. 23, p. 21).
  9. ↑ Jenny Marx quotes in French. Cf. present edition, Vol. 22, pp. 429-30.
  10. ↑ Gertrud Kugelmann
  11. ↑ war to the knife
  12. ↑ Charles Etienne Lafargue
  13. ↑ Franziska Kugelmann