Last modified: 2013-11-30 by rob raeside
Keywords: neonazi | celtic cross | british people's party | november 9th society |
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![[Union Jack with swastika]](../images/g/gb_naz.gif)
by Thierry Gilabert
This flag was used in 1938 during a pro-nazi demonstration in England.
Does anyone know any more about it?
Thierry Gilabert
Back in 1997 I saw an old photo with people holding this flag reproduced in
Newsweek magazine. One thing is certain: it was never used again, this
design having no current nor previous currency, and it was not the flag of the British Union of Fascists.
António Martins-Tuválkin, 7 November 2003
The source of this flag was a picture taken in 1938 in London in a pro-nazi-demonstration.
I saw this picture in a textbook about the British Isles before and during WWII.
The flag is in the center of the picture, and is exactly like the image here. In
my opinion, it is not a flag of a fascist group, but the flag of pro-nazi
demonstrators. I don't know if there is a organisation behind it, but the flag
was real.
Thierry Gilabert 7 November 2003
You illustrate a flag featuring a Union flag (aka Union Jack) in the middle
of which is a white roundel and black swastika. This is the emblem of the
'IMPERIAL FASCIST LEAGUE' ; this British Fascist Movement was led by Arnold
Spencer Leese and operated from 1928 until 1939.
John Millican, 21 February 2004
The former flag of the Imperial Fascist League seems to be currently used by
the National Socialist Movement Britannia, a group sponsored by a similarly
named neo-Nazi movement from the USA, but no photo of this flag in use was seen
so far; only two images can be found, one from their website:
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_--VwoQdZxJI/SraamZy_s5I/AAAAAAAAAB4/A4aQuk67zOI/S660/nsm_brittannia3.jpg
and the other from their discussion group at the Yahoo!:
http://d.yimg.com/kq/groups/30186963/homepage/name/283672?type=sn. The
images include the abbreviation NSM (the first image) or NSM88 (the second
image) above the disc with the swastika and the word BRITANNIA (both images)
beneath the disc. Considering that they don't have a uniform look, it still
remains to be verified if this is more than just a flagoid.
Tomislav Todorovic, 31 January 2010
I am now able to verify that the flag is indeed in use by its then-supposed
user:
National Socialist Movement Britannia - sometimes called National
Socialist Movement 88 Britannia - describes itself as the British division of
the National Socialist Movement (also called National Socialist Movement 88), a
neo-Nazi movement based in the USA. Its flag is derived from the Union Flag by
adding to its center a large white disc charged with a black swastika, the
abbreviation NSM88 above the disc and the word BRITANNIA beneath the disc. The
swastika has a double fimbriation in black and white, and both inscriptions are
in white letters fimbriated black. Unlike the flag image from the site:
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_--VwoQdZxJI/SrCS4CADA6I/AAAAAAAAABc/b0PbXqOFYUU/s1600-h/NSM+UK+Flag+3.png
which shows the flag with the ratio 1:2, the flag whose real-life use was
verified has the ratio 2:3. It is shown in a video clip posted at the YouTube:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNbgbXDb4OM. The flag appears @2:04-2:29, on the
wall behind the speaker.
Tomislav Todorovic, 26 June 2011
![[Celtic Cross neo-nazi flag]](../images/g/gb}naz2.gif)
image by Tomislav Todorovic, 31 January 2010
The red flag with a black Celtic
cross on the white field is the official flag of the British People's
Party, a neo-Nazi movement founded in 2005, and is identified as such at
their website: www.bpp.org.uk/flags.html. The size of cross may
vary and the letters BPP in white may be added to the flag, as can be seen at
the Antifa England News website:
www.antifa.org.uk/nucleus3.32/nucleus332/index.php?itemid=86.
The same
flag is also used by other neo-Nazi groups, such as the White Nationalist
Party or Combat 18, as shown in an article at the Indymedia Ireland website:
www.indymedia.ie/article/64287, which describes how the anti-Fascists
from Portrush, North Ireland, had confronted a group of neo-Nazis who
apparently were members of both organizations mentioned above, forced them to
run away and captured their flag and the promoting material they intended to
distribute there.
Tomislav Todorovic, 31 January 2010
This symbol
was used by neo-nazi groups in the UK in the
early sixties (and probably still is).
anon.
![[November 9th Society flag]](../images/g/gb}n9s.gif)
image by Tomislav Todorovic, 31 January 2010
The November
9th Society was founded in 1977. It claimed to have chosen its name in memory
of the date in 1923 - the second day of Hitler's Beer Hall Putsch in Munich,
when 16 Nazis were killed - while its opponents claimed that the real date
behind the name was the one in 1938 - the Crystal Night, often thought to be
the actual beginning of the Holocaust; the organization denied this, although
its anti-Semitism implied that the name was indeed chosen in memory of
both dates. In 2007, the organization was transformed into the British First
Party, which uses completely different symbols, typical for British far
right, but without direct associations with the Nazism.
Source: Wikipedia page about November 9th Society and British First Party:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/November_9th_Society.
The flag of November 9th
Society was derived from the Nazi flag by replacing the swastika with Roman
numeral IX. Some items charged with its image are still offered for sale from
the party Web shop, such as a patch with the national and movement flags with
crossed staffs:
www.britishfreestore.co.uk/images/crossedflags.jpg. The numeral shown there is a bit distorted so as to fit better in the
image of a waving flag. The attached image is based on another image, which
had made the part of a website which was closed before this text was written.
Tomislav Todorovic, 31 January 2010
