Then Nahash the Ammonite came up, and encamped against Jabesh-Gilead: and all the men of Jabesh said unto Nahash, Make a covenant with us and we will serve thee.
And Nahash the Ammonite answered them, On this condition will I make a covenant with you, that I may thrust out all your right eyes . . .
. . . and they fled every man into his tent: and there was a very great slaughter: . . .
I Samuel
This website is the culmination of a 3 year family archive project to digitize and distribute my late grandfather’s autobiography, American Commissar. The book follows my grandfather from Hungary to America as an immigrant in the 1920s; his entrance to the communist party and their activities during the 1920s and 30s; his wartime experiences serving with the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in the Spanish Civil War; and his frustration and disillusionment with the international Soviet communist movement. The book is human, funny, and—my grandfather being an accomplished playwright—well-paced with memorable scenes and stories. Seriously.
I will be posting one chapter from the book each week—there are 60 total plus an epilogue—on this blog.
While I would not characterize the past 3 years as “steady progress” towards my goal of fully digitizing the book, I’m really happy to be entering the finale. The book itself is nearly 500 pages—which I have been scanning, converting to text (OCR) and proof-reading against the original text. When I’m finished I’ll be submitting the entirety to Project Gutenberg.
In addition to my own personal interest in the work, I think the book has enduring lessons. As a 2nd generation American citizen, the experience of confused immersion and material poverty is so distant; as is the experience of the early-20th century, which few history books expose from such unique points of view. Fighting against the Fascists during the Spanish Civil War, my grandfather would today have been classified as an “unlawful combatant” or terrorist; yet at the time was cheered both locally and abroad. Most enduringly, I think his view of community organizing and his experience with the American Communist Party at the time is profound: the radical populism of the American Communist Party was one of the few movements actively advocating for the social services we take for granted today like Medicare, Social Security and unemployment insurance. As my grandfather argues, it was these evolutionary reforms that protected the American way of life (enduring freedom and opportunities) from Soviet style revolution—a movement that at its end my grandfather became disillusioned with and he worked the rest of his life to distance himself from.
While the book is a harsh critique of the Communist Party, I think my grandfather’s hope, optimism, and well-intentioned desire for positive change—topical concepts for today—are the book’s strongest themes; though I am of a much different generation than both my parents and my grandfather’s contemporaries.
If you have any questions, please send me an email at ben@island94.org.
I am Sandor’s son. I was a young teenager while he was writing the book.
Against his preference, the book’s title, “American Commissar,” was selected by his publisher. It was the era of Joe McCarthy and Herb Filbrick, author of “I Led Three Lives,” a sensationalized “expose” which portrayed communists as nefarious and insidious underminers of the American way.
In that climate, the publishers concluded, American Commissar was more titillating and, hence, more likely to attract readership.
My father’s submitted title was “There Was a Great Slaughter,” derived from the I Samuel Bible quote on the book’s frontispiece, and reproduced above. Sandor explained to me that in the face of murderous facist actions and outrageous demands, the Western democracies behaved like the men of Jabesh, each retreating into their own insular realities. The result, indeed, was a very great slaughter.
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I would like to link you work to my blog: Americans in the Spanish Civil War. Also I would like to touch base with you in regard to your father’s data that I have compiled.
Thanks,
CB
I’m told that a relative of mine is mentioned in your grandfather’s autobiography–they served together in Spain. Do you have any idea how I can get a copy of the book.