The Italo-Ethiopian War of 1935–36 as Fought on the Streets of American Cities

Amber Dearborn

Jacksonville University

It was Tuesday, June 26, 1935, a sweltering evening. Thousands of boxing fans—especially those of African and Italian descent—eagerly anticipated “the greatest heavyweight ring battle of recent years”, as publicists called it. The fight matched Joe Louis, “the Brown Bomber” from Detroit and Primo “Carnivorous” Carnera of Italy.[1] Sixty thousand people, one of the largest crowds yet assembled at Yankee Stadium, made their way through the turnstiles. An estimated 15,000 black Americans attended, the majority of whom were from Harlem, Chicago, and Detroit. Fearing that the more daunting fight would take place outside the ring among the fans, 1500 police, equipped with tear gas bombs and other apparatus, patrolled the stadium. At 8:15, the boxers stepped into the ring “to clash for the synthetic championship of two continents.”[2] Six rounds and a knockout punch later, Joe Louis emerged victorious, as the “newly risen hero of the black race.”[3]

None of the rioting which police and press feared materialized that night at Yankee Stadium. The crowd was orderly, “good-humored and eager.”[4]Back in Harlem after the fight, people were “hilarious with joy.” Capturing the enthusiasm of the Brown Bomber’s fans, one reporter wrote,

Intoxicated with the sweet nectar of victory which had come to the hero, their attitude seemed to say, ‘Everything is hotsy-totsy and the goose is hanging high.’[5]

The jubilant spirit that permeated Harlem that night soon gave way to the same racial tensions that had burned in the community before; only now there was more fuel for the fire. Soon the streets of Harlem would be rent with rioting between Italian Americans and Black Americans and in boycotts of Italian businesses.

What could prompt these two ethnic groups to come to blows? After the Wal Wal Incident of December 1934 in Ethiopia, Italy was clearly bent on going to war to conquer Ethiopia—a country with a proud history stretching back to biblical times and one of only two independent states left in Africa. Reacting to Ethiopia’s plight, many black Americans seemingly put aside their own crusade for civil rights to further the cause in East Africa. J. A. Rogers, a scholar of Ethiopian history, explained the stakes involved: “Ethiopia, sole remnant of black greatness, as Italy is of Roman Power, is a symbol, a rallying point of the Black race.”[6]In other words, an independent Ethiopia affirmed the dignity and worth of millions of African Americans. Teele Hawariate, Ethiopian delegate to the League of Nations, approached American Consul, Prentiss Gilbert in July of 1935, citing the necessity of U.S. support in the impending crisis. “With 11,000,000 negroes in America, you cannot afford to ignore the one independent negro government in the world.”

America’s blacks were not alone. One observer noted that blacks throughout the world reacted similarly:

The Italian invasion of Ethiopia has heightened race consciousness and solidarity in the whole colored world. Colonial peoples have identified themselves with independent ‘justice’ both for Ethiopia and themselves.[7]

Throughout 1935, Italy’s tortuous buildup of military supplies in preparation for its attack gave plenty of time for complicated international tensions to simmer into a rolling boil. Tensions in the United States were but one page of a multi-volumed work of ethnic tensions generated throughout the world.

Relations between Italian-Americans and African-Americans began to worsen when many black leaders realized the political and racial implications of the Joe Louis fight in the face of the coming Italo-Ethiopian war. Professor Rayford W. Logan of Atlanta University, for example, particularly linked the struggle in the ring with the looming international battle between Italy and Ethiopia:

I am afraid that the defeat of Primo Carnera last night by Joe Louis will be interpreted as an additional insult to the Italian flag, which will permit Mussolini to assert again the necessity for Italy to annihilate Abyssinia.[8]

More pugnaciously, at a rally sponsored by the pan-African Reconstruction Association, Reverend Harold H. Williamson Jr. demanded, “Let’s get right up and tell why we want to knock out Mussolini like Joe Louis did Carnera.” Speaking out at a street gathering in Harlem in mid-July, 1935, one man in the crowd exclaimed in a similar vein, “If Joe Louis [can] knock that Giant Carnera on his ear, then Ethiopia’s army could march into Rome and lick those Italians with their natural fists.”[9] African-American backing of Haile Selassie’s Ethiopia went beyond mere moral exhortation. The Pittsburgh Courier, a prominent black newspaper, received thousands of letters from people willing to volunteer in Ethiopia’s army. These letters came after the publication had announced that Haile Sellassie would “welcome U.S. volunteers.”[10] Thousands more queried other black organizations.[11]

Many equated support for the Ethiopian cause as a declaration of war against the white world. W. E. B. DuBois, the revered Black leader, deliberately equated international oppression with oppression at home:

Only a word needs to be said concerning the Negroes in the United States. They have reached a point today where they have lost faith in an appeal for justice based on ability and accomplishment. They do not believe that their political and social rights are going to be granted by the nation so long as the advantages of exploiting them as a valuable labor class continue. This attitude the action of Italy tends to confirm. Economic exploitation based on the excuse of race prejudice is the program of the white world. Italy states it openly and plainly.[12]

As events heated up abroad and Mussolini prepared Italy for war against Ethiopia, the pent-up animosities of black Americans toward whites in general found a convenient outlet in their Italian American neighbors. Many blacks called for economic measures against Italian Americans. One speaker at a neighborhood meeting in Harlem called for boycotting Italian icemen. Another man protested,

He wants you to boycott poor Italian icemen who have children to feed even as you and I…Will you kill a giant tree by plucking a single leaf? [13]

Despite this lonely protest, many in the group pledged to boycott two dozen icemen in Harlem.

On a larger scale, Dr. Willis N. Huggins, an African-American educator and author, and his followers urged blacks in the United States to organize an economic boycott against Italians in New York.[14]

Hundreds of blacks heeded the call, but for many this was not enough. Mirroring the actions of their new hero, Joe Louis, African Americans opted to deal with their resentments through hand-to-hand combat. In the weeks following the match, one publication commented that,

Minor clashes between Italians and Negroes have already been reported, and the likelihood of far more impressive disturbances is only too great. Officials in several of our cities regard the future with genuine anxiety, as they weigh the pressure of fanaticism on the race groups involved.[15]

Recognizing this restlessness and anticipating further problems, William Pickens, Field Secretary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, wrote to Mr. Taub, the head of the American League Against War and Fascism. He expressed concern regarding a parade in support of Ethiopia’s independence:

I notice you plan to take in the Italian district as well as Harlem. I would like to know whether you have secured the cooperation of any of the Italian leaders and whether the Italian people will take part in this parade? The object you are seeing is good, but we do not want to make any trouble which will not promote the objective you have in mind.[16]

In Jersey City, such fears were realized when Italians, angered by the jeering of blacks responded with threats of what Italian arms would do in Ethiopia.[17]More than words were exchanged. Numerous fistfights between the two groups marked the weeks after the fight. Matters escalated as more news on the crisis reached America and found its way into black and Italian communities. On Sunday, August 11, 1935, rioting broke out between Italian Americans and Black Americans on Railroad Avenue, the dividing line between the two neighborhoods. Sparked by an argument the night before among half a dozen members of each group regarding the international situation, the rioting sucked in more than a hundred people. Stones, knives, baseball bats, and even broomsticks, became the debating points. One press account of the event described the scene with the aplomb of a veteran military correspondent:

As the sound of the struggle spread throughout the neighborhood, scores of reinforcements arrived on the run with make-shift weapons. Negro women, shouting wildly, joined the milling, cursing group under the tracks, and armed with broomsticks, pitched into the battle, threatening for the moment to turn the tide in favor of their men. But Italian reserves rushed up and steadied the wavering ranks.[18]

The battle was at its height with neither side giving ground, when the police arrived, their blue and red lights flashing. The rioters scattered into the night. The police arrested eleven of the slow and five of the injured were sent to the hospital. Heavy police patrols in the days after the rioting ensured that fighting did not break out again.[19] Most had predicted that such fighting would first occur in Harlem, Black America’s capital. The events in New Jersey, however, catalyzed the action of those in other northeastern cities who also came to blows over events surrounding the Italo-Ethiopian War.

Animosity between the two groups was high in the weeks after the New Jersey riots, and when the town of Adwa fell to the Italian troops on October 3, 1935, emotions flared anew in Harlem. Black Americans retaliated against Italian-Americans.[20] One local paper concluded that,

the first shots of the Italo-Ethiopian War were echoed in New York City…as Negroes and Italians battled in several patriotic skirmishes.[21]

The disorder began with the picketing of Italian businessmen, such as green grocers and icemen, but soon turned violent as black protesters physically assaulted the Italian employees. Displaying the intensity of African-American dedication to the Ethiopian cause, Charles Linous, a thirty-three year-old black man from Harlem refused to leave his position on a stoop near the incident, despite police orders. He stayed, proudly waving the red, orange, and green flag of Ethiopia until the police dragged him to their patrol car.[22]

The demonstrations and rioting also found a place in the schools where black and Italian youth battled it out. At Public School 178 in Brooklyn, a fight broke out between two boys, one from each ethnic group. The next day students brought to school handmade weapons, such as sawed off billiard cues, broom handles, and lead pipes. Parents and school officials asked the police for protection when school let out at 3:00. Police called in additional reinforcements to control the threatening crowd that had gathered outside the school.[23]

The fall of Ethiopia with the capture of its capital, Addis Ababa, by Italian troops in May 1936, and the subsequent reports of mass

executions of Ethiopia’s patriots in occupied territory, upset Ethiopia’s supporters in New York. They compared the plight of the conquered Ethiopians to their own as many cried, “Stop Mussolini’s lynchings!” After a fiery speech by the nationalistic leader, Ira Kemp, four hundred enraged Harlemites vandalized and destroyed Italian-owned businesses in the area, causing many to close temporarily.[24] In the months that followed, Harlem became a violent hot-bed filled with high-strung protesters and rigorous police patrols. One historian has compared the streets of Harlem to those of Addis Ababa.[25]

Reflecting on the 1930s, some might assume that African-Americans concerned themselves only with their domestic condition. In truth, the New Deal years did lay the groundwork for the massive Civil Rights Movement to come in the 1950s and 1960s; however, there also emerged a powerful Pan-African movement, inspired by Marcus Garvey and kept alive partially by the Italo-Ethiopian war. This movement was particularly prominent in the Northeastern cities of the United States. Inspired by Joe Louis, African-Americans during the Italo-Ethiopian War sought to extend the hand of brotherhood to their embattled brothers in Ethiopia.

Some black leaders, however, preferred to focus on domestic issues. In July 1935, the editor of the Chicago Defender asked black Americans to rethink their dedication to international affairs. He pleaded,

Why don’t you fight lynchings, peonage, bastardy, discrimination and segregation? Why don’t you fight for jobs to which you are entitled? Why don’t you fight for your own independence? What advantage is there in your rescuing Ethiopia from the Italians and losing your own country to tyranny and prejudice?[26]

 The logic in this editorial did not make sense to those who saw domestic and foreign affairs as intertwined and inseparable. The head of the International Negro World Alliance, Robert L. Ephriam, angrily asserted after being denied a permit to stage a parade,

We have a very definite interest in our blood brothers in Africa. Americans have a right to express their sympathy for Ethiopia and to volunteer such help as they can, without embarrassing their own country, America.[27]

By supporting their blood brothers in Africa, black Americans were not denying their status as Americans. Interested in fighting injustice wherever it was found, and particularly in their adopted symbolic homeland, many African-Americans equated their struggle at home with Ethiopia’s. The Joe Louis victory over Primo Carnera, and later Max Schmelling, united African- Americans in ways that had previously eluded them. The rising tide of Pan-Africanism, intensified by the Italo-Ethiopian War, breathed new life into the crusade for Civil Rights at home by giving African-Americans the confidence they would so desperately need in the trying years ahead.

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[1] New York Times, June 25, 1935.

[2] The Pittsburgh Courier, June 15, 1935.

[3] New York Times, June 25, 1935.

[4] Ibid., June 26, 1935.

[5] The Pittsburgh Courier, June 29, 1935.

[6] Ibid., July 20, 1935.

[7] William R. Scott, A Study of Afro-American and Ethiopian Relations: 1896–1941 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University, 1971), 154.

[8] New York Times, June 27, 1935.

[9] Ibid., July 14, 1935.

[10] The Pittsburgh Courier, July 20, 1935.

[11] National Archives, Records of the Department of State Relating to Political Relations Between the Soviet Union and Other States, 1930–1939, National Archives Microfilm Publications, Microfilm Publication T1247, Roll 5. Washington, DC: The National Archives and Records Service. General Services Administration, 1980), frame 00800.

[12] National Archives, frame 00827.

[13] New York Times, July 14, 1935.

[14] Ibid., July 25, 1935.

[15] The Commonweal, 22 (Aug. 30, 1935): 414.

[16] National Archives frame 00698.

[17] New York Times, Aug. 12, 1935.

[18] Ibid.

[19] Ibid., Aug. 13, 1935.

[20] William R. Scott, The Sons of Sheba’s Race: African-Americans and the Italo-Ethiopian War, 1935–1941 (Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1993), 99.

[21] New York Times, Oct. 4, 1935.

[22] Ibid.

[23] Ibid., Oct. 6, 1935.

[24] Scott, Afro-American and Ethiopian Relations, 317–318.

[25] Ibid., 318.

[26] Chicago Defender, July 27, 1935.

[27] Ibid., July 6, 1935.