In spring of 2023, browsing on Google, I found this article that mentioned me in the Lambda Philatelic Journal (LPJ) for March 2011 (v.30, #1)
“Paul LeRoy Bustill Robeson (1898 –1976) Robeson was a multi-lingual American actor, athlete, Basso cantante concert singer, writer, civil rights activist, fellow traveler, Spingarn Medal winner, and Stalin Peace Prize laureate.
“In 1921 Robeson married Eslanda Cordoza Goode. The couple had one child. Robeson would not play a significant role in Gay and Lesbian history was it not for the fact of rumors concerning his bisexuality. In a 1981 issue of the left-wing magazine WIN (now defunct), an article on Robeson had referred to his bisexuality as if it were a well-established fact. Some years later The Advocate (a national gay magazine) printed the claim that Robeson had 'recently [been] revealed to have been gay.' Again in a 1990 article by Hugh Murray, the author insisted that the matter of Robeson's bisexuality remained 'an open question.' His biographer, Martin Duberman, an American historian, playwright, and gay-rights activist and himself openly gay, insists adamantly he had evidence to the contrary and that 'he found absolutely no evidence of Robeson's erotic interest in men.' and that Robeson was 'singularly, rigorously, contentedly heterosexual.' Duberman did find that Robeson had many sexual liaisons and that his most intense, long-lasting affairs were nearly all with white women and that Robeson’s wife seemingly accepted these extramarital sexual adventures. So the rumor of Robeson’s bisexuality appears to be just a rumor started and continued, but also seems to have been disproved by an openly gay scholar who was chosen by Robeson’s own son to complete the biography of the father.”
I was NOT convinced by this article, especially as relatives of the person in question, especially a wife and/or children, might be the least willing to admit that their husband or dad was bi-sexual. But I decided to make some further inquiries to see if it could be settled to the satisfaction of most.
How did I get into this dispute? I had read Duberman's biography of Robeson and was quite impressed. I wanted to review the book, as I had reviewed many others, publishing them mainly in academic journals. This was before the days of Amazon, where I have now reviewed another 80 books or so. Though much of Duberman's biography of Robeson was terrific, I was convinced Duberman had not properly assessed Robeson's political activities while the black celebrity resided in Britain. I began my review with criticism of a guest on Leonard Lopate's WNYC radio talk show, an NAACP spokesman who declared that Robeson was not involved in the American civil rights movement, and Lopate dropped the topic, allowing that distortion to stand unchallenged.
My review was intended to refute the view of the NAACP, which was so critical of Robeson. I am not going to repeat the bulk of my lengthy review here, but will give one example: the most famous civil rights case of the 1930s was the Scottsboro rape cases, in which 8 teenaged blacks were sentenced to death for raping 2 young white women aboard a freight train near Scottsboro, Alabama. The 14-year-old, also found guilty, was given a light sentence because of his age, - a light sentence of life in prison.
When Robeson was in the UK, the Scottsboro rape case continued as a prime example of American racism and injustice. The NAACP and the Communist-front International Labor Defense fought each other to control the defense; the NAACP lost; the ILD appealed all the way to the very conservative US Supreme Court, and won new trials; major civil right legal victories.
The Comintern, that is the international communist movement, had made this a global effort, like the Sacco-Vanzetti case of the 1920s. The Scottsboro case was the cause celebre of the early-mid 1930s. It was the first time since the American Civil War that America's race problems were a major world-wide issue. And domestically it was important because of the contrasts between policies of the NAACP and the ILD. The NAACP sought to provide the attorneys so it could and plead its cases in court. The ILD believed in that too, but equally important, the ILD also sought to mobilize popular opinion through plays, poems, protests, marches, telegrams to officials. The ILD even sent the mother of two of the Scottsboro boys to present the case of her boys, the background of racism in Alabama and in America, and to urge support as she spoke to audiences in London, Moscow, Amsterdam, and pre-Hitler Berlin. Support for Scottsboro defendants came from South Africa, Mme Sun Yat Sen, widow of China's first President, many of the literary figures of the era, and Einstein. The NAACP could not have conducted such an international campaign to save the young blacks, even if it had wantted to.
My purpose here is not to detail all the ups and downs of the Scottsboro case, but a few more should be mentioned. The case was appealed to the US Supreme Court a 2nd time, and again the “horrible 9 old men” ruled in favor of the defendants in a 2nd major civil rights case victory. FDR, the great liberal, was no fan of the Court he tried to pack. Failing that, Roosevelt finally had his chance to “improve” the court. Might Roosevelt choose a most courageous Alabama former jurist, Judge Horton, who heroically threw out a Scottsboro guilty verdict by the jury of Decatur, Alabama, causing him to lose re-election as a judge; might Judge Horton be the President's pick for the Supreme Court? Close, because FDR's first pick for the high court opening was an attorney from Alabama, but Roosevelt chose instead Hugo Black, an attorney for the Alabama Ku Klux Klan. But the liberal wing of the Klan. If there is some question re FDR's racial views, following the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, the President never invited to the White House Jesse Owens who won 4 gold medals, and who had been cheered in the huge Olympic stadium in Berlin. Nor were the other black atletes invited. Owens later complained, that Hitler did not snub him, but Roosevelt did. I mention this because academia and the historical profession are overwhelmingly Democratic, and for them FDR is a near god. America was not merely racist, it had provided inspiration for some early Nazi racial laws. It is noteworthy that Scottsboro earns some discussion in the new book by British critic Kenan Malik, Not So Black and White: A History of Race from White Supremacy to Identity Politics, in which Malik even contrasts the racial implications of the philosophies of Immanuel Kant and his pupil Johann Gottfried Herder. Not the typical work on race, but a fascinating, thought-provoking one nonetheless.
While this was occurring in the US, Robeson was in mainly in Britain, making films that could be shown throughout Africa – half of which was part of the British Empire. (He was in the US to be featured in Hollywood's 1936 version of “Show Boat,” singing Ole Man River.) Robeson in Britain and America was often on stage in plays and singing. He was aware of America's race problems too, and so it is no surprise noting the 2 co-chairs of the British Scottsboro Defence Committee were Paul Robeson and a university student from east Africa. Johnstone Kenyatta. On the set of some films Robeson, a star, met and befriended some of the extras who were African students. Here, for example Robeson met Nnamdi Azikiwe, who would later become the first President of Nigeria. Robeson surely conversed with the Africans and gained a more comprehensive notion of events in the British Empire, which in the 1930s ruled a quarter of the earth. It should be no surprise that when Robeson returned to the US, he became a leader of the Council on African Affairs. And when one student returned to his homeland, Johnstone became better known as Jomo Kenyatta, led the Mau Mau insurrection against the British, and evertually became the first president of Kenya.
No mention of Kenyatta in Duberman's book. Robeson was aware of race problems in the US and in Africa related to colonialism. The common view now is that Robeson was NOT involved in the American civil rights movement, when he lived abroad, AND when he returned to the US. Most historians follow the lead of the NAACP officials in their hostility both to Communism, front groups, and Robeson, and anyone to their Left. Not only do I disagree with this view, I see it as propaganda of the Truman Democrats and their deal with the NAACP, which would soon include creating new intelligence agenciesfor the Cold War and a Democratic Party McCarthyism before McCarthy..
During his fight to change the Supreme Court, when Roosevelt sought to pack the court with his ideological friends, VP John Nance Garner of Texas opposed his boss. When war in Europe erupted in September 1939, Roosevelt had other worries than the Great Depression to consider. And should he defy convention and run for a 3rd term as President? If he did, Garner had to go. There was no great support for him, and the party was satisfied to dump Garner. FDR decided to replace him with his Sec. Of Agriculture, Henry Wallace. The news of spring 1940 was dominated by the swift German victories over Denmark, Norway, Netherlands, Belgium and then spectatularly over France. Europe's news brought change to the Republicans, with the nomination of a former Democrat whose foreign policy was closer to that of FDR than to the isolationist Republicans. In 1940 Congress finally passed an anti-lynching bill, but FDR chose NOT to sign it. Ending lynching was too controversial for the great liveral Democrat. Roosevelt was re-elected for an unheard of 3rd term.
A Soviet agent in the American Treasury Dept. would play an important part in events of 1941. He was assigned to draw up terms to which Japan would have to agree so that the US would not cut off oil and metal shipments to Japan. The agent basically demanded that Japan withdraw all troops from China, which it could not do and remain a major power. It promised to let us know its answer in December 1941. Stalin knew that Japan would not attack Siberia, so he could then release troops from the Far East to defend Moscow, which was under attack by the Germans by winter 1941. The fresh troops from Siberia helped save Moscow, the USSR, and Stalin. Spies can make a difference.
Democratic President Woodrow Wilson had segregated the American armed services as he segregated the Federal Civil Service. One of his progressive reforms. Democratic President Franklin Roosevelt kept the segregated armed services and Civil Service all through WWII.
An NAACP official on WNYC radio in New York asserted that Robeson did not partake in the American Civil Rights movement. Everyone knows, the CR Movement began in the 1950s, usually with the arrest on the bus of seamstress Rosa Parks. I contend that this version of history is distorted for political reasons, and as most historians and media folks are liberal Democrats, they prefer this version. I contend, the first major post-WWII Civil Rights movement began in 1947-48, it was closely allied with the Henry Wallace Progressive Party, and Paul Robeson was a co-chair of that party. Most Americans have never heard of those civil rights efforts BECAUSE it was a movement destroyed by Harry Truman and the Democrats, with the collaboration of the NAACP.
When Robeson returned to the US, he was involved in civil rights. Moreover, I contend that the real post-WWII civil rights movement began not in the 1950s, but in 1947-48 with the founding of the Henry Wallace Progressive Party, especially with its efforts in the South. Robeson was a co-chair of the PP, and while the Wallace campaign tour of the South got some attention, the attempts by Robeson to hire civic halls for the Party and songs were usually dismissed for various reasons, but the real reason, these were to be racially integrated events. Names of Progressive supporters like Daisy Bates and Buford Posey and Floyd Mc Kissick would pop up later,(Bates during the Central High integration in Little Rock, Posey in exposing the locals in Philadelphia, Miss. who contended that the 3 missing civil rights workers were alive and well and had secretly gone to Cuba, Moscow, or New York; and Floyd Mc Kissisk who in the mid-1960s headed the CORE organization). The Progressive Party activists were in the struggle against the one-party Democrats' misrule in the South. Robeson was Co-Chair or the PP. Even in 1949-50 a 4-year old Carl Bernstein (you may have heard of the Watergate scandal) was involved in restaurant sit-downs (later called sit-ins) in the Baltimore/DC area, thanks to his Progressive mother. The Progressive Party WAS the Civil Rights movement following WWII. And it was smashed by Harry Truman, the Democrats, and the NAACP. Most liberal histories present Truman as a civil rights President, the first to address the NAACP, the first to push for integration of the military. But his Atty. Gen. List of subversive organizations meant that any who had been members of the International Labor Defense, the National Negro Congress, the Civil Rights Congress, or the Council on African Affairs might lose their jobs and suffer other consequences. Robeson stood against the Truman Doctrine on the domestic as wall as the foreign fronts. I hope some day someone will write the history of that earlier civil rights movement. Unfortunately, some of that history, is crumbling, on local newspapers that can fall apart as you turn a page and are then lost, unless also on microfilm. There was an earlier civl rights movement that the Democrats seek to deny. I hope some younger historians can become archiologists of that now hidden movement of about 75 years ago. (There was an early Freedom Ride sponsored by the Fellowship of Reconciliation) in 1947 but its participants were arrested in North Carolina, and it was forgotten until revived in the early 1960s by James Farmer of CORE. (Jim Peck, who had partaken in the earlier ride, was among the first to ride in the 60s and was severely beaten by the segregationists in the South. On some of Robeson's efforts to desegregate auditoriums in the Progressive campaign, see, https://specialcollections.buncombecounty.org/2017/11/09/baritone-singer-paul-robeson-and-the-segregation-policies-of-the-asheville-auditorium/ I hope some younger historians will shake the Democrati/liberal blinders from their eyes and research the earlier civil rights struggle in the South by the Left. The Truman/NAACP deal was clear. When Du Bois, and employee of the NAAACP refused to support Truman, and was openly for Henry Wallace, he was promptly fired. That was the kind of freedom offered by the Democrats. Robeson was against colonialism; why would he support Truman? Happily, the Trumanites did not resort to Stalin's methods of dealing with opponents. Radicals were not executed, (unless they were convicted spies). But it was not an easy time for civil liberties, or civil rights..
When I became aware of the LPJ article years after its publication, I realized my charge about Robeson being bi-sexual was still out there. I then thought, can this be cleared, one way or another before we all die?
In my review of Duberman's biography of Robeson, published in the Journal of Ethnic Studies (Summer, 1990), most of my lengthy review concerned Robeson's politics. However, I added a few pages at the end when I included information of a different sort, based on a source whom I thought would have expert, but rather hush-hush allegations. I first met Eric Gordon in the summer of 1969 in my home town of New Orleans. Eric Gordon, then a graduate student at Tulane U., in New Orleans was organizing the Students for a Democratic Society in the South, and the first such meeting was being conducted at the Tulane student center. I had been teaching the university year at Southern U. in N. O., basically the black branch of the state's black university. Once LSU had a New Orleans branch, then called LSUNO, Southern U. in Baton Rouge would get a branch too, SUNO. I had also been among several faculty members fired for supporting a lengthy student strike that began with pulling down the American flag and replacing it with a black nationalist one – black, red, and green. Of course, in the spring of 1969 many campuses throughout the nation erupted, as at Cornell U. in New York. Eric hoped the new SDS would supplant the less radical SSOC, the Southern Students' Organizing Committee. I remember that organization best for its button, - in the foreground a black hand and white hand shaking in friendship, background, the Confederate battle flag (the rebel flag) SNCC and CORE had generally expelled all their white members in the early-mid 60s, so SSOC was mainly for white Southern lefties and liberals. It was also before politically correct madness that would stigmatize as “racist” any symbol of the South, and later, any symbol of America in general. Ironically, the model for the black hand on the button was John Lewis, who became an elected Representative from Georgia. He would later have to give his denunciation of the rebel flag to satisfy the new intolerance of our times.
After being fired at SUNO, I left for Europe. In New York City in the 1980s I encountered Eric Gordon again. We were both singing in the Gay Men's Chorus. I have an extremely nasal, and limited voice, but the chorus invited all. Eric however could really sing, and we stood next to each other, sang and chatted. When he heard I planned to review the book on Robeson, he wanted to give me important information. He assured me that Robeson had a male lover. His lover lived in a separate home; it was all kept secret, but Eric was emotional in asserting that it was true. I asked the name of his lover; but Eric was not at liberty to provide that. If you check Eric's name on google, you will see he is an expert on music, and radicals, so I assumed his story was true. I also assumed that with his radical background he had inside information.
In the concluding pages of my review in the J. of Ethnic Studies (Summer 1990, pp. 125-42), I criticize Duberman for not probing into the possibility that Robeson was bi-sexual.(136) For that, Duberman would denounce me in print, and even the stamp world would read of our dispute.
Interestingly, I made another error in the final “musical “ pages of my review. I accused the wrong Robeson accompanist of being gay. Eric Gordon caught the error, wrote to the journal, and Gordon's letter criticizing me was published, along with my acknowledgement of my error. That was published a year after my article. But Gordon did NOT criticize what I had written about Paul Robeson possibly being bi-sexual.(See Journal of Ethnic Studies, Winter 1991, p. 142)
When I read the LPJ article, I thought we should settle this before we die. I wrote to an old acquaintance, and she kindly gave me Eric Gordon's address. I wrote to him, in part here is the email -
> Hello Eric, ... > I recall that you knew much more about his male lover. Not only is he dead, but our time is running out. If you know, I urge you to reveal pertinent material and end the debate. Of course, I would like to claim Paul as one of ours, but truth is what is important. Can you settle the issue one way or the other?
and Eric responded:
Sent to me March 3, 2023 I'm not sure I can settle this one way or another. I heard a story third hand that intrigued me but with no substantiation I have long since concluded that it was either a fantasy or perhaps my informant’s memory was faulty. So I have not put much stock in it ever since. I trust Duberman to have the final answer to your question.
In the 1990s I encountered a man who had been a paper boy in his youth for radical publications.
He delivered to the elderly Roberson, and on one occasion, thought Paul was coming on to him. He said Paul invited him for some green tea, and that in the gay community, that was an “invitation.” As someone who has resided in Asia, I know that many Asians believe green tea is healthy, and green tea is added to many items. In Saigon I had green tea cheese cake at Starbucks. I think you can find it in toothpaste. The man who had been a paper boy, never said there was sex, just that he thought Paul was inviting him. I think he was mistaken. Moreover, IF Paul Robeson had been bi, surely over the years someone would have come forward with their more elaborate stories. The absence of more allegations over time, basically confirms what Duberman wrote.I apologize. I was wrong. I have no evidence that Paul Robesonwas bi-sexual. I apologize to the Paul Robeson family andto Martin Duberman. Hugh Murray
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