Thomas Hastie Bell

Thomas Hastie Bell
170px Thomas H. Bell, 1888
Born	Edinburgh

Thomas Hastie Bell (1867–1942) was a Scottish anarchist. He was born in Edinburgh in 1867. While in Paris, he urged anarchists in France for an open-air meeting and distributed handbills. In Place de la République in a Sunday, amidst a big crowd and policemen, he climbed up a lamp-post and gave a speech. The police threatened him with prosecution for "insults to the Army and the law", but the authorities were not inclined to prosecute him. After two weeks in jail he was expelled as "too dangerous a man to be allowed loose in France". On the visit of Tsar Nicholas II to Britain, Bell got through to the Tsar’s carriage and shouted in his face “Down with the Russian tyrant! To hell with all the empires!”. Again the British authorities decided not to prosecute him, because a Scottish jury would probably throw out any charges.

Emma Goldman described Bell as "of whose propagandistic zeal and daring we had heard much in America".

References

• Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America 1995 by Paul Avrich