Talk:John Amery

North African Film Venture?
On reading Rebecca West's "The New Meaning of Treason," I got the impression John Amery was involved in securities fraud at an early age, that is, as early as age 16, selling private certificates of indebtedness in exchange for production funds. Each attempt to start a film venture landed him deeper and deeper in debt as his parents repeatedly paid off shareholders, until such a time that he was given a stipend sufficient to float him in foreign countries, where he could deal with his own bankruptcy courts, and not drag his parents down with him. Rebecca West's work implies he may have seriously intended to shoot a film, but enough people got to know him, to judge him mentally unfit for the affairs he attempted. The main page of this article would be improved if there were discussion of his activities in North Africa. I was particularly curious how the company had amassed enough gear and film, that it could not go on, but rather, it was unable to go any farther, and why so many crew members were abandoned in North Africa. How did this come about? Are there any newspaper articles that can be cited? As for being put on trial for treason, this same work by Rebecca West implied he could have had a lot of witnesses brought in, and prove he was seriously mentally ill, unable to tell the difference between fact and fiction. The main page of this article does not address the matter of his early years attempting to start up a film production company. Dexter Nextnumber (talk) 06:20, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Amery's wit on the scaffold
I am not convinced at all by the denial of the authorities for the following reasons.

1. When Pierrepoint enters the condemned cell, before he pinions the prisoner, only three or four people are in the cell. Pierrepoint, the prisoner and one or two guards. There is time for a brief exchange before the witnesses enter.

2. The authorites would of course wish to quash any idea that a Nazi "traitor" could be brave enough to crack a joke.

3. In his 1974 autobiography, Pierrepoint confirms the incident and the exact words (without naming Amery). RodCrosby

The Pierrepoint story comes from the suppressed 'Empire News and Sunday Chronicle' series which Pierrepoint attempted to publish after his resignation, in which he confirms that Amery was 'the bravest man I ever hanged'. Proofs of several of the unpublished articles are in the 'PCOM 9' series of documents in the UK National Archives/PRO at Kew.Griz999 08:52, 15 June 2007 (UTC)

Plea of "guilty" to charge of Treason
Quote from article: "he pleaded guilty at his trial to eight charges of treason. ... This is believed to be the only case of a man pleading guilty to a charge of treason in the UK." Comment: The twenty-five men charged with High Treason as a result of the West-Riding Rebellion of 1820 (Rex v. COMSTIVE & others) all pleaded "guilty" at York Castle in September 1820. They were sentenced to drawn, hanged until dead, beheaded, etc, as required by the law of 1814. However, this sentence was respited, pursuant to an agreement reached before the pleas were entered. The sentencing Judge was aware of this, and commented upon it when passing sentence. Ultimately, twelve rebels were transported to Van Diemen's Land, and the remainder were pardoned after serving short periods in custody in England. [end]

Hi, I have removwed the reference to the Jewish origins of the Amery family. This is inaccurate and has been pasted from ther article on Leo Amery. It may be that John Amery's maternal grandmother was a Jew but this surely does not mean that he is from Jewish family. All the best, Pekka —Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.139.161.102 (talk) 19:19, 15 February 2008 (UTC) Actually it does. Jewishness passes through the matriarchal line. If his matriarchal grandmother was Jewish so was his mother, and so was he. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.40.68.54 (talk) 10:36, 5 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Ronald Harwood was a playwright, not a historian. A not guilty plea would not have resulted in Amery's family being embarrassed because Leo Amery's mother was Jewish.  That is nonsense.  There were and are many jews and part jews in the Conservative Party. And even if the family might have been slightly "embarassed" by having failed to tell everyone that a relation was part jewish, that is no reason to plead guilty to treason.  Jewish dogma may state that someone is a jew if their grandmother was part jewish, but most people would nto take such a rigid racist approach to the matter. I presume that Harwood was just seeking publicity for himself.203.184.41.226 (talk) 21:13, 22 February 2013 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:2WWamerybook.jpg
Image:2WWamerybook.jpg is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot 05:30, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Amery background
I'd much prefer not to discuss people's ethnic background, but this article makes a claim on that subject that appears to be false. "It is believed the boys may not have known their grandmother was Jewish" is credibly denied by William D. Rubinstein is Professor of Modern History at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth (author of The Myth of Rescue: Why the Democracies Could Not Have Saved More Jews from the Nazis, Routledge, 1997). (A brief web-search suggests that Rubinstein is extremely supportive of Israel and a creationist).

Rubinstein is quoted at least twice saying "An obvious question is whether John Amery knew of his own Jewish ancestry. There is no direct evidence on this point, but I am fairly sure that he did (Julian Amery, his younger brother, almost certainly did). If so, John's antisemitism must represent part of an Oedipal revolt against his father, though a very unusual one, with the son of a right-wing father moving not to the extreme left (as one might expect) but to the most extreme right. John Amery also found himself, together with everyone in his generation, having to choose sides between murderous extremes, and was, in a sense, a victim of the "devil's decade" of rival totalitarianisms, although plainly his chosen response was an evil one."

More of this article could perhaps be usefully added eg ''"Everything which is known about John Amery suggests that he was an extremely unpleasant, perverse, and deeply troubled young man, 'inclined', according to his father, 'to revolt against the trend of public opinion ... and ... curiously indifferent to the consequences of his actions'. Sent to Harrow, from which he ran away at sixteen, he attempted to become a film producer, and went bankrupt at twenty-five. At the time of his death he had already been married three times. A fierce anti-Communist and Fascist sympathiser, John Amery found himself in France when the Third Republic collapsed; he gradually became a part of the Vichyite and collaborationist network, actively recruited by the Nazis. In 1943 he delivered six radio broadcasts in Germany urging a compromise peace between Britain and the Nazis. More seriously, he also toured prisoner of war camps in an attempt to create an anti-Communist 'legion of St George', consisting of interned British soldiers, who would fight with Nazi Germany against the Soviet Union. In his preliminary hearing, John Amery stated that he never directly attacked Britain, and was not a Nazi, only an anti-Communist. Attempts by his brother Julian Amery to prove that he had, in the late 1930s, taken out Spanish citizenship (and thus did not commit treason against his country) failed, as did efforts by his counsel to show that he was mentally ill. To spare his family unnecessary pain, he pleaded 'guilty' to the eight charges or treason brought against him at the Central Criminal Court in October 1945, apparently the only time that someone accused of treason in a British court has pleaded guilty. The Times reported that Amery's 'long black hair, curling up at the back, was carefully brushed. He wore a brown overcoat and a black and yellow scarf for a reprieve, and John Amery was hanged for treason at Wandsworth Prison on December 19th. 1945."''

Another article by the same author discusses John's father, Leopold Amery, I've put the information in the TalkPage there.

Based anglo Mischling 177.125.43.72 (talk) 02:19, 17 September 2023 (UTC)