Some comrades of the Socialist League and the Revolutionary Propagandist Committee, which existed prior to the formation of the League and was afterwards merged with it, desire to record in the Freedom. their heartfelt sorrow at the loss of our lamented Comrade Morris.
We call him Comrade, for despite all the differences and divisions which have arisen and must occur as to the best method of attacking the citadel of capitalism, and although diversity of opinion in this respect led to a parting of the ways, yet no truer or stronger friendships were ever created than existed between Morris and the working comrades of the Socialist League.
Amidst all that has been written and spoken around his newly-made grave, much of it only for self-advertisement or to fan the fires of controversy, we feel that it would be marring our tribute to his memory if we joined in the debate as to his motives for seceding from the Socialist League.
Of more importance are the motives which impelled him to join the Socialist movement. His love of the beautiful in Art and Nature canned him to revolt against the sordidness, the filth and the misery, which are the concomitants of capitalism.
His deep human sympathy went out towards the victims of competition; it kindled within him a revolutionary fervour which is betokened in his "Chants for Socialists" (notably "No Master"), "John Ball," and his prophetic forecast of the Social Revolution in "News from Nowhere" these will remain as enduring monuments which, as we labour in the Cause of Human Emancipation from the curse of commercialism will ever cheer us and keep his memory green in our hearts
(Signed)
| S. MAINWARING | F. KITZ |
| JOHN TURNER | J. LANE |
| H. GRAHAM | T. CANTWELL |
William Morris, from some of his old comrades
Sam Mainwaring, Frank Kitz, John Turner, Joseph Lane, H. Graham, and Tom Cantwell
Freedom, Vol X No 110, November 1896
Graham Seaman, September 2020.