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Literal Nazis (episode 215)
They stockpiled guns and ammunition. They built homemade bombs. They had a hit list of a dozen members of Congress who were targeted for assassination. They believed themselves to be patriots, with soldiers and police officers among their ranks. They rallied under the motto of America First, but they planned to overthrow our Constitutional government and install a fascist dictatorship. Believe it or not, I’m not talking about the insurrection on January 6, 2021, but instead a plot that the FBI uncovered in January 1940. The subsequent investigation threw a spotlight on a group called the Christian Front that made its headquarters at Boston’s Copley Plaza hotel, promoting violent attacks on Jewish Bostonians while accepting covert funding and support from a Nazi spymaster who flew the swastika proudly from his home on Beacon Hill.
Please check out the transcript and full show notes at: http://HUBhistory.com/215/
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Literal Nazis- “Inside the Christian Front,” Theodore Irwin, 1940
- Under Cover: My Four Years in the Nazi Underworld of America, Arthur Derounian (John Roy Carlson), 1943
- NORWOOD, STEPHEN H. “Marauding Youth and the Christian Front: Antisemitic Violence in Boston and New York During World War II.” American Jewish History, vol. 91, no. 2, 2003
- “Transcending Boundaries: Boston’s Catholics and Jews, 1929-1965,” Jenny Goldstein, 2001
- “Voices of Defeat,” LIFE Magazine, April 13, 1942
- A survey of news suppression and final exposure of anti-semitic violence in Boston in 1943, Perley J Griswold, 1949
- Execution of George Armstrong under the UK’s 1940 Treachery Act
- Boston Globe Articles (paywalled)
- Jan 15, 1940 the bombing plot is uncovered
- Jan 15, 1940 initial police investigation of Boston CF chapter
- Jan 16, 1940 Boston chapter claims they’re not involved in bomb plot, police decline to investigate them
- Jan 17, 1940 NYPD officers were members of the CF, involved in plot
- Feb 7, 1940 indictments in the bombing plot
- Mar 21, 1940 Boston CF leaders subpoenaed
- Sep 8, 1940 Christian Front comes out of the shadows at a mass meeting at Boston Arena for Father Coughlin
- Jun 3, 1941 Boston City Censor says he didn’t authorize CF to screen Nazi propaganda
- Jun 20 1941 consulate closing
- Jul 8 1941 Scholz burns papers as consulate closes
- Jan 6, 1942 police raid CF, seize books
- Jan 7, 1942 police seize books, pamphlets, records from Boston CF
- Jan 8, 1942 Moran agrees to disband CF, help US war effort
- Mar 16, 1942 Frances Sweeney thrown out of Curran’s Evacuation Day speech, denounced as fascist
- Oct 26, 1943 Violent arrest on same page as antisemitic attack, Coughlin meeting
- Oct 27, 1943 Jewish boys arrested and beaten by BPD
- Oct 28, 1943 Testimony about violent rampage by BPD during arrest
- Dec 3, 1943 Moran sworn into Army
- Mar 20, 1944 Jewish band members beaten with brass knuckles during Evacuation Day parade