The West Sussex Fascists of the 1930s

When the Churchill government introduced internment without trail in May 1940 of supposed ‘fifth columnists’, more people were arrested in West Sussex than any other English county. Who were these West Sussex Fascists and how influential were they? Oswald Mosley’s spokesman on agriculture was a farmer in Angmering, another local leader was both a borough and county councillor, even one of the county’s vicars was a fascist. Yet these men were not always what we might expect, with views on the environment and popular music that could seem more progressive than reactionary.