From Peter Röser's Evidence

Peter Röser, a member of the Communist League Central Authority in Cologne, was sentenced to six years' imprisonment at the Cologne communist trial in November 1852. From December 1853 to February 1854 he was in prison first in Berlin and then in Stettin. Hoping to ease his lot he gave written evidence, which survived in the Prussian police archives, concerning mainly the Communist League activity and the Cologne communities' contacts with Marx and other leaders in London. In particular, he quoted from memory some letters Marx sent to Cologne, which are not extant. Some of the information he gave was inexact, perhaps owing partly to the fact that he himself was not well informed and partly to a deliberate attempt on his part to give a more moderate impression of the Communist League's activity. So he gave an oversimplified account of Marx's idea about the stages of transition to communism, as though Marx reduced the whole process of revolutionary-transformation passing through various stages merely to education. Contrary to Röser's assertion, the Cologne community of the Communist League already existed before it received Marx's letter early in 1850 suggesting that organisational activity in the Rhine Province should be intensified. Schramm was slightly and not seriously wounded in the duel with Willich, and seconds from both parties were present. Despite these and some other inaccuracies, Röser's evidence on the whole presents an objective picture of the state of affairs in the Communist League at the time and throws additional light on the struggle by Marx and his associates against the sectarian adventurists. (MECW Note)

Immediately after the New Year of 1850 I received a letter from Marx in which he asked me to set up a community^[1] in Cologne and to do my utmost to start communities in other Rhine towns, because, now that freedom of speech and of the press has been all but suppressed, he too considers it necessary to reorganise the League, as in the near future, clandestine propaganda will alone be possible. I replied that I was prepared to do this but demanded, before proceeding further, Rules to which we [must] conform and such as would preclude any kind of conspiracy. Marx replied that the Rules of 1847^[2] were no longer in keeping with the times, that the Rules of 1848 were no longer approved in London^[3] and that new Rules were to be drafted; also that, as soon as the League had been organised, a Congress was to be held to which the Rules would be submitted for approval. Up till then, he said, I was to organise things on the basis of the Manifesto^[4] of 1847 which was sold openly in Cologne in 1848 as printed in The Hague and had been in my possession ever since. In both letters he urgently recommended that I hold discussions with Dr Daniels and Burgers with a view to recruiting them into the League...

...In the letter I received from Marx, he repeated that his brother-in-law, von Westphalen,^[5] a lawyer resident in Trier, had formerly been admitted by him into the League and had subsequently set up a community in Trier, but that he was a lazy man and had of late failed to reply to his letters. Marx asked me to write to this von Westphalen, since it was less dangerous for me to correspond with him from Cologne.

I received no reply to two letters conveyed to von Westphalen through Schlegel...

...At the end of July^[6] Wilhelm Klein, a knife grinder and a native of Solingen, who had hitherto lived in London as a refugee, having been compromised by his participation in the uprising in Elberfeld in 1849,^[7] returned from London to Germany after the trial relating to the Elberfeld uprising was over and there was no longer any fear of his being prosecuted. I had known Klein since the time of the 1848 and 1849 congresses in Cologne.^[8] He arrived in Cologne at the end of July 1850, lodged there with his uncle, whose name and address I do not know, and brought me a letter from Marx in which the latter gave vent to his anger at Willich & Company and said it was a great pity that Schapper should have attached himself to this bunch of frauds. He said that during the winter of 1849/50 he had lectured to the London Workers' Society on the Manifesto and had explained that communism could only be introduced after a number of years, that it would have to go through several phases and that generally its introduction could only be effected by a process of education and gradual development, but that Willich had violently opposed him with his rubbish—as Marx called it—saying that it would be introduced in the next revolution, if only by the might of the guillotine, that the hostility between them was already great and he [Marx] feared it would lead to a split in the League, General Willich having got it firmly into his head that, come the next revolution, he and his brave men from the Palatinate would introduce communism on their own and against the will of everyone in Germany. Finally he recommended the said Klein to me as a capable worker who did not as yet have any clear idea of social and communist principles. Here I must repeat what I said during the trial^[9] —that we did not receive the second London Address^[10] or at any rate I was not given it by the said Klein...

...One afternoon during the second half of September 1850 Dr Daniels and Burgers turned up at my lodgings accompanied by a young man whom they described as Haupt, a salesman and native of Hamburg, who was on his way home from London. Whether it was Daniels or Burgers who told me that Haupt had brought with him a letter from Marx addressed to Daniels, I cannot recollect, but either one or the other told me this. We went together to Burgers' lodgings which Daniels left immediately afterwards and where I remained alone with Burgers and Haupt. At this point the letter was handed to me and, having read it, I found that the contents tallied with the letter previously received from Marx. In it Marx said that it was no longer possible to go along with Schapper and Willich, that there had been a formal split and that the majority of the London Central Authority had decided to remove the Central Authority to Cologne and that, should the people in Cologne accept that resolution, they, as the new Central Authority, would shortly have to draft new Rules, which might possibly have to remain provisionally in force until the next Congress, and that they would have to communicate the said Rules to the districts and communities^[11]

Haupt gave us detailed information on the London conflict and stressed in particular that the split had occurred because Marx and Engels, the opposing party maintained, were not going forward resolutely enough and refused to abandon the illusion that it would not be possible to introduce communism already in the next revolution. The conflict had become so embittered that Schramm called Willich a liar at a committee sitting. The result was that Willich challenged Schramm to a duel, which took place on Belgian territory.^[12] Willich is said to have left Schramm lying severely wounded at the place of the duel while he himself returned to London and said that he had bumped Schramm off. There were no seconds at the duel, Schramm was found by a peasant, in whose house he was attended to, and later he returned to London. This Schramm is a Krefeld merchant.

We explained to Haupt that we would submit the resolutions of the Central Authority to the community for discussion, but must first await the arrival of the relevant minutes which, Haupt had said, would follow. Haupt told us that he had fought in the Baden campaign^[13] and had taken refuge in Switzerland, and had gone from there to London. It was only very recently that he had been admitted into the League by Marx. I was surprised at his admittance and subsequently also expressed my disapproval of it to Burgers, because I did not trust Haupt.

...A few days later, I received through the cashier Zimmermann a letter from Eccarius together with a copy of the London minutes, if I am not mistaken, of the 15th of September 1850!^[14] I had recommended Zimmermann to Marx as a reliable man. I gave him the letters and took the letters from him. Police Sergeant Quelting of Cologne saw me frequently visit Zimmermann at his tax collector's office. Through whom Zimmermann forwarded the letters I do not know, but at all events through guards or other employees of the Cologne-Aix-la-Chapelle Railway. Marx must have had similar connections in Belgium and on the Calais-Dover or Ostend-London crossings, through whom letters were forwarded.

The letter was signed by Eccarius. At that time Engels must already have been living in Manchester and Eccarius have been secretary of the Central Authority. I knew of Eccarius, partly through Moll and partly from an earlier letter which, as secretary of the London Workers' Society, he had addressed to the Cologne Workers' Association^[15] in the autumn of 1848. This last-mentioned letter is among the documents relating to the case. I obtained the most reliable information on Eccarius during a visit I paid to Schapper in Cologne in February 1850.

There was nothing in Eccarius' letter save a note to the effect that the minutes of the London Central Authority were enclosed. The minutes contained the resolutions already communicated to us by Marx, namely the removal of the Central Authority to Cologne and the drafting of new Rules. The minutes had been signed by the majority of the now dissolved London Central Authority—that is, if I am not mistaken, by Marx, Eccarius, Schramm, Harry Bauer, Pfänder and by Engels or else by Friedrich^[16] Wolf (Lupus)—I can no longer say for certain—and the signatures were, moreover, original ones. Hence I cannot say whether the minutes sent to Cologne were the original ones, or a duplicate of the same, or a copy with original signatures. This document remained in Burgers' possession and only after we had been arrested was it burnt with all the other papers, as stated by Burgers during the final hearing. Burgers had placed the said papers in safe hands—whose, I do not know, nor could I hazard a guess...

...Finally, I would further remark that we—both parties, that of Marx as well as that of Schapper—have been reproached for wanting communism. Yet it was on the question of the introduction of communism that the two parties became declared opponents, even enemies. Schapper-Willich propose to introduce communism on the basis of the present state of education, if necessary in the next revolution and by force of arms. Marx considers it to be feasible only by a process of education and gradual development and, in a letter to us, cites four phases, through which it must pass before it is introduced. He says that as things are now, the petty bourgeoisie and proletariat will combine against the monarchy until the next revolution. That revolution will not be of their making but will arise out of the force of circumstances, of the general distress. It will be accelerated by periodically recurring trade crises. Only after the next revolution, when the petty bourgeoisie is at the helm, will the communists' activities and opposition really begin. This will be followed by a social and then a socio-communist republic which will finally make way for the purely communist republic...

After the Central Authority had removed to Cologne, Marx told me in a letter that there was a very good community in Göttingen and that Liebknecht, a student, maintained correspondence with it, for which there were very favourable opportunities. For this reason he held that it was better for the time being to correspond with this community from London. I presume that this community consisted or still consists of students. Liebknecht studied in Giessen and Göttingen and does not come from Hanau, as I mistakenly testified today. My testimony in this instance must therefore be corrected. But one of the members of the London League is from Hanau, his name will be easy to ascertain. I can give no further testimony on the community in Göttingen, we never corresponded with it...