Letter to Johann Philipp Becker, February 16, 1872

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 16 February 1872


First published in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXVI, Moscow 1935
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 44


ENGELS TO JOHANN PHILIPP BECKER

IN GENEVA

London, 16 February 1872

Au citoyen[1] J. Ph. Becker

My dear old Comrade-in-arms,

It gave me great pleasure to receive a letter from you once again after so many years.

The business about Lessner's 10 frs has been settled.[2]

Can you make any suggestions about how we might assist Cuno in remaining where he is, i.e. in Milan? I cannot see any way from here and we would certainly be glad to do all we can to keep the brave fellow at such an important post. These damned Italians make more work for me than the entire rest of the International put together makes for the General Council. And it is all the more infuriating as in all probability little will come of it as long as the Italian workers are content to allow a few doctrinaire journalists and lawyers to call the tune on their behalf.

Marx sent the 100 stamps à 1 silver groschen in a registered letter to the address indicated in Cologne, but we have not yet had a reply.

Your young friend Wegmann is presumably the same person as the one about whom my cousin, Mrs Beust, wrote to me in Manchester a few years ago. I tried a great deal then to find him a position, even though convinced of the impossibility of doing so, and my efforts were indeed unsuccessful, a fact on which I reported to Anna Beust in detail.[3] I shall now write once more to Manchester on his behalf, but would be grateful if Wegmann could let me know in what field he is qualified to take up a position. Unfortunately, I cannot really hold out any prospects of success. The place is crawling with young German and Swiss engineers who snap up any position that arises in no time at all. I really tried everything I knew to find something for an Alsatian refugee, but without success, even though the man was on the spot and had very good references. He finally discovered something by pure chance after a long period of giving lessons.

Things are going well in Spain. The forcible measures taken against the International by the government have really cured people of abstention from politics, and Marx's son-in-law, Lafargue, who is in Madrid, is also doing his utmost to drive the Bakuninist quirks out of their heads. I have no worries about Spain. The people we are dealing with there are workers, and Bakunin's few doctors and journalists in Barcelona have to mind their ps and qs. The Spanish Federal Council is completely on our side. People in various sections have expressed very sensible views, and the Federal Council has released a circular (or was about to do so a little while ago), containing its entire correspondence with the General Council and then putting the question whether the General Council had attempted to treat them, the Spaniards, in a dictatorial fashion. In the meantime, the situation has changed so much that it looks as if open conflict is imminent in Spain, and this has completely cut the ground from under the feet of the Jurassians and their adherents. They really do have other things on their hands now in Spain than to make such a to-do about trivialities.

Outine's letter and the Suisse radicale have arrived. We shall publicise the case[4] without delay.[5]

Your enquiry about the letters really did slip my mind. I shall write to Frankel at once to find out whether he received the two letters, and if not I shall keep on searching. If anything has gone astray I shall let you know immediately.

Marx sends greetings to you all and I do likewise.

Fraternally, your old

F. Engels

  1. ↑ To Citizen
  2. ↑ On 20 January 1872 Becker wrote to Engels that he was forwarding to Friedrich Lessner the dues for the International's Milan section which he had received from Theodor Cuno. Becker further asked for 100 stamps to be sent to Cologne for the admission of new members to the Cologne section of the Association.
  3. ↑ This letter by Engels has not been found.
  4. ↑ A reference to the search of Nikolai Utin's (Outine's) flat on 26-28 January 1872 by the Geneva police who had invented his alleged participation in forging Russian banknotes. Utin's papers, including some documents of the International he was keeping, were confiscated, and only the intervention of a progressive-minded lawyer prevented the Swiss authorities from handing them over to the Russian government.
  5. ↑ K. Marx and F. Engels, 'Declaration of the General Council of the International Working Men's Association'.