J. S. Williams

John Samuel Williams (of Dowlais), more commonly known throughout his life as 'J.S' or 'Jack Williams the Communist' was born in Bethseda, Caernarvonshire in 1900. He and his father moved down to the South Wales valleys at some point in the early years of the twentieth century and he worked as a coal hewer.

J.S. Williams probably joined the Communist Party during the early-mid 1920s. He became unemployed in 1926 and remained unemployed for the rest of his life. He devoted his energies to the Communist Party, the National Unemployed Workers' Movement and the Workers' Educational Movement. He was a National Council of Labour Colleges tutor and a student at Coleg Harlech. He served on the South Wales District of the Communist Party of Great Britain and was actively involved in the Hunger Marches of 1931, 1934 and 1936, leading the latter one when Lewis Jones was forced to return to South Wales.

...