MEMORIAL TRIBUTE
TO HENRY WINSTON

JANUARY 11, 1987

CHARLENE MITCHELL (PRESIDING), Member of the
Political Bureau, Chair of the Commission on Afro
American Equality, Communist Party, USA

REV. HOWARD PARSONS, Professor of Philosophy,
Representative of the World Peace Council to the
United Nations

WALTER ROZANSKI, Son-in-law of Henry Winston, for
the family

JOE WALKER, President, International Organization of
Journalists U.S. Chapter; Public Relations Specialist,
Public Employees Federation, AFL-CIO

ROSLYN DLUGIN, Guitarist

GUS HALL, General Secretary, Communist Party, USA

EUGENE 'GUS' NEWPORT, Co-Chair, U.S. Peace Council;
Former Mayor, Berkeley, California

ANGELA DAVIS, Member of the Central Committee,
Communist Party, USA; Co-Chair, National Alliance
Against Racist & Political Repression

CHET WASHINGTON, Bass; accompanied
by DAVID FRIEDLANDER

JOHN ABT, Attorney at Law

PERCY SUTTON, Chairman, InnerCity Broadcasting
Corporation; Former Manhattan Borough President

ELENA MORA, Editor, Dynamic Magazine; Member of the
National Committee, Young Communist League

DR. JAMES E. JACKSON, Secretary, Central Committee;
Member of the Political Bureau, Communist Party, USA

Henry Winston was born in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, where he lived until 1925. At that time his parents, Lucille and Joseph Winston, moved their family of six children to Kansas City, Missouri.

In Kansas City the young Henry Winston came to the fore of his school classes and stood out on the playing field in sports. But the hard times of the Depression years soon closed in on his school days.

Winston joined the growing lines of job seekers. He entered the job market to help sustain the family. Already a veteran in the defense of his dignity against racist practices and prejudices, he entered on the road of the class struggle. At this time he made his lifelong commitment to the cause of the workers who produce the nation's wealth. Winston championed a fair distribution of goods to satisfy the material and cultural needs of people, advocated the right of workers to become the owners of the fruits of their labor and to exercise political power to ensure the just and peaceful development of society.

In 1933 Winston joined the Young Communist League. He became a leader in the struggles of the unemployed, and for the civil rights and equality of Afro-American people against racist repression, Jim Crow laws and lynch terror. By 1936 Winston had become the National Administrative Secretary of the Young Communist League, and at the same time he became a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, USA. From that time forward, for an eventful half century, the public life of Henry Winston was inseparable from the history of the Communist Party. Gus Hall described Henry Winston on the occasion of his sixtieth birthday as "the steel cable that binds together the Party, and the Party with the working class." The Communist Party was the channel of choice for his entire life's work.

*(Please turn the page)*

Henry Winston exerted an important influence on progressive developments of his times, in the United States and throughout the world. He was a soldier in the war against fascism for four years. He was a leading personality in the ongoing battle for peace in the world and for an end to the existence of nuclear weapons, on earth and in space. He was an internationalist who championed the brotherhood of nations. He ardently supported the cause of the overthrow of apartheid in South Africa and defended Nicaragua's inalienable right to freely determine its own path of development. He was a loyal friend of the Soviet Union, of Cuba, of Ethiopia, and of all the great community of states which have embarked on the socialist path.

Henry Winston's political outlook was always one of realism and of confidence—confidence in the power of the people to save humanity from nuclear destruction, to overcome all difficulties and to gain the high ground of the triumph of the people's cause everywhere on earth.

Henry Winston was not only a person of great dedication to noble ideals. He also inspired others by his example of courage and hard work. Above all, there was a special warm, human touch in his relationship to people. He was without ostentation or guile. He was modest and ever concerned with the comfort and well-being of those about him. A confident and reassuring smile wreathed his face, especially in the presence of children, whom he dearly loved.

Henry Winston was a devoted husband, father, son and brother in a family circle that will ever honor his memory. He is survived by his wife Fern, his mother Lucille, his sister Roberta, his daughter Judith, his nephew Sylvester, and many grandchildren.

*The family of Henry Winston and the Central Committee of the Communist Party, USA would like to thank all those who are here today as well as those who sent messages of condolence.*

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