Fineberg Joe

Joe Fineberg

Joe Fineberg (sometimes Feinberg) was born in Poland in 1886.

He became a prominent working class member of the British Socialist Party’s East of LondonJewish section, the “Jewish Social Democratic Organisation”, or JSDO. )

Although Fineberg lived in Hackney, he was the secretary of Stepney BSP branch.

He was guest of honour at a dinner organised at the Old Kings Hall by the Jewish Social Democrats to mark the 100th anniversary of Marx birth. Amongst the 150 guests were representatives of the Jewish Workers Circle.

In July 1918, Fineberg voluntary moved to Soviet Russia, although other East End Russian Communists were actually deported from Britain, including the secretary of the JSDO. In Russia, Fineberg became a translator for the Communist International. He was a member of the British Communist Group in Russia, which was affiliated to the Bolsheviks. 

Fineberg attended the first meeting of the Communist International 2-6th March 1919. He translated and edited, and thus brought to a British audience, "What is to be done" (published in English in 1929) and "Left Wing Communism"(published in 1935), a couple of Lenin’s more famous classic works.

Joe Fineberg died in 1957

Source: `Behind The lines’ by Julia Bush
 

Michael Walker