Walter Benjamin Garland was born in Brooklyn, NY on November 27, 1913. He joined the U.S. army at age 18 and was discharged after two years, attaining the rank of Private First Class. Subsequently, he returned to his education at Brooklyn College. He studied mathematics for just three years, obtaining his degree on an accelerated track.
Interestingly enough, Garland decided to become a musician after graduation. He worked as an arranger and copier for the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) from 1934 - 1936. In 1935, he joined the Communist Party of the United States of America (CPUSA) and in 1936, he also joined the National Negro Congress (NNC). The NNC arose from the CPUSA’s ideologies; what made the organization special was that it was such a broad coalition of people from many different races, religions, and more, all united under the banner of black liberation and anti-fascism.
It makes sense that all of these radically progressive ideas that Garland was interacting with led him to volunteer to fight for the Republican side in the Spanish Civil War. From his standpoint, black oppression in the United States was exactly the same as the fascism emerging in Europe. In the Franquistas and Nazis, he saw the same people “who chain us in America to cotton fields and brooms.” In 1937, he sailed for Europe aboard the Champlain.
Because of his previous military experience, Walter Garland was better qualified than the majority of his peers. Thus, he was appointed Section Commander of the 17th International Column in the Lincoln Battalion. He was wounded twice during the battle of Jarama, but made a full recovery and was promoted to a lieutenant of a machine gun battalion in the George Washington Brigade. This Brigade would combine with the Lincoln Brigade to form the Washington-Lincoln Brigade, after the Lincolns suffered heavy losses attacking Mosquito Ridge.
Walter Garland was incredibly respected by the men he commanded. His bravery set an example for the inexperienced, and although he was a tough commander, he was willing to give second chances. On July 3, 1937, just a few days before the Brunete offensive was initiated, Garland wrote a letter to a comrade condemning the drunkenness of one of his soldiers. “Drunkenness is a very serious offense…especially in a machine-gun [c]ompany where it may cost the lives of many men,” Garland writes. “However…[i]f comrade…through his future actions proves himself to be a good anti-facist soldier, we shall inform you of that fact with very great pleasure.”
Another one of Garland’s soldiers was Milton Wolff, a Jewish-American who would go on to become the last commander of the Lincoln Battalion. Wolff recounts a particular anecdote about Garland during the battle of Brunete: Garland pulled Leo Kaufman, another Loyalist soldier, off a hill in the middle of enemy fire, wounding himself in the process. After “bringing Leo safely into the waiting arms of Sanidad,” Wolff wrote in an article published after the war, “ Walter t[ied] a handkerchief around his own wound and le[d] us on.” Garland taught Wolff everything he knew about using a machine gun, but what’s more important is that he helped instill in Wolff a sense of self-conviction. Wolff even said that Garland made him feel like he could “take on the whole bloody, professional fascist Armies.”
After recovering from the wound he received at Brunete, Walter Garland was placed in charge of the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion. In August of 1937, he also joined a radio broadcast with Langston Hughes, Harry Haywood, and Louise Thompson to inform Americans back home of the events currently happening in the Spanish Civil War. When asked by Thompson if he regretted coming all the way to Spain to fight this war, Garland remarked that “we Negros who have been in Spain are a great deal luckier than those back in America. Here we have been able to strike back, in a way that hurts, at those who for years have pushed us from pillar to post.” Garland’s original beliefs while joining the war had stayed firm throughout; to him, the fascists in Spain always did and always will embody the same spirit as white supremacists in America.
Just two months after the broadcast, Walter Garland was ordered back home to the United States. He went on a campaign to fundraise for the Friends of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, the American Medical Bureau, and other groups.
Towards the end of the 1930s, Garland ran for office several times with the U.S. Communist Party, albeit unsuccessfully.
When World War II broke out, he joined the army. However, he was prohibited from going overseas, likely due to being classified by the FBI as an individual “believed to be the most dangerous and who in all probability should be interned in event of war.” Despite never being able to fight on the front lines, Garland imparted his military experience at Fort Wadsworth on Staten Island, where he explained what occurred at Brunete during the Spanish Civil War, taught mapmaking, and trained troops in using machine guns. He even used his expertise as a machine gunner to design mechanical improvements to army machine gun sights, earning a military commendation for his ingenuity.
Following the end of World War II, Walter Benjamin Garland, along with another Spanish Civil War veteran Bert Jackson, formed the United Negro Allied Veterans Association (UNAVA).
Garland was expelled from the CPUSA in 1952. Milton Wolff, in an interview post-Spanish Civil War for the documentary The Good Fight, wrote that Garland was “poorly handled by CP [Communist Party] after war.” Garland’s expulsion from the CPUSA may have been due to infighting within the party, spurred on by McCarthyism in the 1950s.
Afterwards, Walter Benjamin Garland moved to Columbus, Ohio. He died there in January 1974.
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