Robert and Mabel Williams were two of the most militant organizers of the Black liberation movement in its first couple decades. Unwilling to wait for the US legal system do undo its legacy of white supremacy and consequently in conflict with civil rights groups taking that road, the Williams’ armed defense and anti-colonialist politics put targets on their backs, forcing them into exile. Their story is one that, despite frequent efforts to bury it in the dustbin of history, continues to be heard and retold. Likewise, it continues to inspire. In 2025, Robert’s memoir was republished together with Mabel’s memories by the University of North Carolina’s publishing house. Titled The Memoirs of Robert and Mabel Williams: African American Freedom, Armed Resistance, and International Solidarity, the text includes Robert’s unpublished memoir While God Lay Sleeping and Mabel’s briefer collection of memories. Both manuscripts were submitted shortly before their deaths; Robert’s in 1996 and Mabel’s in 2014. Together they provide an important, radical and under-discussed element of the African-American movement for liberation.
Both Mabel and Robert Williams grew up in Monroe, NC, a small town just south of Charlotte that is now part of the greater Charlotte, NC suburban area. An indication of its history is that a park named after the notoriously racist GOP senator Jesse Helms lies within the city limits. When Robert and Mabel were growing up there, the town was clearly segregated by skin tone and African-Americans were second-class citizens. Of course, this scenario was a relatively common (and legally defined) one across the US South and an unofficial scenario throughout most of the rest of the United States. As a youngster, Robert bristled at living under white supremacy, but had no means to express his dissatisfaction. His mother preached Christian forgiveness and acceptance while one of his uncles spoke angrily and sarcastically about forgiveness and white supremacy. It wasn’t until the 1950s, when Williams was in his twenties, that he decided to do something about it.
The focus of his decision was the town’s racially segregated swimming pool. Even after the defacto organization of Black Monroe residents had asked to set aside a few hours a week for Black children to swim, the white power structure said no. The rationale—which would only make sense to a white supremacist—is that the town couldn’t do this because it would require them to change water after each time African-Americans swam in the pool. The struggle around the pool intensified. Klan members and other racist whites held marches in the part of town mostly populated by Blacks; the marchers carried guns and threatened to shoot. In response, Robert Williams armed the local branch of the NAACP, a branch he had formed with other angry young Black citizens, some who had recently been in the US military. He was able to take over the local branch because it had become moribund and ineffective. Of course, when the new chapter began to carry guns, the national NAACP distanced itself from Williams and the Monroe group. As this was underway, Williams began publishing a newspaper called the Crusader. Likewise, he began a radio show. Both media outlets reflected the Williams’ politics of Black liberation and socialist revolution.
Eventually, the conflict between the racist power structure, its supporters and the Black citizens boiled over. Robert Williams, who had been married to Mabel for a bit by then, was charged with a number of crimes, forcing the couple and their family to leave Monroe and the US. After a brief time in Canada and with the help of some allies and supporters, the Williams made their way to Cuba. The Cuban government welcomed them. The years the Williams spent in Cuba were both educational and fraternal. The revolutionary government in Cuba supported an international edition of the Crusader and the Williams traveled as guests and representatives of the Black liberation movement to China and other nations. They were not without controversy, however. The Soviet Union and China were fighting an ideological battle that would ultimately affect the worldwide socialist movement and various anti-imperialist struggles. There were also sections of the communist movement in Cuba who saw the US Black liberation movement as a diversion from the working class struggles in the Americas. The attacks from these forces would eventually convince the Wiliams family to move to China, where they lived until their return to the United States—a journey filled with deceit and lies from various US officials around the globe.
As this review only hints at, this is a book filled with stories of lives lived in resistance to white supremacy in all of its guises and with its focus on the capital of white supremacy—the United States. Mabel’s memoir is considerably shorter than Robert’s While God Lay Sleeping was in its first incarnation. Mabel’s section of the book is expressed in words which, while few in number, reveal a deep and humane understanding of the work she and her partner were involved in. More importantly, it emphasizes the work still to be done.
The Williams are historically less remembered than other Black liberation fighters, yet the lives they lived remain as important as the struggle they led and participated in. In a time when the most reactionary forces of white supremacy are once again publicly asserting their poison into the culture and politics of the world in ways many are only beginning to see and understand, the militance of the Williams’ politics and tactics must be seriously considered if we are to prevent the vision those reactionary forces have in mind.
