Declaration by Karl Marx on His Naturalisation in England

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Getting ready to travel to Karlsbad for medical treatment in August 1874, Marx applied to become naturalised in Britain. This was a precaution against possible reprisals by the Austrian authorities. Marx left for Karlsbad on August 15, having failed to receive a reply to his application.

This document is an official blank on which information about Marx (in italics in the text) has been entered in a clerk’s hand. Only the signature is Marx’s. The special report by W. Reimers and J. Williams was written on a separate blank.

Appended to the application are the statements made by Marx’s referees written on special blanks, as well as the letter of Morris R. Willis, Marx’s lawyer, to the Secretary of State for the Home Department of August 29, 1874, requesting to know the reasons for the refusal to grant a Certificate of Naturalisation.

I Carl Marx

of No. 1 Maitland Park Road Haverstock Hill in the County of Middlessex, Doctor of Philosophy, do solemnly and sincerely declare as follows:

That the statements contained in the paper writing now produced and shown to me marked with the letter “A” purporting to be a Memorial addressed by myself to The Right Honourable Richard Assheton Cross, Esq., M.P., Her Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for the Home Department, praying for the Grant of a Certificate of Naturalisation under the provisions of the Act of Parliament made and passed in the 33rd year of the Reign of Her present Majesty Queen Victoria, Cap. 14 intituled “An Act to amend the Laws relating to the Legal Condition of Aliens and British Subjects”, are true as therein set forth.

And I make this solemn Declaration conscientiously believing the same to be true and by virtue of the provisions of an Act made and passed in the 6th year of the Reign of His late Majesty King William IV intituled “An Act to repeal an Act of the present Session of Parliament intituled ‘An Act for the more effectual Abolition of Oaths and Affirmations taken and made in various Departments of the State, and to substitute Declarations in law thereof and for the more entire suppression of voluntary and contra-judicial Oaths and Affidavits and to make other provisions for the abolition of unnecessary Oaths’”.

Declared at Number 82 Saint Martin's Lane in the County of Middlessex this first day of August One thousand eight hundred and seventy four Before me Christ. R. Cuff, A London Commissioner to administer oaths in Chancery,

[signed] Karl Marx

METROPOLITAN POLICE OFFICE

Detective Officer's Special Report

Scotland Yard

17th August 1874

Carl Marx.—Naturalisation.

With reference to the above I beg to report that he is the notorious German agitator, the head of the International Society, and an advocate of Communistic principles. This man has not been loyal to his own King and Country.

The referees Messrs Seton, Mathesen, Manning, and Adcock are all British born subjects, and respectable householders. The statements made by them with reference to the time they have known the applicant are correct.

W. Reimers—Sergeant

J. Williams—Sergeant