Biography
Clyde Allen was a Black unemployed man prosecuted in Brooklyn's "Hammer Man" case. Police shot him during his arrest and took him to hospital before he was jailed. A Kings County jury convicted him of second-degree burglary and first-degree rape. The International Labor Defense organized a defense campaign, arguing that attacks attributed to the Hammer Man had continued while Allen was in custody. On November 1, 1935, the Appellate Division reversed his conviction and ordered a new trial, finding that the trial court had improperly barred a defense witness from testifying and refused requested jury instructions.
Daily Worker, July 10, 1934: Page 1 includes the allegation that Allen was arrested, shot in the leg and framed on a false charge in the fifteen-organization delegation’s complaint about New York police violence. This adds a contemporary attribution for the injury claim within his existing prosecution, without changing later court outcomes or supplying a new arrest day. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1934/v11-n164-jul-10-1934-DW-LOC.pdf
Daily Worker, December 24, 1935: Page 4 reports that a sixteen-person political-prisoner relief delegation visited him in Brooklyn’s Raymond Street jail on December 23 and then visited Ruben Kaufman at Welfare Island. The visit establishes Allen’s continuing local detention after reversal of the original conviction; it does not supply a new arrest or release date. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n309-NY-dec-24-DW-Q.pdf
The February 18, 1935 issue prints Clide Allen in a defense appeal describing his imprisonment at Sing Sing and the International Labor Defense campaign in the Brooklyn Hammer Man prosecution. Its thirty-five-year formulation is the paper’s description of the imposed sentence, not actual time served; the existing record preserves the conflicting concurrent-term account and later court outcomes. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1935/v12-n042-Nat-feb-18-1935-DW-LOC.pdf#page=5
The ILD statement on page 4 invokes the Clyde Allen case as a comparison to the May’s strike prosecutions, accusing Geoghan of relentlessly prosecuting an innocent Black worker and sending him to prison for a long term. This is an attributed contemporary defense statement, with no precise length or new personal incarceration established. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1936/v13-n111-NY-May-08-1936-DW-Q.pdf
The article dates the shooting and arrest to May 25, 1934, says charges were delayed for days and places him in Raymond Street Jail awaiting a new trial. The reported thirty-five-year sentence is an imposed-term description already distinguished from the concurrent-term account, not actual time served. Daily Worker, January 14, 1936, original PDF page 4. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1936/v13-n012-NY-jan-14-1936-DW-Q.pdf#page=4
The Brooklyn report places his retrial in Kings County Court Part 9 on December 16, describes the prosecution’s robbery-and-rape allegations and names officer Arthur Wallot in the arrest account. This is a pre-verdict observation in the existing prosecution; it does not replace the separately documented December 18 sentence or establish another arrest. Laisve, December 16, 1936, original PDF page 6. Source: https://www.spauda2.org/laisve/archive/1936/1936-12-16-LAISVE.pdf#page=6
Labor Defender, February 1936, PDF page 9: The Christmas-visit account places him at Raymond Street Jail, Brooklyn, awaiting a new trial obtained by the ILD. It establishes ongoing confinement at the visit, without a precise admission or discharge date. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1936/v12-%5B10%5Dn02-feb-1936-orig-LD.pdf#page=9
Labor Defender, March 1935, PDF page 17: Printed Clide Allen, the defense account dates his arrest at his evicted Brooklyn home to May 25, 1934 and says police shot his knee and held him three days without charges. It describes hospital identification attempts, alleged coercion and the defense challenge to a purported confession he denied making. The imposed 35 years is not actual service and the article’s frame-up claims are attributed. This is the existing Hammer Man prosecution, not a second arrest. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/labordefender/1935/v11n03-mar-1935-orig-LD.pdf#page=17
Contemporary custody source
The January 14, 1936 Daily Worker, Page4 confirms the already recorded May 25, 1934 arrest, followed by several days before charges were laid. It reports that Allen was still in Raymond Street Jail, Brooklyn, after a new trial had been awarded. The new-trial order is not treated as a release, and this report does not establish his eventual custody endpoint.
After the original conviction was reversed, a second trial resulted in two consecutive sentences totaling fifteen to thirty years, imposed by Judge John Fitzgerald on December 18, 1936. The original trial judge and earlier sentence remain identified separately in the case chronology.
The December 7, 1934 Laisve English section reports Clyde Allen’s original sentence as concurrent terms of seven to fifteen years for burglary and ten to twenty years for rape. It individually identifies his conviction on October 16 and describes actual confinement in a prison hospital while awaiting trial. This contemporary account differs from the later thirty-five-year summary previously recorded; concurrent terms must not be added together or used as actual time served. The account’s allegations of a police frame-up, racial jury exclusion and pressured identification are attributed to the newspaper. The separately documented 1936 retrial sentence and its date are preserved; no 1934 hospital admission or final discharge day is inferred.
Daily Worker, July 10, 1934; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, December 24, 1935; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
Daily Worker, May 8, 1936; relevant page stated in the accompanying profile note.
