Biography
Sam Brown was a Black Harlem worker arrested and held in the Tombs under $10,000 bail on robbery, grand larceny, receiving stolen goods and felonious assault charges. The article “2 Negro Workers Framed in Court,” on PDF page 2 (headed May 16) bound into the Daily Worker of May 18, 1931, describes the accusations as retaliation for opposition to Garvey movement leader “General” Grant. The ILD was seeking habeas corpus; the article does not establish conviction or actual release. This 1931 worker is distinct from the later Brink’s case defendant Samuel Brown.
Daily Worker, May 13, 1931, page 2: The May 13 local report names Warfield, Sam Brown, Campbell and Arthur Williams as arrested the previous day on an assault-and-battery complaint by St. William Wellington Grant. It says Grant urged police to treat them as Reds and agitators. This is retained alongside the later mixed-date robbery account; abbreviated names in this report are not used to invent a first name or merge the separate November Warfield/Campbell defendants. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1931/v08-n115-NY-may-13-1931-DW-LOC.pdf
The May 13 issue names Warfield, Sam Brown, Campbell and Arthur Williams as four Harlem workers arrested on accusations by St. William Wellington Grant. It calls the formal charge assault and battery and attributes the arrests to their revolutionary organizing for unemployment relief and against lynching, reporting Grant’s anti-Communist accusations at the police station. It describes Campbell and Williams as arrested for the second time. This earlier report’s charge wording differs from the later detailed Tombs account, which lists robbery-related counts; the original wording and surname-only identification of Warfield and Campbell are preserved. Its relative yesterday dating is not used to overwrite the unresolved chronology in the later mixed-date issue. No duplicate arrest or continuous jail span is created.
The November 23 issue announces the General Sessions Part 7 robbery trial of four Harlem defendants, printed as James Warfield, Louis Campbell, Arthur Williams and Sam Brown. The exact group and proceeding correspond to the previously reported Grant-related defense case, but the first names James and Louis differ from David/Daniel Warfield and William Campbell in the earlier records. This discrepancy is retained without replacing the stored names or creating additional namesake profiles. The announced trial is prospective; no conviction or actual custody endpoint follows from it.
The General Sessions trial notice identifies these four Harlem LSNR workers in the robbery prosecution instigated by Garvey leader General Grant. It says Williams and Campbell were out on $1,000 bail, while Warfield and Brown remained in the Tombs; ILD counsel Allan Taub secured reduction of their bail from $10,000 to $2,500 but habeas efforts had not won release. The text calls May 26 Thursday although it was Tuesday; the scheduled trial is not a verdict or new arrest.
Page 1 calls supporters to the May 26 General Sessions trial, Part 3, 32 Franklin Street. It again describes Williams and Campbell’s $1,000 bail release while Warfield and Brown remained in the Tombs. Its repeated $10,000 figure does not erase the May22 report of a reduction to $2,500, and the scheduled trial is not an established verdict or another arrest.
