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<h1 id="reader-title">Alprentice ‘Bunchy’ Carter ‘would have
rode with Nat Turner’</h1>
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<p><strong><em>by </em></strong><a
href="http://nation.lk/online/author/thilinap/"><strong><em>Norman
(Otis) Richmond, aka Jalali - October 12, 2016<br>
</em></strong></a></p>
<p><em>“If Bunchy had been on the same plantation as Nat
Turner, you can believe he would have rode with Nat
Turner. That’s the type of person Bunchy was.”</em> –
Kumasi</p>
<p>Oct. 12 is the birthday of one of the most talented and
promising young men martyred in the massive state
repression against the Black Panther Party for Self
Defense.</p>
<p>NBC television has resurrected Alprentice “Bunchy”
Carter with a series called “Aquarius.” The imperialist
media has brought back both Carter and Charles Manson.
Carter was an iconic Black revolutionary from Los
Angeles. Manson was a cold-blooded serial killer who led
the Manson Family that murdered many in California.</p>
<p>Somehow Hollyweird has united these two polar opposites
for television. It is not that weird when we understand
that these forces are part of the state whose job it is
to keep Africa, Africans and all oppressed people
confused.</p>
<p>Gerald Horne, who wrote the volume, “Confronting Black
Jacobins: The U.S., the Haitian Revolution and the
Origins of the Dominican Republic,” taught Carter’s
daughter Danon at the University of California, Santa
Barbara, and has written extensively on Hollywood. Horne
says Hollywood has done a number on Africans in America
from “Birth of a Nation” to “Gone with the Wind,”
depicting Black women as mammies, servants and sex
objects.</p>
<p>Linden Beckford Jr., a graduate of Grambling
University, is currently writing a biography of Carter.</p>
<h3><strong>Carter is almost forgotten</strong></h3>
<p>Unlike Huey P. Newton, Bobby Seale, Eldridge Cleaver
and George Jackson, Carter has almost been forgotten
from the history of Africans in America except for
diehards.</p>
<p>Yes, the Fugees – Wyclef Jean, Lauryn Hill and Pras
Michel – mention Carter on the 1996 soundtrack film
“When We Were Kings” about the famous “Rumble in the
Jungle” heavyweight championship match between Muhammad
Ali and George Foreman, which took place in 1974. And
yes, M-1 and stic man of dead prez did “B.I.G. Respect,”
a song on their mixtape, “Turn off the Radio,” that
mentions Carter. But that is about it.</p>
<p>Who were Carter and John Huggins and why are they
important for the 21st century? Carter, then 26 (born
Oct. 12, 1942), was assassinated on Jan. 17, 1969, along
with John Huggins, 23 (born Feb. 11, 1945), in a
Campbell Hall classroom at UCLA in Los Angeles.</p>
<p>The team of Carter and Huggins are interesting for
several reasons. Number one, Carter was born in
Louisiana but was made in Los Angeles. Huggins was born
on the other side of the country in New Haven,
Connecticut. Number two, Carter was a product of the
Black proletariat while Huggins was from the Black
middle class.</p>
<p>One of Huggins’ aunts, Constance Baker Motley (Sept.
14, 1921 – Sept. 28, 2005) was an African born in
America whose parents hailed from Nevis in the
Caribbean. She was a lawyer, judge, state senator and
borough president of Manhattan, New York City. Huggins
committed class suicide and he and Carter had no problem
working together.<br>
</p>
<p>It is a tragic coincidence in history that eight years
before Carter and Huggins joined the ancestors, Patrice
Emery Lumumba, the first democratically elected
president of the Congo, Joseph Okito, vice president of
the Senate, and Maurice Mpolo, sports and youth
minister, were killed in the Congo by an unholy alliance
of the CIA, Belgian imperialism and other agents of
imperialism headed by Mobuto Sese Seko Ngbendu Wa Za
Banga, aka Col. Joseph Mobuto, on Jan. 17, 1961.</p>
<p>Carter and Huggins were gunned down by members of the
cultural nationalist US Organization. An FBI memo dated
Nov. 29, 1968, described a letter that the Los Angeles
FBI office intended to mail to the Black Panther Party
office.</p>
<p>This letter, which was made to appear as if it had come
from the US Organization, described fictitious plans by
US to ambush BPP members. The FBI memo stated, “It is
hoped this counterintelligence measure will result in an
‘US’ and BPP vendetta.”</p>
<p>Many feel that the leader of US, Ron Karenga, was
working for the other side. An article in the Wall
Street Journal described Karenga as a thriving
businessman, specializing in gas stations, who
maintained close ties to Eastern Rockefeller family and
LA’s mayor.</p>
<p>Michael Newton pointed out in the volume, “Bitter
Grain: Huey P. Newton and the Black Panther Party,” a
Wall Street Journal article which reported: “A few weeks
after the assassination of Martin Luther King … Mr.
Karenga slipped into Sacramento for a private chat with
Gov. Reagan, at the governor’s request. The Black
nationalist also met clandestinely with Los Angeles
police chief Thomas Reddin after Mr. King was killed.”</p>
<h3><strong>We need some stronger stuff</strong></h3>
<p>At that moment in history, many cultural nationalists
maintained that the cultural revolution must take place
before a political one could proceed. Huey P. Newton,
the co-founder of the Black Panther Party, countered
with the view: “We believe that culture itself will not
liberate us. We’re going to need some stronger stuff.”</p>
<p>The Black Panther Party led by Newton and Bobby Seale
was like the African National Congress of South Africa
(ANC). It was an anti-imperialist alliance; many like
Carter embraced revolutionary nationalism while others
like Newton, George Jackson and Fred Hampton took a
Marxist-Leninist-Maoist (MLM) position. Hampton openly
said he was fighting for socialism leading to communism.</p>
<h3><strong>Carter named Geronimo</strong><br>
</h3>
<div id="attachment_65529" class="wp-caption alignright">
<p class="wp-caption-text">In its Feb. 17, 1969,
edition, The Black Panther newspaper pays tribute to
assassinated leaders Bunchy Carter and John Huggins.
Click to enlarge.</p>
</div>
<p>Carter was a firm supporter of the Native American
struggle. It was Carter who changed Elmer Pratt into
Geronimo ji-Jaga Pratt (Sept. 13, 1947 – June 2, 2011)
after the great Native American warrior Geronimo, “the
one who yawns” (June 1829 – Feb. 17, 1909) was a
prominent Apache leader who fought against Mexico and
Arizona for their expansion into Apache tribal lands for
several decades during the Apache Wars.</p>
<p>Geronimo replaced Carter as the deputy minister of
defense of the Southern California Chapter of the BPP
after Carter was taken out. Carter left a memo saying
his wish was for Geronimo to replace him.</p>
<p>Carter was never known as an anti-Communist. Before
joining the Black Panther Party, Carter was recruited by
Raymond “Maasi” Hewitt to a Maoist study group called
the Red Guard. I was a part of the same group; however,
Carter came in after I left Los Angeles.</p>
<p>Carter was influenced by Jean-Jacques Dessalines of
Haiti and Dedan Kimathi of the Land and Freedom Army,
the so-called Mau Mau. The Los Angeles Chapter under
Bunchy’s leadership required that members take the Mau
Mau Oath. Here is the Mau Mau Oath:</p>
<p>“I speak the truth and vow before God / And before this
movement, / The movement of Unity, / The Unity which is
put to the test, / The Unity that is mocked with the
name of ‘Mau Mau,’ / That I shall go forward to fight
for the land, / The lands of Kirinyaga that we
cultivated, / The lands which were taken by the
Europeans, / And if I fail to do this, / May this oath
kill me, / May this seven kill me, / May this meat kill
me.”</p>
<h3><strong>Days at Los Angeles City College</strong></h3>
<p>Carter and a small segment of people who lived in my
area of Los Angeles had an international world view. He
was a legendary figure in my neighborhood. After he was
released from prison, he attended Los Angeles City
College. Carter was my senior and I didn’t meet him
until he was released from jail.</p>
<p>He and others, like Sigidi Abdullah and his S.O.S Band,
“Take Your Time (Do It Right)”; Rhongea Southern, now
Daar Malik El-Bey, who worked closely with Abdullah;
Earl Randall, who went on to work with Willie Mitchell
at Hi Records and wrote Al Green’s “God Bless Our Love”;
Fred Goree, who became Masai Karega Kenyatta and a DJ on
WCHB 1440AM in Detroit, went to LACC at the same time.</p>
<p>Sigidi told me that Carter asked him to organize a
talent show at LACC. I remember singing the Spinners’
“I’ll Always Love You” at this event. El-Bey was my
guitarist.</p>
<p>Carter’s political consciousness was raised before he
joined the Black Panther Party. Kumasi, who Huey P.
Newton asked to replace Carter as the leader of the
Southern California Chapter of the BPP, talked to me
about the LA legend.</p>
<p>Says Kumasi: “When Malcolm X first came to Los Angeles,
he built the first outpost right there in our
neighborhood. The Mosque (Temple 27) itself was close to
us and all of us had visited the Mosque. As a matter of
fact, Bunchy and many of the Renegade Slausons (Bunchy
had his own set of Slausons inside the Slausons) were
the first youth Fruit of Islam (FOI) in LA. Carter was
only 15 years old at that moment in history.</p>
<p>Carter was a 20th century renaissance man. He was great
at many things and was a poet and a singer. Elaine Brown
has written that many Panthers sang together: “John
(Huggins) sang bass to my contralto and Bunchy’s
falsetto.”</p>
<p>Brown pointed out in her autobiography, “A Taste of
Power: A Black Woman’s Story,” how the trio used to sing
the Young Hearts’ “I’ve Got Love for My Baby.” He was
also a great dancer. David Hilliard maintains that if it
were not for racism, Carter may have become an Olympic
swimmer.</p>
<p>Brown says while all this is true, Carter was first and
foremost a revolutionary. This is extraordinary if you
consider that Carter suffered a childhood bout of polio
and moved to South Central LA, where his mother, Nola
Carter, enrolled him in a “therapeutic” dance class.</p>
<p>Carter’s Louisiana-born mother is still in the land of
the living at the time of this writing. She is almost a
century old and has lost two sons: Arthur Morris,
Carter’s older step brother, acted as Carter’s bodyguard
and was the first member of the BPP to lose his life. He
was killed in March of 1968. Little Bobby Hutton, who
was influenced by Carter, was killed on April 6, 1968.
Her youngest son, Kenneth Fati Carter, is currently
locked down in Corcoran State Prison in California.</p>
<p>Caffee Greene, mother of Raymond Nat Turner, Black
Agenda Report’s poet-in-residence, hired Carter to work
at the Teen Post in Los Angeles. Greene first hired
Raymond “Masai” Hewitt, who was replaced by Carter. It
was at the Teen Post that I first heard Eldridge Cleaver
speak. Cleaver and Carter were both Nation of Islam
ministers in prison.<br>
</p>
<div id="attachment_65531" class="wp-caption alignright">
<p class="wp-caption-text">The Afrikan Students Union at
UCLA keeps alive the memory of Black Panther leaders
Alprentice “Bunchy” Carter and John Huggins with an
annual commemorative gathering in Campbell Hall
Classroom 1201, where they were gunned down, on the
anniversary of their assassination on Jan. 17, 1969.
At the 2014 gathering, panel member Ericka Huggins,
also a leader in the Black Panther Party and widow of
the late John Huggins, encouraged them to “make a
portal for students way younger than you to be here …
Use the skills the university has given you and turn
them toward your community … We are all standing on
someone’s shoulders; imagine someone is standing on
yours.” – Photo: Afrikan Students Union</p>
</div>
<p>Turner saw the cultural side of Carter: “Yeah, I heard
Bunchy sing Stevie’s ‘I’m Wondering’ and ‘I Was Made to
Love Her,’ and I used to hear Tommy (Lewis) play piano
at the Teen Post my mom directed. … It was also fun to
watch Bunchy dance – Philly Dog, Jerk and Twine … a lil’
‘Bitter Dog’ with the Philly Dog every once in a while …
‘Bebop Santa from the Cool North Pole’ and ‘Black
Mother’ were also great to hear.” Tommy Lewis, Robert
Lawrence and Steve Bartholomew were murdered by the Los
Angeles police at a service station on Aug. 25, 1968.</p>
<p>Kumasi opines that Carter and George Jackson were like
Henri Christophe and Jean-Jacques Dessalines. While they
were well-versed in history, revolutionary theory and
current events, both were soldiers ready to take to the
battlefield. Carter made a contribution to Africa,
Africans and oppressed humanity. We should remember him
every Oct. 12.</p>
<h3><strong>Post script</strong></h3>
<p>In his Executive Order No. 1, “The Correct Handling of
Differences Between Black Organizations,” issued in
1968, Alprentice “Bunchy” Carter, then the deputy
minister of defense of the Southern California Chapter
at Los Angeles of the Black Panther Party for Self
Defense, wrote: “Let this be heard: The Black Panther
Party must never be the enemy of the people. The Black
Panther Party must never put itself in that other
organizations can make them seem to be the enemy of
Black People …</p>
<p>“History will show we have the correct analysis of the
problem. The people will relate to the party that
relates to them. Therefore, we must continue to relate
to the people. Therefore, we do not get into squabbles
with other Black organizations; we do not have time for
this when engaging in revolution. Let this be done.”</p>
<p><em>Norman (Otis) Richmond, aka Jalali, was born in
Arcadia, Louisiana, and grew up in Los Angeles. He
left Los Angles after refusing to fight in Vietnam
because he felt that, like the Vietnamese, Africans in
the United States were colonial subjects. In the
1960s, Richmond moved to Toronto, where he co-founded
the Afro American Progressive Association, one of the
first Black Power organizations in that part of the
world. Before moving to Toronto permanently, Richmond
worked with the Detroit-based League of Revolutionary
Black Workers. He was the youngest member of the
central staff. When the League split, he joined the
African People’s Party. In 1992, Richmond received the
Toronto Arts Award. In front of an audience that
included the mayor of Toronto, Richmond dedicated his
award to Mumia Abu-Jamal, Assata Shakur, Geronimo
Pratt, the African National Congress of South Africa
and Fidel Castro and the people of Cuba. In 1984 he
co-founded the Toronto Chapter of the Black Music
Association with Milton Blake. Richmond began his
career in journalism at the African Canadian weekly
Contrast. He went on to be published in the Toronto
Star, the Toronto Globe & Mail, the National Post,
the Jackson Advocate, Share, the Islander, the Black
American, Pan African News Wire, and Black Agenda
Report. Internationally, he has written for the United
Nations, the Jamaican Gleaner, the Nation (Barbados)
and Pambazuka News. Currently, he produces Diasporic
Music, a radio show for Uhuru Radio, and writes a
column, Diasporic Music, for The Burning Spear
newspaper. For more information, contact him at </em><a
href="mailto:norman.o.richmond@gmail.com"><em>norman.o.richmond@gmail.com</em></a><em>
and his blog, </em><a
href="https://normanotisrichmond.wordpress.com/"><em>https://normanotisrichmond.wordpress.com/</em></a><em>.</em></p>
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