For nearly 30 years, Evelyn Rich, the longtime romantic partner of white nationalist Jared Taylor, has been attacked by white nationalists accusing her of being Jewish. Recently, Rich contacted the Southern Poverty Law Center after being viciously attacked by the notorious anti-Semite, John DeNugent.
Editors’ Note: Rich wrote her Ph.D. dissertation on the Ku Klux Klan in the late 1980s. She lives with Jared Taylor, who runs the white nationalist group American Renaissance in northern Virginia. They have two children together. In the past, Taylor has distanced himself from anti-Semites and been heavily criticized in the movement for it. Rich, though not an anti-Semite, asked Hatewatch to publish this letter. The unrelenting attacks accusing her of being Jewish and an infiltrator offers an interesting glimpse into the virulent anti-Semitism that motivates many members of the movement.
It was March 1985, thirty-one years ago, in Groton, Massachusetts, when I got behind the wheel of my little Datsun 310 hatchback and began the first of two extended trips to the Southern states and Washington, D.C.
I was a doctoral student at Boston University and my dissertation topic was the ideology of the modern Ku Klux Klan. I had met and interviewed my first Klansman back in October 1980, when Bill Wilkinson, Imperial Wizard of the Invisible Empire Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, arrived In Boston from Louisiana and held a rally in Connecticut of all places. The New England news media went on a feeding frenzy.
I was 23-years-old and had lived in Britain my entire life. (I came to the US for the first time in August 1978 as a Foreign Exchange Student.) I was intrigued by this garrulous man who took me to dinner and talked to me for several hours. I was surprised to learn the Klan still existed. Everything I knew about it came from the book and film versions of “Gone With the Wind.”
I was a doctoral student at Boston University and my dissertation topic was the ideology of the modern Ku Klux Klan. I had met and interviewed my first Klansman back in October 1980, when Bill Wilkinson, Imperial Wizard of the Invisible Empire Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, arrived In Boston from Louisiana and held a rally in Connecticut of all places. The New England news media went on a feeding frenzy.
Who joined the Klan? Why? What did Klansmen believe? Everything I read in the press implied or stated that Ku Klux Klan was a self-explanatory term. Like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s definition of pornography –– “I will know it when I see it” –– the Klan did not need to be defined. Klansmen were just plain nuts. End of story.
Before I pulled out of the driveway I had arranged a couple of months of research opportunities. (These were the days before the Internet and mobile phones). I wanted to interview as many Klansmen and former Klansmen as possible. I wanted to talk to as many anti-Klan groups and individuals as possible. I wanted to go everywhere! I wanted to talk to everyone! I did my best. I interviewed Klansmen, I went to Klan rallies and cross “burnings” or “lightings.” I talked to anti-Klan groups and individuals, I went through the FBI’s files in Washington, DC and I talked to everyone who would talk to me. I went everywhere I was invited and tried to get invited everywhere else.
Through these initial contacts, I met more and more people and was given all sorts of opportunities. David Duke suggested I attend an Institute for Historical Review conference. Thanks to David’s sponsorship I was able to attend my first conference and because I was a student, Willis Carto was kind enough to waive my registration fee. Thanks to that first IHR conference I met Mark Weber and was invited to the next one. Thanks to the next one I met Jared Taylor, who was there as a Japanese interpreter. Thanks to Jared I have two wonderful children.
So, why am I writing this? Why now? Why at all?
After 30 years of listening to discussions about me by people who do not know me, I have finally had enough. I would not care what rot is said about me were it not that I am a mother. Recently a despicable Internet bully and notorious fruitcake has begun “wondering” about my daughters. My daughters are off-limits. I need to let them know I will never submit to bullies and loonies, I also need to let them know I will not put up with lies and rubbish. Not all adults are grown up.
All of this comes down one question: Am I a Jew?
The answer is no, I am not a Jew. I am not a Jew by religion, ethnicity, race or any other criteria or definition. My accusers, and they are accusers, give the following reasons for thinking as they do. Here they are and here are my replies:
• I look Jewish. – If I look Jewish to you, then I look Jewish to you. That was an was an easy one!
• My surname is allegedly Jewish. – I am not American, and no one in my family is American. Plenty of people have told me that in the USA Rich is a version of the German surname “Reich”. Nobody in my family has ever set foot in Germany. (Okay, I once changed planes in Munich). It is nonsense to assume that the German surname Reich has any connection to the ancient and venerable ENGLISH name of Rich. There have been English people named Rich as long as there have been English people. In addition to the Earls of Warwick, possibly the most famous branch of the Rich family, we also boast an Archbishop of Canterbury, Edmund Rich (1175–1240). I do not know of any English people named Reich, let alone any English people who changed their names from Reich to Rich. If Americans do this weird stuff, that’s their business.
• I am a Jewish agent or “Honeypot” whose houri-like fascinations have forced Jared into a philosemitic trance and caused him to refuse to attack Jews. What utter rot! If anyone knows how to make Jared do or not do anything, please let me know. I’ve failed for 25 years! This is such a load of codswallop I refuse to believe any rational person could even consider it! (The rational and interested might like to know I married a German-American, surname of Klumpp. Maybe I could have saved myself a lot of trouble by calling myself Klumpp?)
Finally, I am attaching a number of documents for those who prefer to “Trust but Verify.”
• My Christening certificate from November 1957.
• My Bible presented to my at school. C of E is the officially taught religion in English schools.
• My father’s Christening certificate from 1929
• My father’s Royal Navy records stating his religion as Church of England. (God Bless him for his service to his country)
• My grandfather’s Royal Navy records stating his religion was also C of E. (God Bless him for his service to his country)
• My great great grandparents’ C of E Marriage banns – James Rich and Lucy Morris who were wed in1852. (Morris is my dad and grandpa’s middle name.)
I could go on, but this message and these documents are intended for the lucid and rational. Others who accidently stumble upon them will disregard them and proceed as usual.
Evelyn Beatrice Mackenzie Rich
Oakton, VA
April 18, 2016
