We Have Lost a Strong Advocate for the Poor and Homeless: Scottish Journalist Frank Chalmers

By Stephen Wilson, one of our reporters abroad

Frank Chalmers, a political activist, journalist and brilliant swimmer, has just died at the age of 69 from cancer.  Although he won fame as a great wild open-air swimmer, many people will remember him for his generosity, kindness and immense patience.

He was a true friend of the poor and great champion of the homeless

I had long lost contact with Frank Chalmers.  I often wondered what had happened to him.  Then by chance while browsing through a newspaper I came across an obituary written by his son.  {It can be read on-line in the *Guardian Newspaper, August 2024} To my surprise the article mentioned how he was a great open-air swimmer who had undertaken legendary feats of swimming across treacherous channels and around whirlpools!  He had not only swum across the English Channel but over dangerous waters sailors would go well out of their way to avoid. He was certainly not the 'stay at home type.'  Most people celebrate their birthday by getting out a cake with candles or inviting people to their party.  

But not Frank Chalmers.  

Instead, for his 50th birthday, he set out to swim the channel.  In 2003 he was the first Scot in 50 years to swim through the treacherous whirlpool off the Island of Jura.  But it was his audacious attempt to swim across the Pentland Firth which separates the Orkney Islands from the mainland of Scotland, an act which intrigued people.  This represents one of the hardest open-air swims!  It is such a dangerous stretch of water that sailors call it 'Hell's Mouth' and 'The graveyard of ships.'  

The story was even made into a film by Meekat Films in 2009.  {See 2009 BBC documentary “Crossing Hell's Mouth.”}  It is clear from those tremendous feats that Frank was courageous.

I confess I did not know about Frank Chalmers, the legendary open-air swimmer.  I got to know Frank Chalmers when he was the head of the Young Communist League in Scotland during the late 1970's.  Frank Chalmers was from Dundee and, like his parents, had joined the Communist Party.  He had dropped out of a postgraduate course to lead the Young Communist League in Glasgow, Scotland.  

It was at that time that I also joined the Communist party.  {The Communist party of Great Britain was formed in 1920 and had a huge influence and authority in the trade union movement than the small number of elected members of parliament had suggested.  For instance, the Communist party played a decisive role in the General Strike of 1926 and the Miner's strike of 1984-85.  The Communist party later imploded in the late 1980's as it split into factions of Euro-communists and Stalinists.  Though membership reached new heights during the Second World War it lost many members following the 1956 invasion of Hungary, the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia, and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.  

As far as I know the Morning Star, the newspaper of the Communist party, still exists.  

When I joined the Communist party, I did not know what I was letting myself in for.  The hostility shown to us was incredible.  I was often insulted and at times assaulted while campaigning for them in 1979.  At that time joining the communists provoked the wrath of some of my family.  My father once told me 'To get out and go to Russia!'  This was one of the few times when I obeyed him and eventually moved to Russia in 1994—and I'm still here.

Frank Chalmers struck me as a very charismatic leader.  He was a very patient and open-minded person who never held any grudges or got very angry with people.  He must have been the most patient person in Scotland!  So when his son recalls how he was a tactful and patient editor it comes as no surprise.  

I recall one day when we were putting posters up against unemployment.  An angry man from the 'Troops Out ' movement came up to us and started shouting at us.  He told us that “Your position on Ireland is terrible.  You support the British occupation.”  Frank delicately retorted the Communists wanted to withdraw the troops by taking them off the streets and into the barracks.  He remained remarkably calm.

When I had nowhere to stay, Frank Chalmers put me up in Glasgow.  While I was staying with him it was staggering to come across all the works of Vladimir Lenin in English in his flat.  I never knew Lenin had written so much!  The selected works took up lots of shelves.  During this time Frank was organizing the Campaign against Youth Unemployment and the selling of the newspaper of the Young Communist League Challenge.  I think I could detect Frank's voice in one leaflet we put out on the streets.  It stated, “Some unemployed youth believe nobody cares about us.  This is not true.  We care about you.”

It sounded just like Frank.  I think he would have made a great constituency member of parliament on the caliber of William Gallagher who was a Communist politician for Fife.  Frank Chalmers took the trouble to visit my aunt whom I was staying with to mend up a strained relationship.  He made a great impression on her.  She thought he was a very polite, practical, sensible, and decent person.  

Later I left the Communist Party to join the left of the Labor party.  I still met old members of the Communist party in some pubs in Scotland.  Indeed, the organizer of a Job Club in Glasgow was an old comrade who helped me before I left Scotland for good to get work abroad.  I did not know that Frank Chalmers had left Scotland to work in London in 1981.  The last I heard of him was when he and his supporters had managed to get around the security and march into church and heckle Margaret Thatcher while she was giving a speech….

Frank Chalmers claimed it was hypocritical of Thatcher to profess to be a Christian when she was attacking the poor.

He certainly had a great sense of humor.  We often cracked jokes.  He also asked me not to needlessly take out my anger on people and to calm down.  When I met him, I felt the whole world was against me.  If anything, Frank Chalmers was an ideal role model to emulate.  If I practiced even 10% of his wisdom I would be happy!

I later learnt that Frank Chalmers had become a full-time journalist working for the Morning Star and later as a free-lance journalist for all kinds of health magazines.  He was also an activist who defended the interests of writers via the National Union of Journalists.  I did not know his talents stretched to being a musician as well as hosting legendary Robert Burn's Suppers!  It might seem strange to people that he won fame as a great swimmer!  I knew him in a very different light.

For me, he was a very humane and approachable person who was ready to help anyone in trouble! So it is no exaggeration to say he was a true friend of the homeless and the poor.  He was a champion indeed of the homeless whose rights he actively campaigned for.

He would swim through the darkest seas of troubles with you!

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* Note this version of his obituary also:  https://www.inkl.com/news/frank-chalmers-obituary