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{{Short description|American neo-Nazi (1953–2018)}}
'''Harold Armstead Covington''' (born [[Burlington]], [[North Carolina]], 14 September 1953) is an American White separatist leader and novelist with a small but vocal underground following.
{{Use mdy dates|date=July 2013}}
{{Infobox officeholder
| name = Harold Covington
| image =
| caption = Covington circa 1970
| order =
| office = 2nd President of the [[National Socialist Party of America]]
| term_start = 1977
| term_end = 1981
| predecessor = [[Frank Collin]]
| successor = organization disbanded
| birth_name = Harold Armstead Covington
| birth_date = {{birth date|mf=yes|1953|9|14}}
| birth_place = [[Burlington, North Carolina]], U.S.
| death_date = {{death date and age|2018|7|14|1953|9|14}}
| death_place = [[Bremerton, Washington]], U.S.
| occupation = Author
| module = {{Infobox military person|embed=yes
|allegiance = United States
|branch= United States Army
|serviceyears= 1971–1973
|rank= Private First Class
}}
}}


'''Harold Armstead Covington''' (September 14, 1953 – July 14, 2018)<ref name=SPLC/> was an American [[neo-Nazi]] activist<ref>{{cite news|last1=Murphy|first1=Dan|title=Why would an American white supremacist be fond of Rhodesia?|url=http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/Backchannels/2015/0618/Why-would-an-American-white-supremacist-be-fond-of-Rhodesia-video|access-date=27 March 2016|newspaper=Christian Science Monitor|date=18 June 2015}}</ref> and writer. He advocated the creation of an "[[Aryan race|Aryan]] homeland" in the [[Pacific Northwest]] (known as the [[Northwest Territorial Imperative]])<ref>Brennan Clarke (July 25, 2011). [https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/british-columbia/neo-nazi-sympathizer-fatally-shot-by-nanaimo-police-didnt-fire-flare-gun-probe-told/article2109423/ "Neo-Nazi sympathizer fatally shot by Nanaimo police didn't fire flare gun, probe told"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110727122701/http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/british-columbia/neo-nazi-sympathizer-fatally-shot-by-nanaimo-police-didnt-fire-flare-gun-probe-told/article2109423/ |date=July 27, 2011 }}. ''Toronto Globe and Mail''. Retrieved November 7, 2013.</ref> and was the founder of the '''Northwest Front''' ('''NF'''), a [[White separatism|white separatist]] political movement that sought to create a [[white ethnostate]].<ref name=SPLC/>
Harold Covington was originally converted to the National Socialist world iew due to his experiences in an integrated high school in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He first became involved in radical rightist politics while he was serving in the United States Army in Hawaii. In 1972 he joined the National Socialist White People's Party, successor to George Lincoln Rockwell's American Nazi Party, while still in uniform. He served as editor of the Party's newspaper WHITE POWER from 1972 to 1973.
<ref>{{cite web |last=Donner |first=Andreas |title=On the Death of Harold Covington |url=http://northwestfront.org/2018/07/on-the-death-of-harold-covington/ |website=Archive |date=July 24, 2018 |access-date=June 21, 2023 |archive-date=July 25, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180725115458/http://northwestfront.org/2018/07/on-the-death-of-harold-covington/ |url-status=bot: unknown }}</ref>
==Early life (1953{{endash}}1971)==
Covington was born on September 14, 1953, in [[Burlington, North Carolina]], to Forrest McAllister Covington (1925 – 1999) and Frances Anne Covington (née Glass) as the eldest of three children.<ref>{{cite web |title=Covington History Full Report|url=http://www.covingtonhistory.co.uk/CovhistoryHI.htm}}</ref>
According to an interview with Covington, at age 15 in 1968 he was sent to [[Chapel Hill High School (Chapel Hill, North Carolina)|Chapel Hill High School]].<ref name=counter>{{cite web |last1=Johnson |first1=Greg |author-link=Greg Johnson (white nationalist)|title=Interview with Harold Covington |url=https://www.counter-currents.com/2010/07/interview-with-harold-covington/ |website=Counter-Currents Publishing |date=July 15, 2010 |access-date=26 July 2018}}</ref>


In 1971, he graduated from high school and joined the [[United States Army]].<ref name=SPLC>{{cite web |last1=Lenz |first1=Ryan |title=Harold Covington, founder of white separatist group, dies at 64 |url=https://www.splcenter.org/hatewatch/2018/07/25/harold-covington-founder-white-separatist-group-dies-64 |website=Southern Poverty Law Center |access-date=26 July 2018 |date=July 25, 2018}}</ref>
In 1974 Covington went to South Africa and worked for a time for a construction company in Johannesburg before going north to Rhodesia and joining the Rhodesian Army, where he served during the bush war which eventually led to the establishment of the Marxist Mugabe dictatorship in what became Zimbabwe. He and two other Americans, Eric Thomson and Jeffrey Spencer, were deported from Rhodesia in 1976 on the order of the Ian Smith government due to their activity in creating the Rhodesia White People's Party (RWPP) in opposition to what they and many White Rhodesians viewed (correctly)as a sellout of the country's European population by the Smith government.


==Early political activities, Rhodesia and South Africa (1971{{endash}}1979)==
Back in America Covington joined the National Socialist Party of America (NSPA) and was involved in the famous Operation Skokie free speech case, which won a Supreme Court decision in 1978 allowing the party to rally in Chicago's public parks. He was one of 35 National Socialists who stepped out onto the Daley Plaza in Chicago on June 25th, 1978 to confront over 50,000 Jewish and leftist counterdemonstrators.
In 1971, Covington joined the National Socialist White People's Party (NSWPP), the political successor to the [[American Nazi Party]] (ANP).<ref name=SPLC/> He moved to [[South Africa]] in December 1973,<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1980/05/14/nazis-showing-in-nc-race-embarrasses-gop/84295cd5-37c3-449c-b8b6-cea599978b14/?noredirect=on|title=Nazi's Showing in N.C. Race Embarrasses GOP|last=Guillory|first=Ferrel|date=1980-05-14|newspaper=The Washington Post}}</ref> after his discharge from the U.S. Army, and later to [[Rhodesia]] (now [[Zimbabwe]]).<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kbKJU3e59MsC&pg=PA45|title=Codename Greenkil: The 1979 Greensboro Killings|last=Wheaton|first=Elizabeth|date=2009-04-01|publisher=University of Georgia Press|isbn=9780820331485|pages=45|language=en}}</ref> Covington was a founding member of the [[Rhodesian White People's Party]] and later claimed [[Foreign volunteers in the Rhodesian Security Forces|to have served]] in the [[Rhodesian Army]]. He was deported from Rhodesia due to his racist beliefs, particularly due to his threatening letters to the Jewish community.<ref name=":0" />


==Political activities after returning from Rhodesia==
Covington rose to national prominence for a brief time in 1979 and 1980 when members of the NSPA and the Ku Klux Klan were involved in a gun battle with members of the Communist Workers' Party on November 3rd, 1979, in Greensboro, North Carolina. Covington spearheaded the Greensboro 16 Defense Fund, and was widely credited by the media and the government with being instrumental in obtaining the acquittals at their trial in November 1980, after he helped Greensboro journalist Martha Woodall expose the presence in the NSPA ranks of a badge-carry informant for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms named Bernard Butkovich.
In 1980, while leader of the [[National Socialist Party of America]], he lost a primary election for the [[Republican Party (United States)|Republican]] nomination for candidates for [[attorney general]] of [[North Carolina]].<ref>[https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=QxQyAAAAIBAJ&sjid=i6IFAAAAIBAJ&pg=3115,5477183&dq=harold-covington&hl=en "Nazi Loses in Republican Primary"]. ''Reading Eagle'' via Google News. May 7, 1980. Retrieved February 18, 2013.</ref> Covington resigned as president of the NSPA in 1981.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=VYgiAAAAIBAJ&pg=5063,4821415&dq=harold-covington+underground&hl=en|title=N.C.Nazi Chief Quits|date=March 27, 1981|access-date=July 23, 2011}}</ref> That same year, Covington alleged that would-be presidential assassin [[John Hinckley Jr.]] had formerly been a member of the NSPA. Law enforcement authorities were never able to corroborate this claim and suggested the alleged connection "may have been fabricated for publicity purposes".<ref>{{cite web|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=AD8aAAAAIBAJ&pg=4414,3778065&dq=hinckley+covington+law-enforcement-authorities&hl=en|title=Doubts grow over Hinkley's nazi ties|date=April 2, 1981|access-date=July 23, 2011}}</ref>


Covington later settled in the United Kingdom for several years, where he made contact with British far-right groups and was involved in setting up the [[neo-Nazi]] terrorist organisation [[Combat 18]] (C18) in 1992. C18 openly promotes violence and [[antisemitism]] and has adopted some of the features of the American far right.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.axt.org.uk/antisem/archive/archive2/uk/uk.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150713035219/http://www.axt.org.uk/antisem/archive/archive2/uk/uk.htm|archive-date=July 13, 2015|title=antisem/archive|publisher=[[Institute for Jewish Policy Research]]|date=September 1998|access-date=July 23, 2011}}</ref>
In 1980, Covington ran for North Carolina Attorney General in the state's Republican primary, polling over 57,000 votes and gaining 43% of the total vote, as well as carrying 47 of North Carolina's 100 counties.


In 1994, Covington started an organization called the National Socialist White People's Party, using the same name of the successor to the American Nazi Party under [[Matthias Koehl|Matt Koehl]], in [[Chapel Hill, North Carolina|Chapel Hill]], North Carolina. He launched a website in 1996; using the pseudonym "[[Winston Smith (Nineteen Eighty-Four)|Winston Smith]]" (taken from the novel ''[[Nineteen Eighty-Four]]''), Covington became one of the first neo-Nazi presences on the Internet.<ref name="web.archive.org">{{cite web|url=http://hatemonitor.csusb.edu/US_Senate/Howard_Berkowitz.html |title=Hate on the Internet: The Anti-Defamation League Perspective – Statement of Anti-Defamation League before the Senate Judiciary Committee |publisher=Hatemonitor.csusb.edu via [[Waybackmachine]] |date=September 14, 1999 |access-date=July 23, 2011 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080103132832/http://hatemonitor.csusb.edu/US_Senate/Howard_Berkowitz.html |archive-date=January 3, 2008 }}</ref><ref name=blacksun>[[Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke]] (2001). ''[[Black Sun (Goodrick-Clarke book)|Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity]]''. [[New York University]] Press. p.28. {{ISBN|0-8147-3124-4}}.</ref> Covington used the website and the Winston Smith pseudonym to disseminate [[Holocaust-denial]] material.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Gardell |first1=Mattias |title=Gods of the blood : the pagan revival and white separatism |date=2003 |publisher=Duke university press |location=Durham |isbn=9780822330714 |page=106 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FIwwWSSL5JIC&pg=PA106 |access-date=26 July 2018}}</ref>
In 1979, members of the Chicago NSPA unit found "films, pictures and addresses of some little boys" in the Marquette Park headquarters of the organization. As a result of these discoveries the then NSPA leader Frank Collin was arrested, pled guilty, and sent to prison on buggery charges. This is a unique event in the history of the American White racial nationalist movement, because it is the only time where the membership of a white racial organization has successfully dealt with and terminated the extreme misbehavior which so often characterizes the leadership of such groups.


Beginning in 2005, Covington maintained a political blog titled "Thoughtcrime".<ref>{{cite book|last1=Tsai|first1=Robert|title=America's Forgotten Constitutions: Defiant Visions of Power and Community|date=2014|publisher=Harvard University Press|isbn=978-0674059955|page=338|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=09aDAwAAQBAJ&q=%22Harold+Covington%22++++blog++%22Thoughtcrime%22&pg=PA338}}</ref> As a fiction writer, Covington authored several occult-themed novels.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/search.php?query=harold%20covington|title=Internet Archive Search: Harold Covington|access-date=February 18, 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/intelligence-report/2003/neo-nazi-harold-covington-authors-cheesy-occult-novels|title=Neo-Nazi Harold Covington Authors Cheesy Occult Novels|publisher=[[Southern Poverty Law Center]]|date=Summer 2003|access-date=July 23, 2011}}</ref> As an author, he is best known for his series of five Northwest Independence novels: ''A Distant Thunder'', ''A Mighty Fortress'', ''The Hill of the Ravens, '' ''The Brigade'', and ''Freedom's Sons''. In November of 2008, he founded the Northwest Front, a movement devoted to creating a white ethnostate similar to that depicted in the novels.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/294090243_Fighting_for_an_Aryan_Homeland_Harold_Covington_and_the_Northwest_Front|title=(PDF) Fighting for an Aryan Homeland: Harold Covington and the Northwest Front}}</ref>
Covington has been the subject of a number of increasingly hysterical smears, slanders, and attacks based on fabrication in an attempt to discredit his character. He has been called a Jew, a homosexual, a Federal informant, and all the usual litany of vilification which is part and parcel of participation in radical politics of any kind. None of these accusations have ever been proven or documented in any way, and they appear to originate with leftist groups such as Gerry Gable's Searchlight Magazine, the Southern Poverty Law Center of Morris Dees, and the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith.


Covington was mentioned in the media in connection with the [[Charleston church shooting]], whose perpetrator [[Dylann Roof]] discussed the Northwest Front in his manifesto, and was critical of its means and objectives.<ref>{{cite news |last=Berger |first=Knute |date=2015-07-08 |title= Hate-Filled Zone: The racist roots of a Northwest secession movement |url= https://crosscut.com/2015/07/hate-filled-zone-a-group-of-white-racists-wants-a-nw-secession-a-vile-dream-with-deep-historic-roots |work=Crosscut|access-date=2020-11-25}}</ref> According to Covington, the shooting was "a preview of coming attractions", but he also believed it was a bad idea for his followers to engage in random acts of violence, instead supporting organized revolution.<ref name="roof">{{cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/28/harold-covington-northwest-front-dylann-roof-manifesto-charleston-shooting|title=White supremacist calls Charleston 'a preview of coming attractions'|website=[[TheGuardian.com]] |date=June 28, 2015}}</ref>
Covington is presently one of the primary spokesmen (although certainly not the only one) for the Northwest Migration movement, which advocates the establishment of a Homeland for all White people in the Pacific Northwest. He is the author of a number of novels including the Northwest Trilogy, a futuristic set of three novels describing a successful White revolution and the establishment of a Northwest American Republic.


==Death==
Covington died in [[Bremerton, Washington]], on July 14, 2018.<ref name=SPLC/>


==References==
==References==
{{reflist}}

<references />


==External links==
==External links==
* [https://vault.fbi.gov/harold-covington/harold-covington-part-01/view Harold Covington Part 01] on the [[FBI Index|FBI Vault]]
*[http://nwhomeland.blogspot.com Northwest Homeland], a blog by Covington

*[http://downwithjugears.blogspot.com/ Thoughtcrime], a blog by Covington
{{Neo-Nazism}}

{{Authority control}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=March 2012}}


[[Category:1953 births|Covington, Harold]]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Covington, Harold}}
[[Category:Living people|Covington, Harold]]
[[Category:1953 births]]
[[Category:Neo-Nazis|Covington, Harold]]
[[Category:2018 deaths]]
[[Category:20th-century American far-right politicians]]
[[Category:American neo-Nazis]]
[[Category:United States Army soldiers]]
[[Category:20th-century American novelists]]
[[Category:21st-century American novelists]]
[[Category:American science fiction writers]]
[[Category:American fantasy writers]]
[[Category:American male novelists]]
[[Category:American Nazi Party members]]
[[Category:American volunteers in the Rhodesian Bush War]]
[[Category:People from Burlington, North Carolina]]
[[Category:Novelists from North Carolina]]
[[Category:20th-century American male writers]]
[[Category:21st-century American male writers]]
[[Category:North Carolina Republicans]]
[[Category:Chapel Hill High School (Chapel Hill, North Carolina) alumni]]
[[Category:People deported from Rhodesia]]
[[Category:Neo-Nazi politicians in the United States]]
[[Category:Activists from North Carolina]]

Revision as of 03:31, 8 May 2024

Harold Covington
2nd President of the National Socialist Party of America
In office
1977–1981
Preceded byFrank Collin
Succeeded byorganization disbanded
Personal details
Born
Harold Armstead Covington

(1953-09-14)September 14, 1953
Burlington, North Carolina, U.S.
DiedJuly 14, 2018(2018-07-14) (aged 64)
Bremerton, Washington, U.S.
OccupationAuthor
Military career
AllegianceUnited States
Service/branchUnited States Army
Years of service1971–1973
RankPrivate First Class

Harold Armstead Covington (September 14, 1953 – July 14, 2018)[1] was an American neo-Nazi activist[2] and writer. He advocated the creation of an "Aryan homeland" in the Pacific Northwest (known as the Northwest Territorial Imperative)[3] and was the founder of the Northwest Front (NF), a white separatist political movement that sought to create a white ethnostate.[1] [4]

Early life (1953–1971)

Covington was born on September 14, 1953, in Burlington, North Carolina, to Forrest McAllister Covington (1925 – 1999) and Frances Anne Covington (née Glass) as the eldest of three children.[5] According to an interview with Covington, at age 15 in 1968 he was sent to Chapel Hill High School.[6]

In 1971, he graduated from high school and joined the United States Army.[1]

Early political activities, Rhodesia and South Africa (1971–1979)

In 1971, Covington joined the National Socialist White People's Party (NSWPP), the political successor to the American Nazi Party (ANP).[1] He moved to South Africa in December 1973,[7] after his discharge from the U.S. Army, and later to Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).[8] Covington was a founding member of the Rhodesian White People's Party and later claimed to have served in the Rhodesian Army. He was deported from Rhodesia due to his racist beliefs, particularly due to his threatening letters to the Jewish community.[8]

Political activities after returning from Rhodesia

In 1980, while leader of the National Socialist Party of America, he lost a primary election for the Republican nomination for candidates for attorney general of North Carolina.[9] Covington resigned as president of the NSPA in 1981.[10] That same year, Covington alleged that would-be presidential assassin John Hinckley Jr. had formerly been a member of the NSPA. Law enforcement authorities were never able to corroborate this claim and suggested the alleged connection "may have been fabricated for publicity purposes".[11]

Covington later settled in the United Kingdom for several years, where he made contact with British far-right groups and was involved in setting up the neo-Nazi terrorist organisation Combat 18 (C18) in 1992. C18 openly promotes violence and antisemitism and has adopted some of the features of the American far right.[12]

In 1994, Covington started an organization called the National Socialist White People's Party, using the same name of the successor to the American Nazi Party under Matt Koehl, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. He launched a website in 1996; using the pseudonym "Winston Smith" (taken from the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four), Covington became one of the first neo-Nazi presences on the Internet.[13][14] Covington used the website and the Winston Smith pseudonym to disseminate Holocaust-denial material.[15]

Beginning in 2005, Covington maintained a political blog titled "Thoughtcrime".[16] As a fiction writer, Covington authored several occult-themed novels.[17][18] As an author, he is best known for his series of five Northwest Independence novels: A Distant Thunder, A Mighty Fortress, The Hill of the Ravens, The Brigade, and Freedom's Sons. In November of 2008, he founded the Northwest Front, a movement devoted to creating a white ethnostate similar to that depicted in the novels.[19]

Covington was mentioned in the media in connection with the Charleston church shooting, whose perpetrator Dylann Roof discussed the Northwest Front in his manifesto, and was critical of its means and objectives.[20] According to Covington, the shooting was "a preview of coming attractions", but he also believed it was a bad idea for his followers to engage in random acts of violence, instead supporting organized revolution.[21]

Death

Covington died in Bremerton, Washington, on July 14, 2018.[1]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e Lenz, Ryan (July 25, 2018). "Harold Covington, founder of white separatist group, dies at 64". Southern Poverty Law Center. Retrieved July 26, 2018.
  2. ^ Murphy, Dan (June 18, 2015). "Why would an American white supremacist be fond of Rhodesia?". Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved March 27, 2016.
  3. ^ Brennan Clarke (July 25, 2011). "Neo-Nazi sympathizer fatally shot by Nanaimo police didn't fire flare gun, probe told" Archived July 27, 2011, at the Wayback Machine. Toronto Globe and Mail. Retrieved November 7, 2013.
  4. ^ Donner, Andreas (July 24, 2018). "On the Death of Harold Covington". Archive. Archived from the original on July 25, 2018. Retrieved June 21, 2023.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  5. ^ "Covington History Full Report".
  6. ^ Johnson, Greg (July 15, 2010). "Interview with Harold Covington". Counter-Currents Publishing. Retrieved July 26, 2018.
  7. ^ Guillory, Ferrel (May 14, 1980). "Nazi's Showing in N.C. Race Embarrasses GOP". The Washington Post.
  8. ^ a b Wheaton, Elizabeth (April 1, 2009). Codename Greenkil: The 1979 Greensboro Killings. University of Georgia Press. p. 45. ISBN 9780820331485.
  9. ^ "Nazi Loses in Republican Primary". Reading Eagle via Google News. May 7, 1980. Retrieved February 18, 2013.
  10. ^ "N.C.Nazi Chief Quits". March 27, 1981. Retrieved July 23, 2011.
  11. ^ "Doubts grow over Hinkley's nazi ties". April 2, 1981. Retrieved July 23, 2011.
  12. ^ "antisem/archive". Institute for Jewish Policy Research. September 1998. Archived from the original on July 13, 2015. Retrieved July 23, 2011.
  13. ^ "Hate on the Internet: The Anti-Defamation League Perspective – Statement of Anti-Defamation League before the Senate Judiciary Committee". Hatemonitor.csusb.edu via Waybackmachine. September 14, 1999. Archived from the original on January 3, 2008. Retrieved July 23, 2011.
  14. ^ Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke (2001). Black Sun: Aryan Cults, Esoteric Nazism and the Politics of Identity. New York University Press. p.28. ISBN 0-8147-3124-4.
  15. ^ Gardell, Mattias (2003). Gods of the blood : the pagan revival and white separatism. Durham: Duke university press. p. 106. ISBN 9780822330714. Retrieved July 26, 2018.
  16. ^ Tsai, Robert (2014). America's Forgotten Constitutions: Defiant Visions of Power and Community. Harvard University Press. p. 338. ISBN 978-0674059955.
  17. ^ "Internet Archive Search: Harold Covington". Retrieved February 18, 2013.
  18. ^ "Neo-Nazi Harold Covington Authors Cheesy Occult Novels". Southern Poverty Law Center. Summer 2003. Retrieved July 23, 2011.
  19. ^ "(PDF) Fighting for an Aryan Homeland: Harold Covington and the Northwest Front".
  20. ^ Berger, Knute (July 8, 2015). "Hate-Filled Zone: The racist roots of a Northwest secession movement". Crosscut. Retrieved November 25, 2020.
  21. ^ "White supremacist calls Charleston 'a preview of coming attractions'". TheGuardian.com. June 28, 2015.

External links

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Harold_Covington&oldid=1222821287"