Early Life
Born as Jacob Comacho, Jack Comer was the youngest of four children. His father was a poor Jewish tailor's machinist who had moved to London with his wife from Łódź, Poland in 1903. To assimilate more into British society, the Comacho family changed their name from Comacho to Colmore to Comer.
According to Brian McDonald in 'Gangs of London' he was born as Jacob Colmore (mother's maiden name Lifschinsky).
Jack Comer grew up in a Jewish ghetto street in Fieldgate Mansions, along the west side of Myrdle Street, across from the Irish in terraced houses along the east side. At age of seven Jack had joined his first gang, which was made up of boys from the Jewish side of Myrdle Street who fought their Catholic rivals from the other end of the street. "Spot" soon started being called "spotty" because he had a big black mole on his left cheek.
"Spot" Comer claimed to have taken part in the Battle of Cable Street. In his version of events, Spot and his mob charged into the fascists with full power injuring as many Blackshirts and police as possible. "Spot" found himself alone and was surrounded by police with truncheons. He was badly beaten and sent to hospital, then prison. However, the Battle of Cable Street was fought virtually entirely between police and Anti-fascists, the reason for this was that police had directed the Blackshirts away from the planned route of the march. Mosley instead held his rally in Hyde Park, making Comer's story extremely unlikely.
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