In those days when [they] were young communists, and very radical, they had friends amongst the Liberals and amongst prominent businessmen, and her house was a crossroad of people of different political persuasions. That was a wonderful girl, I loved very much. I loved and respected [her] very much and I was very sorry when I heard from prison that she had passed away.

STENGEL: And their house was, as you say, a kind of centre.

MANDELA: Oh yes.

STENGEL: And would you go there for dinner…?

MANDELA: Oh very often, very often. I had a clash with her…in 1958, I appeared in a trial and…I lost the case, and some women were sent to jail, and she then criticised me in the way I handled the case. It was actually the criticism of somebody who was not conversant with the law. But it was over the telephone and I was hard-pressed because I was dealing, you see, with more than 2,000 women, trying to arrange defence [for] them. The whole day, you know, I’d be busy either actually defending them or arranging people to defend them. And…then I handled one case and I lost it and three women were sent to jail, although, of course we bailed them out. Then she, on the telephone, criticised the manner in which I had handled the case and I told her to go to hell. And then [laughs] immediately thereafter I realised, man, you see, this is a lady, and this is a very good comrade. However wrong she was, she believed in what she said. Then, at the end of the day, instead of going home, I went along with Winnie to her place and I found her with one of the lecturers…at university…I just came in, didn’t say anything, just grabbed her, embraced her and kissed her and walked out. Walked away. [laughs] Ja, they tried to say sit down and so on – I just walked away. Yes. But I’d made peace. And Joe was saying, ‘I told you Nelson would never have any grudges against you.’ I walked away. So we made up. I didn’t want any tension between us. Although I lost my temper I immediately realised that, no, I was unfair to her. She’s a very sincere comrade, she should be entitled to criticise the way I behaved in anything where I made a mistake. But we made it up. I really respected Ruth and when subsequently I went underground she was one of my contacts.

18. FROM A CONVERSATION WITH AHMED KATHRADA

Gee whiz. I think we should describe, you see, what banning means…you are just prevented from attending gatherings and confined to a magisterial district. That was the first time, you know, I was banned, under the Riotous Assemblies Act in December 1952…I was prohibited from attending public gatherings, and then I was confined to the magisterial district of Johannesburg. Now, it was a new experience in so far as I was concerned and the fact that I couldn’t go beyond Johannesburg was, of course, something that affected me a great deal. But there was no shunning by people because not everybody in the first place knew when he met you that you are a banned person. The only case in which I came across this was, there used to be a chap called Benjamin Joseph, an attorney, where Harry Mokoena worked. One day…I was coming down Fox Street and he was coming towards me and as I approached he says, [whispering] ‘Nelson, don’t talk to me.