[citation needed] He served the United States as a soldier in World War II; afterwards, he and other veterans worked to support voting rights.
[2] He worked with other Black leaders in the Congress of Industrial Organizations to advocate for the rights of laborers, especially in the southern United States.
Mayfield became a miner and worked for seven years in the largest foundry in Birmingham, the Stockholm Pipe and Fitting Company,[5] and became a member of the United Mine Workers, one of the labor unions of the time.
He was one of the black male leaders that tried to abstain from drinking, opposed having affairs and felt free to intervene in comrades' marital problems.
[1] Henry O. Mayfield was recruited into the Communist Party (CPUSA) by Hosea Hudson, with whom he worked at the CIO, where his main goal was to attract black workers.
[7] To educate himself on Communist beliefs, including self-determination, he began by reading The Liberator with John Beidel, West Hibbard, Joe Howard, Charles DeBardelebel and Hudson.
Mayfield's involvement with the Party included helping to create CPUSA-led trade unions that allowed Black workers, which were a new development at the time.
[7] The program's aims included confronting police brutality against people of color, ending poll taxes, federal housing, and voting rights for all citizens.
Mayfield, Hudson, Brown, and other Black activists, such as John Bedell and Sam Hall, were among those targeted by the FBI for their participation in the Communist Party.
[2] Theophilus Eugene "Bull" Connor was a particular member of the FBI who targeted these Black activists, conducting raids against anyone he considered a "radical".
[2] Henry Mayfield and Sam Hall both lost homes that they were buying under GI loans due to FBI interference.
Henry Mayfield became more widely known as a leader in the movement for Black freedom and equality after his involvement in the founding convention for the Southern Negro Youth Congress (SNYC).
[11] Some Black men refused to join the march or watched from the sidelines, due to the threat of racially-motivated violence from the Ku Klux Klan, as well as from the police.
Mayfield believed that “The Negro workers trained the white workers in the struggle.”[1] According to Mayfield, both the women and the children of the Black family played a role in union creation; when the men were on strike, the women could gather food for other families, while children could join protests with their fathers.