M H
Issue 15: September 2014
Manchester Historian
The Empire Goes to War History in Features
Magdalene Asylums History You Should Know
Ebola: History in the Headlines Ashburne: History of the Halls
A Note From the Editors
Issue 15: September 2014
Summer is over, and the chill in the Manchester air is a reminder that winter is imminent. So we have provided you with some fantastic reading material for those long rainy nights as you settle back into academic life. As the new editors we both thought it was important to bring something new to the magazine, which reflects both of us. We have achieved this by adding in two new sections to the magazine that favours each of our historical interests: war, and feminism. Guess whose is whose? We have paired up to bring you some strategy and tactics, alongside a historical revision from a woman’s point of view. But the big theme this month is something that you could not miss this summer. 100 years ago, the great powers of Europe took part in one of the most devastating events of history; the First World War. Out of the 65 million combatants (including 8 million from Britain) that fought in World War One, 10 million of these soldiers died. So what better way to begin this year’s Manchester Historian than by marking the centenary of this conflict, and by commemorating all of those who lost their lives? We have covered some areas that are less well known or documented: from the Suffragette Split as a result of the war, to the Battles in the Skies. 2014 also marks 20 years since the Rwandan Genocide, which we have included in the ‘History You Should Know’ section alongside other important historical events such as Magdalene Asylums across the world and the Islamic Revolution. We are also bringing you ‘History Behind the Headlines’, from a history of Scottish Independence to the war on Isis. Finally, we’ve got the classic new staff interview so you can read all about Eloise Moss’s love of the history of British crime. And for those of you looking for a good TV series or book, you will find a couple of reviews here. If you have any suggestions for any articles or want to write for us, please get in touch by emailing us at:manchesterhistorian@gmail. com We hope you enjoy reading Issue 15 of the Manchester Historian! Zoey and Xan ‘The lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime’. – British foreign secretary, Sir Edward Grey, August 1914. The
Manchester Historian 2014/2015 Team
Editors Zoey Strzelecki Xan Atkins Head of Design Jamie Brannan Head of Copy-Editing
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Head of Online James Schoonmaker Design Team Charlotte Gore Laura Robinson Laura Callard Copy-Editing Team Sophie Brownlee Thomas Learmouth Helen Chapman Natalie Sharpin Charlotte Munday Marketing Team
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Xian Atkins and Zoey Strzelecki
Contents Women in History • Page 3 - Women in World War One • Page 4 - The Suffragette Split • Page 5 - Staff Interview: Eloise Moss History in Features • Page 6- The Empire Goes to War • Page 7 - World War One in East Asia & Our World War Review • Page 8 - The Power of the Poppy & Soldiers Armed with Lucky Charms • Page 9 - Gas Masks, Please! • Page 10 - Revolt in the Ranks • Page 11 - Battle in the Skies • Page 12 - Birdsong Review & Christmas Day Truce • Page 13 - The July Crisis • Page 14 - Riding Through History • Page 15 - Undiscovered Heroes of History: Nurse Mabel Earp • Pages 16-17 - WW1 in 10 Pictures • Page 18 - Battle of the Month History You Should Know • Page 19 - Rwandan Genocide • Page 20 - Origins of Quakers & Magdalene Asylums • Page 21 - What Caused the 1979 Iranian Revolution? • Page 22 - Human Trafficking History in the Headlines • Page 23 - Ebola • Page 24 - Isis & Scotland, Stay with us • Page 25 - History in Manchester: Ashburne Hall Others • Page 26 - History Society Column • Page 27 - Careers Column
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Women in History
Issue 15: September 2014
Women in World War One Henry Scanlan
The story of the stoic and diligent women of the Great War, newly mobilized and feted as heroines of the home front, is by now one well told, particularly in the history of feminism. But was there really a sea change in attitudes towards gender roles in those tumultuous years, or was there a return to the status quo in peacetime? Were these new freedoms for women long-lasting, or did they merely amount to emancipation ‘on loan’? Inevitably the truth lies somewhere in between. One enduring legacy of the war seemed to be the opening up of alternative areas of employment, as seen in the decline in the percentage of women working in domestic service. While the rise of domestic ‘labour saving’ appliances played its part in that statistic, the war undeniably opened up a number of alternative areas of employment for women. Though this was borne out of necessity, it resulted in the development of the ‘expectations’ of women. The number of women working in the Civil Service more than tripled between 1911 and 1921; jobs which compared favourably to domestic service in terms of wages, working conditions and genuine responsibility. 8 million (aged 30 and over) were given the long sought-after vote by the Representation of the People Act - though this move is widely perceived as a bartering tool for men to coax women into wartime action, given that suffragette movements had been gathering momentum since the turn of the century but only achieved success after 1914. Nonetheless, the policy’s lasting effect was consolidated in 1928 when the vote was extended to all British women over 21. The tide of feminism that had been coming to fruition in the years leading up to the war was presented with a potential roadblock when the conflict began. A divide opened up in the suffragette movement – the majority called for a truce in the campaign, while radicals were determined to push on with their struggle. The majority were vindicated: focusing on the war effort did more to earn public respect than continued protestations. Home Secretary George Cave introduced the reform act of 1918 with a speech that signified the war’s catalytic impact on women’s rights. It implied changes were pragmatic rather than idealistic: ‘war...has brought us closer together, has opened men’s eyes, and removed misunderstandings on all sides.’ Serious doubts are raised when political changes hinged on the extreme circumstances of war are linked to any wholesale rethinking of gender roles. Could these be trusted to be sincere and long-term proposals? In any case, change did come. British women were empowered, enfranchised and employed. On the surface, a win-win situation: men were fed, armed and clothed, and a generation of females had a new purpose in life. This was propagated by the romanticised visual legacy of women working in munitions factories (many people’s mental image most likely consists of a cartoonized, patronising poster of a hearty glamour girl in overalls). The reality was not quite so rosy. Working conditions were often appalling. TNT plants were notoriously dangerous, with workers’ skin turning yellow from exposure, and explosions taking over 100 lives. The psychological damage was another story altogether; young women scarred for generations, either widowed or left caring for traumatised survivors. Life would never be the same again. Meanwhile, the hostility and suspicion of male unions and employers towards the potential morphing of gender roles formed the glass ceiling that reminded women of their status as merely ‘temporary men’. Equal pay for women was avoided by subdividing tasks - the notion of replacing a man with merely one woman was considered absurd by reluctant employers, who reinstated men after the war on the grounds that one man alone could fulfil a role that required 2 to 3 women. Inevitably, as men came home and factory production slowed, most women were forced to leave their wartime roles. But all was not lost: women had proven more than capable of matching up to the work of men, and had paved the way for their acceptance as contributors to society. This was consolidated when they gained full enfranchisement in 1928. The war presented a complex and turbulent experience for women on the home front. A simultaneously liberating, harrowing and frustratingly transient experience for the many, many women who were catapulted from domesticity to the beating heart of wartime Britain, only to be sent back to kitchens of the suburbs come 1919.
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Women in History
Issue 15: September 2014
The Suffragette Split Jennifer Nuttall
The Pankhurst family were crucial to the Suffragette movement in the early 20th Century. The Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) was founded in Manchester, Pankhurst’s hometown, prior to World War One. There were six founders of the WSPU, including both Sylvia and Emmeline Pankhurst. The WSPU displayed a more militant strand of the suffrage movement than its predecessor, the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). The WSPU used tactics such as heckling, or lobbying politicians, breaking windows, chaining to railings, hunger strikes, attacking politicians and attacking properties in order to be heard. However as the First World War broke out in Britain in 1914 the Pankhurst’s were divided in opinion regarding their support of the war effort. As the British nation became unified in an attempt to assist the state under wartime measures, the suffragettes, as well as other social movements such as the trade unions, were under pressure to halt their campaigns for the time being and contribute to the war effort.
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The trade unions came to an agreement with the government to postpone any strikes until after the war. However the decision of the suffrage movement, in terms of postponing any suffrage campaigns during the war, was a far more complex situation to deal with. Emmeline Pankhurst was of the opinion that support should be given to middle and upper class women during the war, as they were, in her opinion, the most able Wikimedia Commons and likely to gain suffrage once the war was over. This was an elitist perspective on suffrage and was a view which was not shared by her daughter, Sylvia Pankhurst. Sylvia Pankhurst expressed the urgent need to support the working classes at this time as she believed that more left wing Labour policies were necessary to gain a universal suffrage for all males and females (working class males disenfranchised at this time also.) Sylvia believed that the suffrage movement should be part of the wider struggle for working class rights, a view her mother, Emmeline, rejected. This difference in opinion during the war caused a divide in the WSPU and Sylvia founded her own suffrage campaign; the East London Federation of Suffragettes. This movement proved to be more effective than that of the WSPU, with non-military tactics and a focus on persuading women to help during the war and securing important meetings with politicians such as Asquith.
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Ultimately, the reason for the family divide was a clash in ideologies. Both Emmeline and Sylvia were fighting for the same overarching course of female suffrage. However, Emmeline was only interested in aiding middle class women to gain suffrage whereas Sylvia was fighting for universal suffrage; a right that was eventually granted post World War One.
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Staff Interview
Issue 15: September 2014
Interview with Eloise Moss Zoey Strzelecki
What brought you back to Manchester? I just love Manchester as a city and I’ve always found the History department incredibly friendly, supportive and welcoming. I studied for my MA here and knew that I wanted to return. I noticed that while the department covers such a range of history, there was a gap in the department for the study of British crime.
What got you interested in history/ the history of British crime? In my MA, I studied a sex scandal in Bolton workhouse, 1889. A workhouse nurse, Rose Morris, was found dead and pregnant. It turned out she was sleeping with half the local government board, including the Mayor! When this scandal broke out it was around the same time as the Jack the Ripper murders in London. So, there are all these late-Victorian fears about the motives of aristocratic, predatory men in the press anyway, and then this workhouse nurse Rose dies, so all of those fears are targeted again at the local government board in Bolton and the mayor. This said a lot about the regional circulation of ideas about sex and scandal. Whilst studying all of this and having a great time and thinking about doing a PhD, I was coming up against all these different reports and details on all kinds of crime, I realised that nothing had ever really been done on burglary in the existing historiography. The more I thought about it and discussed it with people here in Manchester (particularly Max Jones and Julie-Marie Strange); I thought burglary (traditionally a ‘masculinised’ form of crime) would be a fascinating topic to pursue. It’s all about homes and cities and how we feel about our homes and cities, and the masculine interloper into the feminised spaces of the home, and what kind of fears and threats that poses. My passion for the history of British crime also creeps out from my love of crime TV!
Is there any part or subject of history that you haven’t explored or researched fully but hope to? I’m writing my book on burglary at the moment that will take time over the next few years. My subsequent project is going to be on hotels and national identities, which isn’t an excuse to go and stay in lots of fancy hotels! I’m really interested in the relationship between space and identity, and how people move through interiors and negotiate privacy in those kinds of commercial spaces. So, one of the things that intrigues me about burglary is the fact that it exposes how open and how porous the home can be to the interloper and to the policeman, or any interested neighbours who can come in. I think there is something similar going on with the hotel where, nominally you’re in a private space that you’ve paid for, but realistically you’re actually going to encounter all sorts of people from maids or butlers, and other service providers within that space and they’re not necessarily bound to keep your secrets. You are actually allowing yourself to be monitored in a way that I think is really interesting. These are also the spaces that our tourist population first see. Their whole impression of Britain, and British national culture is derived from what they encounter in that first impression in the hotel, and there’s such a range of hotels that it really makes you think how have we marketed Britain historically through these spaces. Do you have any advice for current History undergraduates? I should probably say something really sensible but my immediate thought was have fun. In the sense that I’ve always had fun doing history. Even when you’re studying difficult topics, it is an inherently fascinating subject. I think that we can all be job focused which is good, but you need to not lose sight of the stories and empathising with people in the past which is actually something that is really important as a life skill. But I guess, my pearl of wisdom is time management. I am highly organised myself but if I could go back and do it again, I would set a really good working routine, do the 9-5 day. If you can get into that early it is a really good life skill.
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History in Features
Issue 15: September 2014
The Empire Goes to War Stephen Wears
We are all familiar with the story behind the outbreak of the First World War; what is less familiar is the response of the Dominions, India and other imperial colonies. The declaration of war obligated the Dominions to rally to the defence of the mother country. The Dominions of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Newfoundland mobilised for war immediately and before long soldiers drafted into service were making long and arduous journeys across vast oceans bound for the western front. It must not be forgotten that a huge number of men were drafted from India and British colonies in Africa and the West Indies. Many of these men found themselves fighting a European war which had no direct impact on their homeland. Public opinion in the Dominions fervently supported involvement in this distant war. There was a distinct attitude of solidarity with the United Kingdom; their ‘Mother Country’. The dominions were treated as ‘kith and kin’ in stark contrast to Indian and African subjects who were referred to as ‘natives. Perhaps the most famous battles fought by dominion troops are the Gallipoli campaign and the Battle for Vimy Ridge. The Battle of Gallipoli against the Ottoman Empire is famous for being fought by troops of the Australia and New Zealand Army Corps better known as ANZACs, but it must not be forgotten that soldiers from the Dominion of Newfoundland and British India battled alongside their ANZAC counterparts. Gallipoli has gone down in history as an unmitigated failure of military planning, handing the Ottoman Empire its greatest victory of the war. By the end of the campaign nearly 47,000 British and Empire troops had been killed and 106,000 injured alongside just over 27,000 French casualties. In attempting to take the strategically vital high ground of Vimy Ridge, soldiers from Canada took casualties of over 10,000 men with 3,500 of those having been killed in action. This battle was ultimately successful with the capture of the ridge, but the scale of the losses meant the by the end of the war, though Canada was not a defeated nation, in common with other belligerents it was a disillusioned one. The failed campaign in the Dardanelles and the horrific battles of Passchendaele and Vimy Ridge began to turn the support of the Empire. Public opinion in New Zealand increasingly touted that the country was merely being bled dry of its finest men. Whilst many of the more famous battles were fought by Dominion soldiers, it is worth remembering that men and women were also drafted in huge numbers from India, Africa and the West Indies. At the start of the war the army in British India numbered more than 1.7 million soldiers, many of whom were stationed in Mesopotamia, Europe and the Mediterranean. During the war the independence movement in India became fully engaged in the war effort offering tactical support in the hope of securing the respect and ultimately a better home rule deal from London. The Indian Army took part in battles across the world including the Western Front, German East Africa and the German port of Tsingtao in China. In the course of the war 74,000 Indians laid down their lives and a further 67,000 were injured. The war also spread to Africa, the result of the multitude of European colonies which had been divided among the great powers of Europe during the ‘Scramble for Africa’ in the late nineteenth century. The East Africa Campaign saw 13,000 South African and Rhodesian and 7,000 Indian and African soldiers join forces with Belgian and Portuguese contingents seeking to limit the involvement of Germanys east African colony of Tanganyika. By 1917 the German army was restricted to a small corner of the territory they once controlled. Without the incredible response from the empire, the bravery of its soldiers and the vast material resources dedicated to the war effort the involvement of the United Kingdom in the First World War would have been very limited, The support of the empire was invaluable to Britain’s war in Europe and enabled Britain to take the war to the disparate colonies of Germany’s African empire, disrupting the ability of the enemy to utilise resources held there. The involvement of the Empire had far reaching repercussions; it was the beginning of the end for Britain’s control. The Dominions and British India had been given the opportunity to prove that they were the equal of the ‘mother country’ and thus set them on a journey to Independence.
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History in Features
Issue 15: September 2014
World War One in East Africa Jonathan Van Varik
The war in East-Africa was a war on far away soil. The large distance to Europe made communications hard so there was no clear direction or aim. Colonial rulers largely had to improvise their actions of war. Local troops could not expect any reinforcements from the motherland, as the European fronts claimed most of the attention and manpower the colonial powers could spare. After all, EastAfrica did not have priority. Most colonies were hardly thirty years old, were underdeveloped and infrastructure was mostly insufficient. The German goal was the harassment of their troops, rather than confronting them. On the seas, the small German fleet manoeuvred in a likewise manner; evading the Royal Navy while harassing the transports that were so much needed on the European front. The main goal was to obstruct any form of support from the colonies. The reason why imperialist European powers were willing to break the promise of African neutrality, as was agreed upon at the Conference of Berlin in 1885, was mainly the hope of conquering land in order to get a better negotiation position in the ultimate peace negotiations in 1919. In addition, imperialist rivalry sometimes appeared stronger than a wish for peace and even with some fraternity of powers battling the same enemy, cooperation between various colonies was cumbersome. In the colonies, military presence existed of relatively small groups of local soldiers under command of European officers. Most colonial troops were meant to deal with local uprisings, rather than fighting a foreign power. They were locally recruited as the colonial government hoped that they would be able to cope with the East-African climate. The terrain of battle was hot and dry with seasons of extreme rain. This created a fertile ground for Malaria mosquitos and Tsetse flies, both of which would raise the death toll to extraordinary high rates. Mortality of infected pack animals would make armies dependent on human carriers for their goods, thereby decreasing its capacity and efficiency. In the early years, German attempts to dodge confrontations with the superior forces of the British and Belgians appeared to be successful. The prevention of a British amphibious landing at Tanga and attacks on the Uganda railways in the border regions made Great Britain draw colonial troops from other colonies, mainly India and South-Africa, to aid the war in East-Africa. A superior power forced the Germans back to the far south of their colony. The German army, while dodging British and Belgian forces, was driven back to the southern borders of their colony. They crossed the border and entered Portuguese Mozambique. The decision of the German army to make a move towards British Rhodesia in a search for supplies led to the end of the campaign. Slow communications made German commanders ignorant about the bad situation in Europe. It was on 13th November 1918, that the news of the armistice of 11th November reached the leading German officers and an armistice was signed; the formal German surrender took place two weeks later.
Our World War Review Grace Mcpherson
The recent centenary of WWI was marked by BBC3’s ‘Our World War’, an attempt to engage a new generation with such a massive event. The three-part programme is a compelling mixture of historical and social drama, based on real diaries of British soldiers from 1914-1918. All the archetypal aspects of a war drama are present: a military hierarchy, comradeship vs. conflict, and of course guns lots of them. Though crucial in the reconstruction of battles such as the Mons, and instrumental to the central plotline which illustrates the advancement in technology over four years, the abundance of guns becomes tedious. The drama features an unorthodox anachronistic soundtrack, with ‘Teenage Kicks’ the background to the recruitment process; this comes across (maybe mistakenly) as the BBC glorifying the experiences of the ‘Great War’. The filming technique which frequently uses a camera angle from the point of view of the barrel of the gun disassociates the viewer from the psychological act of killing and imitates the atmosphere of a first-person shooter game. We also see through the eyes of William Holbrook, the ‘runner’, which due to his job description creates a disjointed perspective, certainly reflective of the erratic nature of war. However this adds to the videogame effect; it is as though the viewer is thrust into the role of the soldier and the assertion that the series is ‘like call of duty the movie’ (submitted by an insightful Youtube commenter) rings true throughout. This is brand new but grows tiresome, and undermines the grittier aspects of the plot. Each episode introduces a new set of characters meaning we cannot get attached to any of them. This presumably is intentional, forcing us to empathise with the men and understand the difficulty in their forming relations. The latter episodes delve into more emotional subjects: by 1916 Britain had introduced conscription and linked to this is the storyline which focussed on desertion and the mental struggle a member of a firing squad could face. There are also conventional romantic storylines, the poignancy of which are far outstripped in the scene where three different Britons grapple with killing a leftover young German – for me this was the most evocative moment of the series. Local viewers will certainly appreciate the light-heartedness and tomfoolery provided by the ‘Manchester Pals Battalion’, serving to remind us how young the soldiers were. The historical accuracy of the broadcast is confirmed at the end of each programme, with sombering statistics and a brief commentary from the veterans. Despite its classic grey-green military hue saturation and my personal gripe of the excess of machinery ‘Our World War’ is not as novel as the BBC wishes, though for reaching a 16-34 demographic it is the best contender in its field.
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History in Features
Issue 15: September 2014
The Power of the Poppy Will Davis-Coleman
After a long, cold winter the weather the Spring of 1915 was unusually warm. Among the trampled soil and burnt out carcasses of trees, the poppies grew. Of all the symbols which stand as testimony to the First World War, the red poppy is at the forefront. In May 1915 Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, who was stationed at Ypres wrote the poem “In Flanders Fields” which, in its final line, has the first reference to the battlefield poppies; “We shall not sleep, though poppies grow in Flanders fields.” Laurence Binyon’s poem ‘For the Fallen’ explains perfectly the reason for wearing a poppy each year on 11th of November. “Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn… We will remember them.” Acknowledging the fallen is not the sole purpose of remembrance; the horror of the First World War was such that people were determined to remember the consequences of such a conflict and the unmitigated damage which it caused, the loss of an entire generation. The flower itself is a euphemistic symbol of resilience and determination; the wild poppies which were strewn across the battlefields of Mons and Flanders could only grow in a state of constantly churned up soil and so flourished in the barren wastelands Wikimedia Commons of the Western Front. This sent out the message that despite the fallen soldiers, life still prevailed. There are few other symbols, with their delicate blood red petals, which could be such a poignant reminder of the destruction and death and yet stand for such remembrance and hope. One symbol which does possess a similar strength and which did endure is the Star of David, of especial significance during World War Two. The Nazis attempted to brand the Jews with their own star in mockery of their religion and to set them apart from the societies in which they lived. Instead of the intended purpose of shaming the Jews and extinguishing their religion permanently, the Star of David set them apart, marked them out in defiance. Many Jews did not hide their faith despite it resulting in their deaths. From the opening of the first ‘death camp’ at Treblinka in Poland in 1941 through to the closing of the camps in 1945, the Nazis were able to exterminate six million Jews and yet despite their best efforts the Jewish faith and their star prevailed, like the poppy. Both of these potent symbols are above all a reminder of the men and women who died for what they believed in, when faced with untenable adversity.
Soldiers Armed with Lucky Charms Jordan Booth
The harsh conditions and horrific nature of World War One are well documented, from having to live in trenches and deal with hazardous weather conditions to killing an enemy soldier and paying the ultimate price. What is often overlooked is perhaps the biggest hurdle British soldiers had to face, the mental challenge. It is hard to imagine how the soldiers coped with not only the war itself but also the pain of missing loved ones. One way that soldiers got through this was by carrying lucky charms with them that often had special meanings and allowed soldiers to escape from the horrendous reality of the War. Good morale was vital and good luck charms played a huge part in keeping spirits high. But what kinds of good luck tokens did soldiers carry with them? Photographs were one of the most popular good luck tokens, they were a way of soldiers reminding themselves of those they had left behind and the reason they were fighting in the first place. Letters were also vital as this was the only contact they would get with their loved ones and were treasured by the men who received them. MP Alan Johnson writing for the BBC said that letters were crucial because “For some, it was a welcome distraction from the horrors of the trenches”. Astonishingly 12 million letters were sent to the front line every week! The huge numbers of letters were, along with photos, essential to morale and without them the task of war would have been immeasurably more difficult for the soldiers. Other popular charms included a gift from the soldiers’ sweetheart. These included necklaces with a photo inside, bracelets and even buttons! While this may not seem much it would make the world of difference to a soldier and was a crucial personal ‘boost’ when morale was low. Crucifixes, ornaments and “Tommy Touchwud” dolls (a wooden doll that was supposed to bring luck, one of the many superstitions people invested in at that time!) were amongst other good luck charms soldiers treasured. The fascinating thing about good luck charms that were taken to the frontline is that every man had something different that meant something unique and special to them. They are a humanizing feature of World War One and greatly improved morale of the soldiers, something that was essential to victory.
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History in Features Gas Masks, Please! Rosie Wright
In the First World War poisonous gas was used frequently in an attempt to destroy the enemy. The gas used ranged from the barely noticeable to the extremely toxic; the latter used more towards the end of the War to defeat stalemate which had been difficult to overcome. It was used by both sides, both whom (to start off with) were ill-prepared. World War One is infamous for its chemical warfare, but in actual fact only a small number of deaths in the war were directly caused by gas.This is because both sides came up with solutions to prevent the gas attacks from harming their soldiers. Many Britishs oldiers urinated on hankies (or wet their hankies for a slightly more hygienic prevention) in an attempt to counteract the toxic nature of the gas, however eventually the invention of gas masks saved not only the soldiers but would prove a useful tool for the general public too. Prior to the invention of gas masks, German soldiers were given gauzes to protect themselves which was a much more efficient way of preventing the gas from having harmful effects on them. Contrary to popular belief it was actually the French that initiated the use of gas. However it soon became a popular phenomenon being used by many countries.
Issue 15: September 2014 can trigger mental disturbances and psychological defects; this differs from the initial use of chemical weapons which only caused physical damage. The effects of chemical warfare have become ever more dangerous and to an extent much more malicious, as with so many weapons there are of course so many different ways to harm enemies/ innocent people. However with the progression of the chemical warfare industry the need for safer and more complex gas masks increases. Many different gas masks were developed particularly during the period of the Cold War as the world prepared for various possible attacks. Although the awaited attacks were assumed to be mainly nuclear, the threat of chemical warfare did not waver. The UN reported that in the 1970s and 80s, 25 states were developing chemical weapons, exemplifying the development of the chemical warfare industry. We cannot overlook chemical warfare as it was just as much a threat in this period as the threat of nuclear attacks. In the present day, chemical warfare is still a huge threat to the health of the masses particularly in the Middle East. Only last year it was alleged that a gas attack took place in Damascus, Syria which produced a significant amount of fatalities. It would seem for every war that has taken place in the last 100 years there has been some sort of chemical warfare involved. The effects of chemical warfare can be extremely dangerous such as blurred vision, paralysis and even respiratory failure. One idea from the First World War has managed to cause so much harm in an unjust manner. The long term effects of some of the recent instances of chemical warfare may be unknown, but for now the children in Vietnam with extreme birth defects or the soldiers with chemical burns on their bodies from mustard gas should serve as a warning. A world free from chemical warfare might be an unreachable ideal at the moment, but for now we want gas masks, please!
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The use of chemical warfare did not stop with the First World War. After World War One the USA come into the spotlight for their infamous and unfair use of the weapon. The Americans used this type of warfare in the Vietnam War later in the 20th century. Chemical warfare has proved particularly damaging in the Vietnam region with lots of birth defects, deaths and cancers being linked to the so-called ‘Agent Orange’ used by the US. This clearly shows the dangers of chemical warfare and not forgetting the long-lasting effects on innocent citizens as well as brave soldiers. The use of chemical weapons initially caused a minute (but still unfortunate) number of problems having not yet been developed properly in the First World War; however the advances in science and new technologies in the mid to late 20th century meant that chemical warfare advanced too, and with that so did the seriousness of the injuries it caused. Chemical warfare has changed from its initial beginnings of tear gas and has now expanded into many different categories of weapons. In the present day there are numerous new chemical weapons from lethal herbicides to psychological agents which
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Collection of National Media Museum. Frank Hurley’s Australian War Records Section. Wikimedia Commons
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History in Features Revolt in the Ranks Lizzie Rule
As the centenary of the outbreak of World War One is commemorated across Britain, people remember relatives that gave their lives. Perhaps the most compelling of these memorials contains 888,246 red, ceramic poppies filling the moat of the Tower of London, one for each British and colonial soldier who died in action. However, the men who were killed by court martial for desertion or cowardice across the British armed forces are largely ignored; these men, many younger than 19 years of age, also fought and died for the future of Britain. Shockingly, between August 1914 and March 1920, over 3000 men were given a death sentence in British Army Court Martial (though 89% of these were reprieved), due to desertion, cowardice, murder, espionage, mutiny or striking a superior officer, as defined in the British Army Act.
Issue 15: September 2014 and Germany, who did not regularly deploy firing squads. Only 346 men, or 1.1% of those convicted in total were executed, from a majority desertion, murder and cowardice in the face of the enemy crimes. This accounts for only 0.0003% of the British army. Life in the trenches was difficult for all involved, however whilst some reacted with religion or indifference, a large number failed to cope at all and suffered from ‘cowardice’. For this the penalty was death. It has since been acknowledged that many of those suffering with ‘cowardice’ were suffering from what we now know as ‘post-traumatic stress disorder’ (PTSD). At the time, there was acknowledgement of mental trauma, referred to as ‘hysteria’ or ‘neurasthenia, but the attitudes were very different. To the 21st century person, it seems shocking that execution could be the reaction to such a mental disorder, but the forces needed to utilise a tough system to prevent mass exodus. If you were to look through the thousands of web pages, newspaper articles or books about the First World War, you would be hard-pressed to find anything of these men or of the harsh punishments for sometimes undeserving provocation. World War 1 was glorified in the media in order to keep na tional morale high, but on the front line many men were terrified of losing their lives. Many men also played down these fears in correspondence with home, to maintain a strong image and reduce worry.
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The memorialisation of war means that the ‘ordinary’ people and their actions are heroised, whilst the less glamorous, less publicly acceptable actions are ignored as a matter of national pride. The British armed forces are seen to ‘do what they have to do’ and abide by their own military code. Although I fully understand the need for organisation I do, however, find it difficult to comprehend how it could ever be acceptable to kill a 16 year old boy for being too scared to face a war for which he was conscripted.
The question remains over whether the death penalty was necessary, how the armed forces dealt with question of socalled disloyalty and ‘unnationalistic’ behaviour, and whether, of course, it was fair or ethical under the premise of wartime. The court martial system included different levels of crime with corresponding levels of punishment. Small scale misdemeanours included matters of individual presentation and tardiness, punishable with extra exercise or loss of pay for a day or two. Moderately serious offences were punishable by forfeit of all pay for 28 days or- in the case of drunkenness- a fine up to 10 shillings. Finally, serious matters came under two categories: firstly, military offences such as discharging firearms intentionally occasioning false alarms on the march or misbehaving before the enemy in such a manner as to show cowardice; secondly, matters that would have been tried in ordinary court if in the UK such as murder or destroying another person’s property. Both of these counts would regularly have been punishable by death. The importance and maintenance of discipline in the army has and will always be considered a very serious affair. Although there was much ill-discipline during World War 1, much of it was of a non-serious nature; as a proportion of the army as a whole, serious punishment was tiny and instances of failures to obey orders few. The British use of such penalties fell between France, whose large army suffered around 700 executions,
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The Deserter’ Wikipedia Commons The Deserter by Boardman Robinson. Anti-war cartoon depicting Jesus facing a firing squad made up of soldiers from five different European countries First published in The Masses in 1916.
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History in Features Battle in the Skies Paddy Allen
On December 17th 1903, the Wright brothers accomplished the world’s first heavier-than-air flight, and set global militaries on a new path. Great Britain, throughout its history, had famously relied on its natural moat and superior naval forces to defend its people from invasion, but this was soon to change. The First World War heralded a new era of military innovation as aircraft, ranging from the original Blériot XI monoplane that successfully crossed the English Channel in 1909 to the Fokker Dreidecker (tri-plane) flown by the infamous Red Baron, Manfred Van Richthofen, were successfully employed to change the pattern of war. In four years of war, aircraft commissioned for military use would move from being little more than wooden frames wrapped in taut fabric to mass produced robust vehicles of war.
Issue 15: September 2014 As the war progressed, two new classes of aeroplanes developed: bombers and fighters. Out of the two, fighters evolved more rapidly. Initially, air-to-air combat consisted of an exchange of handheld gunfire and, in extreme cases, grappling hooks in an attempt to bring one another down. The first break in air combat came in 1915 when Dutch engineer Andrew Fokker developed the German Fokker Eindecker, which utilised a synchronised, forward-firing machine gun and so began the Fokker Scourge. So prolific were these planes and their pilots, the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) ordered that ‘reconnaissance [aircraft] must be escorted by at least three other fight machines’.
Bombing at the war’s outbreak, was also extremely crude – the pilot, or co-pilot, would simply drop a handheld bomb out of the plane, and accuracy was more luck than science. However, by the end of the war, each nation’s air forces had developed specialised long-range bombers, less manoeuvrable than fighters, but able to carry larger explosive loads. The German From the war’s outbreak, French General Foch famously said Gotha G.V bomber, which appeared in 1917, could carry almost ‘aviation is good sport, but for the army it is useless’, but even 2,000kg, as opposed to the 300kg capability of the Albatros B.II he couldn’t deny its impact on several of the key opening battles. used at the beginning of the war. Previously, aerial reconnaissance took the form of air balloons but aircraft, could fly further. With their newfound perspective of the battlefield, aircraft were able to spot enemy positions and effectively coordinate with artillery to strike targets. At the battle of Tannenberg in 1914, German forces were consistent in maintaining the provision of air reconnaissance through the engagement, whilst the Russian forces instead chose to utilise traditional cavalry patrols. This proved their undoing when a split between the Russian First and Second armies was detected by aerial reconnaissance, and quickly utilised, resulting in the Second Army’s annihilation and General Samsonov’s suicide. In similar fashion, General Charles Lanzerac was able to exploit news given by aerial reconnaissance to successfully attack the German Second Army’s exposed flank at Guise. This forced the Wikimedia Commons German First Army, under General Von Kluck, to shift its line of march to pass Paris to the east and set up the conditions for “the Miracle of the Marne”. As a result, Von Kluck retreated, and the It should be noted that throughout the war air warfare also Schlieffen plan failed, setting in motion the ‘Race to Sea’ which included the mighty dirigibles of German empire. The Zeppelins, famously championed by their namesake, Ferdinand Von stagnated into trench warfare. Zeppelin, were the envy of Germany’s European counterparts. These leviathans were able to cross the channel and repeatedly harassed London – over the course of the war, they would drop 5,806 bombs (196 tons), kill or injure nearly 2,000 Britons and cause £1.5 million pounds of damage ($88 million in 2014). However, September 3rd 1916 would spell the end of the Zeppelin military career as incendiary and explosive munitions used by British Air Defence would prove effective at handling the Zeppelin threat, whilst the later Hindenberg disaster would end its civilian career as well.
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As Major General Heinz Guderian remarked in 1939 about the First World War, “aircraft became an offensive weapon of the first order, distinguished by their great speed, range and effect on target. If their initial development experienced a check when hostilities came to an end in 1918, they had already shown their potential clearly enough to those on the receiving end. We don’t have to be out-and-out disciples of Douhet to be persuaded of the great significance of air forces for a future war”.
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History in Features
Issue 15: September 2014
Birdsong Review Chloe Wright
From the outset, Sebastian Faulks’s ‘Birdsong’ is a novel of parallels. Parallels between joyous youth and broken youth, love and hatred, peacetime and wartime, past and present. We are introduced to Stephen Wraysford and follow his journey through War and Peace. Faulks’s intense imagery and narration provides the reader with a graphic insight into the true reality of war – extreme living conditions, fear and pain, as opposed to slanderous “glory of war” propaganda used to lull a generation away from their home to be slaughtered like cattle. A particular scene which grabs the reader using sensory imagery to describe the wounds of a mustard gas victim is particularly harrowing, transporting you to the war and leaving imagery in the mind long after you have finished the novel. Similarly, Faulks’s description of the infamous Somme is hauntingly beautiful and heart breaking at once, capturing a storm of emotions; religious despair, anger, pain, sorrow. Faulks also touches on the effect war has on non-combatants, critically drawing upon the home front when Captain Weir returns home to a cold reception by the family he is fighting for. The condition of women and children is also explored by Faulks. An interesting aspect of the novel is the storyline of Stephen’s granddaughter, Elizabeth, set in the 70s. Determined not to let the memory of her grandfather die with him she pursues his life, in turn meeting one of Stephen’s soldier’s - a man ravaged by shell shock - in a retirement home. The treatment of this character and the lack of regard Elizabeth’s colleagues have for the past is often seen as a statement by Faulks: the sacrifices of those whom fought in the Great War should never be forgotten or devalued. Elizabeth’s storyline also provides hope to a story which mainly depicts despair, the birth of her son whom she names in accordance with a promise Stephen made to one of his fallen comrades and the prevalence of nature in her chapters indicate that there is always something greater than war, and human life itself, and life will continue. Birdsong is a novel which perfectly captures the futility of war, the bravery of brotherhood Wikimedia Commons and the scars war leaves on the societies it ravages. Perhaps most importantly, Elizabeth’s storyline raises a thought provoking reminder of why the Great War should never be forgotten whilst providing a sense of hope and life’s beauty.
Christmas Day Truce Mike Banner
Many things are associated with the Christmas period which we know and love and we can generally count on having a great time during the festive period. Circumstances were very different when soldiers of the Allied and German armies put down their weapons and stopped fighting to enjoy some familiar activities during the Christmas period of 1914, World War One. There is some disagreement as to exactly what happened in 1914, but through letters from soldiers to their families, we have been able to piece together some of the details. The war was less than six months old and fighting had been fierce. Despite the grim situation, on 7th December 1914, Pope Benedict XV proposed a period of no fighting in order to allow the troops to celebrate Christmas. This plea fell on deaf ears; there was no officially agreed truce between the major powers. Despite this, when Christmas Eve arrived, many accounts suggest that both Allied and German troops began to sing Christmas songs in their respective trenches. Some of the songs appear to have been directed in a friendly manner to the opposite side, Germans singing ‘Merry Christmas’ and Brits responding with ‘Stille Nacht’ (Silent Night). The following day saw German troops leave their trench South of Ypres and walk through No Man’s Land towards their Allied counterparts. Initial concern that an ambush might be in place was quickly dismissed as soldiers found themselves face to face with their former enemies. Private Jack Chappell (1/5th Londons) wrote home that in the morning his battalion and the Germans opposite agreed not to fire. Gifts of food were exchanged and a football match was played, whilst both sides collected their dead and provided a dignified burial. No matter where troops found themselves, in France, the deserts of the Middle East, the ravines of Gallipoli or the African bush, the scenes of Christmas celebration and peace were ubiquitous. Reports differ as to how the fighting resumed, from a signal flare to movement of new troops into the lines, but the truce was never repeated during WW1, as commanding officers suppressed any future festivities. Many authorities rightly believed that such fraternisation could prove damaging to the mission. Nevertheless, medical truces remained to bury the dead and attend to the sick, for example in Gallipoli between Australian and Turkish forces on 24th May, 1915. However, in the words of Prince William, the truce remains “wholly relevant today as a message of hope over adversity, even in the bleakest of times”.
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History in Features
Issue 15: September 2014
The July Crisis Chloe White
The 28th June 1914 not only marked the anniversary of the Battle of Kosovo in which the Ottoman army defeated the Serbians at tremendous human cost, it commemorated the 14th wedding anniversary of Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie. Crucially, it would also mark the beginning of the July Crisis in the lead up to the First World War. Despite receiving warnings of an assassination plot which threatened to murder the Archduke in Sarajevo, Bosnia, the visit went ahead. Upon leaving the railway station the Archduke and his wife were tailed by assassins. After one failed attempt, a message containing a change in route instructing the driver to avoid Franz Joseph Street where the final assassin eagerly awaited did not arrive in time. The Archduke and Sophie were fired at point blank range by a Serbian nationalist. Despite attempts to save them, neither survived and the future heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne was pronounced dead at roughly 10.45am. At this time, fearing opposition in their mission to silence Serbia, the Austro-Hungarian Emperor Franz-Joseph and his government appealed to Germany for backing to which the Kaiser responded by guaranteeing full support if countries, namely Russia, interfered. An ultimatum was sent to the Serbian government on the 23rd July brazenly demanding conditions such as the suppression of activities directed against the Austro-Hungarian government and most controversially the annexation of several Serbian provinces to compensate for the death of Franz Ferdinand. Giving the Serbian government only 48 hours to respond and deeming their objections to the participation of Austro-Hungarian officials in the assassination inquiry insufficient, the Austro-Hungarian government immediately rejected the reply and prepared for military action. As predicted, Serbia’s Slavic connection with Russia meant that when the Serbian government appealed to Russia for support, it was guaranteed. The prospect of war between more than three countries became almost unavoidable. In reaction to the increasingly serious international situation British Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey, suggested an urgent European Peace Conference. Nevertheless, on the 27th July the question of British action began to gain leverage. Pressure on the British government grew from France and Russia to declare support, Germany was asking for British neutrality and Grey’s lack of commitment was straining the government’s ability to prepare for the reality of war. German threat to Belgian neutrality proved the turning point in Grey’s policy. Following the principle of the entente, Grey concluded that such an aggressive move would force Britain to declare war. Despite this cautious diplomacy receiving a backlash of British criticism when Germany declared war on France on the 3rd August and invaded Belgium, Britain declared war a day later. The July Crisis demonstrates the unrest of many European powers in 1914 as they questioned the possibility of war. It consolidated Austro-Hungarian distrust of Serbia, made apparent the alliances of France, Germany and Russia, and further shows how close Britain came to remaining neutral. It is possible to argue for the contingency and ‘what ifs’ of such events which took place during the July Crisis, meaning that the declaration of war in August 1914 could never have materialized. Nevertheless, at this point the Crisis had escalated to a point of no return.
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History in Features
Issue 15: September 2014
Riding Through History Xan Atkins
The look of confusion and astonishment on the locals isn’t surprising. They are greeted with the sight of men on horseback moving slowly up the main road, dressed from head to toe in First World War army uniforms. For some of the onlookers it is almost as if they have been transported back one hundred years., which is the exact purpose of the riders. They are part of the War Horse Ride, the biggest British First World War cavalry commemoration ever to take place outside the United Kingdom. In August 1914, Britain declared war on Germany. The first real engagement, at Mons in Belgium, was a disaster. The scale of the German onslaught was entirely unexpected and the British, despite a gallant defence, were forced into a retreat which lasted several weeks, always with German troops on their heels. It was then that the 9,000 men and 10,000 horses of the cavalry division played their first major role in the war, covering the rest of the British Expeditionary Force’s (BEF) retreat. This is what the 26 riders, who are all serving or former soldiers, are commemorating. They were each representing their company’s 1914 equivalent, wearing exact 1914 regimental dress and armed with First World War rifles, swords and lances. The ride was to take place over 5 days and cover nearly one hundred miles following the exact line of retreat to the day, and stopping in the towns where some of the main cavalry actions took place. We left London for Dover on the 25th August in heavy rain which last nearly the whole trip, provoking thoughts of the conditions in 1914. The first day covered over 30 miles, a gruelling experience for horses and riders alike who contended with long rides and cumbersome 1914 military saddles. Three of the riders carried lances owing to their serving in lancer regiments and those riding as officers carried pistols and swords.
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The second day of riding brought the company to the town of Moÿ-de-l’Aisne, in time for the town’s commemorations for the battle of Moy exactly one hundred years earlier. Celebrations involved the marking of a new memorial. A company of 9th/12th Lancers had travelled from their base in Germany to take part, the same regiment in 1914 which had charged successfully from their position at the battle of Moy. After several days riding, the company reached the end point, Nery for commemorations to mark the hundredth year anniversary of Battle of Nery. On 1st September, 1914, one brigade of British cavalry and one battery of the Royal Horse Artillery were engaged by almost twice their number in the form of a German cavalry division and artillery. Dismounted German cavalry attempted to attack the village whilst their artillery wreaked havoc. Of the thirteen British guns, only three could be brought to bear and two were quickly knocked out of action, leaving one gun with only three men. They performed admirably and distracted the German guns long enough for the British cavalry to get into a defensive position around the village. ‘L Battery’ kept up supporting fire until ‘I battery’ arrived with cavalry reinforcements, forcing a German withdrawal. Nery hosted a whole weekend of events, including a parade and a football match between German and British soldiers. Representing Wikimedia Commons the Royal Horse Artillery, is the Kings Troop there to commemorate the actions of L Battery now known honoured for their achievements as Nery Battery. We camped on the very spot where the 11th Hussars were camped one hundred years earlier and on 1st September we rose to the same mist that had greeted them just minutes before the Germans attacked. The morning’s parade and commemorations marked the end of the ride. On 5th September 1914 the German advance was stopped and the British and French began advancing back towards Belgium. The role of the cavalry had been instrumental. One hundred years on and the War Horse Ride had been a great success. There was no doubt that if those riders who had taken part in the Great Retreat were looking down, they would have been immensely proud.
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Undiscovered Heroes of History
Issue 15: September 2014
Nurse Mabel Earp Emma Davies
We all have images of life on the front line during the First World War: young men in uniforms, trenches, guns and tanks. But occasionally we are given a more personal insight into real experiences of the war. We were given such an insight upon the discovery of the notebooks of Nurse Mabel Earp last year. A volunteer nurse at two local hospitals in Cheshire, Earp’s notebooks were used by soldiers to write notes and poems, some expressing their gratitude for her nursing skills and kindness, while others described the horrors they had endured. Alongside these notes Earp, a trained artist, often drew scenes described to her by patients or painted rural scenes to cheer them up. Injuries suffered by the men are detailed in the diaries. Lance Corporal William Beech of 23rd Royal Welsh Fusiliers described how at Ypres on in 1914 he ‘was wounded in a bayonet charge and had to have his right leg off’. His note continued on to encourage other men to go to war and ‘go for the Germans and get your own back’. The officer clearly still had faith in the war despite his injuries. He also speaks with admiration for the nurses and the compassion they showed. Private B Cooksey, of 1st Duke of Cornwall’s regiment, described suffering in the trenches, recalling his frost-bitten toes in Le Bassee. Other pages featured less literal description and more expressive words, such as the passionate poem by Private H Thacker, of the 1st King’s Own Royal Lancaster Regiment: ‘Lay the proud usurpers low! Tyrants fall in every foe! / Liberty’s in every blow! Let us do or die!’ Another poem, Wikimedia Commons dedicated to Nurse Earp and dated 1916, recalls horrors such as being gassed. Also featuring in the notebooks is a love poem, written by a soldier in 1916 about the nurse who looked after him. Many men were reserved in their descriptions of their experiences of war. Despite this, these diaries provide a better understanding of life on the front line: experiences given by men in their own words. Furthermore, the notebooks tell us a great deal about the home front, showing the relationship between injured soldiers and the nurses who cared for them. Mabel Earp herself married a wounded ex-soldier in February 1918, although it is not known whether this was a soldier she cared for, as romantic as that would be!
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WW1 in 10 Pictures
Issue 15: September 2014
English tank captured by Germans, photograph taken by civilian near Hindenburg line, 1919. Wikimedia Commons
Amputees on a cigarette break, 1918. Wikimedia Commons
Wounded American soldiers enjoying weaving at the ‘Walter Reed Hospital’ Washington D.C, 1918.
WW1 in 10
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Americans wearing new gas masks, 1917. Wikimedia Commons
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David Lloyd George and ‘The Big Four’, Paris Peace Conference 1919. Wikimedia Commons
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WW1 in 10 Pictures
The iconic and largely reproduced Lord Kitchener - ‘Britons Wants You’ poster.
Issue 15: September 2014
Wartime family photo on Dorset Beach, 1914. Wikimedia Commons
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0 Pictures German infantryman next to an unknown dead French soldier duruing the attack of Fort Vaux, 1916 Wikimedia Commons
British soldiers marching to the Somme, 1916 Wikimedia Commons Women munition workers filling cartridge cases at the ‘Woolwich Arsenal’ London, 1918. Wikimedia Commons
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Battle of the Month
Issue 15: September 2014
The Battle of Mons Matt Steadman
The Battle of Mons saw the British Expeditionary Force’s (BEF) first major involvement in the First World War, as it took part in what is commonly known as the Battle of the Frontiers, where the British and French armies engaged the German forces along the french border. The BEF was stationed on the left flank of the French Fifth Army, in Southern Belgium, which meant that it stood directly in the path of the German First Army, whose objective was to push on to Paris at all costs. As a result of heavy fighting between the French Fifth Army and the German 2nd and 3rd armies near Charleroi, the BEF was ordered to hold the line on the Mons-Conde canal for 24 hours so as to protect the Fifth Army’s left flank from attack and encirclement. On the 21st of August, the BEF prepared for defensive action by digging in along the canal and reinforcing their defences at the crucial handful of bridges crossing it. The British put particular emphasis on the 4 bridges which were situated in a salient, formed by a loop in the canal, as they were the most exposed to an attack given how they protruded a few miles out of the British line. At dawn on the 23rd August, German artillery bombardments commenced all along the canal, as a prelude to the infantry offensive which began at 9.00 am with the Germans attempting to force their way across the four bridges in the salient. Four German battalions attacked Nimy Bridge, defended by only one company of the 4th battalion, the Royal Fusiliers. However, despite outnumbering the defenders 2 to 1, the initial German attack was decimated as they advanced in grouped, parade-like formation, thereby presenting easy targets for the British machine gun and expert riflemen. At this point, and after the disastrous first wave of attacks, the Germans switched up their tactics to a more open and flexible formation which proved far more effective as the scattered troops presented much harder targets for the British machine gunners. As the day wore on, the outnumbered British troops saw increasingly ferocious fighting and only a thin trickle of reinforcements and the exceptional bravery of their soldiers allowed them to hold off the Germans. It was during this heroic defence that the first two Victoria Crosses of the war were awarded, the first to Lieutenant Maurice Dease at Nimy bridge, who took control of his machine gun after every other man of his section had been killed, and despite being wounded 5 times, kept the Germans pinned down on the other bank with constant and unrelenting fire, before being evacuated to the rear where he died of his injuries. The second was awarded to Private Sidney Godley, who took over Lieutenant Dease’s machine gun and stayed behind to cover his company’s retreat from the advancing Germans, before being captured. Elsewhere, the 4th battalion Middlesex Regiment, who suffered 368 casualties in the first few hours of the battle, and 1st battalion Gordon Highlanders, were equally hard-pressed but with support from the Royal Irish Regiment managed to repeatedly resist the Germans throughout the day. On the right flank, the 1st battalion Royal West Kent Regiment and 2nd battalion King’s Own Scottish Borderers suffered extremely heavy casualties but also managed to hold their position. However, by the afternoon it was clear that the British position in the salient had become untenable and at 3.00 pm the order was given for a tactical retreat to positions to the south of Mons. This was achieved by reserve regiments covering the first line troops as they pulled out, which also allowed the BEF to further hold up the German advance and allow the French Fifth Army to retreat and escape encirclement. At this stage, few would have expected that this tactical retreat would turn into “The Great Retreat”, spanning a total of two weeks and covering 250 miles, before the French and British armies could reorganise and re-engage the German forces at the Battle of the Marne. However despite conceding ground, the BEF had achieved its main objective in holding up the Germans for a full 48 hours and preventing the French Fifth Army from being outflanked and crushed. Not only that, but they inflicted very heavy casualties on the Germans, around 5000 according to some sources; whilst also proving that the British could stand their own against a numerically superior enemy.
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History You Should Know
Issue 15: September 2014
Rwandan Genocide Melanie Fernandes
In approximately 100 days between April and June of 1994, an estimated 800,000 Rwandans were slaughtered by Hutu extremists. The extremists targeted members of the Tutsi minority community who made up approximately 15% of the Rwandan population, as well as any political opponents. With the twentieth anniversary this year, this article aims to provide a breakdown of this traumatic event in human history and the legacy of the slaughter on Rwanda today. The genocide was ignited by the death of the Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana when his plane was shot down on the 6th of April 1994. Hutu extremists blamed the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) while the RPF argued that the plane had been shot down by Hutus to provide an excuse for the impending violence. Regardless, within hours a campaign of violence spread from the capital throughout the country. While the death of the president ultimately triggered the massacre, it was by no means the only cause of Africa’s largest genocide. Ethnic tension between the two groups had grown substantially and heightened after 1916 when the Belgian colonists considered the Tutsis to be superior, giving them more powerful jobs and educational opportunities compared to the Hutus. This resentment led to a series of riots in 1959 and subsequently, when Rwanda was granted independence in 1962, it was the Hutus who took the Belgian’s place in power. Over subsequent decades, the Tutsis became the scapegoats for every crisis. As a result, tens of thousands of Tutsis fled to neighbouring countries and it was a group of Tutsi exiles who formed the RPF which invaded Rwanda in 1990. Fighting between the Wikimedia Commons Tutsis and the Hutus continued until 1993 when a peace accord was signed between them. However, the aforementioned death of the Rwandan President reignited this tension and exploded in the form of the genocide. The Hutu regime believed that the only way it could hang on to power was by wiping out the Tutsis completely. Immediately after the death of the president in 1994, in Kigali the presidential guard initiated a campaign of retribution. Weapons and hit-lists were handed out to militias, who went and killed all named enemies and their families. The violence was widespread and indiscriminate, neighbours killed neighbours and some husbands even killed their Tutsi wives. Radio propaganda urged people to kill the Tutsis, and an unofficial militia group called the Interahamwe was mobilised. The UN pulled out of the country after ten Belgian soldiers were killed and subsequently Rwanda was largely left alone by the international community during this horrific period. The genocide ended when the RPF captured Kigali on the 4th of July 1994 and declared a ceasefire. Approximately two million Hutus fled across the border into DR Congo fearing revenge attacks. At first a multi-ethnic government was set up, with Hutu, Pasteur Bizimungu as president and Mr Kagame as his deputy who later was made president. Although the killing in Rwanda was over, the presence of Hutu militias in DR Congo led to years of conflict there causing up to five million deaths. Rwanda’s now Tutsi-led government had twice invaded its neighbour and declared wanting to wipe out the Hutu forces. Thus although the genocide ended in 1994 the tension between these two ethnicities persists. Twenty years on, Rwanda cannot truly escape its past. While 800,000 people were killed during the genocide, a further two million were displaced and 200,000 were raped. As a result, Rwanda was left to deal with legacies including unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases like HIV and Aids. Whilst two million people were tried in local courts for their role in the genocide and the International Criminal Tribunal has been set up in its aftermath, justice for the victims of the genocide appears impossible until today. The genocide has also caused a great deal of guilt within the international community who have poured aid into the country to help expand its healthcare, education and electricity. However, the victims of the genocide have been given Wikimedia Commons very little formal assistance and more needs to be done to address economic, social and cultural legacies of the genocide so that victims can fully repair their lives. The fear of talking about ethnicity in Rwanda today could spawn ignorance, arguably preventing true reconciliation and merely masking the tensions. In this way, on the anniversary of the genocide we should recognise how this huge event Rwandan history has shaped the country and remains fresh in the minds of its survivors today.
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History You Should Know
Issue 15: September 2014
Origins of Quakers Katy Roughton
The ‘Quakers’, or the Religious Society of Friends, stretch back to the 1600s in Cumbria when local George Fox, disillusioned with the church at the time, said that he had experienced a vision from God as he climbed the idyllic Pendle Hill. This vision encouraged Fox to spread the word that Quakers still live by today; that there is that of God in everyone, and each person should be treated equally. This message was spread by Fox and his contemporaries across England and later America; Quakers reached large groups of listeners by holding meetings which detailed Fox’s vision and its implication that appreciating the Lord need not involve dogma or preaching, contrary to the opinion of the church at the time. Because of their self-expression and promotion the Quakers were regularly persecuted and some even fled to America. This began the global expansion of the Religious Society of Friends. Although Quakerism started as a Christian movement, it now embraces those of all religions who wish to worship their god in silent meeting alongside those who hold the same values. The Quakers get their name from the early occurrences of these silent meetings for worship in which some participants would feel the presence of the Lord so strongly that they would begin to shake, or ‘quake’. These days however Quakerism tends to focus less on religion and more on peace, equality and pacifism. Throughout history many wealthy Quakers have set up businesses which aim to uphold these fundamental values. Companies run by Quakers, such as Cadburys, Rowntrees and Clarks, cared for their employees in a paternalistic way, ensuring fair pay, housing and treatment for all workers; something which Quakers still work towards today. The Religious Society of Friends has had many influential members including Manchester’s very own John Dalton, several British and American politicians (the Obama daughters both attend a Quaker school in Washington DC) and numerous authors and playwrights. These members have played essential roles in shaping our world today including abolitionists, social reformers, academics and philanthropists whom we can thank for promoting peace and egalitarianism through humanitarian efforts throughout the world. It’s safe to say that, without this humble group whose origins began halfway up the side of a hill in Cumbria in 1650s, history’s landscape would look very different. There are many Quaker meeting houses across the country, even one here in Manchester if you fancy a visit!
Magdalene Asylums Kate Ayling
Magdalene asylums, also known as ‘Magdalene laundries’, emerged in the late 18th century to house “fallen women”. Originally this meant women who worked in prostitution, but this term gradually expanded to include women classed as sexually promiscuous, unmarried mothers, women considered too tempting to men, and women who were considered a family burden. They were sent to the convents by their families or the state and were trapped in these institutions as slaves; sometimes they resided there for a number of years, but more commonly they were trapped for life. The first Magdalene asylum in Ireland arose in 1765, following the founding of the very first asylum in 1758 in Whitechapel, England. These institutions were named after Mary Magdalene, a biblical character who was wrongly thought to be a prostitute. They were ran by the Roman Catholic Church In Ireland, and the young women were guarded by Sisters of a number of different orders. When women were imprisoned by these institutions they were given a new name and identity. Despite having committed no crimes, women of the Magdalene Laundries were locked away; they had no rights, no visits, and no independence. The little family they did have were not told about their whereabouts. They worked long hours without pay, performing gruelling manual labour six or seven days a week, and suffered severe emotional, physical and sexual abuse at the hands of those running the laundries. It is estimated around 30,000 women were incarcerated in Magdalene asylums between 1765 and the late 1990s. Yet the truth of these institutions was not uncovered until 1993 – 228 years after their inception. A convent named High Park in Dublin, one of the largest asylums in Ireland, sold part of their grounds to a commercial property developer. Unbeknown to the developer, this land actually contained a mass grave of 155 women’s remains, most of which were unnamed, which was discovered upon beginning the construction dig. Upon uncovering this mass burial, a long campaign for justice began for the victims of the Magdalene Laundries. The last Magdalene asylum shut its doors in 1996, and in 2001 the Irish Government formally acknowledged that the institutions were places of abuse. In 2013, a formal state apology to the women of the Magdalene Laundries was issued, and a £50 million compensation scheme put in place for the survivors. Yet, despite their exposure and calls from the UN and the Irish government, the Catholic Church has refused to compensate the women whose lives they have destroyed.
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History You Should Know
Issue 15: September 2014
What caused the Iranian Revolution of 1979? Katie Buckingham This article will argue that although there were many reasons for the Iranian Revolution, the main cause was fundamentally Shi’ite religion and the rise of Ayatollah Khomeini in sustaining and succeeding with the revolution. There are other causes to consider when analysing the revolution. By the late 1970s, monarchies were fading around Europe and the Middle East, in Italy, Albania, Greece, Egypt, Iraq, Libya, Ethiopia and Afganistan. Furthermore, the Pahlavi monarchy had also only recently been founded and within four years Reza Pahlavi, an officer in the Iranian Cossack Brigade, was named to the throne and crowned in April of the 1926. These factors combined to mean that the Iranian Pahlavi regime had little support.. Another cause was the nature of the Pahlavi regime; both Reza and his son Mohammed Pahlavi ruled very autocratically. Even though schools, factories, and industry were creating a new middle class, this middle class were allowed no power. The suppression of the press, parliament and intellectual life meant that they were practically unable to have a voice in Iran. This was a significant cause of the revolution as there was widespread disillusionment towards the regime in Iran. As a result of Pahlavi having no dynastic claim to the throne, he actively encouraged modernity in Iran. He introduced public education, the civil service, a new legal code and the beginnings of modern industry. However, this modernisation was in conflict with his suppressive and autocratic rule, and arguably this conflict was a significant factor in the cause of the Iranian revolution. The significance of Shi’ite religion in the revolution is, for many people, a religious upsurge in response to corruption in high places of the government and growing materialism. However, it must also be noted that others have seen it as a rejection of the modern and western world seeping into Iran. In order to understand this we must look back at the history of Shi’ism and its fractious history with the state. The separate development of the religious and secular powers of Shi’ite Islam in Iran can be said to be a large contributor to the 1979 revolution; Shi’ite Islam is hostile to temporal authority because religious power associated with justice must always be at power with temporal powers associated with injustice. Therefore, by Shi’ism guidelines, the religious institution must always be hostile towards a secular government; this underlying tension is very important in the cause of the Iranian Revolution. Indeed, the history of Iran is seen by Shi’ism as a decline of Islam; more and more corruption of holy law as temporal, ‘illegal’ power was increasingly imposed. Rulers were encouraged not to attempt to gain temporal power because of the failures of the first three Imams – Calphi Ali, and his sons Hasan and Hosein. It is therefore purported to be the duty of all Muslims to be against the government; essentially, secular governments must be bad as they do not carry the interests of the Imams and Islam. Elwell-Sutton points out that ‘the contradictions and tensions inherent in this view are evident’. It was these tensions between Shi’ite Islam and the government which were so significant in causing the Iranian Revolution. Religion and specifically Shi’ite Islam was the main cause of the Iranian Revolution, as it was the tool that Ayatollah Khoimeini used to mobilise the masses and to subsequently take power in 1979.
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History You Should Know
Issue 15: September 2014
Human Trafficking Nina Khan
Human trafficking is the world’s third largest underground network, deeply entrenched in both the developed and third world. Measures to curb human trafficking are continually being revised to ensure that the aid provided to the 20 million affected by slave trade is funnelled into where it is needed most, in order to combat this $31 billion industry. Over a hundred years ago the United States headed the campaign which would see the world take the first step in combatting trafficking, finally attempting to put a stop to this “debasement of our common humanity” through the 1904 International Agreement for the Suppression of “White Slave Traffic”. At the base of this foundation, the 1904 agreement intended to cleanse domestic trafficking but applied solely to women and girls, specifically only “white” women and girls. Though a step for mankind, this still allowed the transportation of persons within the international grid of sex and drugs and left the male population unprotected. It also failed to recognise human trafficking as a violation of human rights and rather than explicitly outlaw unconsented sex of any nature, it sought to address “debauchery” and “immorality” which are semantically ambiguous and fail to truly combat the underlying issue at its core. This act was ratified by thirteen European states including the United Kingdom and was acceded by a further nine states including the United States: the initial proposer state. The total number of signatories in 1904 reached thirty-four. This was followed by 1921 International Convention for the Suppression of White Traffic, which sought to release annual reports and also saw a number of NGOs get involved. It gave this cause further recognition and in doing so also provided them with a greater amount of bureaucratic apparatus in order to carry out this task. At this point it was recognised that the clamp down needed to be extended into the third world and was taken to Asia-minor, Asia and the Middle East, which was a movement away from the euro-centric stance which had existed up until 1921. Despite this, the UK placed a reservation on article 5 (affecting persons under 21) and limited the impact in colonial territories, namely India, a motion also reserved by Japan and Thailand. During the next quarter of a century between the build up to WW2 and the formation of in the UN, the number of child slaves doubled in Asia and it estimated by later British reports that the number of organisations affiliated with this trade also rose by a staggering number too. Britain’s reservation was later lifted in 1947 by Britain, yet the number of slaves being trafficked did not drop to pre-war levels and have just continued to rise since. After this 1921 movement headed up by the League of Nations, the anti-trafficking push went cold, despite a follow up convention being scheduled for 1937. In actuality, little was done to further this cause and the publication annual reports which were stressed in 1921 were not rigorously followed with only a percentage of nations actively seeking to put any statistics out into the international sphere. Though only a small percentage of people forced into this industry are male, it still exists and as well as being used as sex slaves many men are forced into labour camps. The recent upsurge in the demand for boy dancers in Afghanistan proves why it is just as important to hone in on both sexes and not assume that men as simply only ever the oppressors in this industry, as was assumed by the US in the first half of the twentieth century. The world recognised this necessity for revision and inclusion of outlawing trafficking against men in 1976. Actions taken to combat trafficking have been progressively expanding in the last 25 years; one of the more recent establishments as of 2000 is a Trafficking in Persons Report, which seeks to evaluate the progress and efforts made by countries in minimising trans-national trade. This in turn often leads to greater measures being put in place by the host nation, and despite this, the slave trade remains one of the fastest growing global network. This agreement was the stepping stone which has been built upon over the last decade and in January of 2013 Obama declared January “Human Trafficking Awareness Month”, which has further thrust this key issue into the public domain, rather than one which remains concealed within government documents.
Credited to Nina Khan
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History In The Headlines
Issue 15: September 2014
Ebola
Vivienne Delliou-Daly The current Ebola outbreak in West Africa is the deadliest occurrence of the disease since its discovery in 1976 and has sent media coverage wild. This isn’t the first time the proliferation of a deadly disease has caught the world’s attention. Who can forget the 1918 flu pandemic – that circled the globe wreaking so much destruction that its effects have been compared to those of the First World War? Or the 2009 panic in Britain regarding ‘swine flu’? To this day — though we remember little else about the fourteenth century — we are all familiar with the Black Death; probably the greatest plague in human history, a seemingly indiscriminate killer that wiped out between 30% and 60% of Europe’s population. Throughout the centuries, the outbreak of a deadly disease has the ability to spark religious, social, economic and political upheavals. Whilst the long-term consequences of the current outbreak of Ebola remain to be seen, it is clear that these wheels are already in motion. Ever since the death of the first European victim of Ebola, a Spanish priest and missionary named Miguel Pajares who was working in Liberia, media coverage of the issue has increased exponentially. Ebola has also been rocketing up the list of priorities for governments around the world. A prediction from the US public health institute claims that 1.4 million people may be infected by the virus by January if it continues unchecked. Ministers, diplomats and humanitarian organisations from 20 different countries have pledged a further £79 million to control the outbreak. It has already killed more than 3,000 people, and a group of 35 European security officials from the European Leadership Framework, issued a joint declaration suggesting that Ebola should be treated in the same way as the threat posed by nuclear weapons. In the US, which has already had its first case of Ebola, the debate has become even more heated. One Fox News correspondent even Wikimedia Commons highlighted the national security implications in these terms: ’We have a border that is so porous Ebola or ISIS or Ebola on the backs of ISIS could come through our border.’ Whilst this has prompted many commentators in the West to question why politicians don’t expend the same amount of energy trying to conquer somewhat more common killers, such as heart disease, it cannot be denied that Ebola, which has left around 70% of people infected to die a painful death, is a terrifying disease. It is this that gives Ebola the power to make both people, and their governments, very afraid indeed. It was the middle of the Cold War when the disease was first identified and mistrust between the United States and Soviet Union still ran very deep. What would happen if an enemy tried to use the virus as a biological weapon? This question preoccupied the British military, which kept a live Ebola sample at Porton Down, one of the government’s military science parks, in order to try and understand the virus and perhaps even engineer a vaccine.
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After the Cold War ended, however, the military’s interest in Ebola began to fade. Professor Charles Arntzen, a plant biologist at the Biodesign Institute in Arizona, recounts the declining interest in trying to combat Ebola in a postCold War world: ‘If I had been a research director in a pharmaceutical company and I went up to my CEO and said “you know we should really develop a drug against Ebola”, he’d look at me like I was nuts. This is a disease that has — now we have a few thousand cases — before it was a few hundred cases per year. The people who get the disease are very poor. I mean, there just was no return on investment for big pharma.’
However, according to Arntzen this attitude changed dramatically following the 9/11 terrorist atrocity, which had the US military newly focusing on bioterrorism. This meant Ebola jumped from being a poorly studied, not much known about disease to a Category A Biothreat. This opened up government funding for scientists to try and combat the disease. It now seems like those fighting Ebola are well placed, with more money than ever pledged to try and tackle the disease and save lives. However, scientists’ efforts to produce a vaccine and save lives have already fluctuated in the tide of world affairs and have been subject to both political and financial imperatives. It’s too early to tell what kind of influence this outbreak, once it abates, will have had on the world at large, or even whether fears of biological warfare were justified.
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History In The Headlines
Issue 15: September 2014
Isis
James Doyle If you have been keeping up with current affairs recently it will have been hard to miss the frequent reports on the atrocities being committed in vast swathes of Syria and Iraq, by a group tagged ISIS. But who are ISIS and what are their origins? In this short piece I will try to shed more light on a group, who were relatively unheard of until the outbreak of the Syrian Civil War in early 2011, but have grown to prominence ever since. ISIS or formally the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant, have been installing a caliphate state in an area roughly the size of Belgium running through Iraq and Syria, whereby sharia law overthrows all other systems of justice. ISIS have been able to take advantage of this by exerting barbaric acts on numerous other religious groups in Iraq and Syria, including Kurds and Shia Muslims, with these atrocities becoming a part of daily life under this new regime. Their aim is to create and conserve an Islamic State that includes a vast landmass consisting of not only Syria and Iraq but other countries as well. Due to the fact that they hold considerable oil fields in Iraq, they have been able to finance the ongoing conflict, and have ambitions to expand their influence throughout the Middle East and into areas such as Israel, Jordan and the Gaza Strip. The popular view is that the idea of a caliphate state is something radically new, however, the ideology of a caliphate state is not just a utopian idea for some, but it has been installed into a handful of societies throughout history. The most recent being the widely recognised caliph in the Ottoman Empire which ended in 1924, which shows that the ideology of a caliphate state is not just one of ancient times. Many Muslims think of the caliph or khalifia to be the leader destined to unite the Islamic world, and can be likened to the position the Pope plays in the world of Christianity. The actual origins of a caliphate originate back to the times of the Prophet Muhammad, whereby the Islamic World was governed by this legal system for centuries from the early seventh century onwards, with the death of Muhammad in 632 becoming the trigger factor for the installation of a caliphate state. With the western world beginning to intensify their efforts against ISIS, and with the introduction of air strikes on ISIS’ key strongholds, it begs the question whether the world will be able to combat this serious threat to democracy in the Middle East and beyond, or whether the ideology of ISIS will live on and come to bite later in the future.
Scotland, Stay With Us Jennifer Birdsall
The union between England and Scotland was solidified with the 1707 Acts of Union; creating what we know as ‘Great Britain’. 2007 saw the 300 year anniversary of this union and it was celebrated with the release of a commemorative £2 coin. The September 2014 referendum, on the issue of Scottish Independence, featured weightily in the national news. It was the ‘NO’ to independence vote that ultimately succeeded. Nevertheless, despite the outcome, there have been many occurrences that have altered or threatened the Great British relationship. One of these was devolution. The 2001 Scotland Act set out devolved powers for the Scots within the overarching governmental system. Seemingly, this act can be viewed as a catalyst for the referendum headed by the SNP. A key problem arose years before the official union of the two states. The Civil War saw the eventual beheading of Charles I, James VI of Scotland’s son. The war also gave light to Jacobitism. The Jacobites wanted to restore the Roman Catholic monarchy. The tension between the Parliamentarians and the Royalists was to an extent reflected in the boundaries between Scotland and England. Post-Civil War, the general support of the monarchy flourished. The passion and enticement for the monarchy grew at an especially tremendous rate under Queen Victoria. Within the boundaries of the recent referendum, an independent Scotland would still have shared Queen Elizabeth II and future monarchs. The British Empire was the largest of its kind at the height of its power. Although a lot of Wikimedia Commons credit is given to Englishmen and their efforts in expansion, the contributions of the Scots cannot be overlooked. The entrepreneurial skills of the Scottish were incomparable. They could be found all over the Empire – their skills were transported across India, Australia and so forth. All these Scottish enterprises that took place greatly enhanced the British economy. This history perhaps shows that the possibility of losing one of the countries that contributes to making Great Britain just so ‘great’ was daunting to many. The history of the relationship between England and Scotland is not often taught. So, is the best thing about the referendum that, despite the outcome, it got the general public interested and attentive to our nation’s history?
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History In Manchester
Issue 15: September 2014
Ashburne Hall - A trip through the ages Grace Middleton
Ashburne Hall was first created in 1899 and soon became a symbol of the move toward equality in terms of female academia. Prior to the creation of Ashburne Hall, John Owens had created a male only cohort at the university and it wasn’t until an act of parliament that the barrier preventing women attending university was broken down. With this came the problem of housing these women, and the answer came in the form of Ashburne Hall. Ashburne Hall began as a small hall of residence with only 9 students. This number quickly began to increase and in 1901, due to the sheer amount of applications, a new wing was built. This then led to the creation of a larger Fallowfield estate, which was subsequently turned into ‘Ashburne Hall’, with the old building renamed as ‘Egerton hall’ on the 22nd October 1910. The First World War had a major impact on Ashburne Hall, and not only on the building itself. It also highlighted the community spirit of the Wikimedia Commons hall, along with the students’ willingness to help out no matter what the situation. For example, students would often greet wounded soldiers at the train station with tea and cigarettes, and many students also became resident Voluntary Aid Detachment nurses (V.A.D.s). The interwar years saw the re-emergence of the link between Ashburne Hall and the welfare of women within the education system. Ashburne Hall played its part in The Women’s Suffrage Bill being passed, including Mrs Hope Hogg’s (warden from 1917-30) creation a scholarship open to completion for all female scholars. The community spirit of Ashburne is again highlighted in the annual plays with Hulme Hall. This can be seen in the social aspect of sitting down and chatting with lecturers who have lived within the halls, along with the traditions of the Halloween and Christmas parties. However this was tested during World War II, and yet again the Ashburnians rose to the occasion. Parts of the building were turned into air raid shelters and, since many of the nurses’ accommodation had been bombed, they were allowed to live within the halls of Ashburne, being heavily involved in the ‘dig for victory’ campaign. Despite this, exam results thrived.
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Now Ashburne Hall still stands tall with grandeur. A hall like no other. Although some traditions may have disappeared or changed, the spirit and focus of Ashburne are still very much alive and kicking.
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Others
Issue 15: September 2014
History Society Column Hello to our new freshers, and welcome back to returning students! We hope that you all enjoyed your summer and the first few weeks of the new semester. The 2014-2015 academic year has seen a growth in the members of the History Society committee. This year, the committee is determined to make the society, and the role it plays in the history department, more prominent. The start of this process has begun with a direct relationship between the society, the peer mentor programme, and the Manchester Historian. We had our first social of the year on Tuesday 23rd of September. We built on comments we received last year in an effort to make the social the best yet – and it worked! The social at 256 followed by Factory was a massive success! As returning students should be well aware, the society holds an annual pub quiz at 256. The turnout, of staff as well as students, is always really high. This year the quiz will be held by our very own Max Jones on Tuesday 14th October – put the date in your diaries! All the specifics for our annual post-exams trip have been finalised. The History Society is going to Dublin! Sign up using the link on the poster – you pay a small deposit then the rest of the money is not due until a few weeks before the trip. Lastly, make sure you’re all signed up to our facebook page and that you are a member of the society on the SU website! The facebook page is ‘University of Manchester History Society’ and if you search for us under societies on the SU website and join (for free!) our group. These are the best ways for us to keep you up to date with everything that’s going on with us!
History Society Netball Team
Don’t forget to book onto the Dublin trip! Wikimedia Commons
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Others
Issue 15: September 2014
Careers Column Jamie Taylor
Throughout this year there will be a vast amount of careers events run by the careers service, which any of you may attend. These events are course based, aimed at history students, and also school based, for arts, languages and cultures students meaning that there will be an event for any kind of career path or industry you could ask for. The Media Club! The Media Club is a great way for students to interact with peers and alumni in order to find out about pursuing a career in the media. Interested in PR, Television, Radio, or Advertising? Then this club is for you. Join the Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/mcrmediaclub/ What is it like to work in Television? Tuesday 21st October, 5.15-6.30pm, Room 5.4 Crawford House. Meet Helen Tongue, Managing Director and Executive Producer of Title Role Productions. A great opportunity to find out what it is like to work in television from someone who runs her own production company. Want to work in Newspapers? Tuesday 23rd October, 5.15-6.30pm, Room 5.4 Crawford House. Meet Paul Gallagher, Digital Innovations Editor of the Manchester Evening News. Find out about the different roles involved with working within a newspaper and how to find relevant work experience. Interested in PR? Thursday 20th November, 5.15-6.30pm, Room 5.4 Crawford House. Claire Boyd from Havas PR will be giving a talk explaining what it is like to work in PR, what the different roles are, and how to successfully find and apply for opportunities.
Other Events: Teamwork Challenge Monday 27th & Tuesday 28th October (Reading Week). An undergraduate workshop designed for SALC students. The challenge will involve you working in a team to develop a proposal and pitch your ideas to a panel of professionals. Spaces are limited so register now! Meet the Professionals: Alumni in Charities and Public Sector Thursday 6th November (Location TBC). A great opportunity to have face to face conversations and network with Manchester alumni who now work within charities and the public sector. Law Careers for SALC Students Wednesday 12th November (Location TBC) Ever considered a career in law? Come along to this event to meet solicitors and barristers who will inform you about how to successfully follow in their footsteps. Spaces are limited so make sure you sign up soon! To confirm your place at any of these events please visit: http://www.careers.manchester.ac.uk/careerslink/
Keep up to date on future events! Join The University of Manchester History Society Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/UoMHistorySociety/?fref=ts
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