Before the Plebs. Talk on Sat. 12th October

News from Nowhere Club

http://www.raymondwilliamsfoundation.org.uk/NfNHome.html

 8pm Saturday 12 October

Author of "Chartism after 1848" - see

www.merlinpress.co.uk/acatalog/CHARTISM_AFTER_1848.html

Keith Flett

http://londonsocialisthistorians.blogspot.co.uk/

Before the Plebs:

Independent Working Class Education

in the Nineteenth Century

They sought not the useful knowledge of a conventional education but really useful knowledge to take on capital.  We look at this lost tradition of radical education in the working class and reflect on what it might mean for today.

 News from Nowhere Club

The Epicentre,
Leytonstone,
E11 4LJ

http://www.raymondwilliamsfoundation.org.uk/NfNfindus.html

info@newsfromnowhereclub.org.uk

0208 555 5248

07443 480 509

 

                                                                                                                                

 

Duke Street, Derry, 5 October 1968

A RaHN meeting to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the
CIVIL RIGHTS MARCH, IN DERRY, NORTHERN IRELAND, 1968
 was held on Wednesday  8  Oct. 2008, at Wood Green Social Club.
Pre-meeting notes were circulated as follows:-

On the afternoon of Saturday 5-10-68 a march was held in Derry (a.k.a. Londonderry) to demand an end to discrimination against Catholics in the matter of housing, jobs and the local government electoral system, and to protest against the state repression (Special Powers Act) in force in Northern Ireland.  The allegedly illegal route was blocked by police, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, who after a stand-off charged the marchers with batons and drove them off the street, inflicting numerous injuries and finishing the job by bringing in water-cannon. This led not only to riots in the Bogside Catholic ghetto that night, but to a great deal of publicity; the presence of Labour MPs from Westminster and camera crews ensured that the event was headline news on TV and in the Sunday papers.  This sort of thing might happen in Paris but wasn't supposed to be seen on the streets of cities in the UK; it was a wake-up call to the Wilson government which, the files show, realised that changes would have to be made to sort out the anomalous situation in the 'province'.

Press coverage was extensive

On the Monday it was the main topic of conversation in the students' union at Queen’s University Belfast, resulting in follow-up protests, mass meetings and the formation of the 'People's Democracy' movement, which tried against increasing odds to maintain a non-sectarian left-wing political perspective.  We may want to discuss why this sort of attempt failed, and if its failure (along with the resurgence of the IRA, nationalism, paramilitary violence etc.) was inevitable.

Queen's University Belfast Student Newspaper

A later PD leaflet with cover photo
of the sitdown in Linenhall St.

Reading list (selected - there's lots more on subsequent events, background etc.)
Paul Arthur, The People’s Democracy, 1968-1973. (1974)

Owen Dudley Edwards, The sins of our fathers : roots of conflict in Northern Ireland. Dublin : Gill & Macmillan, (1970)

Mike Farrell, Struggle in the North. (1969)

John McGuffin, Internment. Anvil Bks. (1973)

Henry Patterson, The Politics of Illusion: Republicanism and Socialism in Modern Ireland.  Hutchinson Radius, London, (1989)

Political Background [Official version as at March 1998 from N. I. Office website]: “Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom [...] It has a population of some 1,577,836 (April 1991 Census) of whom the majority are descendants of Scots or English settlers who crossed to the north-east of Ireland, mainly in the seventeenth century. As a result many are Protestants who have traditionally been committed to the maintenance of the union with Great Britain. The remainder - a little over a third - are Roman Catholic, many of whom are nationalist in political aspiration, favouring union with the Irish Republic.  #From 1921 until 1972 Northern Ireland had its own Parliament in which the Unionists, primarily representing the Protestant community, held a permanent majority and in consequence formed the regional Government.  #The present unrest began when the 1960s Civil Rights Movement and reactions to it led to serious inter-communal rioting between the late 1960s and early 1970s. From August 1969, militant nationalists (principally the Provisional IRA) and also "Loyalist" terrorist groups sought to exploit the historical divisions in the community and engaged in campaigns of violence. This then led to the Government authorising the deployment of units of the Armed Forces in support of the civil power [...]”

Cover of People's Democracy magazine (1971)

and p.1: the Editorial condemns “the disgraceful record of both Irish governments”.

In the student milieu, the "People's Democracy" movement made real efforts to emphasise class politics across the sectarian divide and also took inspiration from the French experience in trying to link struggles of workers and students. On some occasions, however, demonstrations were decreed to be for "students only", as in a march and sit-down at Belfast City Hall in the aftermath of Duke Street; the idea was to avoid accusations of there being outside agitators directing events (i.e. of being Republican pawns, perhaps).  An often forgotten episode was the People's Democracy march from Belfast to Dublin at Easter 1969 which combined civil-rights slogans with a protest at the border against censorship in Eire. 

QUB students held a mass meeting in response to the Duke Street events and organised a march to Belfast City Hall, which culminated in a sit-down in Linenhall Street.

The Times (London)

Sunday News (Belfast)

The Observer

*****************
POSTSCRIPT
December 2018

Merchandise on display in the window of Bookmarks, Bloomsbury St., London

IWCE SEMINAR, Swansea: Saturday 12th October 2013 10.30 - 3.30

INDEPENDENT WORKING CLASS EDUCATION IN SWANSEA

In conjunction with South Wales Miners' Library and Llafur: Welsh People's History Society.

Presentations will include: Richard Lewis on The Plebs League and the WEA in South Wales, Hywel Francis on South Wales Miners’ Library and the IWCE tradition, Rob Turnbull on Noah Ablett: an agitator to the end,Dave Chapple on Mark Starr and Colin Waugh. There will be a Panel discussion and lots of participation

 

Lunch at 12.30.

Cost for day £6.00. Pay on the day.

Email iwceducation@yahoo.co.uk now to confirm your place.

Directions: http://www.swansea.ac.uk/iss/swml/

IWCE Network tries to * develop a diverse range of education materials and approaches for trade union and other working class and progressive movement groups * respect the role of the working class in making history, and in making the future.

Keith Venables, Convenor

Woodberry Down history project

[from leaflet]

WOODBERRY DOWN: WHAT IS YOUR STORY?

Woodberry Down Community Organisation (WDCO) is applying for funding for an oral history project – “Woodberry Down, the People’s Story” – and we would like your support and participation. We are looking for:

• Personal histories and experiences of those who have come to live in Woodberry Down, from the 1950s to the present day.
• Your high points and low points (if you had any!) of living here.
• How you came to live in Woodberry Down
• The people in the neighbourhood you remember best.

Eventually we hope to produce a book and exhibition. Right now we are looking for people who would be willing to:

• Tell us your memories of Woodberry Down
• Take part in the project by researching the history of the area or recording people’s memories
• Letting the project copy any photographs you have of Woodberry Down and the people who have lived here.

If you can help or would like to be involved contact WDCO at 6 Chattenden House, Woodberry Down Estate, London, N4 2SG or e-mail: wdhistory@hotmail.co.uk

(There is an interesting history of the estate here: http://municipaldreams.wordpress.com/2013/09/17/woodberry-down-hackney-the-estate-of-the-future/ - NB not connected to the WDCO)

Clapton Festival event, 28 September.

"Memoirs of an East End Guttersnipe" by Brian Walker

3.00 p.m. on Saturday 28^th at the Levy Centre, 18-24 Lower Clapton Road, E5

(part of the annual Clapton Festival).

Brian's personal recollections and anecdotes date back over seventy years and are documented on his website "Tales of the Old East End"  <http://www.tales-of-the-old-east-end.co.uk>. Essentially this is the history of the life of a riverside community in Hackney filtered through the author's earliest memories and experiences.

Born in 1938 in the family home overlooking the River Lea, Brian still lives close to his former Lea Bridge home. His stories are told with wit, warmth and emotion and are filled with the everyday dramas which his family and their neighbours faced during the period encompassing World War II and the aftermath of war in the 1950s.