Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
1977: Anti-fascists battle it out with NF on Ducketts Common
I have been absorbed this week in my library book, Andy Beckett's When the Lights Went Out: Britain in the 70s , a period of recent history that I remember more for Frazzles and flares than its political or social history.
As I was got to the middle of a chapter entitled Pressures Building about the rise of racial tension and prejudice in the late 70s and the fleeting success of the National Front as a political force, I suddenly found myself reading about the NF's first big demo of 1977 which took place in Wood Green, and the pitched battle between anti-racists and the NF around Ducketts Common. Always eager for any snippets of local history, had a bit of a dig on Google but there's very little on it.
In the book SWP activist and historian of street politics of the period, David Widgery, recounts the story,
While the worthies of the Labour Party and the Communist Party and the official ethnic bodies...addressed a rather small audience in a local park, the Front...were faced with a determined opposition armed with smoke bombs, flares, bricks, bottles and planned ambushes...there was a spontaneous move to block the road and attack the Front...Conventional anti-fascist politicos had been augmented by North London tribal gangs, rockabillies, soul girls and tracksuited Rastas...a squad of black kids accurately hurling training shoes borrowed from Freeman, Hardy and Willis...
David Renton offers a similar account minus the training shoes,
On 23 April 1977, a twelve-hundred strong National Front march through Wood Green was opposed by some 3000 anti-racists, including delegations from Haringey Labour Party, trade unionists, the Indian Workers' Association, local West Indians, members of Rock Against Racism and the Socialist Workers Party. While Communists and churchmen addressed a rally at one end of Duckett's Common, a contingent composed of more radical elements in the crowd broke away and subjected the NF column to a barrage of smoke bombs, eggs and rotten fruit. Eighty-one people were arrested, including seventy-four anti-fascists.
Anyone remember this bit of street history?
PS from Site Admin: See a photo and a personal recollection here.
Tags for Forum Posts: 1977, battle of ducketts common, ducketts common, wood green
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Lesley Ramm on
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Well I never. I have no recollection of this at all - and I was 25 at the time so youth was no excuse.
I wonder what time of day it all happened? Did it make national or lcoal TV or radio news? Assume Hornsey Journal covered it but their online archives do not go back that far. Glad enough locals opposed the NF in Haringey. NF never did well around here as far as I recall and then they gave up even putting candidates up for local and national elections.
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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Hi Lesley
A local activist was telling me that the Hornsey Journal carried a wonderful front page on it the next day but as you say it's too far back for the online archive. They also said that the councillors of all parties (the council had every shade of councillor then) were united in their condemnation and all turned up to the demo under an anti- fascist banner. It seems the NF gathered at Ducketts Common and attempted to march up the High Road. They didn't get far before the march was attacked and broken up.
Also, a commemoration meeting and event was held at Ducketts Common in April 2002 with some of the organisers of the protest, Jeremy Corbyn [then a Haringey Councillor] and Lynne Featherstone- they were both there.
You're right too about subsequent fascist activity in the area. They never really bothered around here after that. Let's hope it stays that way. -
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Permalink Reply by mother hen on
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I was there. I do not remember it as the triumph these authors seem to suggest. More a feeling of anger and despair that these people were allowed to march with such police protection. I remember they tried to stop us getting level with them on Wood Green High Road so we ran round the back and through BHS, which had a back door then. Marching and haranguing and avoiding police was an exhausting day, and then the anxiety of waiting for friends to return safely...
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Permalink Reply by Lucy Whitman on
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I was there too. I remember it as terrifying and thrilling. Terrifying to see the NF marching through our neighbourhood and the vast numbers of policemen who were there to protect them. Thrilling to see that they were totally outnumbered by the motley collection of anti-fascists who had turned out to greet them. The fascists were clearly completely taken by surprise at the response and they realised that there was absolutely no point whatsoever in trying to win over local people to their point of view.
I also remember on one occasion a man trying to sell National Front News in Crouch End Broadway. He offered me a copy of the paper and nearly jumped out of his skin when I bellowed at him to get lost (I am paraphrasing). I can’t say it was entirely down to me but never again did I see anyone trying to sell National Front News in Crouch End.
In 1977 we were genuinely scared that the National Front might be about to gain real political power and influence, and the reason they didn’t was because good-hearted people up and down the country saw the danger and got together to stop them. Organisations like Rock Against Racism, the Anti-Nazi League, Women Against Racism and Fascism (WARF), the Campaign Against Racism and Fascism (CARF), Gays Against the Nazis, etc etc.
There was also a huge Rock Against Racism festival at Alexandra Palace in 1979, just before the election which swept Margaret Thatcher into power. This was part of RAR’s Militant Entertainment tour which went all round the country featuring bands such as the Gang of Four, Stiff Little Fingers, Misty in Roots, Aswad, Tom Robinson, the Ruts, Barry Ford etc. Thatcher had just made her speech about British people feeling “rather swamped by an alien culture”, so there was a big banner up in the great hall, “Hi! It’s all your Alien Kulture!”
Those were the days!
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Gold dust, Lucy. Thanks for sharing your memories and analysis on this.
It is a time I remember very dimly and through a haze of spangles and Bay City Rollers scarves, and growing up in a small town in East Anglia as I did, much of the political and social upheaval of the time seemed a long way away in that London.
It is wonderful to have people share their recollections of Harringay past.
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