Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Lottery Grant awarded to Haringey First World War Peace Forum for Conscientious Objector project
Haringey First World War Peace Forum have won a National Lottery grant for their work commemorating the Conscientious Objectors, known as ‘COs’, of Haringey.
The Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) award of £9,900 is for their project 'Conscientious Objection Remembered' which will include a programme of activities and events from February 2017 to May 2019, and the installation of a commemorative plaque outside the Salisbury public house on Grand Parade in Harringay.
Local MP Catherine West and Haringey Mayor Stephen Mann will attend the official announcement of the award outside the Salisbury at 10.30 am on Friday 1st December. The site is where anti-war protests took place 100 years ago.
Who were the Haringey COs?
Amongst the 350 men, more than anywhere else in the UK, there were no less than 23 sets of brothers. COs were Socialists, Quakers, Christadelphians, Plymouth Brethren, Jews, Methodists, Catholics and others who professed no religion. They were from Palmers Green to Stroud Green and from Highgate to Tottenham. Typical of Haringey, some were locally born and some came from around the country to live and work in London. COs also included men from Ireland, Germany and Eastern Europe. The youngest was 17 and the oldest was 43. They were clerks, professional men, students, printers, post office workers, transport workers, teachers, butchers, piano workers, shop workers, engineers, carpenters and joiners. In fact from all walks of life.
Bringing the story to life
With the help of a professional sculptor and collaborating with Haringey charity Generation Exchange as well as local historians, archivists and teachers, people of all ages will be able to find out about Haringey’s COs, gathering and recording information, photographs and documents, engaging with an interactive sculpture in Bruce Castle, taking part in workshops, joining walks and making posters. Perhaps they will even find the names of their own family members amongst those who made a stand against war between 1914 and 1918.
When the plaque is installed on Green Lanes, at the end of the project, there will be a permanent commemoration for these men and their principles.
Mayor Stephen Mann welcomes the project: ‘We are so pleased that Haringey First World War Peace Forum has been awarded a National Lottery grant to build on the innovative research done in discovering the 350 men who became COs, often at great cost and hardship to themselves and their families – a newly-discovered part of Haringey’s heritage.'
Stuart Hobley, Head of HLF London, said: “The impact of the First World War was far reaching, touching and shaping every corner of the UK and beyond. The Heritage Lottery Fund has already invested more than £90million to more than 1,800 projects – large and small - that are marking this global Centenary; with our small grants programme, we are enabling even more communities like those involved in 'Conscientious Objection Remembered' to explore the continuing legacy of this conflictand help local young people in particular to broaden their understanding of how it has shaped our modern world.”
Haringey First World War Peace Forum are a group of local people who, for the last four years, have been researching, through the surviving records of the Middlesex Tribunals, the lives of local men, from what is now known as Haringey, who resisted conscription in various ways during the First World War.
Website (under construction): Conscientious Objection Remembered
Tags for Forum Posts: world war one
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Lesley Ramm on
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Well done to HFWWPF for getting your grant.
Having been marginally involved in early research of the COs in Hornsey i have attended various associated evnets which expand on their stories.
I very much look forward to a permanent memorial to commemorate these men in our borough.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Guest on
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Just to cross reference this Liz with a post I put up recently about an archaeological dig in Flanders next year to understand what happened at Hill 80, and possibly uncover the fate of some of those who were not COs.
It is appalling to think about the conditions these men from both sides fought and died under, and the oppression that faced those brave enough to stand up as COs. It is not very often I see things like this and cannot but think it could have been me in a different age.
There is an incredible part in the drama 'The Village' where you get some insight into what happened to COs and also some shell shocked young men who were shot for desertion.
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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Justin, you've reminded me to link to the post about Fred Murfin, a Tottenham Quaker and CO who wrote down his experiences in a compelling narrative.
(We also have a number of posts in the History of Harringay about World War One)
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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I'm grateful for the work done to prepare and launch this project.
In August this year, Zena Brabazon and I went with an American friend to an exhibition at the Imperial War Museum, called "People Power: Fighting For Peace". It included material from 1914-18 to recent events. The exhibition made me reflect on how ignorant I am about the organisations and people who opposed and argued against wars. It got me thinking about what we can learn - or fail to learn. Whether from museums, books, films (documentary or fiction) - and from the accounts of participants and survivors. I was nudged a bit more by recent radio and TV programmes marking various war anniversaries.
I realise that - without explicitly setting out to do so - I've been reading and downloading material about different aspects of the insanity of war-making. A random mixture including: "Bright Shining Lie by Neil Sheehan (about Vietnam); to Buda's Wagon by Mike Davies (History of the car bomb); to lots of material on Israel/Palestine. Also what happens to people who return from wars changed and damaged. ("None of us were like this before", is a book by Joshua E.S. Phillips about U.S. soldiers and torture.)
I read French historian Thomas Hippler's "Governing from the Skies" about the horrors of aerial bombing, initiated he thinks in 1911 by an Italian pilot dropping a single bomb over the side of his cockpit on some tents near an oasis near Tripoli.
Can I ask if other people went to the exhibition and maybe want to share their thoughts and feelings? Or some photos they took. Some of mine are here.
They include a photo of painting called Paths of Glory’ by Christopher Nevinson who served as a volunteer ambulance driver with the Friends' Ambulance Service on the Western Front in the early months of the First World War. He was commissioned as an official war artist in 1917. His painting - showing the corpses of two British soldiers - was censored. However, Nevinson included the painting in his official exhibition. Adding a brown paper strip across the bodies bearing the word "censored". Nevinson was reprimanded by the War Office for exhibiting a censored image, and for using the word "censored".
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Permalink Reply by Joanna Bornat on
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I agree, this was an impressive exhibition, including many rarely seen artefacts and including much personal testimony, illustrating resistance to war over the last hundred years and more, up to the present. The only down side was the cost to visit, likely to have deterred a few people and certainly families, and the fact that it wasn't more visible within the collections of the Imperial War Museum. The book of the exhibition is also tremendous, for anyone who missed the exhibition.
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Permalink Reply by Antoinette on
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There's a list of all the known conscientious objectors from the area online too:
https://hfwwpf.wordpress.com/cos-associated-with-hornsey/
which happens to include a gentleman who formerly lived in my own house. A lovely couple (I think they were from the humanitarian society) came round to let me know that my house was on their official walk around and not to panic if they saw a group of random strangers lurking around!! I have found myself fascinated by the topic since, and it's been an interesting topic to discuss with my son. He found the concept that all men of a certain age were expected to go to war quite shocking. He had no idea that men were imprisoned for refusing to fight and the terrible social stigma for their families.
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Thanks for those comments Antoinette and Joanna.
The day after our visit our friend from the U.S. went back to the Imperial War Museum on his own. Maybe we could have usefully done so as well.
I'm thinking too that the next time we're in Yorkshire we should plan a visit to the Bradford Peace Museum.
About the cost of visiting such special exhibitions, buying books etc. Three of the books I mentioned are published by Verso who seem to have an annual flash sale of 90% off e-books.
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Verso Books have now announced a December book sale £50% off everything for people with an online account. Free postage for orders of £10 or more. Free e-books (if available) "bundled" with the paper version.
(Apologies to the Big Green Bookshop. But as you know, BGB, you're never forgotten.)
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(P.S. Apart from my account with Verso Books, I have no links with them.
No hotels; free dinners; free flights; football strip for our grandkids etc.)
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