  I'm posting this leaflet because a friend recently tried to find a copy online and couldn't. So here it is! The British Withdrawal from Northern Ireland Campaign was established in 1973, largely by pacifists. It was much less stridently republican than the larger Troops Out Movement. Fourteen activists - the BWNIC 14 - were prosecuted for 'conspiracy to incite disaffection' for publishing this leaflet. In 1975, after an eleven week trial, they were acquitted, Ross Bradshaw has written about BWNIC here. I suspect this leaflet was not an original issue, but republished during the BWNIC 14 campaign. And 'Some Information for Disaffected Soldiers' was itself a revised, and more carefully worded, version of a leaflet for which the peace campagner Pat Arrowsmith had been convicted and jailed.  And who were the BWNIC 14? Well, in alphabetical order: Albert Beale (journalist, London); Wendy Butlin (secretary, London); Phil Cadbury (student, London); Bill Hetherington (social worker, Walsall); Juliette Hornsby (secretary, Chelsea); John Hyatt (journalist, Nottingham); Frank Keeley (unemployed, Liverpool); Ronnie Lee (soliticor’s clerk, Luton); Chris Roper (aeronautical engineer, Essex); Paul Steed (student, London); Bob Thomas (factory worker, Cardiff); Rick Walker (unemployed, Liverpool); Mike Wescott (make-up artist, Birmingham); Gwyn Williams (social worker, London).
And here they are!
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 Isn't this wonderful! A postcard sent from Mafeking in August 1897 to Major F.D. Lugard in Ngamiland. Major F.D. Lugard is Frederick Dealtry Lugard, born in India and later in life the Governor of Hong Kong and the first Governor-General of Nigeria. He was a pioneer of indirect rule, of using traditional forms of hierarchy, deference and governance to administer the colonies. He became Lord Lugard in 1928. And N'gamiland? Well, in 1896-7, Lugard led an expedition to Lake Ngami in modern-day Botswana, just to the north of the Kalahari desert, on behalf of the British West Charterland Company. At about the time this card was despatched, he was recalled and sent to West Africa. Perhaps that's why this postcard is knocking around. Perhaps it never reached Lugard and someone else pocketed it as a souvenir. This was part of my happy haul at Much Binding in Cromer the other day.   This is Andy Slovak in his Aladdin's cave of a bookshop - praise (from me) doesn't come much higher than that - in the Norfolk seaside town of Cromer. Much Binding (that's what the bookshop was called - a riff on the venerated radio comedy 'Much Binding in the Marsh') has, sadly, closed for good. But Andy very kindly allowed me in yesterday to have a last, lingering browse of his shelves and boxes. It was my third and final visit to Much Binding - I blogged about my last visit four years ago. Much joy was had. And a fair bit of dosh spent.
Andy's shop was unusual in stocking quite a lot of odd copies of left and radical papers and journals. Just up my street! I was delighted to find a few copies of the Black Power paper The Hustler, published in Notting Hill from 1968.  Black Dwarf was perhaps the best political paper of that era, and some of the covers featured striking drawings by the rapier-like Ralph Steadman - recognise Harold Wilson here?  Tariq Ali and other IMGers on Black Dwarf broke away to set up Red Mole, not as good a paper but again the iconography is interesting:  And who wouldn't love a copy of the International Times with the Furry Freak Brothers on the cover (this is from 1970):  Andy also had some runs of old anarchist papers in French and Spanish - I picked up a couple of copies of an Argentine anarchist publication from the 1920s:  And yes, I did buy a fair few pamphlets and handbills too. That's for another blog.  In the shop window, something quite remarkable ... and beautiful,. A hand-painted Bengali election banner. (No I didn't buy it!) Amazing what you could come across at Much Binding by the Sea!
 What a band! Senegal's Orchestra Baobab have been going for almost as long as the Rolling Stones. And like the Stones, they still deliver! I caught up with Orchestra Baobab last night at one of London's loveliest music venues, the Union Chapel (sometimes known as the Congregational cathedral) in Islington. Most of the audience were the same vintage as the band - but they were up and grooving. Just a pity, on such a sweltering evening, that the chapel has no air conditioning. And yes, they played 'Utrus Horas', the opening track from their classic album, Pirate's' Choice: And here's Orchestra Baobab playing the same track more than forty years back: A wonderful evening with a band which has real energy as well as talent and such a great act to see live.. 
You can see where I've been this week. In the footsteps - well, the paw steps - of the country's most famous cat. Larry was selected to be the Downing Street Cat from a shortlist of three inmates of the Battersea Dogs & Cats Home. Although he now has the title 'chief mouser', he was chosen not because he showed any aptitude for catching mice but because he was good with people. You can imagine the scene if Larry had shown his claws to Gavin Williamson or snarled at Matt Hancock!  My visit to Battersea was to make a donation. Not money, but a slice of history. Many year ago, I bought at an ephemera stall a fragile handbill from the 1860s soliciting support for a 'Temporary Home for Lost and Starving Dogs'. I was attracted to it because I live not far way from the onetime dogs' home in Holloway. But it turns out that in 1871, this dogs' home moved to Battersea and became ... yes, you've got it. Battersea's archivist explained that they have vanishingly little in their holdings about the home before it moved south of the river. Well, now they have this -  And if you're curious what the dogs' home looked like in its Holloway incarnation, a drawing of it has survived:  Wonderful! But you can sort of see why the neighbours were keen to wave the home goodbye. The handbill emphasises that it's for lost and stray dogs only, not for ancient or no-longer-wanted domestic pets ...  Indeed, as you can see, it suggests that if your favourite pootch is getting a little long in the tooth, perhaps the kindest thing would be to put it down. Given the lack of veterinary care at the time, that's perhaps understandable ... but it's the exact opposite of Battersea's current approach. The home is happy to accept and rehouse unwanted pets, and says the cost of living crisis has sadly prompted more pet owners to wave a fond farewell to Rover or Mogs (the home's name was changed to include cats in 2002). And they only put down animals with very serious health problems or those dogs that are aggressive.to the point of being unhousable.  The Battersea campus is ultra-modern - and indeed the oldest building there, dating from 1905, looks almost comically out of place amid the lines and curves of the new wings and the Battersea Power Station development beyond. The home also makes use of a row of railway arches, a couple of which used to be the home of a small rail station (Battersea Park Road station, which opened in 1867 and closed in 1916). The station's splendid late Victorian decorated brick is worth a look.   It's the iconography which makes old political papers, pamphlets and ephemera so interesting. The Church Socialist was not in the first rank of political journals. But what a charming cover design, which featured on every issue of this monthly, or bi-monthly, for several years.  The Church Socialist was published from 1912 to 1921, the journal of the Church Socialist League. And the cover design? There's no acknowledgement and it's not signed - but am I imagining it, or is there a trace of Walter Crane in the composition?  Many years ago, I bought a batch of the Church Socialist as part of an auction lot. I have a few to spare. If you would like one, let me know.
And if you can tell me who designed the cover, I'll add that information to this post,  It's amazing what you can come across in a Muswell Hill curio shop. Immortalised in pottery are two of the presenters of Radio 4's Today programme. The items are dated 2005 and the figure on the right is clearly John Humphrys who presented the programme from 1987 to 2019.  But the other guy? Not so easy to identify. Anyone like to offer a guess? Some clues - he's well known and still broadcasting, indeed I heard him on Radio 4 just the other day. The first to get the name right - it's stamped on the bottom so I know who it is supposed to be - will get their name in lights on this blog. *** UPDATE: TIM HOLMES, SIMON CROW, ABBAS NASIR AND IAIN PURDON WERE ALL EXCEPTIONALLY QUICK OFF THE MARK IN IDENTIFYING THE MYSTERY EGG HEAD AS JAMES NAUGHTIE *** And what are these pottery pieces? Well, Today is a breakfast programme - and what do Radio 4 listening Brits have for breakfast ...   I hope this isn't a sin - buying a book for the bookplate. But how could I resist! Charles Bradlaugh was a commanding Victorian radical: atheist, republican, radical, reformer, oratur, propagandist, Parliamentarian, advocate of birth control, supporter of Irish and Indian nationalism and founder of the National Secular Society. Quite a guy! I've blogged about Bradlaugh before and about the bronze bust I have of him - here it is:  By the way, the book (duly listed on page 60 of the inventory of Bradlaugh's library) is a life of one of the most remarkable of Scottish reformers. Thomas Muir was convicted of sedition and sentenced to transportation. In Australia, he escaped and made his way via California, Mexico and Cuba to Europe - but he died in 1799 while in France. He was 33 on his death. He is one of those commemorated on the Political Martyrs' Monument in the burial ground on Edinburgh's Calton Hill.  The copy I came across online is a bit battered, but at least it is in the orginal binding and the pages - and bookplate - are clean.  Intriguingly, quite a few of the pages have handwritten notes in the margins - often corrections of the text. Could this be the somewhat obsessive Charles Bradlaugh, pencil in hand, tut-tutting as he comes across the author's inexactitudes?   You know the song 'Morning Dew'? Well a Canadian singer-songwriter, Bonnie Dobson, wrote it sixty years ago. And last night I heard her perform it. Bonnie Dobson is now 82 - but you would never guess it. Her voice is in excellent shape and so is her guitar playing. It was a good evening at MOTH, a cosy, friendly venue in Hackney. Here's her rendition from a decade ago - when she was joined by Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant: 'Morning Dew' is a song about nuclear apocalypse, and there have been many, many cover versions. My favourite - it has to be the rendition by the Grateful Dead: Bonnie Dobson came across as really genuine and warm. She and her husband were sitting close by watching the support acts - not that I realised it was her at first - and she gave me her brandy and ice ... the drink had been bought for her but on reflection she didn't want it. Cheers, Bonnie! From the stage, she talked about being on the New York folk circuit in the early Sixties, hanging out with the likes of Bob Dylan, and being tipped for future greatness alongside Joan Baez. After several decades away from the limelight, Bonnie Dobson started touring again a few years back - so glad that she's still walking out in the morning dew.  |
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