Easter Monday 1962: CND march reaches Trafalgar Square
At Easter 1962(Monday 23rd April) CND held the fifth of its annual Spring marches. The first had gone to Aldermaston from London but subsequent ones including this one reversed the direction.
Easter was chosen in part because of religious symbolism and numbers of Church leaders were connected with CND at this point. The cause of nuclear disarmament (not to speak of departure from NATO which became CND policy in 1960 but was rarely a campaign focus) had by this stage become central to discussion in the Labour Party..
While historians myself included usually date the rise of large and very large demonstrations in London from 1968, the 1962 march had gathered around 80,000 people by the time it reached central London.
2022 Beard, Shorts & Sandals Season moves to early peak
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has said that the 2022 Beard, Shorts and Sandals Season which opened a month ago is moving to an early peak
The 2022 pre-season began a month earlier than 2021 recognising a spell of dry and warmer weather across much of the UK
The campaigners have said that ‘advice’ given by Stephen Doig in the Daily Telegraph (March 23rd) that shorts wearing should be left until ‘summer’ is wrong. Firstly because shorts wearing is essential to adapt for the new season after winter hibernation. Secondly because there is no guarantee that summer weather will be any better than it is now.
2022 Season guidelines
1] Shorts should ideally be three-quarter length-‘culottes’ for the 2022 season. The length of shorts is particularly important as climate change may mean that unprotected legs get sunburnt.
2] Footwear should be casual. There is a considerable range of sandal type footwear now available. Some leaves parts of the feet and toes open to public view, while some does not. The BLF is not prescriptive about the matter.
3] Socks should usually not be worn. However there is no definitive policy on this currently.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, the Beard, Socks and Sandals season has been a major influence on summer fashions in recent times and in 2022 we’re looking to early June to celebrate beards shorts and sandals. May God save them
3a] If the beard, shorts and sandals are to be displayed in relatively busier urban areas it is likely to be prudent to wear closed rather than open casual footwear and ankle socks, not visible to others may be worn.
4] There is no prescription or definition on what type of beard may be worn, or how this may match with the shorts and sandals. This is left up to the individual.
Hocktide: Women Turning the World Upside Down at Easter
British traditions are varied and confusing and those of Easter are no exception.
A strand of radicalism is a frequent thread. That is, the existing order of power relations is subverted in some way. The most common form of this is the Lord of Misrule, a character who is the precise reverse of the existing order of monarchs and other leaders. The figure is meant to be one of fun but as often disorder and riot are also present.
Easter has little association with Misrule but there is still a subverting tradition- that of Hocktide. In more recent times (and I’m not sure it existed beyond the early nineteenth century) it took place on Easter Monday or Tuesday. Earlier it was to be found at the end of a much longer Easter festival- two weeks or so after Easter Sunday.
Hocktide involved most commonly groups of women, married or single, kidnapping men and holding them to ransom for money. Originally the money raised went to local Church funds but it appears that later it was used to fund sporting activities.
In a male dominated society it was a rare expression of female power.
Hocktide, like many other religious associated customs was discouraged under the Long Parliament in the 1640s and even more so during the period of Cromwellian Government in the 1650s.
With the Restoration in 1660 it returned and it wouldn’t be surprising to find even today some echoes of the tradition taking place.
Bob Dylan’s message for Boris Johnson: With God on Our Side
Bob Dylan’s With God On Our Side is almost 60 years old. It appeared on his 1964 record The Times They Are A Changin. Mike Marqusee in his book on Dylan and the 60s, Wicked Messenger, noted that the focus of the song was ‘the horror and absurdity of nuclear weapons competition, the insanity of a system that claimed ‘a world war can be won’. One wonders if Boris Johnson has ever given it a listen..
Historian on Partygate: current system ‘not enough to constrain the ego in No.10’
Peter (Lord) Hennessy is a journalist, historian of post-1945 Britain, and an expert in the labyrinthine conventions of the British Constitution, such as it is:
The point can be made that Britain’s Constitutional Monarchy is not particularly democratic but even within that there are rules and conventions which are meant to be observed. In recent times observation of them has been at best hit and miss (the convention that Ministers should resign when something has gone wrong is not much observed in recent times) and the current PM is by far the most significant example.
Lord Hennessy spoke out about the matter on Radio 4’s Broadcasting House on 17th April. He argued that Johnson had broken the Ministerial Code and should resign. The problem is he is the custodian of the Code and when it was introduced by Attlee after 1945 it was not envisaged that the PM would be the point at issue.
Indeed the Code was not in the public domain until John Major put it there in May 1992 partly as a result of campaigning by Hennessy. His point on Sunday was that Johnson had not only broken the law but lied about it and the Code demanded his resignation but also offered no way of enforcing this. His suggestion was that the PM should swear an oath to Parliament that he would stick to the Code. One might wonder how this would help since if a PM could still command a majority in a no confidence vote they could carry on anyway. That said the British system has an interesting historic obsession with oaths (think Tolpuddle Martyrs) so perhaps Hennessy has a point.
Hennessy concluded that Britain faced the most serious Constitutional Crisis in its modern history. Many might feel that the key issue is that Britain has the most serious cost of living crisis for the best part of 50 years but there is a connection. A PM who is not accountable to Parliament and ignores the framework he is meant to operate in can ignore a social crisis as much as he can a political one.
Perhaps however, not forever…..Hennessy is a fine historian of post-45 Britain, his books on the matter are far more authoritative to my mind than more popular accounts by Dominic Sandbrook et al (even if Sandbrook is more entertaining). But it is history from above and from within the Parliamentary system. There is also pressure from without and from below, as Johnson may yet find out.
EASTER MESSAGE TO THE HIRSUTE: AVOID CHOCOLATE-BEARD INTERFACE
The Beard Liberation Front, the informal network of beard wearers, has sent Easter greetings to its followers but urged them to beware any chocolate-beard interface on Easter Sunday.
The campaigners say that chocolate in the beard can lead to a sticky mess which can only be satisfactorily removed with collateral damage to beard hairs and follicles.
Particular caution is urged when eating Easter eggs with creme or soft centres.
BLF Organiser Keith Flett said, Easter is a traditionally a time of new growth and BLF supporters will now be getting in training for the traditional, socially isolated, May Day Beard Waggle. In the meantime we urge enjoyment with care for Easter eggs to avoid beard damage
Vince Casey: from ‘slime ball’ to the Ambridge ruling class
The back issue of the Ambridge Socialist that poses the question of whether Vince Casey is a slime ball, peasant or decent sort, is one of those most viewed but developments this week suggest a change of status. The ruling class in Britain is a mixture of inherited wealth based on the land and new industrial wealth. New Left Review perpetually disputes the point but the Ambridge Socialist accepts this as a basic analysis. In Ambridge it is the Archers who represent old wealth across a number of representatives. New wealth has arrived by becoming part of the family-think Peggy (Archer)and Jack Woolley. Vince Casey who has made his money in abattoirs has a special relationship with Elizabeth Archer. This week David and Ruth have accepted his offer to fund solar panels for Josh Archers business…. Casey is now part of the Ambridge ruling class.
The Ambridge Socialist poll. How do you see Vince Casey now?
Ruairi has told Ben that he is a male escort (or possibly male prostitute) he found an older female benefactor Julianne on-line. There is nothing illegal about any of this, so who cares?
Who is the Easter Bunny: who cares?
The hunt for the Easter Bunny and the identity of the individual in the costume has reached fever pitch this week. In earlier weeks the thought it might be the perpetually aloof Call Me Russ was mildly diverting but matters have gone beyond that. The identity will be revealed later on Sunday it seems
A day at the cars: Vroom, vroom
A deeply puzzling episode of the Archers saw Jill, Leonard, Ben and Beth go vrooming. Someone must have enjoyed it…
Between 1647 and 1660 the celebration of Easter was banned by Parliament
Parliament banned the celebration of Easter and other religious holidays on 8th June 1647. Cromwell had no particular role. However there was an important and not mentioned quid pro quo. Parliament also ordered that the second Tuesday of each month should be a workers holiday. If employers refused then the Courts had the power to intervene. This concession came after a protest march by London Apprentices on 20th April 1647 from Covent Garden to Westminster protesting the ban.
Parliament of course had no issue with Sunday worship, the issue was with the feasting, drinking and celebration that went with it at Easter. Easter ales were common and at 1623 in Storrington, Sussex after the Easter sermon, parishioners enjoyed the ancient custom of a barrel of ale with bread and cheese
Die Martis, Junii 8, 1647.
Festivals called Holy-Days be no longer observed. June 8; Ordinance of Recreation.
Forasmuch as the Feasts of the Nativity of Christ, Easter, and Whitsontide, and other Festivals commonly called Holy Days, have been heretofore superstitiously used and observed, Be it ordained by the Lords and Commons in Parliament assembled, That the said Feasts of the Nativity of Christ Easter, and Whitsontide, and all other Festival-Days, commonly called Holy-Days, be no longer observed as Festivals or Holy-Days within this Kingdom of England, and Dominion of Wales, any Law, Statute, Custom, or Canon to the contrary in any wise notwithstanding: And to the end that there may be a convenient time alotted to Scholars, Apprentices, and other Servants, for their Recreation, Be it ordained by the Authority aforesaid, That all Scholars, Apprentices, and other Servants, shall, with the leave and approbation of their Masters respectively first had and obtained, have such convenient reasonable Recreation and Relaxation from their constant and ordinary Labours, on every second Tuesday in the Month throughout the Year, as formerly they used to have on such aforesaid Festivals commonly called Holy-Days. And that Masters of all Scholars, Apprentices, and Servants, shall grant unto them respectively such time for their Recreations, on the aforesaid second Tuesday in every Month, as they may conveniently spare from their extraordinary and necessary Services and Occasions. And it is further ordained by the said Lords and Commons, that if any Difference shall arise between any Master and Servant concerning the Liberty hereby granted, the next Justice of the Peace shall have Power to order and reconcile the same.
Marx on Easter Monday 1866 in Margate- very bad weather
Marx to Engels April 2nd 1866 5 Lansell’s Place Margate
The weather has been very bad here for several days, as if it had been made especially to order for the COCKNEYS who have invaded this place for the Easter Holidays
Marx had been staying in Margate one of his favourite seaside resorts for several weeks for health reasons. It was quiet and out of season until Easter, hence the remark above…
Michael Rosen: Please Write Soon. Another history of the present
Michael Rosen is adept at writing books for young people which also have important things to say for people of all ages and Please Write Soon(Scholastic 2022) is part of that.
The book is based on a real story from Michael Rosen’s family, but here two fictional cousins, Solly in London and Bernie in London, exchange occasional letters during the years of the Second World War. Solly is evacuated to the countryside when London suffers Nazi bombing (his mother remains in the Capital) and writes of his experiences of rural life. Bernie has a rather more dramatic time- being forced as a Jew to flee his home and become in effect a refugee ending up in a Russian camp and then as a soldier, fighting at Monte Cassino in Italy one of the epic( and terrible) battles towards the end of the war.
The ending is a poignant one which I wont spoil- get the book and read it for yourself.
Themes from the book, displacement, not knowing what was happening to close relations and friends, uncertainty about the future, are familiar to so many around the world now as they were in the 1940s. There is also a lot of humanity in the book, with Bernie noting that a bear had been adopted by his unit of soldiers.
The book has a focus on poppies, a symbol of Monte Cassino, which explains why my late father who fought at the battle (but was hardly the most ‘patriotic’ of people) always wore one. There is a also quite a bit about the wartime experiences of an obscure North London football team, Arsenal. Whatever happened to them?
The book, while fictional, is in many ways a history of the present. Its framework is based on historical fact around which personal experiences, feelings and thoughts develop and speak across the decades as a history of the present as much as of the 1940s.
It’s a book Priti Patel and Boris Johnson should be reading this Easter, but won’t be..
