Events Archive - Page 29 of 56 - Bristol Radical History Group

Studio 2: Bristol and the arms trade

A look at the early development of Bristol's aeroplane industry and how Bristol planes helped 'police' the empire in the interwar years. Special reference to Afghanistan, Iraq and Aden (Yemen).

The Somme 1916: From Both Sides of the Wire

Episode 3: End Game

This BBC series uses original research in German military archives to interrogate long-standing assumptions and prevailing myths about the what happened in the most iconic battle of the First World War. The final programme, End Game questions the broadly accepted idea that the Somme campaign was the ‘decisive victory’, British Commander in Chief Douglas Haig claimed it to be. To do this, it examines the revealingly different military cultures of the British and Germany armies, not just in terms […]

Smoke, Gas, Strikes, Metal and Slums

An historical walk through the Dings and St Philips

Due to popular demand, the Remembering the Real World War One history group are re-staging the Smoke, Gas, Strikes, Metal And Slums walk that was so well-attended twice last year. A two hour walk through St Philips and the Dings where Alfred Jefferies, the only man from Bristol shot for desertion, and his family lived and worked, including his brother Arthur who was killed in action on the Somme. Learn about the forgotten industries, back streets, schools and social history of Bristol in the […]

Book Launch: The Northern Ireland Troubles in Britain

Impacts, engagements, legacies and memories

Eds. G Dawson, Jo Dover and Stephen Hopkins. MUP Nov 2016. This ground-breaking book provides the first comprehensive investigation of the history and memory of the Northern Ireland Troubles in Britain. It examines the impacts of the conflict upon individual lives, political and social relationships, communities and culture in Britain, and explores how the people of Britain (including its Irish communities) have responded to, and engaged with the conflict, in the context of contested political […]

Sylvia Pankhurst, ‘The Dreadnought’ and the ‘Great War’

During the First World War Sylvia Pankhurst’s newspaper, The Dreadnought was the most consistently anti-war publication. It not only opposed the global conflict but condemned the crushing of the 1916 Easter Rising in Ireland, supported the 1917 Russian Revolution and campaigned for a revolution in Britain. Professor Newsinger is the author of numerous books including The Blood Never Dried: A People’s History of the British Empire (2006), Fighting Back: The American Working Class in the 1930s […]

Film showing: The White Ribbon

Dir. Michael Haneke

This film showing kicks off a series of events this year from the Remembering the Real World War One group looking at WW1 from a German historical perspective. Film Summary: In the run-up to the outbreak of WW1 in August 1914, the peace and quiet of a small Prussian village is upset by a series of disturbing events that seem to involve local children. As the villagers vacillate between exposing and concealing the perpetrators of the crimes, the wider question of culpability becomes […]

A ‘night of infamy’: Black Friday, 1892

History Walk

Bristol was rocked by two major strike waves in the late 19th Century, the first (1889-90) marked the emergence of ‘new unionism’ representing male and (significantly) female unskilled and semi-skilled labourers. Victory in these strikes improved pay and conditions for workers but led to an organised counter-offensive by employers in the autumn of 1892. The response of workers was a second strike wave which united miners, dockers and female confectionary workers, culminating in 'Black Friday' on […]

Kurdish/Syria Solidarity night

Films and Speakers

Tonight is an evening to find out more about the situation in Northern Syria and the region that the Kurdish groups and those that support them call Rojava. We are going to show two films and have some speakers discussing and facilitating a discussion about supporting the situation in Rojava and what we can do in Bristol and the wider UK to raise awareness and support the struggle for an autonomous and secular region in Northern Syria. We will try and encourage a space for all those interested […]

Spies and Trouble Makers

Wales's response to the Russian revolution

In 1917 in Britain, one of the government’s worst nightmares was developing. There had always been a ‘hard-core’ of opposition to the war on political, moral & religious grounds. Over the course of the war this opposition had developed as conscription was introduced. It began to be joined by industrial militancy as working conditions came under attack. With the February Revolution those opposed to the war could see an alternative and a way for the war to end. The authorities understood the […]

Detroit: Future City?

The US city of Detroit had a population in the region of 1.8 million in the 1950s but automation and the flight of big business, particularly in the automotive industry, led to massive redundancies, foreclosures and the displacement of millions. The population now stands at less than 700,000, the lowest it has been for a century. In the midst of this neo-liberal catastrophe and the associated withdrawal of public services, residents have banded together to create their own solutions including […]