Winstanley College

History Magazine October 2014 Edition

Please note that any views or opinions expressed in this magazine are the views of

the author, and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Winstanley College, or its

History Society.

Contents:

1.

Editorial:

Welcome to this year’s first edition of

the Winstanley History Magazine! 2014

so far has seen a number of events that

have shaken the world, the annexation

of Crimea, the shooting down of flight

MH17 and the rise of Islamic State in

Iraq to name a few. Closer to home we

have also seen the referendum on

Scottish independence and the subse-

quent resignation of Alex Salmond.

Most of these events have their

groundings in the past, Crimea as a

former territory of the USSR, the rise of

Islamic State in the 2006-7 Iraqi civil

war and possibly even stretching back

to the colonial era, and arguments over

Scottish independence from the medi-

eval period to the 1707 Act of Union,

and these recent developments will

most likely continue to shape our per-

ceptions and the ways in which the

world works for many years to come.

Keeping with the theme of Scotland, in

this edition we have a fascinating arti-

cle on why the Romans never managed

to take Scotland, or Caledonia as it was

known back then. On the theme of An-

cient History, similarly intriguing is the

debate over which form of Ancient

writing came first: hieroglyphics or cu-

neiform, as covered by Emma Porter.

Moving away from the ancients, in this

edition we also challenge the concept

that celebrity scandal is reserved for

the 20th Century, with articles on a

number of scandalous historical figures

such as Isabella of France and the Bor-

gia family. The Renaissance period is

also expanded upon through an en-

grossing exploration of the effects of

the Reformation on the monarchy.

More modern topics covered include

the civil rights movement, especially

poignant with the events currently un-

folding in Ferguson after the shooting

of Michael Brown, and a case study of

the effects of the Nagasaki atom

bomb.

Two other fascinating articles on The

Seven Years War and how it related to

WW1, and the Kwangju uprising also

pose the age old question– do we ever

learn from history?

Enjoy!

Maddie and Sally

Editors.

'You must always know the past, for there is no real Was, there is only Is.' -William Faulkner

2.

3.

On 6th October 1762, as part of the Seven

Years' War, the British beat the Spanish at

the Battle of Manila, only to occupy the Phil-

ippines' capital until the end of the war, by

then just a year away. This was a war that

reverberated across continents and whose

effects may be seen in the outbreak of war

in the 20th century.

The Seven Years' War is called many names

across the nations and continents it affect-

ed, which included Europe, North America,

Central America, the West African coast, In-

dia, and the Philippines. Despite technically

lasting nine years, its fever pitch lasted the

seven year period from 1756 to 1763 hence

the name 'The Seven Years' War'. The war

was primarily driven by the colonial and im-

perialistic tendencies of Europe's greatest

powers such as Great Britain, France and

Spain, as well as the power disputes of Prus-

sia and Austria. The various alliances be-

tween the aforesaid countries cooked up a

huge conflict which culminated in the Seven

Years' War. This feature alone foreshadows

the events in the build up to WWI, where

the Triple Entente and Triple Alliance played

a vital role in the spread of war across Eu-

rope.

Not only in its outbreak are the similarities

to WWI particularly striking: the outcome

bears a remarkable likeness, too. First of all,

the post-war negotiations of the Seven

Years’ War between the great powers were

held in Paris and the subsequent treaty

drawn up as a result of these negotiations is

known as the 'Treaty of Paris': Versailles, the

scene of the post-WWI negotiations, is itself

a district of Paris.

4.

As at Versailles there were notable absen-

tees at the Paris negotiations in 1763 who

had contributed to the build-up of war,

though at Paris it was Austria and Prussia,

as opposed to Austria-Hungary and Germa-

ny at Versailles. Even so, the actual land ar-

ea covered by the former and the latter

countries hardly differ, despite the 150 year

time lapse between them. The only differ-

ence is that the biggest losers in the Seven

Years’ War were involved in the subsequent

negotiations, as France and Spain teamed

up with the victorious Britain to form the

Treaty.

As in the wake of Versailles, the landscape

of Europe changed with the Treaty of Paris

and the subsequent treaty, 'The Treaty of

Hubertusburg’, which did include Prussia

and Austria. Like after WWI, European bor-

der disputes were resolved and they re-

turned to the 'Status quo ante bellum' - as

they were before the Seven Years' War

broke out. In a sense, important countries

that would play a significant role in the fu-

ture were formed: the negotiations created

the modern Germany as it is now known, as

Prussia gained huge influence in Europe at

the expense of the Holy Roman Empire.

This was a move of paramount importance

for the future of European relations, espe-

cially when considering the unequivocal

role played by Germany in the two world

wars of the 20th Century.

Moreover, Britain gained colonies and ex-

panded her Empire. Perhaps an interesting

contrast between the treaties of Versailles

and Paris is that the Paris negotiations en-

couraged colonialism, whereas Wilson's in-

sistence at Versailles encouraged European

self-determination. Britain's occupation of

much of North America as a result of the

Treaty of Paris could also be viewed to be

of huge significance in 20th century war-

time and the inter-war years. After WWI,

the American move towards Harding's

'normalcy' in the 1920's was born partially

out of the desire to return to a White Anglo

Saxon Protestant (WASP) society as created

by their British ancestors, which in turn

kept them out of the League of Nations - a

factor many believe to be crucial in the fact

that WWII was not prevented. This can

therefore clearly be linked to the British oc-

cupation of most of North America after

the Seven Years' War, in that their occupa-

tion would have encouraged British emigra-

tion to the USA, and hence established the

WASP ancestry of the USA.

The economy of Britain verged on bank-

ruptcy following the Seven Years' War. In

attempting to pacify the French and the Ro-

man Catholics based in Canada - which Brit-

ain acquired as a result of the Treaty of Par-

is - the British were forced to keep Canada

and appease their needs, which came at

huge expense. Economically, these post-

war events again strike chords similar to

that of WWI’s aftermath where Britain was

forced to pacify the Americans who were

keen to end their ties with Europe and

were demanding Britain to pay up the huge

outstanding debts caused by the borrow-

ing of money from the US to invest in the

war effort. The difference was that Britain

began to recover within a decade of The

Seven Years' War due to the beginning of

the Industrial Revolution, where industri-

alists such as Richard Arkwright came to

the fore to establish an era of economic

excellence for Britain, even on an interna-

tional stage. This harshly contrasts to the

stagnant economy of the 1920's where

the effects and the debts of the war

loomed over the British economy, fol-

lowed up by the collapse of the New York

Stock Exchange and the start of the Great

Depression within a decade of the Treaty

of Versailles.

And so I pose the question: was the Seven

Years' War a warning to the world of what

was to come in the future? Is it even com-

parable to WWI in its aftershocks and

effects, and from a British perspective is it

worthy of comparison when we gained

massively as opposed to the losses of

WWI and its negative impact on the econ-

omy?

To attempt to answer his vast question,

the context must be considered. Without

the Industrial Revolution, with financial

outgoings and investments going to Cana-

da, and new colonies, I doubt whether the

British economy could have survived hav-

ing neared bankruptcy immediately after

a war of this scale - naturally, one would

require an astute understanding of eco-

nomic to make such a claim with certain-

ty, but it certainly seems unlikely that a

pre-Industrial Britain would have borne

these costs easily. Furthermore, the mass

transfer of territorial ownership and land

that would later be the cause of dispute

does reflect much of the controversy of

the Treaty of Versailles a century and a

half later. In addition, the unquestionable

links between the political mood of North

America post-WWI and the British occu-

pation of land masses in North America as

a result of the Treaty of Paris 1763, and

the transferral of power to Prussia that

would later form the Germany at the

heart of WWI, to me seem to prove that

the Seven Years' War not only foreshad-

ows but lays the foundations for the First

World War. Obviously, the Seven Years’

War is followed by revolutionary social

and economic changes in Europe and oth-

er political conflicts that have an impact

on the course of history that leads inevita-

bly to WWI, but the link remains.

Can we therefore pin the First World

War’s causes on events one hundred and

fifty years prior? I think not. This being

said, undeniably, the Seven Years' War

bears some influence on international

events and theatre of war that struck up

the calamitous world wars of the 20th

century.

By Harry Griffiths.

5.

Ok, I know what you’re thinking: why

should I care about two dead languages

which I can’t read, and have no intention of

ever learning to read? “I’m interested in

WWII”, you might scoff, or, alternatively,

you may be thinking “Cuneiform, you idiot!

Are you just plain stupid?”

However, while it’s widely accepted by

some historians and language specialists

that Cuneiform came first, others say it did-

n’t and that there is no reason to go mak-

ing wild accusations and hurting the hiero-

glyphics feelings. It’s just plain rude. (And

you should totally care about hieroglyphics

vs. cuneiform because it’s…because

it’s….because it’s just cool alright? Go with

it. For me. Please? Thank you!)

Cuneiform

To start, if you’re wondering what cunei-

form and hieroglyphics are, I’ll give you a

brief (ha!) introduction. Firstly, the word

cuneiform means “wedge-shaped”, as all

cuneiform symbols have wedges in them.

Essentially, any wedge-shaped text/symbols

can be classed as cuneiform. Also, it wasn’t

a language. It was a picture-writing system

that used symbols, like hieroglyphics. In An-

cient Mesopotamia, it was universally un-

derstood, whether the reader was Akkadi-

an, Sumerian, or Babylonian. Each symbol

was the same word; just in different lan-

guages.

Cuneiform was developed from a Mesopo-

tamian accounting system of clay tokens.

Around 8000 BC, clay counters were used

to count goods in agricultural communities. 6.

An early form (not fully developed) of cu-

neiform script was used on the tokens and

on containers of tokens to show how much

there was inside. Goods such as cattle, ce-

real and textiles were documented on these

tokens and later on clay tablets.

Around 3100 BC, the symbols developed.

Mesopotamian authorities seemed to have

made it law to have the names of the indi-

viduals buying or selling the goods to be

recorded on these tablets. It was extremely

hard to do, as the current state of cunei-

form was logographic (1 symbol=1 word).

Therefore, there were too many names, too

many words to remember what all of them

meant. That meant it had to be developed

so that scribes wrote people’s names logo-

phonetically (1 syllable = 1 symbol). This

took a few centuries to develop, but even-

tually, cuneiform developed into this form,

used by Babylonians and Assyrians.

But the cuneiform I’m talking about is Su-

merian script. (I know, I’m confusing you.

Sorry!) At this time, 3200 BC, Sumerian cu-

neiform was read and written from top-to-

bottom and the symbols weren’t wedge

shaped. At this time, it wasn’t fully devel-

oped, but it was advanced and a form of

proto-writing. This is the script we’re talking

about. Over 200 years it developed into the

wedge shaped Sumerian cuneiform we

know and love and became read from left

to right. So, cuneiform as a true writing

form came into being around 3200-3000

BC, agreed? Agreed.

(The Sumerians don’t agree – they say that

the god Enlil created writing. Well, each to

their own, eh?)

Egyptian Hieroglyphics

Hieroglyphics on the other hand are much

less well documented than cuneiform.

They seem to have appeared suddenly

around the time 3100 BC. This is 100 years

later than cuneiform coming into being.

(‘Cuneiform came first!’ ‘Be quiet!’)

Egyptian Hieroglyphics were the writing sys-

tem of the Ancient Egyptians. According to

the Egyptians themselves, hieroglyphics

were given to them by the god Thoth,

(Dhwty in Egyptian); the scribe and histori-

an of the gods. There are three types of Hi-

eroglyphics: hieroglyphic, hieratic, and de-

motic. Hieroglyphic is inscribed on stones in

monuments; Hieratic is the "priestly" script,

used on manuscripts and paintings, and a

form of monumental hieroglyphics; and fi-

nally, demotic is a cursive script that re-

placed hieratic as the script for everyday

use from 600 BC onward. Got it? Good.

Hieroglyphics were also logophonetic, how-

ever the Ancient Egyptians wrote only in

consonants. This meant that the same

glyphs could be used to write a word, but

the word had different vowels in it – came

and come for example, would be written

with the same glyphs as they have the same

consonants. How would it be separated you

ask? Well, I answer. The signs in Egyptian

hieroglyphics were separated into 3 groups

– logograms, phonograms and definitive. 7.

Don’t worry; I’ll walk you through the jar-

gon. Logograms were signs that wrote out

the consonants or morphemes (smallest

meaningful part of a word i.e. in-com-ing

making incoming. The separate parts of the

word are morphemes). Phonograms were

the signs that represent the sound or

sounds, and the definitive weren’t spoken,

but they helped determine the meaning of

the words that preceded them i.e. finding

out if the word is come or came.

(Phew, glad that’s over!)

The Argument and The Evidence

The development of Egyptian Hieroglyphics

is less well documented than that of cunei-

form. The fully formed words seem to have

suddenly appeared in history. One of the

ideas on how hieroglyphics formed was that

Mesopotamian writing influenced it and

brought about the idea of a more complex

system of writing and recording, around the

time of 3100 BC. This is evidenced by certain

styles of architecture, use of cylinder seals

and decorative patterns which show fantas-

tical animals, all of which are connected to

Mesopotamia and could have influenced it.

It’s quite damning evidence of Mesopotami-

an influence on Egyptian culture. However,

there is little to no evidence of Egyptian in-

fluence on Mesopotamian culture, sug-

gesting the idea that Mesopotamia influ-

enced Egypt, but Egypt didn’t influence Mes-

opotamia. It leads credence to the idea that

Mesopotamia helped create Egyptian

writing, or certainly the idea of it.

The dates are particularly damning

when deciding which came first. Mesopota-

mian cuneiform has tablets dating to 3200

BC. Hieroglyphics, 3100 BC. Therefore cunei-

form came first. There. End of. Language ex-

perts agree with me, such as Geoffrey

Sampson, who says that Egyptian hiero-

glyphics “came into existence a little after

Sumerian script and is thought probably to

have been invented under the influence of

the latter”. So there.

“Aha!” Says the other side. There is proof

that it may not have come from the Meso-

potamians. So there!

Pottery vessels, bone and ivory tags, clay

seal impressions, all discovered in Abydos in

Egypt in the 1990’s, depict hieroglyphics

which were dated between 3400 and 3200

BC. That doesn’t compute with the theory

that Sumerian Cuneiform came before Egyp-

tian Hieroglyphics. Cuneiform came about in

3200 BC. If the cuneiform influenced the hi-

eroglyphics, how can they be dated 3400

BC?

By Emma Porter

8.

Born in 1431, Alexander VI, formerly Rodrigo

Borgia, would come to be one of the most

scandalous Popes in history, his name forev-

er interwoven with the greed, corruption

and nepotism that was rife in Renaissance

Italy in the 15th century. Made Cardinal of

the Holy See of Valencia at just 25 by his un-

cle Calixtus III, Rodrigo quickly rose through

the clerical ranks to the position of Vice

Chancellor of the Holy Roman Church at just

27. His securing of the post was less than

noble, largely achieved through nepotism,

bribes and underhanded favours; however

he was described by Calixtus’ successor Pius

II as “an extraordinarily able man.” He used

both his intelligence and connections to

amass an extraordinary fortune and en-

hance his influence within the conclave,

playing a vital role in the election of Sixtus IV

in 1471. He also managed to amass the

bishoprics of Albano, San Nicola and

Santa Maria, as well as being appointed

the Papal legate to Spain in 1172. Rodrigo’s

personal life was equally intriguing and even

more scandalous; despite his vow of chasti-

ty, he was a renowned womanizer and fa-

thered four legitimized children by his mis-

tress Vannozza de’ Catanei and countless il-

legitimate ones by a number of women.

In 1492, Rodrigo was elected Pope and be-

came Alexander VI. His election was secured

largely through bribes; with Florentine au-

thor Francesco Guicciardini writing in the

15th century that “his election was due to

the fact that he had unashamedly bought

the votes of many cardinals in a manner that

was unprecedented in those times.” Despite

coming to power through largely unscrupu-

lous means, it was accepted that the Papacy

needed a strong, competent and intelligent

heir to calm the anarchy that had emerged

under the ineffective leadership of Innocent

VIII, and Alexander VI matched all of these 9.

qualities. He was also committed to restor-

ing order in Rome and the Papal States,

setting up prison inspectors and police com-

missioners, whilst ordering complete admin-

istrative reorganisation. However, Alexander

was also determined to establish his family

among the elite European nobility and was

willing to use any of the means at his dis-

posal in order to achieve this.

Before Alexander had been elected as Pope,

he had already promised his daughter Lu-

crezia to two different men, first to a young

Spanish nobleman, Don Juan de Centelles, a

match abandoned as soon as a more advan-

tageous one arose, and second to a Spanish

grandee, Don di Procida. The contract with

di Procida was still being arranged when Al-

exander was elected Pope, meaning he

could set his sights much higher, and so he

“gave the young man 3000 ducats to buy his

silence and break the contract” according to

Buchard, the Vatican’s Master of Ceremo-

nies. A match was then arranged with Gio-

vanni Sforza, cousin to the Duke of Milan,

whom Lucrezia married in June 1493. How-

ever, after three years the match had de-

clined it its political usefulness and Alexan-

der demanded a divorce, another practice

forbidden by the Catholic Church. This di-

vorce was justified by the loose claim by Lu-

crezia that the marriage had never been

consummated; with Sforza being told to de-

clare that he was impotent. At first, he re-

fused this humiliating demand and request-

ed the support of his uncle, Ludevico of

Milan, in retaining his marriage and po-

sition. However, Ludevico was reliant on

the Pope for protection against the impend-

ing invasion of Italy by Charles VIII of France,

and therefore on the threat of being dis-

owned, Giovanni was forced to agree to the

divorce and declared himself impotent. He

did not take this indignity lying down, and

spread vicious rumours about incest be-

tween Lucrezia, her brother Cesare, and Al-

exander himself, an allegation which would

follow all of them for the rest of their lives

and was a source of endless disgust

throughout Europe. However, this was only

the beginning of the intrigue surrounding

Lucrezia’s marriages. Whilst still embroiled

in her divorce, Lucrezia, the ‘virgo intacta,’

was already pregnant, either by Giovanni or

a valet she had been having an affair with.

Sadly the child was stillborn, although this

opened the way for a match to be arranged

between her and Alfonso of Aragon, the ille-

gitimate son of the King of Naples, whom

she married in July 1498. This marriage ce-

mented the alliance of Naples, Spain and

Italy against the adamant claims of the

French monarchy to Naples. However, as the

military supremacy of France became ap-

parent, Alexander VI once again changed his

mind. In Rome on July 15th 1500 Alfonso

was strangled to death by Lucrezia’s brother

Cesare, leaving the Pope able to negotiate

with France. The lack of outrage at his mur-

der further demonstrates the absolute pow-

er and absolute corruption of the Renais-

sance Papacy.

10.

However, Alexander was not done with his

daughter yet. He decided on a new hus-

band, Alfonso d’Este, son of the Duke of

Ferrera, as his estate bordered the Ro-

magne where Cesare was currently under-

taking a campaign of conquest for himself.

When the Duke declined Alexander’s offer,

he persuaded him through both bribery and

the threat of Cesare invading his territory.

However, this was to prove a much more

lasting union, from 1502 until her death in

1519, as Alexander turned his attention

from Lucrezia to Cesare.

Cesare Borgia, born around 1486, was an

equally controversial figure in European

politics, and not just for the aforemen-

tioned allegations of murder and incest.

Cesare inherited his father’s love of extrava-

gance and decadence, his devotion to

which was completely uninhibited by his

selection as a Cardinal at just 18 years of

age. Wherever he travelled, wild parties

often followed, as did frequent bouts of the

mal de francese, known today as syphilis.

However, at 22, with Alexander’s other

male heirs either dead or considered impo-

tent, Cesare became the first Cardinal in

history to leave the Church, or “put off the

robe” as Buchard referred to the highly un-

usual situation as. Cesare left the Church so

that he could take up an offer made to him

by the new King of France, Louis XII, in

which if Cesare betrayed his old allies, the

Sforza’s, and helped France to conquer Mi-

lan, he would provide him with his own ar-

my, and an advantageous marriage to a

French noblewoman, Charlotte d’Al-

bret. And so Cesare, driven purely by the

pursuit of power, cast away his devotion to

the Church and to old allies, and began his

secular career. From 1499, Cesare used his

connections to France and to the Papacy to

bring most of Southern Italy and the Roma-

gna under his control state by state, his con-

quests usually following the same pattern.

The Pope would declare some miniscule

wrong committed by the region’s leader,

and Cesare would swoop in to right this

wrong, adding the territory to his ever

growing empire in the process. Cesare’s ar-

my was financed by Alexander, who raised

funds by creating new Cardinals in ex-

change for gold, often at the despair of the

College of Cardinals, who saw the increase

in numbers as a threat to the prestige and

sanctity of their position. However, when

his father died, Cesare was imprisoned in

Spain and his lands were reclaimed by the

Papacy under Julius II. After managing to

escape, he was killed whilst fighting to re-

gain his lands in July 1507.

Alexander VI died in August 1503, allegedly

after drinking poisoned wine. Whilst many

of his predecessors could not be described

as paragons of virtue, it is Alexander and his

children who have come to embody the li-

centious and unending scandal of the Re-

naissance Papacy. An autocratic ruler in his

own right, Alexander simply ignored all of

the conditions of his position, engaging in

murder, incest and betrayal along with ex-

traordinary shows of glamour and deca-

dence. Alexander was not greatly loved, on

his death many criticisms of him were 11.

voiced, for example Machiavelli once said

“in the Pope’s saintly footsteps came his

three servants and beloved handmaidens,

extravagance, simony, and cruelty,” but the

trail of scandal and intrigue that followed

him all of his life has ensured he will never

be easily forgotten.

By Madeleine McDonagh

12.

In 55 BC, the Roman army fought its way on-

to British shores for the first time, under the

command of Julius Caesar. Poorly equipped

and under-prepared, they won only token

victory. One year later, they tried again, this

time succeeding in their mission (to return

the ousted King Commius, Caesar’s ally, to

the Atrebatic throne). Still, Caesar returned

to his campaigning in Gaul disappointed. In a

letter to the philosopher, Marcus Tullius Cic-

ero, he complained that there was nothing

of value to be had in Britain. Then, less than

a century later, Britain was invaded again.

The Emperor Claudius launched his full scale

invasion in AD 43, lighting the flames Roman

occupation in Britain for the next 400 years.

Yet, in all this time, the occupation was nev-

er complete. Ancient Scotland, known to the

Romans as Caledonia, was never fully sub-

dued. It is one of history’s greatest mys-

teries that this country, populated only

by disparate, less-advanced tribes,

seems to have been host to one of the few

Roman failures.

Some scholars and, indeed, many people

like to believe that the Britons of the North

were too warlike for the Romans. Cassius

Dio said the tribesmen were ‘fond of plun-

dering; consequently they choose their bold-

est men as rulers.’ He goes on to paint a pic-

tures of this war-based society, in which

men are reared to be ferocious fighters, un-

der the command of strong powers. But,

Dio, like all Roman contemporaries, is frus-

trating in that he is very fond of spouting hy-

perbole. To see the truth, we must pick out

the finer details and look at them in context.

Tacitus wrote: ‘they [the Caledonians] go in-

to battle in chariots, and have small, swift

horses; there are also foot-soldiers, very

swift in running and very firm in standing

their ground.’ 13.

We can probably accept that the Britons

were war-like, but they were certainly not as

disciplined or skilled in combat as the Ro-

man fighters, even the auxiliaries (soldiers

recruited from conquered lands). Moreover,

it is a fact that the Chariot, by the time of

Agricola’s campaign (of which Tacitus is

wrote), was an obsolete machine, aban-

doned in the rest of Western Europe. What-

ever the case, the Roman army had definite-

ly encountered more organised, well-

equipped foes and bested them, the Gauls

being just one example.

Another suggestion is that the geography of

Northern Britain was too treacherous for the

Roman force to endure, but this is, perhaps,

an even weaker argument. Tacitus mentions

the ‘roughness of the ground’ and says ‘our

infantry had only a precarious foothold.’

However, as precarious as the terrain may

have been, it did not match the danger of

that found elsewhere in the empire. Spain

and Dalmatia, for instance, have much high-

er mountains and much hotter climates.

If physical factors did not stop the Romans,

what did? It may be that the Romans did not

place enough value in Britain to motivate a

total conquest. Caesar was certainly de-

terred by Britain’s lack of value to him. Taci-

tus imagined the speech of a Caledonian

leader: ‘What men know nothing about they

always assume to be a valuable prize. But

there are no more nations beyond us; noth-

ing is there but waves and rocks.’ It is unlike-

ly that Tacitus would entertain a contradic-

tory viewpoint like this without purpose.

Perhaps, then, Tacitus genuinely thought the

campaign was, to some extent, a wasted

effort. The uneven land and alien tribes had

little to offer the Romans in the long run, not

least because they had no coinage, and

would struggle to pay taxes. Groenman van

Waateringe suggested a successful occupa-

tion was only possible in ‘regions where the

Romans were confronted with a well-

organised proto-urban or urban structure,

which they could utilise for the supply of

their armies and… project gradually their so-

cial and administrative system.’ Northern

Britain was no such place. It was an agricul-

tural regime, in which farmers grew just

enough to sustain themselves, with a small

excess for the ruling classes. However, to

suppose that the Romans could not bend

their system to accommodate for a strange

culture is, perhaps, to underestimate the Ro-

man ability. Even if a revolt occurred, the Ro-

mans did not struggle to deal with such

things. The question is, if Caledonia had no

value, why were so many attempts made to

take it?

Agricola, Severus and Antoninus all led or

commissioned campaigns in the north for

one reason, to bolster their prestige. For

them, Caledonia needed no value. Provided

its inhabitants put up a fight, it was a victory

worth having. Even Julius Caesar first came

to Britain in an attempt to garnish his victo-

ries on the continent with another beyond

the sea. Politics played a central role in Ro-

man conquest and, as such, may be the

cause of this Roman failure.

14.

Following Agricola’s climactic battle at Mons

Graupius, in AD 84, the Emperor Domitian

put a stop to the campaign. ‘If the valour of

the Roman army and the glory of the Roman

name had allowed it, a stopping place would

have been found within Britain,’ writes Taci-

tus, clearly insinuating the Emperor’s inter-

vention, by reference to the ‘glory of the Ro-

man name.’ Domitian ordered the with-

drawal of Legio II Adiutrix and, soon after,

recalled Agricola to Rome under mysterious

circumstances. It is commonly believed that

the emperor was jealous of the governor’s

achievement. Unlike Agricola, Antoninus Pi-

us never intended to conquer the rest of

Britain. He simply wanted to out-do his pre-

decessor, Hadrian. This was accomplished

by the building of the Antonine Wall, on the

Forth-Clyde line. As for the Emperor Seve-

rus, he was in failing health even before his

campaign. He also made the fatal mistake of

bringing his sons on campaign, so that when

he died, at York, in AD 211, they made

peace with the Britons and hurried back to

Rome to quarrel over the throne. Herodian

said that Severus’s favoured heir, Caracalla,

‘paid little attention to the war, but rather

attempted to gain control of the army.’ It

seems that, in bringing his sons, politics

doomed Severus’s march from the outset.

Thus, it seems, the strongest argument,

gives us our ultimate reason for this failed

conquest. Politics was the reason for every

expedition to Caledonia and, as a result, it

was the reason for its loss.

By Nathanial Lamb 15.

Although Isabella of France is often de-scribed as a ‘She-Wolf’, was she really that bad?

In terms of the political arena that was oc-curring under Edward II’s reign – her hus-band- she can be seen as the voice of the people; Edward was far more interested in his ‘favourites’ Piers Gavestone, and later Hugh Despenser than retaining the control over Scotland that his father, Edward I had gained.

Isabella could be seen as unfortunate in her coronation as queen to Edward II. She was ultimately overshadowed on her own coro-nation day to become the Queen of England as it was abundantly clear who his attention belonged to; Piers Gavestone, whom he dressed in imperial purple silk embroidered with pearls. Witnesses described Gavestone as ‘more splendidly dressed than the king himself’. The King’s questionable relation-ship with Gavestone was ended when, on the 19th June 1312, Gavestone was bru-tally murdered and decapitated by the

Earls who felt drastic action needed to be taken to wake Edward II from his ‘love struck’ dream and face the realities of turbu-lent Scotland rebelling and taking back their land.

With Gavestone gone and Isabella the moth-er to a son, Edward III, she finally had the power to become the Queen she so desper-ately wanted to embody.

However, this was impossible with Edward II finding a new ‘favourite’ soon after Gavestone’s death; Hugh Despenser the Younger. Isabella found herself marginalised in her own rule and subsequently she need-ed to assert her power and she had the per-fect tool for this; her son as the heir to the throne.

She used her opportunity whilst in France to publicly declare her power. Contemporaries report that Isabella publically declared that ‘someone has come between my husband and myself’

16.

and she would not return to England until

‘this intruder has been removed’.

Isabella challenged the whole view of wom-en in the political arena in the medieval era; she imprisoned her husband and acknowl-edged him as dead, ruling in his absence as her son, Edward III’s regent.

However, her need for control which caused her to be described as the ‘she-Wolf of France’ ultimately led to her downfall. With Edward III feeling that he was being derived of his rule, he rebelled against his mother and came to power.

Isabella is one of the strongest female char-acters in the medieval era, should this really be embodied with the negative term of a ‘She-Wolf’? Rather, I believe she is a politi-cal genius.

By Sally Dickens.

17.

The declaration of martial law and the as-

sassination of the then acting President and

Dictator of South Korea, Park Chung-Hee, as

well as the now new found freedom of the

ROK (Republic of Korea) army General Chun

Doo-Hwan led to the unlawful massacre of

reportedly 2,000 South Korean civilians and

students in the city of Kwangju in the year

of 1980. The uprising is considered a major

landmark in the struggle for South Korean

democracy, it also marked the beginning of

anti-American sentiment in South Korea.

In the frenzy after Park’s demise students

and some professors led a huge movement

for democracy, however General Chun Doo-

Hwan had seized power and threatened vio-

lence if the protests were to continue, and

with the approval of the United States mili-

tary some of the most well trained para-

troopers were dispatched to teach the city

of Kwangju a lesson. The first confronta-

tion began on the morning of May 18th in

1980 when some 200 Chonnam university

students had gathered and began demon-

strating in the morning and by 2:00 PM had

been joined by more than 800 additional

demonstrators, when the city police were

unable to control the crowd the army were

dispatched and so unlawful violence en-

sued, a deaf 29-year-old, Kim Gyeong-cheol,

became the first fatality; he was simply in

the wrong place at the wrong time, but the

soldiers beat him to death. “A cluster of

troops attacked each student individually.

They would crack his head, stomp his back,

and kick him in the face. When the soldiers

were done, he looked like a pile of clothes

in meat sauce." (Lee Jae-Eui, Kwangju Diary:

Beyond Death, Beyond the Darkness of the

Age, p. 46)

Through-out the next two days more and

more infuriated citizens of Kwangju would

join the protests out of sheer disgust for the

violence and unjust murder that littered the

streets 18.

19.

On May 19th people from all walks of life

marched with the students, some throwing

Molotov cocktails at the soldiers whilst oth-

er demonstrators hurled rocks, however it

escalated to the point where soldiers would

beat to death anyone they came across in

the streets. By the morning of May 20th

more than 10,000 people were protesting in

downtown Kwangju, that day the army sent

an additional 3,000 troops to ‘control the

situation’, what ensued was no less than

barbaric. The Special Forces beat and muti-

lated people with their bayonets, troops

shot dead twenty girls at Kwangju’s central

high school, one hundred students who

took shelter in the Catholic centre were

slaughtered and university and high school

students that were captured had their

hands tied behind their backs with barbed

wire and many were then later executed,

even taxi drivers and ambulances trying to

help the wounded were shot.

May 21st can be seen as the climax as the

violence reached all new heights, people

fought back with bats, pipes, iron bars and

hammers. Students and civilians even broke

into police headquarters and gathered am-

munition to fight back against the army, stu-

dents mounted one of the machine guns on

the roof of the medical university. The local

police refused to help the army, subse-

quently many were beaten to unconscious-

ness for attempting to help the injured.

However, by 5:30 that evening the army

were then forced to retreat from downtown

Kwangju and by the morning of May 22nd

the army were forced to withdraw from

Kwangju, however they kept a blockade

around the city, when a bus of civilians

attempted to escape the army open fired

killing 17 of the 18 passengers aboard, that

same army-troops accidently killed 13 of

their own in a friendly-fire. Meanwhile in

the city of Kwangju students and profession-

als came together to form committees to

provide medical care for the wounded, fu-

nerals for the dead and even compensation

for those who had lost their loved ones. In-

fluenced by Marxist ideals, some of the stu-

dents arranged to cook communal meals for

the people of the city. For five days, the peo-

ple ruled Kwangju. Word of the massacre

spread fast leading to anti-government pro-

tests in neighbouring cities like Mokpo,

Gangjin, Hwasun and Yeongam.

Such peace didn’t last long, as on May 27th

at 4:00 AM the army moved back in down-

town Kwangju, students attempted to stop

their entering the city by lying in the streets

whilst the armed civilian militia prepared for

a new fight, after only an hour and half of

desperate fighting the army took control of

Kwangju.

Concerning the number of casualties, the

new Chun Doo-Hwan government issued a

statement saying that 144 civilians, 22

troops and 4 police officers had been killed

during the uprising however census reports

reveal that nearly 2,000 Kwangju citizens

went missing during this time. A small num-

ber of students who mostly died of May 24th

are buried in a cemetery just outside of

Kwangju, however several eyewitness ac-

counts report seeing hundreds of bodies

piled into mass graves on the outskirts of

the city.

In the aftermath of the massacre, the then

government lost a lot of its legitimacy in the

eyes of the Korean public, and anti-

government, pro-democracy protests con-

tinued to run throughout the 1980’s de-

manding that the perpetrators for the

Kwangju massacre be punished. Kim Dae-

Jung, a politician from Kwangju who had

previously been sentenced to death on

charges of formulating the rebellion ran for

president but did not serve as president un-

til 1998 to 2003, and went on to receive a

Nobel peace prize in 2000. The former pres-

ident at the time was then sentenced to

death in 1996 for corruption and his part in

the massacre.

The slaughter at Kwangju paved the way for

democracy in South Korea and though it

would take nearly a decade to obtain,

Kwangju was the turning point in the long

struggle. However, the horrors of those few

days will never be forgotten as historian

George Katsiaficas said “The liberated reality

of the Commune in Kwangju contradicts the

myth that human beings are essentially evil

and therefore require strong governments

to maintain order and justice. Rather, it was

the forces of the government, not the un-

governed people that acted with great bru-

tality and injustice.” Even now in Hong Kong

protests for democracy rage on, I only hope

that the government has learnt from past

events and refrains from acting with “great

brutality and injustice”.

By Sophie Scott

20.

21.

Black Americans make up about 12% of all

US citizens. They are descended from the

slaves brought over from Africa to work the

tobacco, cotton and sugar plantations. They

were supposedly at liberty in 1863, but still

suffered from poverty, segregation and dis-

crimination of all kinds. In the southern

states of the USA, for example Mississippi

and Alabama, black American citizens had

their own transport, cafes, cinemas, toilets

and schools. There were even posters put

up on shop windows exclaiming ‘Whites on-

ly’. This was all because of Jim Crow Laws,

which prevented blacks from voting and en-

forced separate, and unequal, schools.

These were state laws that forced, for exam-

ple, blacks to pass tests in order to vote,

which they obviously were not going to pass

due to the fact that they were less well edu-

cated than white children due to the segre-

gated, unequal schools. Thirty-two states

had segregated schools. The aim of the Civil

Rights Movement was desegregation, voting

rights, civil rights and an end to discrimina-

tion. The methods which they used in order

to try to obtain these aims included legal

action through courts, violent protest, non-

violent protest and civil disobedience.

Firstly, legal action through courts was par-

tially successful in trying to achieve the aims

of the Civil Rights Movement. In order to try

to force industry to employ blacks, Roose-

velt, the President of America from 1933 to

1945, issued Executive Order 8802 in 1941.

This prevented discrimination in industrial

and governmental jobs. In 1941, Roosevelt

also set up the FEDC (Fair Employment Prac-

tices Committee) to enforce the order. How-

ever, he had no power to force companies

to follow his policy. After Roosevelt died in

1945, he was succeeded by Truman. In

1946, Truman formed a President’s Com-

mittee for Civil Rights and he produced

a programme of reforms in 1947. This in-

cluded a proposal to outlaw lynching and

also ban Jim Crow laws. However, this was

crushed by congress. In 1948, Truman is-

sued an Executive Order which ended segre-

gation in units of the armed forces. This

came into effect in 1950 and was in force

during the Korean War. Also, in 1950, the

Supreme Court declared that black and

white students could not be segregated in

the same school and that the education pro-

vided in segregated schools had to be equal

in every respect. This gave the NAACP an

important foothold because segregated

schools were rarely equal in every respect.

The whole point of segregation was to en-

sure privileged for some. Their big oppor-

tunity came in 1954, with the Brown V To-

peka Case in which Oliver Brown was told

by the Topeka board of Education in Kansas

that his seven year old daughter, Linda,

could not attend her nearest school. This

proves that the Supreme Court ruling was

not effective. Brown used the Supreme

Court ruling to take the City of Topeka to

court for forcing his daughter to attend a

school a far away, instead of being allowed

to go to the nearby whites’ only school. The

NAACP supported the case and Brown was

represented by Thurgood Marshall, who lat-

er became the first black member of the Su-

preme Court. Eventually, Oliver Brown won

his case. In 1954, the Supreme Court de-

clared that all segregated schools were ille-

gal, because separate must mean unequal.

The following year, the Supreme Court

ordered all states with segregated

schools to integrate black and white school

children. However, this was easier said than

done. In 1956, the University of Alabama

refused to accept Authorine Lucy as a stu-

dent despite a government court order.

Therefore, equality in education was not

achieved.

Secondly, violent protest was moderately

successful in trying to achieve the aims of

the civil rights movement. Race riots broke

out in Detroit in June 1943 and thirty-four

people were killed and $2,000,000 worth of

damage was caused. Black soldiers also riot-

ed in nine army training camps because

they were receiving unequal treatment. By

the end of the war, some units of the army

were desegregated. General Eisenhower,

the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe,

personally supported integrated units. At

the beginning of the war, there were only

twelve black officers in the US army and

black soldiers were often given routine tasks

to perform. By the end of the war, much

had changed. Black officers were appointed

in all three services and the Air Force began

to train black pilots, six hundred in total, by

the end of the war. Altogether, about

1,000,000 black Americans served in the

armed forces. They found themselves in-

volved in a struggle against a racist dictator,

while they were themselves subject to racist

discrimination at home. However, many

were sent to Europe where they had no ra-

cial bars. When they returned to the USA in

1945, it was even harder to accept the re-

turn to discrimination. 22.

Whatever the experience of black Americans

during the war, in 1945 they returned to the

USA where many were unable to vote and

were condemned to be second class citizens.

In this respect, the war was a big boost to

the civil rights movement, motivating black

Americans to fight harder for their rights.

Thirdly, non-violent protest was partially

successful in achieving the aims of the civil

rights movement. In 1957, Elizabeth Eckford

along with eight other black students tried

to enrol at Little Rock High School in Arkan-

sas. She was stopped by the state governor,

Orval Faubus, who surrounded the school

with the state National Guard. When the

nine students tried to enrol on 5th Septem-

ber, they were faced by a crowd of more

than 1,000. After lunch, they were escorted

home by the police. Press and TV coverage

in the USA and across the world was a seri-

ous embarrassment to the USA – a country

which apparently championed freedom and

equality. President Eisenhower sent federal

troops to escort and protect Elizabeth Eck-

ford and the other students. After a month,

the federal troops were replaced by National

Guardsmen under the orders of the Presi-

dent. They stayed at the school for a year.

This caused Eisenhower to finally introduce

the first Civil Rights Act since 1875. It set up

a commission to prosecute anybody who

tried to deny American citizens their rights.

The demonstrations were seen on television

and in newspapers across the world. Many

US citizens saw, for the first time, the racial

hatred that existed in the southern

states. Governor Faubus attempted to

get around the President’s action by closing

all the schools in Arkansas in September

1958, but he was forced to reopen them to

black and white students by the Supreme

Court. Despite these events at Little Rock,

progress on integration was slow. By 1963,

there were only 30,000 children at mixed

schools in the South, out of a total of

2,900,000 and none at all in Alabama, Mis-

sissippi or South Carolina.

Fourthly, non-violent civil disobedience was

the most successful method in achieving the

aims of the Civil Rights Movement. One inci-

dent was the Montgomery Bus Boycott in

1955, in which Rosa Parks was arrested in

Alabama for refusing to give her seat up on

a bus to a white man. The Montgomery Im-

provement Association (MIA) was set up to

organise a boycott of buses, led by local

church minister, Martin Luther King. Martin

Luther King organised a boycott of the buses

which lasted a year. All the Black Americans

in Montgomery and the surrounding area

walked rather than use the buses. Eventual-

ly, the bus company was compelled to give

in and desegregate the buses. Throughout

the boycott, there were appeals to the Su-

preme Court challenging segregation on

buses. In 1956, the Supreme Court said that

segregation on buses was also illegal. A

peaceful approach had brought about a sig-

nificant victory. It had shown that black

Americans could organise themselves. The

boycott established King as the leader of the

Civil Rights Movement. His energy and en-

thusiasm were a major reason for the suc-

cess of the campaign. 23.

King set up the Southern Christian Leader-

ship Conference (SCLC) and became its pres-

ident in 1957. He organised sit-ins with the

first one being at Woolworth’s in Greensbo-

ro North Carolina, in which eighty-five stu-

dents demanded to be served at a white’s

only counter. When they were refused, they

sat at the counters waiting to be served but

did not react to intimidation, threats or

abuse. Altogether, 70,000 took part and

3,600 went to jail. When whites turned vio-

lent, there was widespread television cover-

age and support for Civil Rights. Other varia-

tions of sit-ins developed to try to end seg-

regation for example ‘kneel-ins’ in Churches,

‘wade-ins’ in swimming baths and ‘read-ins’

in libraries. By 1961, 810 towns and cities

were desegregated. The civil rights move-

ment gained much publicity when television

highlighted the non-violence of the protes-

tors in the face of violence from some white

racists. Martin Luther King additionally set

up the Freedom Riders. The Supreme Court

decided in December 1960 that all bus sta-

tions and terminals that served interstate

travellers should be integrated. In 1961,

King and the Congress of Racial Equality

(CORE) wanted to test that decision by using

the tactic of the freedom ride. The Freedom

Riders began to make bus journeys to break

Jim Crow Laws. The first of the freedom rid-

ers was in May 1961, when thirteen CORE

volunteers left Washington DC by bus to

travel to New Orleans. At Anniston, Ala-

bama, a bus was attacked and burnt. In Bir-

mingham, there was no protection and

the freedom riders were attacked by an

angry mob. The police chief, Bull Connor,

had ‘conveniently’ given the police the day

off. Nevertheless, they had gained tremen-

dous publicity. The Freedom Riders wanted

to put pressure on Kennedy. They succeed-

ed – later the same year, all railway and bus

stations were desegregated by the Inter-

state Commerce Committee.

In conclusion, the most successful method

in achieving the aims of the Civil Rights

Movement was non-violent civil disobedi-

ence, organised by Martin Luther King. He

followed the methods used by Gandhi when

campaigning for independence for India.

Martin Luther King created so much publici-

ty about the civil rights movement that

President Kennedy even began to appoint

black Americans to important positions.

John F Kennedy’s brother Robert, who was

Attorney General, prosecuted people who

tried to prevent blacks from voting.

By Emma King.

24.

Henry VIII was no Protestant. In fact, he hat-

ed the tenets of Protestantism and fancied

himself as an amateur theologian and wrote

and published a response to the reformist

preacher Martin Luther. For this, the Pope

was most grateful. So, how did Henry get

from here – being the Pope’s pet – to the

Reformation? As most of you will know this

was bound up with his wish to marry Anne

Boleyn. After many years of trying to get a

divorce, he turned to Protestantism. As Su-

preme Head of the Church of England, he

could marry and divorce whomever he

pleased. And he did. This involved shutting

down the monasteries, confiscating Church

lands, and virtually declaring himself at war

with every kingdom in Europe. Worst of all,

this meant change. If Henry wanted to make

England a Protestant country, then he would

have to change England irretrievably

and beyond recognition.

The trouble was that, because this change

of the established religion occurred over

night and not for religious reasons, nobody

really had any idea what to change. Thus,

Catholics were killed, Church treasure loot-

ed, preachers flooded in, but there was no

common direction to it all. And this was un-

derstandable. Even if Henry had turned Eng-

land Protestant because he felt swayed by

the arguments of the Lutherans, this would

mean that England had converted to Luther-

anism and not the various other versions of

Protestant worship. Catholicism is Catholi-

cism, or, rather, it is what the Pope says it is,

whereas Protestantism at the time of the

English Reformation could be Lutheranism,

Calvinism, or Presbyterianism – today the

choice is wider still. This makes any kind of

top-down Reformation – one imposed by

the king or parliament – difficult, because it

excludes the other kinds of Protestantism, 25.

but at least if Henry had picked one of

them, he would have chosen a door for

England to go through. Instead, what he did

was he boarded up the door of Catholicism

and simply pushed the English down the

corridor of Reformation. And for at least a

hundred and fifty years, we paced up and

down, unsure of which handle to turn.

Henry’s son and heir, Edward, was brought

up a fanatical and zealous Protestant and,

backed by the Greys, he acted where he

thought his father had dithered; the last

years of Henry’s reign had been seen as a

stalling of the Reformation, with a drifting

back to more conservative values. Icono-

clasm – smashing up churches and religious

art – became the order of the day in true

Protestant fashion. On top of this, a new

Book of Common Prayer was written,

stripped of all Catholic-leaning worship. On-

ly a few years later, the Holy Communion

was dramatically simplified as were the

vestments – clothing – of English priests.

The Church was now becoming strongly Cal-

vinist.

With Edward’s premature death came the

accession to power of a Catholic Queen.

England once again became a Catholic

country: Protestants were burned; a new

Book of Common Prayer was written; and

the English monarch was now married to a

Spanish king. What could go wrong?

Mary I died on the 17th November 1558,

the last openly Catholic monarch England

was to have for almost one hundred

and thirty years. Elizabeth, her sister,

and the last of the Tudor monarchs, learned

from the mistakes of her siblings, Mary and

Edward, and aimed for an equilibrium be-

tween Catholicism and Protestantism in

England, knowing that Catholicism was still

very much alive and kicking, and that Prot-

estantism would have to be appeased to

some extent to make up for the wrongs of

the preceding reign.

The Elizabethan Religious Settlement was

made into law by the Act of Supremacy –

making her Supreme Governor of the

Church of England – and the Act of Uni-

formity – republishing the 1552 Book of

Common Prayer with minor alterations and

enforcing church attendance once a week.

In addition to these Acts, the harsh laws

against Roman Catholics were repealed,

attacks on the Pope were removed from An-

glican prayers, and belief in the Catholic

concepts of transubstantiation and Real

Presence during the Holy Communion was

permitted by changes in the litany. Elizabeth

allowed for the foundation and develop-

ment of Anglicanism: a rich, diverse, liberal

form of Protestantism, unique to England is

this respect, with a High Church and a Low

Church, which every one of her successors

preferred immensely to any of the purist

alternative forms.

However, during Elizabeth’s reign the lines

of fire became clearer: on the one side

were the Puritans who wanted to scrap the

Book of Common Prayer and governance of

the Church by bishops and archbishops –

known as episcopacy; on the other side,

Catholic-minded, yet anti-Roman Catholic 26.

Episcopalians, meaning those who believed

in rituals and in bishops, who came to be

known as Anglicans. It was to be the aboli-

tion of the Book of Common Prayer and

episcopacy that was the main rallying cry of

the Puritan dominated Parliaments of the

late 1630s and the 1640s leading ultimately

to the English Civil War.

During the reign of Charles I, William Laud

became Archbishop of Canterbury. Laud had

more in common with the pre-Reformed

Catholics than with the Protestant non-

conformists in England. Since the Elizabe-

than Religious Settlement of 1559, the pre-

dominant theological makeup of the English

Church had been a mixture between Calvin-

ism and Lutheranism, with the idea of pre-

destination being one central unifying fea-

ture of this theology. Laud was not a predes-

tinarian, but an Arminian – one who believes

in the free will of all men to achieve salva-

tion.

Laud managed to upset a balance which had

been shown to work, for the most part,

since 1559. The Puritans, at the same time,

were quickly becoming paranoid and hysteri-

cal: the Protestant states in the Thirty Years’

War were taking a thrashing; the ecclesiasti-

cal hierarchies were shown to be incredibly

corrupt; and Laud was transforming the

Church in England into something almost

Catholic.

Events came to a head when King Charles I

tried unsuccessfully to impose the Anglican

Book of Common Prayer on the Scots.

The Scots had had a much more thor-

ough Reformation than the English, with the

established church – or Kirk – in Scotland be-

ing Presbyterian – both Calvinist and with-

out bishops. The Puritans perhaps had every

reason to be frightened that they would be

the next targets of some large anti-

Protestant conspiracy.

The Puritans were not drawn from the nobil-

ity, but were largely members of a new class

of men: the gentry. The gentry had been on

the rise since the early 17th century and by

the late 1630s the Puritans had some control

over the House of Commons. Now, with the

Scots invading England over the Book of

Common Prayer, the King needed the sup-

port of Parliament to fight them off. But

when Charles called a Parliament, he found

that the Scottish invasion was the last thing

they wanted to discuss: they would rather

call for the abolition of episcopacy and a cur-

tailing of the feudal rights of kingship. Here,

Charles seems to have been unable to

choose between a compromise with the

Scots and a compromise with his own Parlia-

ment; neither were very promising. Any

compromise would involve the abolition of

the bishops and a more reformed version of

the Anglican Church.

The Puritans succeeded in seizing power –

not that it is clear whether this was ever

their aim. In fact, the lack of any clear direc-

tion in the Puritan Commonwealth would

suggest that they had never planned to do

what they actually did.

27.

The Great Rebellion, as it was known, would

not have occurred without the Reformation.

The Reformation gave legal sanction to the

kinds of ideas which brought down the

monarchy in the mid-17th century, but,

luckily for the monarchy, not to the kind of

men who would keep it down – the Puritans

were largely unsuccessful in holding on to

power. The monarchy came back in 1660

stronger than before and the Puritans were

brought into disrepute by the horrors of

Cromwell’s Lord Protectorship. The Angli-

cans, too, came back and in a much stronger

state than before: everyone was tired of

conflict and needed something reliable to

fall back on. The Anglicans could now say

that they had been right all along about the

Puritans and they now more than ever sup-

ported and were supported by the monar-

chy.

These Anglicans, too, were partly responsi-

ble for the Glorious Revolution of 1688: a

cross-party coup to remove James II in fa-

vour of William of Orange. James was a

Catholic and managed even to annoy the

Anglicans and the Tories – the political party

most closely aligned with the monarchy.

However, James’ two daughters had been

raised Protestant and so the established au-

thorities took it as read that the next mon-

arch would be a Protestant.

On 10th June 1688, James Francis Edward

Stuart, Prince of Wales, was born. This was a

disaster for the political and religious au-

thorities and they began to become

quite hysterical about this birth, claim-

ing that the child had been smuggled into

the Queen’s bedchamber in a warming pan.

The handling of the birth was perhaps not

very tactful on the part of the king: those to

witness the birth were few, and Catholic.

Still, whether the child was the Queen’s or

not, this was irrelevant; the future of the

Anglican Church and the freedom of the ar-

istocracy to do as they wished were now in

danger, according to the Tories and the

Whigs. Again, had the Reformation not tak-

en place, the key players in this event – in

this case the Anglicans and not the Puritans

– would not have even existed.

The result of the Glorious Revolution was

undoubtedly as step in the direction of de-

mocracy and parliamentary superiority for

England. In the early 17th century, it was

not uncommon for the King to rule without

parliament for long periods, whereas after

1688, parliament was in almost continuous

session. Not only this, but parliament decid-

ed to abrogate to itself the right to change

the succession laws, suggesting that parlia-

ment was now very much the senior partner

in the relationship between crown, lords

and commons. After 1688, taxes, debt, and

government spending rocketed due to the

fact that government was no carried out

mainly by ministers – elected representa-

tives or aristocrats –who: weren’t personally

liable for the debt incurred; weren’t spend-

ing their own money, but the crown’s; and

who knew the king would take the blame

when times were bad. In conclusion, then,

the Reformation changed the nature of Eng-

lish government irreversibly. 28.

29.

First we saw attempts at violent and radical

further reform under Edward and then an

equally violent, reactionary counter-reform

under Mary. Some balance was achieved

under Elizabeth which lasted almost a cen-

tury, but ultimately the ‘broad church’ was

made up of warring parties: the Anglicans

and the Puritans. Roused by the action of

Charles I and his Archbishop of Canterbury

and a general lust for change, in the 1640s

the Puritans brought down the monarchy.

Roused by the threat of change, the Angli-

cans played a leading part in the removal of

our last Catholic monarch James II. Only the

Glorious Revolution, however, set a new

precedent: that of ‘legally’ removing a king

through parliament. This precedent sig-

nalled the end of the theory of the divine

right of kings and absolute monarchy and

clearly showed that parliament and the An-

glicans had won in the long drawn out inter-

nal religious conflicts of the latter half of

the 16th century and the majority of the

17th century. England henceforth was a

constitutional monarchy – as we remain to

this day.

By Keir Martland.

At 11:02am on the 9th of August in 1945 a

bomb exploded 503m above the city of Na-

gasaki in the South-West of Japan. The radi-

ation, intense heatwaves and blast force

that followed the explosion created massive

and instantaneous destruction, that year

70,000 people died.

One building that mostly remained standing

was Shiruyama Primary School. It was made

from reinforced concrete and withstood

most of the effects of the blast. That day

138 people died on campus leaving only 20

survivors, the Vice-Principal Hideo Arakawa

was one of the twenty. There were two

wings to the school, the North and the

South, the North was where the lessons

were held, however this particular day the

children were told to stay at home so it was

mostly teachers in that building. However,

the South Wing was at this time used as the

Mitsubishi Arms Factory where many

students had gotten jobs, this is the

building that held the most casualties; one

part of the Northern building still stands to-

day, preserved. Inside shows the scars of

what happened, the marks from the heat

waves and intense pressure and extreme

heat that destroyed the iron window frames

and scorched the wood black.

Vice-Principal Hideo Arakawa kept records

of interviews that he held with other survi-

vors as well as the relatives of victims and

his own experience of the explosion. “The

blast blew away the windows, scattering

shards of glass like sharp knives, the roof

and the ceiling collapsed and the thick plas-

ter crumbled as a result many people died

from the initial blast or burned to death”. So

where was Arakawa when the explosion oc-

curred?

He was in a meeting with four other teach-

ers, including the principal Sukeo Shimizu,

concerning procedures to take during an air-

strike. 30.

He recounted his experience in his notes

“Mr Kinoshita – wounds on the back of his

head, glass shards were embedded there.

The principal was on the floor face down

under a massive square timber, lying across

his neck and lower back. He’d been crushed

to death under the rubble of partition walls

and shelves smashed by the blast. Ms Og-

awara was also crushed, she was grasping

the Principal’s trousers calling for help when

she died, later when someone tried to un-

clench her tight grip the skin of the palm

suck to the hem and her hand couldn’t be

removed”.

The Principal’s office was in a corner

towards the back of the school, so how did

it retain so much damage? The school itself

was hit by a horizontal wall of force at

around 8400 tonnes, this horizontal wall is

called the Mach Stem, the Mach Stem was

created when the bomb exploded 503m

above the ground of Nagasaki, the shock-

waves of the explosion expanded in a ball-

like shape, when the waves hit the ground

they were reflected and when the two

waves merged they more than doubled the

individual pressure and expanded horizon-

tally, as it did so it grew in height and

strength. This Mach Stem began 300m from

ground zero and hit Shiruyama Primary

School 0.9s after the bomb exploded. The

Principal’s office is next to the courtyard in

the school, so the Mach Stem hit the front

wall of the school and passed through the

building, when it came to the back wall it

reflected and turned back on itself,

strengthening the force before com-

bining with the waves from the courtyard

and annihilating the office, killing 4 of the 5

people there.One month after the explo-

sion, American troops went to investigate

and survey the damage done, they also in-

terviewed survivors and relatives of victims

to gather as much detail as possible. They

made records of casualties, one of which

was for Shiruyama Primary School, deaths

were identified as a circle, if black they died

instantly, if half black and half white, they

died later on. The records made consisted

of numbers for the deceased with name,

age and cause of death just after. For exam-

ple:

No 33 – Aiko Tenaka – Died from the

blast – Age 22

No 07 – Wayata Fujiwana – Crushed –

Age 30

No 34 – Sachiko Yamazaki – Didn’t dis-

tinguish corpse/Body unidentifiable – Age

20

The U.S. Military used this data in their nu-

clear weapons development programs to

improve the damage made by Plutonium

bombs like that used on Nagasaki.Another

survivor was Hiroko Kanaya, she was 17 at

the time of the explosion and was working

with three other girls Chiyoko Nakamura,

Hisako Nomoto and Sanae Oku, as account-

ants in the Mitsubishi Arms Factory, in the

southern wing of the school. Just a few

minutes before the bomb exploded, Kanaya

had made her way to her shift in digging out

the air raid shelter, there she survived the

explosion but but still experienced the

shockwaves “I heard this tremendous noise 31.

and was flung off my feet to the back wall”

after she dragged herself out of the shelter

she described what she saw “Everything

looked completely different, all the glass was

gone it was like a warzone with everything

incinerated and all the people had terrible

injuries, their clothing was in shreds stained

red with blood, they’d stagger out and col-

lapse, some were crawling on their stom-

achs, it was a scene from hell”. She also re-

counted finding the three other friends she

worked with who were on the 3rd floor at the

time “Nakamura had shattered glass stuck all

over her body I said ‘Oh no, that must hurt

so much’ she said something like ‘I feel

numb beyond pain’. Nomoto too, I told her

‘Your eyeballs are sticking out a bit, are you

alright? Can you see?’ she said ‘No, not real-

ly, your face looks a bit blurry I can see only

half of it’ her eyeballs were protruding by

about 2cm, I’d never seen anything like that”

As for her friend Sanae Oku, she was num-

ber 63, she died from the blast. When Ka-

naya asked about her during the final mo-

ments of her friends’ lives, they told her she

could not move her body and gestured with

her eyes to them ‘go on without me’.

t was also recently discovered through re-

search found by Tetsuya Fujita, a scientist

who invented the F-Scale for measuring the

intensity of tornadoes, who visited Nagasaki

eleven days after the explosion that the

most destruction was done on the outskirts

of the blast. Also, top secret documents

from the U.S. government were uncovered,

revealing the meticulous calculations that

went into creating the nuclear bomb, nick-

named ‘Fat Man’ as it caused 30% more

destruction than that in Hiroshima,

which destroyed Nagasaki. One of the docu-

ments is minutes from a meeting of the Tar-

get Committee which were primarily focused

on picking a city to bomb, in such meetings

the strength of the Mach Stem was inten-

sively discussed. U.S. Brig. Gen. Thomas Far-

rell, a member of this committee said

“Correlate the data on the size of the bomb

burst, the amount of damage expected and

the ultimate distance at which people will be

killed”. The American Government wanted

to create the largest amount of destruction

they could and so calculated the perfect

height to detonate the bomb. At 1,000m the

explosion would spread too large and the

Mach Stem would cause little damage, at

100m the Mach Stem was created too near

ground zero, and although the damage

would be substantial it wouldn’t spread far

enough, and so it was decided on 503m

from the ground, where the optimum

amount of damage was created. Assistant

Professor at Stevens Institute of Technology;

Alex Wellerstein said “they were measuring

success on how many metres of the city they

destroyed…they considered the blast effect

to be the primary effect, it will destroy al-

most everything”, the U.S. forces fully in-

tended for this intensity of destruction to

take place.

Every morning, when students of the newly

renovated Shiruyama Elementary School ar-

rive they bow and say good morning to a a

shrine commemorating those lost due to the

explosion, and on the 9th of every month

32.

the children pray in front of the preserved

building and listen to survivors’ accounts of

the event. Only until July 2014 has the sister

of Sanae Oku been able to visit the site

where her sister died, meeting Kanaya for

the first time and taking some of the

schools soil as a memento of the site. Such

an event will never be forgotten when thou-

sands of innocent lives were unnecessarily

taken, unfortunately things such as this con-

tinue to happen, and so I wonder, will hu-

manity ever really learn from mistakes of

the past?

By Sophie Scott

33.

Want to get involved in the His-

tory Society?...

History society events!

Come and see how you can get in-

volved by joining the History Society;

keep an eye out for any changes on

the History notice board outside of

A4... 34.

Winstanley College History Society

2014-2015…

PRESIDENTS Cameron Fleming &

Zara Andrews

SOCIAL MEDIA Harry Griffiths

HISORICAL DRAMA Vanessa Holt

TOTAL WAR TOURNAMENTS! Dominic Doran

HISTORY MAGAZINE CO-

EDITORS

Maddie McDonagh &

Sally Dickens

MAGAZINE EDITORIAL TEAM Keir Martland, Ethan Freeman,

Elizabeth Cunliffe & Emma

Porter

35.

Come down to mentoring at 1:30 at Thursday

lunchtimes in A4

For more information contact:

Anya Lyon-Fraser W4652

Saffy Lowsley W4101

36.

Then join the

History Society’s

Social Media

pages!

Featuring:

Articles

Revision Hints

Event updates

Topical news

Find us on

Twitter & Facebook:

@WinHist

www.facebook.com/WinstanleyHistory

NEW VACANCY

We are looking for an enthusiastic,

social-media-active student to help run the

pages. Please email Harry via the History Society

or speak to any of the History staff for details!

37.

WIGAN FAMILY and LOCAL HISTORY SOCIETY

Meetings held at St. Andrews Parish Centre

Woodhouse Lane - Wigan - WN6 7LZ On the

2nd Wednesday of the month at 7:15pm.

Wednesday 12th November 2014. SPEAKER : David Fearnley

The Lancashire Fusiliers and their links with the Gerard’s of Ashton.

Wednesday 14th January 2015. THEME : Researching your Family Tree

Interested in your family History? Would you like discover more? Why not join us this evening when

members will be on hand to help you get started, attempt to iron out any problems and point out the best

way forward. NOTE This meeting will be held at the Museum of Wigan Life, Library Street, Wigan., from

4:00pm to 8:30pm.

Wednesday 11th February 2015 SPEAKER : William “Bill” F Ashurst.

Ex Wigan, Penrith Panthers, Wakefield and Runcorn Rugby League Player, who will share

thoughts of his playing days in contrast to present day.

Wednesday 11th March 2015 SPEAKER : Alex Miller

Alex is the Archivist Manager for Wigan and Leigh Archives who will talk on the Archives and

how to use them.

Thursday 26th March. 2015 1:30pm Visit to the Wigan and Leigh Archives

Further information will be given nearer the time.

Wednesday 8th April 2015 SPEAKER : Mrs Marion Howell

Marion is the Community Heritage Manager for the LCC and will give a talk on George Lyon,

Highwayman.

Wednesday 13th. May 2015 SPEAKER : MRS KATE HURST.

Catholics Priests in Wigan.

NON-MEMBERS MOST WELCOME TO ALL MEETINGS

A small charge will be made for Tea, Coffee & Biscuits

38