History in the News: controversial development on Cold War airbase

Plans for housing development on Oxfordshire Cold War airbase

30th September 2008

A public inquiry began today into proposals for the construction of 1,075 houses by the North Oxford Consortium on the RAF Upper Heyford Site in Oxfordshire.

The airbase was one of the largest US Air Force bases in Europe during the Cold War. It housed reconnaissance and fighter aircraft including the famous F-111 fighter plane known as the “Aardvark”. It has a runway almost two miles long and was redeveloped in the 1950s in order to be able to handle the heavy B52 bombers used by the US air force at the beginning of the Cold War.

It was used from 1924 until 1991, when the US withdrew from the base. It was closed in 1994 and designated as a Conservation Area in 2006. It includes around 400 buildings and structures, including four Hardened Aircraft Shelters, which protected the F-111s from an aerial attack.

Nigel Barker, the head of the English Heritage Team for Oxfordshire, will give evidence at the inquiry on behalf of English Heritage, in an attempt to satisfy the needs for both new housing and the preservation of the site, which remains a unique testimony to the perceived Soviet threat and consequent scale of investment for the defense of the West.

Nigel Barker of English Heritage proposes that some of the historic structures could be re-used “to help fund the management and maintenance of the flying field for future generations”. The shelters, for example, could be transformed into storage depots various companies’ and organisations’ paper records and archives.

History in the News: Assassins’ weapons on display

by Tom Bowers

A pistol and bomb used by the assassins of Franz Ferdinand are to go on display in Britain for the first time. The assassination of the Austrian Archduke and his wife in Sarajevo on June 28th, 1914 sparked the First World War. The items are part of the exhibition In Memoriam: Remembering the Great War at the Imperial War Museum, London, from September 30th.

In Memoriam, which runs until September 6th 2009, marks the 90th anniversary of the Armistice using evidence and memorabilia to highlight notable events in the conflict. Other artefacts on display include the Victoria Cross awarded to one of its youngest recipients, Jack Cornwell, who died at the Battle of Jutland; Wilfred Owen’s Military Cross; and a wreath given to David Lloyd George after the Treaty of Versailles.

For more info on the exhibition, just click here.

Last chance to explore Berlin with History Today!

The Politics and Art of 20th-Century Berlin

November 5th-10th, 2008

5 nights/6 days

November 9th has great significance in the history of Berlin and Germany. In 1918 the Kaiser abdicated; in 1938 Kristallnacht signalled an acceleration towards the Holocaust; in 1989 the Wall came down. It is therefore appropriate that our next History Today tour should lead a lucky group there on that very day. Tour leader and historian Neil Taylor will take us to where these events and many others took place, discuss the context and the results.

only £995 per person*
Price includes:
• Return scheduled flights (Heathrow/Berlin) & airport taxes
• 5 nights’ bed and breakfast accommodation at the 4-star Hotel Berlin
• Three dinners
• All entrance fees and coach transfers
• 2 x 3-day public transport passes per person
*single supplement is £160. Tour excluding flights £895.

Itinerary

Wednesday November 5th
Midday BA flight from Heathrow to Tegel. On the transfer from the airport we have an introductory tour of the Western part of the city. Dinner together in the hotel, the centrally located four star Hotel Berlin.

Thursday November 6th
Visit the Reichstag and view Berlin from the Norman Foster dome. Then walk to the Pariser Platz, now almost as it was in the 1930s, and continue to the Holocaust Memorial. After lunch, walk east along Unter den Linden, then see the model of Berlin in 1939 at ‘Berlin Story’. We visit the German History Museum then walk to the Schlossplatz, the site of the former royal palace and town centre until 1918.

Friday November 7th
We take a coach through the old East. Some areas were built to show the German Democratic Republic at its best, such as the Alexanderplatz and the former Stalinallee, now Frankfurter Allee. Visit Karlshorst, where a second surrender was arranged in May 1945: it is now a German-Russian Museum, on the eastern front and the battle for Berlin. Then drive to the Stasi Museum. The afternoon is free.

Saturday November 8th
We drive to the Bernauerstrasse where parts of the Wall have been rebuilt to see how it looked from the East, and visit the Berlin Wall Memorial Ensemble and the Documentation Centre. After lunch, we walk around the Potsdamer Platz. Visit the Film Museum to relive the very different Germanies of Leni Riefestahl and Marlene Dietrich, then continue to ‘The Story of Berlin’ where many centuries and aspects of life are portrayed.

Sunday November 9th
Coach to the Wannsee Villa, where the January 1942 Holocaust planning conference took place. We next visit Max Liebermann’s Villa, and the Brücke Museum. Free afternoon: perhaps visiting art museums nearby, or the Allies Museum, palaces or the Düppel Museum, a recreation of a 12th-century village.

Monday November 10th
Free morning before leaving for Tegel Airport and the return BA flight to Heathrow.

Enquiries to: Heritage Group Travel, Charlotte House, 12 Charlotte Street, Bath BA1 2NE
• Tel: 0044 (0)1225 466620 • Fax: 0044 (0)1225 482236 • Email: heritage@grouptravel.co.uk

History in the News: Eastern Anatolia & the Kurdish regions

Canyon, Kurdistan, northern Iraq.

26th September: Eastern Anatolia & the Kurdish regions

by Derry Nairn

Reuters reports today that Turkey has bombed the positions of Kurdish guerrillas in northern Iraq (read the full news story by clicking here). The operation is one of several launched in recent months by the military against the Kurdistan People's Party (PKK).

The military venture has wider political ramifications for the region. Turkey's status as a key US ally, a NATO member and a potential entrant to the EU are all compromised to some extent by the border incursions.

According to the report, the PKK launched their campaign for a Kurdish homeland in 1984. However, articles from our archive show that the origins of tensions among stateless ethnic minorities in the region can be traced back centuries.

In Turkey's Fundamental Dilemma, John Crossland looks at the impact of statesman and soldier Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey.

In Andranik of Armenia, Aram Bakshian tells the story of a national hero without a state, whose story "personifies the fate of small nations caught in the cross-fire of great powers and great events."

Francis Robinson identifies both the physical and historical limits of the region of 'Greater Central Asia' in A Forgotten Region.

History in the News: Orphans of History - their fight for official recognition continues

Soldiers graffiti on a painting by harkis, Fort de Cormeilles-en-Parisis, France.

25th September 2008: 8th journée nationale d’hommage aux harkis.

by Kathryn Hadley

The first national day of commemoration for the harkis, the Algerian nationals who fought alongside the French during the Algerian War, was celebrated in 2001 under Jacques Chirac’s presidency. It was both a reflection of French attempts to defend its republican ideals of unity and solidarity and of practical concerns for the integration of the harkis into the French national community.

Chirac argued in his speeches at the time that the recognition of the harkis’ sacrifices, and of some of the shortcomings of French colonial policy, was a question of honour and duty. Following the signature of the Evian Agreements in 1962, approximately 150,000 harkis were massacred by the the Algerian independence force (FLN). The French army was ordered not to intervene and the Gaullist government severely limited the repatriation of harkis back to France.

The decree of 31st March 2003 formally incorporated the journée nationale into the calendar of national commemorative ceremonies. It stipulated that an official ceremony would be held in Paris every 25th September and that the regional prefects were responsible for the organisation of local celebrations in their department.

In previous years, however, there has been very scant coverage of the journée nationale in the national press. This year, news of the programme of celebrations is similarly very difficult to find in both the national and local press. On the websites of three of the biggest national newspapers Le Figaro, Le Monde and Libération there is no mention of the journée nationale; nor is there any coverage of the ceremony in Paris in the local Parisian paper Le Parisien.

Abdelkrim Barki, an harki veteran in his 70s, was repatriated to France in 1962. When I interviewed him in December last year, he described the official institution of the journée nationale last year as is ‘que du bla bla'. It appears that this supposed national day of celebration remains a meaningless and empty promise of recognition.

Do you have an opinion on the topic? Comment below this article.

Or find out more on the subject from our archives and links.

Ten Great Figures of French History

by Derry Nairn

Our archive of past articles has over 10,000 articles stretching nearly 60 years. It's a fantastic resource!

Just one example of this is the new page about French history. Here you can read our nominations for the ten greatest figures of French History and follow links to find out their stories. If you don't agree, you can even nominate your own (Thierry Henry included!).

To view the page, just click here...

Sign up for our newsletter!

by Derry Nairn

Twice a month we select the best bits from our magazine and website and drop it in your inbox, free of charge.

This month's newsletter covers some big anniversaries: Nelson's birth, the discovery of penicillin and Chamberlain's 1938 Munich conference.

If you'd like to sign up, just follow this link...

History in the News: Stonehenge could have been ‘Neolithic Lourdes’

by Kathryn Hadley

Following the first dig inside the circle of sarsen stone pillars at Stonehenge for 44 years by Profs Tim Darvill and Geoff Wainwright, 14 samples of organic material from beneath the stones were sent for carbon dating at Oxford University. The results of the tests have provided new evidence about the origins and purpose of Stonehenge. The radiocarbon tests dated the stones to 2,300BC, 300 years earlier than previous studies. It is believed that the stones were transported to the plain from a site in the Preseli hills in South Wales 240km away. The excavations also suggest that Stonehenge may have been a type of healing centre, contrary to previous theories that it was a site of worship or a calendar to mark the solstices. Corpses found in nearby tombs reveal serious injury or disease and approximately half the corpses were from people who were not native to the region, suggesting that people may have travelled to Stonehenge, described by Darvill and Wainwright as a ‘Neolithic Lourdes’, to be cured. A documentary about the recent findings recorded by the BBC Timewatch series will be broadcast on BBC Two on September 27th.

Find out more from our archive and links:

Solving Stonehenge
Anthony Johnson argues that an accurate interpretation of the great monument rests in the sophisticated geometric principles employed by its Neolithic surveyors.

Stonehenge: How Did The Stones Get There?
Anthony Johnson argues that an accurate interpretation of the great monument rests in the sophisticated geometric principles employed by its Neolithic surveyors.

Our link page for other good Archaeology sites

The Times of My Life

A new website that might interest History Today readers is to be launched this week. The Times of My Life is a web project designed to link the memories of ordinary people to the often-monumental historical events happening around them. Following the death of his late mother, its founder Mark Hickman realised it was too late for him to record her memories to show his children, tried to find a better method of doing so.


The Times of My Life project is not unique in its aim of preserving the memories of ordinary people. It calls to mind similar ventures such as last year's Email Britain project, whereby the email communications of normal people were forwarded directly to the British Library's archive for storage. Eyewitness to History is another example of a site performing a similar role to The Times of My Life.

It remains to be seen precisely how this type of service will differ from the plethora of 'personal-data-collecting' websites already in existence. Take YouTube for example. A cursory search under 'WW2' and 'memories' turns up a wealth of septugenarians recounting their war exploits.

This raises some questions:

• Will the Times of My Life incorporate multimedia materials like video?

• Will that material be original or will it source its content from pre-existing media such as YouTube?

Either way, the development of this site will be interesting to keep track of.