Weather! Two inches of snow and daytime temperatures just above zero! Britain grinds to a halt and Dr St John stays in bed! Historians could tell us about REAL weather problems which produced REAL crises…
Inaugration Quiz
This afternoon, Barack Obama will be inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States of America. Presidential inaugurations have witnessed a number of memorable speeches and quotations in the past. Do you know which former President said each of the following and when?
1. “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
2. “My fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country. My fellow citizens of the world: ask not what America will do for you, but what together we can do for the freedom of man.”
3. “The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.”
4. “We have reached a higher degree of comfort and security than ever existed before in the history of the world.”
5. “Let us, then, fellow citizens, unite with one heart and one mind. Let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things. And let us reflect that, having banished from our land that religious intolerance under which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little if we countenance a political intolerance as despotic, as wicked, and capable of as bitter and bloody persecutions.”
6. “We are provincials no longer. The tragic events of the thirty months of vital turmoil through which we have just passed have made us citizens of the world. There can be no turning back.”
7. “Our democracy must be not only the envy of the world but the engine of our own renewal. There is nothing wrong with America that cannot be cured by what is right with America.”
8. ” The economic ills we suffer have come upon us over several decades. They will not go away in days, weeks, or months, but they will go away. They will go away because we as Americans have the capacity now, as we’ve had in the past, to do whatever needs to be done to preserve this last and greatest bastion of freedom. In this present crisis, government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem.”
9. “Employed in the service of my country abroad during the whole course of these transactions, I first saw the Constitution of the United States in a foreign country.”
10. “Much has been given us, and much will rightfully be expected from us. We have duties to others and duties to ourselves; and we can shirk neither. We have become a great nation, forced by the fact of its greatness into relations with other nations of the earth, and we must behave as beseems a people with such responsibilities.”
Beat Shipley!
Beat Shipley!
In his own estimation, the School’s greatest expert on Russian history is Andrew Sebag (Sp?) Shipley. But he does not know much. Show him up by being first to answer the following questions. Just reply (’Comment’) giving your answers and your name and form.
The leaders of the Bolsheviks in October 1917 were Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin (yes!), Zinoviev, Kamenev and Sverdlov.
1. Which of these six leaders were Jewish?
2. Two of them were closely related, by marriage; what was the connection?
3. Lenin’s famous disguise when he fled to Finland in 1917 owed much to one of the other leaders; which one shaved Lenin’s beard off?
Sebag (Sp?) doesn’t know. Do you? Spectacular prize for the winner.
RCS
The Y7 History Trip to…Agincourt (1415)
On the 27th of June, a large part of Year Seven (62 boys) was waiting in anticipation for the upcoming trip. Dr.Sloan told the Joblings boys to go to the front of the coach; true to form, we went to the back! This apart, the behaviour of all of the boys was impeccable. When we reached Abbeville we had our dinner and went for what some people say was the least exciting part of the trip – bowling! We had lots of fun and Luke (7S), Joe (7H) and Ethan (7J) dominated.
The next day we were told to be up by 7:45 as breakfast was at 8:00.
Then we left for the Underground City of Naours. We met up with a guide who spoke (almost) flawless English. We entered a cold, dark, narrow corridor that did not warn you of the gargantuan network of rooms ahead of us. There were three chapels, two of which were HUGE. The guide told us about different types of traps which the French used against lone bands of attackers. Then the group who did not go to the city first went on ‘le petit train’ and saw a windmill. This windmill was used as a secret lookout to tell the villagers to get underground. When we got back to the coach we enjoyed some Blackadder, which was played almost constantly for the rest of the trip.
Our next visit was to the châteaux of Rambures. I would say this was my favourite parts in the trip. We were split into 2 groups. My group was to go in second. While we waited we were told in full by Mr. Clark the background history of the Hundred Years War; his Henderson’s class (obviously) knew the most. When we entered (much to the dismay of Mr. Clark) we were led across a dry moat across a drawbridge and into a relatively small open-air antechamber. We were shown a prison (converted to a kitchen). We were told why the walls were made of brick, not stone. We saw the King’s resting place in the fortress and we were informed about the history of coats of arms and how they symbolised your position or assets as a baron or knight. One of the highlights of the chateau was when Ed Nutting had to (try) to carry a knight’s chest-armour; he managed to do it for the time the guide was talking. A knight’s armour was so heavy if he fell off his horse he would not be able to stand up.
After this, we travelled to St.Valery sur Somme, the port from which William the Conqueror left for England. We went to a beach there and started throwing stones at the beach (for some unknown reason). Dion fell into the sea. When we reached our meeting point in the town we were given 10 Euros each and were told to spilt into groups of 3 to buy our dinner. After this we went back to the hotel and went to sleep; it was a long day!
The next day we woke up at the same time (more or less) and went to Crecy. My group was the first to go to a tall tower-like structure where Edward would have stood in Crecy. Dr. Sloan told us about Crecy and how the English longbow men, (I mean Welsh) won the battle. When we left the tower, Mr. Clark took various pictures of us as dead French or triumphant English. After this we set off for Agincourt where there was a good information centre and a museum. A particularly interesting thing about this museum was that there was a sack with a rope that was used to show whether you could properly pull the string of a longbow. We left the top floor of the museum and went to a room where the battle was laid out. Then we entered a dark room where there was some dodgy projection as there was a statue (meant to be Henry V) with a projection so off-centre he had 2 noses! We continued on to a room with more projections that gave a detailed explanation of the battle. We proceeded on to a room with a video about Agincourt which, annoyingly, kept on repeating the lines ‘Agincourt, 1415’. We then left the information centre and went to the battlefield (even though we didn’t get off); we were told by a French guide the position of the armies and their camps.
Then we left for Calais and the only difference between this and the way to Calais was this was much louder as every one was exited. I suggest anyone that gets to go on this trip should go as it is great fun and Dr. Sloan would be happy.
I would like to thank him and all of the teachers for running this trip and helping us to finish the year on a high.
Pranav Subhedar, 7J
The Battlefields trip to Northern France and the Somme
14th&15th June 2008
At 6’o’clock on the morning of the 14th of June a coach full of bleary-eyed, tired Habs boys in year 9 and 10 gathered in the coach park awaiting their visit to the World War I battlefields. The boys were marshalled by the enthusiastic staff team consisting of Mr. Clark, Dr Sloan, Mr. Simm, Dr St John and Dr Wigley.
We eventually made it to Dover and after a relaxing ferry trip we arrived in Calais and caught our first glimpse of France. However, we had no time to soak up the French ambiance and we were whisked straight to our first destination, Vimy Ridge. The battle field has been recreated and the trenches themselves have been rebuilt since the war so tourists like us are allowed to pretend they were in a battle. The battle itself was between the Canadian Corps and the German Army in April 1917. It was when the Canadians successfully attacked the German positions on the ridge and took the high ground after many casualties.
After we had finished looking around, Mr. Clark shoved us back onto the coach to our next site the World War I museum in Peronne where we voluntarily filled out worksheets and a learned great deal about the build up to the war and the fighting over the four years. We could only stay at the museum for a short while before we were transported to our final destination of the day, Amiens. Our hotel was also in the city and we were given time to explore the city and get some food whilst the teachers had a drink or four.
We woke early the next morning, well most of us did except for Nabil Freeman and Tom Ough whose alarm clock “didn’t work”, and it was because of this delay we arrived at our next destination half an hour late. The next port of call was the Newfoundland Memorial at Beaumont Hamel. This was the site of huge casualties suffered by the Newfoundland regiment on the first day of the Somme.
We wandered around the gravestones and the battlefield, which has been preserved, shocked by the huge loss of life. Our next site was the Ulster Tower. Dr Sloan told us about the significance of the memorial both in France and in Ireland. The Tower was built to honour the soldiers from Ulster and Northern Ireland who fought so well and so bravely in the Somme; in fact, the soldiers fought too bravely, became isolated and could not retreat, so they suffered many losses.
After our visit to the Tower we moved on to the famous Thiepval Memorial and Museum. This huge structure was dedicated to the 73,000 missing from the Battle of the Somme; of that vast number 8 were old Habs boys and Dr Wigley laid a wreath and said a few words of remembrance of the dead. We were completely taken aback by this colossal loss of life.
After a busy morning of memorials and coach trips we were quickly becoming very hungry and we headed to lunch. Our meal was at an old dressing station from WWI where we split and half went to see the station while the other half gratefully munched on their lunch. It was during this munching that Raphael Levy, a ‘big-boned’ boy, broke a bench, he achieved this by simply sitting on it and under the weight the bench collapsed. A hurried apology and exit followed as we left in fits of laughter to our next destination.
“La Grande Mine” is a huge crater where on the opening day of the Somme, a huge mine was exploded. It was heard in London apparently and decimated the German positions on the 1st of July 1916 when the mine was let off. We had to move on due to our ridiculously tight schedule and so we went to Fricourt. This is the German cemetery for the Somme; it is very bleak and is not very well looked after. We were told that the Red Baron, the fighter ace, was buried here; we eagerly set out to find his grave only ten minutes later to be told that his grave has been moved.
Our last site before the long journey home was the South African memorial which was in Delville Wood, where the South African soldiers fought bravely and suffered heavy casualties against the Germans in difficult fighting in the wood. The memorial was built during the Apartheid era when the South Africans were under a lot of pressure and lacked any popularity, so they built the museum and memorial to show that they should be treated better as they fought bravely for the British in Delville Wood. Like the Ulster Tower, it is a good example of how history is often used for political purposes.
After this final memorial we then began our never-ending home journey which ended only a couple of hours later than we were expected, thanks to the vigilance of the security men who see every traveler as a potential terrorist. The trip could not have taken place if it were not for the heroic role the teachers played in managing to look after us for two days without going mad. Thank you very much!
James Colenutt, 9M1
Haffner Essay Prize
The winner of the Haffner essay prize for 2008 is Adam Pabani of 10R1.
Adam showed an engagement with the material in Sebastian Haffner’s “Defying Hitler” and showed better than any other review that Haffner’s memoir had illuminated his understanding of Weimar’s problems and the rise of Hitler.
His prize will be a £20 book token, which he will use to buy a history book.
RCS
Happy Birthday Israel?
“Are we going to live according to the laws of Moses or to the laws of Parliament?”
(President Yitzhak Navon)
All of this talk of 60 years is nonsense, really. Not only does it demonstrate a rather juvenile obsession with, and unwarranted attachment of value to, the decimal system, but it also ignores the thousands of years of history that precede 1948; the state enters its seventh decade, while the nation is well into its fourth millennium, and the resonance is strong.
As a Jewish state – the only Jewish state – Israel is unique. But this is more profound than simply a matter of monopoly: Judaism is the only religion that has intrinsic nationality. Etymologically, the Jews are called as such because they come from the province of Judea, and throughout nearly 2000 years of exile, the religion has never lost touch with its nationalist root.
This creates an enormous problem for the secular progressive state of Israel, which from the very beginning was to be democratic, inclusive, strong and free: Judaism is none of these. An example of this would be that rather than the hereditary, theocratic and corrupt rule of the priestly class of Cohanim and Leviim, the modern state opted for proportional representation.
But the dichotomy between religion and secularism pervades Israeli society, and a balance has not yet been found. There are several allowances which are made to appease the Orthodox community: because it is a coalition system of government, the relatively small religious factions in the Knesset wield significant influence.
Matters are most serious in family law. Control of marriage and divorce rests entirely with the Orthodox rabbinate, under whose restrictions Jews may not marry non-Jews (they have to go to Cyprus if they wish to do so), there are no secular unions (Muslim and Christian weddings are recognised, but there is no registry) and I’ll let you guess their position on same-sex marriage.
Moreover, according to halacha (Jewish religious law), a woman cannot divorce her husband if he is not willing to cooperate; so it is, unbelievably enough, in the modern, democratic state of Israel. The courts are therefore empowered to use sanctions up to and including imprisonment to coerce the husband, but in the meantime the woman remains an “agunah”, “bound woman”. It really is quite astounding.
The majority of Israelis, however, are secular, and even those who are religious do not necessarily want to live in what is referred to as a “halachic state”: they look at their (somewhat unfriendly) neighbours in Saudi Arabia, Iran and elsewhere and decide that they’d really rather not, thanks. But their private religious views also tear on the fabric of Israeli society.
It is very easy to blame the Israel-Palestine conflict on the settlers in the West Bank (who, for the most part, are religious Zionists), which is why I do. Because they believe that the land was given to them by God and that it is their inheritance, they continue to appropriate and populate land that does not belong to them in any actual sense. Meanwhile, the government, which needs the backing of religious parties to maintain a majority in the Knesset, largely turns a blind eye. In the unilateral pullout from Gaza, these tensions exploded across Israeli society with a remarkably polarising effect.
On the other hand, in 2006 the Attorney-General Menahem Mazuz ordered the Jerusalem Police to provide 12000 of officers to protect both the freedom of expression and the lives of those participating in a Gay Pride march in the “holy city” of Jerusalem from religious bigotry and violence. As Yael Gelman, the mayoress of Herzliya, said at the time, “How could it even be imagined that violence could prevent an elementary right like this in the state of Israel?” How indeed?
It was Mr. Simm (quoting President Lincoln) who said, “A house divided against itself cannot stand”. He (President Lincoln) turned out to be correct. The a fortiori application to Israel is rather worrying: if two halves of a continent the size of America, actually separated by a great big line drawn across the map, cannot live together half-slave, half-free, then how can a country the size of Wales, in which those on either side of the philosophical divide may live down the street from each other, manage?
Leo Davidson
The Dark Side
No-one can resist the power of the dark side…
I have taken more good from alcohol than alcohol has taken from me.
-Winston Churchill
Do you know about the dark side of a historical figure? WRITE about it here on the history blog, click on comments below.
For example, on Friday 22nd February,
Teddy Kennedy celebrated his 75th birthday. He has a dark side…!
The Leipzig, Dresden and Prague trip
The 2007 History trip to Leipzig, Dresden and Prague. Gregory Steckelmacher has written the following reflections on the recent History Trip. Please submit your responses. “Europe’s basically one giant guilt-trip about World War II,” to paraphrase Gabriel, the oft-used tour-guide of the History department on their expeditions into continental Europe. He had said this on a tram making its way through Dresden, referring to the TV screens fitted into the ceilings of each carriage, which continuously played a selection of government and commercial advertisements, and noticeably contained a wide array of ethnic minorities. That the German government still appeared to be trying to right the wrongs of its past appeared odd, but the necessity was demonstrated by the drunken man who had followed us around Leipzig, shouting “only a dead Indian is a good Indian”. Although he sheepishly ran off at the first mention of police on a mobile phone, it had only been around seven weeks prior to our visit when eight Indians were injured in an attack near Leipzig itself. In some ways the 18 years after the fall of communism seemed a long time. The huge shopping centres and shopping-centres-in-train-stations (a by-product of Sunday trading laws, I am told) were bustling and I couldn’t imagine them not being there. Alternatively, however, the scars of a bygone era were unmissable when traversing the residential areas of Leipzig. Huge concrete buildings tower over the roads, each filled with the same communist flats, mandatory for everyone (as Gabriel told us, you would never need to ask where the toilet was when visiting a friend, for it would be in the exact same place as in your own apartment). Dilapidated and in need of renovation, sitting on land that no-one wants to buy, they are brightened only by large decorative hangings positioned on their side. The situation is worse in Dresden, a city which had almost all of its 19th century architecture destroyed in a firestorm created by the Allies in 1945; it now looks as though it has been overrun by council-housing. And, indeed, where communism hasn’t literally built over the past, nothing has. Dresden is 63% green areas, and although I was sceptical when Gabriel first informed us, casually yet seemingly cynically, that there was nothing anymore at Dresden, I can not help but agree. The new shopping centres, museums, and even a football stadium, are there, but the architecture of Dresden’s past is sorely absent. A shopping centre is no identity for a town to cling to.
| Monument to the lost children of Lidice |
Prague itself appeared to have successfully retained most of its architectural history, something which might be seen in the staunch warning we got of pick-pockets whilst in the city, a sure sign of tourists flocking to view it in all its beauty. Our time there was spent touring the city’s wealth of landmarks, from Charles Bridge to Prague Castle, and from the Astronomical Clock to Wenceslas Square, where student Jan Palach set himself on fire as a political protest against the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. However, it was outside Prague itself where I received my most poignant experience of the History trip – at the site of the old village of Lidice, which proved that the Nazis’ drive to exterminate their enemies was not a solely attack on the Jews of Europe. After the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich by the Czech resistance force, it was ordered that the village be completely destroyed, and its men and most of its children (save those young enough to be “Germanized”) were killed. The people living in the village had no connection to those involved in the assassination other than the fact that its name was written on a piece of paper held by one of the assassins – the people there were truly innocent. And so, I found myself reconsidering, even if only for a small while, my beliefs on the Holocaust. Perhaps because I had been raised in a Jewish environment, I had always felt that the Holocaust was brought up too much, and that people had never really moved on from it. Yet, on the last few days of the trip, I was asking myself if that was entirely fair. Should the atrocities of the German regime be forgotten? Should Lidice and its 82 gassed children be forgotten? You would have to be most hardened to say so. But I soon found myself thinking once again that if we allow ourselves to be too concerned with events in the past, we stop making decisions based on the current situation, but rather because of what has happened already, subsequently producing choices which might not always be the most appropriate. Gregory Steckelmacher
