| Main Performers | Canon [Dr] 'Dick' Sheppard [Chair],
Agnes Maude Royden,
Edmund Blunden,
Frank Crozier,
Siegfried Sassoon - speaker |
| Secondary Performers | Arnold Goldsbrough - organ |
| Set List | Speeches (Dick Sheppard, Maude Royden, Frank Crozie),
Address (Edmund Blunden),
Extracts from War Poems (Siegfried Sassoon),
Hymns |
| Performance Notes | Canon [Dick] Sheppard (Hugh Richard Lawrie Sheppard) was the founder of the Peace Pledge Union (PPU) and staunch pacifist who could not reconcile war with Christianity.
In an official Peace Ballot conducted between 1934 and 1935, the results of which were announced at the Royal Albert Hall, over 6 million Britons had endorsed the right of the League of Nations to employ force as a sanction against aggression. It was Sheppards belief that collective security on this basis spelled endless conflict. In October 1934, Sheppard, then Canon of St Paul's Cathedral, London, instigated a peace ballot of his own, by sending a letter to newspapers that invited readers to sign a postcard pledging to renounce war and never again, directly or indirectly, support or sanction another. Published in the Guardian and several other papers, excluding The Times, on 16 October 1934 Dick wrote of "the almost universally acknowledged lunacy of the manner in which nations are pursuing peace...It seems essential to discover whether or not it be true, as we are told, that the majority of thoughtful men in this country are convinced that war of any kind or for any cause, is not only a denial of Christianity, but a crime against humanity which is not to be permitted by civilised people". Over 100,000 people signed the pledge: I renounce war and never will I support or sanction another.
Dick called his demonstration in the Royal Albert Hall on 14 July 1935, which inaugurated the Sheppard Peace Movement. Around 7,000 people, only men, attended the event. They heard Sheppard declare that war was, 'a blasphemous betrayal of the future of man' and castigate leaders of Church and State for their 'lack of moral courage.'
Kingsley Martin, the editor of the New Statesman, told his readers that Sheppard had the makings of a Führer of British pacifism. Sheppard told Martin that a Peace Army thousands strong was ready to take his orders. In the wake of the Royal Albert Hall rally he published his anti-war testament 'We Say "NO" - The Plain Man's Guide to Pacifism'. In May 1936, with the help of other notable figures such as George Lansbury and Donald Soper, the organisation became The Peace Pledge Union.
NOTE: The Archive does not hold a programme for this event but the orginal was a single-fold programme, page 3 being four hymns to be sung during the meeting. The programme contained a plea for money, since 'we have not one bean behind us.' The cover picture was designed by Arthur Wragg (1903-1976) and shows a cenotaph encasing a stricken soldier and dripping with blood. This was produced as a large poster but was banned from the London Underground at the time because it was 'too gruesome'. |