London | >Re-PHOTO

Brownswood Park Finsbury Park – 1990

Brownswood Park Finsbury Park: My walk on April 1st 1990 began at Finsbury Park Station. I walked a short distance past the gates to the park and then turned right down Queens Drive.

Queen's Drive, Finsbury Park, Hackney, 1990, 90-3m-13 — *Queen’s Drive, Finsbury Park, Hackney, 1990, 90-3m-13*

Queen’s Drive was laid out and developed from 1869, the same year that the park, misleadingly named Finsbury Park despite being a couple of miles from Finsbury, was opened, just a few years after the opening of Seven Sister Road station in 1861. In 1870 the station was renamed Finsbury Park. Most of the street was built up by the 1871 census, largely with substantial and well decorated four-storey terraces.

Queen’s Road – later renamed Queen’s Drive – was built as the ‘best road’ in a new select suburb then known as Brownswood Park, developed at first by John Brookes Porter in 1862. You can read more of its history in the Brownswood Conservation Area Appraisal.

Like many such areas it went downhill over the years. Wartime bombing including a V2 rocket damaged and destroyed a number of houses in it and nearby streets. By the 1950s most of the houses were in multiple occupation by “students, migrants, and the working class.”

This picture is of the rear of the Pembury Hotel which is on the corner of Queen’s Drive and Seven Sisters Road, just a few yards down the road and is a post war addition.

*Houses, Princess Crescent, Finsbury Park, Hackney, 1990, 90-3m-15*

Princess Crescent, also in Browsnwood Park, is not a crescent but two straight lengths of road at an angle joining Queen’s Drive and Gloucester Drive. The houses here were rather smaller than those in Queen’s Road. The other section of road has a two large blocks of council flats, St John’s Court on one side and a primary school on the other. From 1934 until 1960 the Finsbury Park Synagogue was there.

I walked back onto Queen’s Drive and continued to Brownswood Road, turning east and crossing Green Lanes into Lordship Park – not a park but a street.

*Lordship Park, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 90-4a-01*

Taken on Lordship Park and looking up Allerton Road towards the ‘castle’ designed by architect William Chadwell Mylne for the New River Company on Green Lanes, to house steam engines to pump water which had been cleaned in the adjoining reservoirs and filter beds to consumers.

The water was pumped to a large tank at the top of the main structure and then gravity fed to consumers. The towers and turrets disguise the huge industrial engines inside, initially giant single cylinder steam engines linked to pumps. These were later replaced in the 1930s by diesel and electric pumps. The gothic fantasy was felt to be more acceptable in this then select suburb than an industrial-looking building.

When the water board closed down this facility in 1971 it was saved from demolition by Grade II* listing and three years later converted into a climbing centre.

*House, Tree, Lordship Park, Stoke Newington, Hackney, 1990, 90-4a-03*

A pollarded tree in front of semi-detached houses on Lordship Park. The two story houses have some fine decoration on their doorways and windows. There are larger houses close to Green Lanes.

*House, Cars, Green Lanes, Brownswood Park, Hackney, 1990, 90-4a-61*

Notices on the house say ‘NO BALL GAMES; and NO PARKING’ but there seems to be some kind of car scrap business running here in front of once fine derelict houses.

*House, Cars, Green Lanes, Brownswood Park, Hackney, 1990,, 1990, 90-4a-64*

I think these houses were just to the north of Portland Rise on the west side of Green Lanes and have since been demolished and replaced by to modern blocks of flats at 291 and 293 Green Lanes. The building at extreme left is still there.

*House, Cars, Green Lanes, Brownswood Park, Hackney, 1990,, 1990, 90-4a-54*

Unusually I took 11 frames here and there are six of them on Flickr – but I’ll only post three here.

These houses were a short walk from the West Reservoir where my my next post from this walk will begin.

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Marikana, Bangladesh, Bahrain & Lula – 2018

Marikana, Bangladesh, Bahrain & Lula: Monday August 13th 2018 was a day of protests around London concerned with overseas events, though also about the freedom to protest here. There is a very long history of political movements across the world, particularly from the British Empire protesting here, often when protests were not permitted in their home countries, now mainly carried on by those from them who have settled here.

Justice For Marikana – 6th Anniversary Protest

City of London

Marikana, Bangladesh, Bahrain & Lula - 2018

The mining industry in southern Africa was largely developed by British companies and much is still owned and financed by companies based in the City of London, which also provides financial services including insurance.

The London and Rhodesian Mining and Land Company Limited was set up in London in 1909, and later became Lonhro and later Lonmin, still listed on the London Stock Exchange on 16th August 2012 when 34 striking miners were shot dead by South African police at its Marikana platinum mine.

The miners were striking for better wages and living and working conditions and were trying to disperse and hide when they were shot; another 10 had been killed previously since the strike began. Among those who encouraged the police violence against strikers was Lonmin board member Cyril Ramaphosa, a former mining union leader who since 2018 has been president of South Africa.

I photographed a tour of City of London investors, insurers and shareholders who profited from the violence against people and nature in Marikana. It stopped outside each of the offices for speeches giving details of their involvement and about the colonial roots of the huge wealth of the City of London. There were brief protests outside Majedie, Schroders, Investec, Legal & General and BASF, the major customers for Marikana’s platinum.

There had been no compensation for the victims’ families or for the injured mineworkers. The protest by the Marikana Solidarity Collective supported the demands of women’s organisation Sikhala Sonke and victims’ representatives that Lonmin must fulfil a social covenant with the community instead, including reparations, releasing the imprisoned mineworkers, prosecuting the physical and intellectual authors of the massacre, and taking responsibility for the environmental destruction in Marikana.

The international outcry over the massacre eventually led to Lonmin being acquired in 2019 by multinational mining and metal processing group Sibanye-Stillwater.

More pictures on My London Diary at Justice For Marikana – 6th Anniversary.

Release Bangladeshi opposition leader Khaleda Zia

Downing St

Protesters from the Bangladeshi Nationalist Party UK called for the release of their party leader, Begum Khaleda Zia, jailed in February for five years for embezzlement of international funds donated to Zia Orphanage Trust.

The BNP claim the charges are politically motivated, though there appeared to be many charges and a great deal of evidence against the woman who became Bangladesh’s first female head of government from 1991-6 after the BNP won the country’s first democratic election in 20 years, and served as prime minister later in 2001-6. Her sentence was later increased to 10 years.

In 2020 she was released from prison on medical grounds and was later acquitted on some charges and in 2025 allowed to go to London for medical treatment. She died in Dhaka as the end of December 2025.

Some Bangladeshi friends tell me there was little to chose between the her and her political rival Sheikh Hasina Wazed and their parties, and that both are corrupt and neither represented the interests of the people of their country.

More pictures at Release Bangladeshi opposition leader.

Against attack on Bahrain Embassy hunger striker

Bahrain Embassy, Belgrave Square

Islamic human rights group Inminds came to protest outside the Bahrain Embassy on Monday after hunger striker Ali Mushaima who was protesting outside there had been attacked early on Sunday morning by staff inside the embassy. A bucket of an unknown liquid was thrown on him from the ambassador’s balcony.

Mushaima’s hunger strike, which had begun on August 1st, was calling for his 70-year old father in prison in Bahrain to be given urgently needed medical care, family visits (stopped 18 months ago), and access to books.

Hassan Mushaima and other human rights defenders and opposition leaders were abducted in March 2017, brutally tortured and given life sentences in mock trials for calling for democracy in Bahrain.

*The cast included Theresa May, with the Butcher of Bahrain Hamad Khalifa and Little Stooge Fawaz Khalifa*

Inminds called for his release along with that of around 5,000 other Bahraini prisoners of conscience languishing in the Al-Khalifa regimes jails, as well as an end to UK complicity in the Al Khalifa dictatorship and Saudi crimes against the Bahraini people.

*Britain sells arms which are used to shoot Bahraini people*

The attack had been reported to police who had failed to investigate it fully, but did come to harass the protesters, telling them they could not protest on the pavement outside the embassy.

*The International Criminal Court arrived and the members of the criminal regime were brought to justice.*

Inminds refused to move and continued their protest with some street theatre in which Theresa May sold arms to the Bahraini dictator which he used to shoot protesters, who were then chained up. Unlike in real life the International Criminal Court came to their rescue, released them and condemned the Bahraini regime for their crimes against humanity.

More at Attack on Bahrain Embassy hunger striker.

Free Lula – Brazilians for Democracy & Justice

Brazilian Embassy, Cockspur St

Finally I joined protesters outside the Brazilian Embassy calling for the release of Lula – Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva – a former trade union leader who was President of Brazil for two terms from 2003-11- to enable him to stand for election again in October.

Lula had announced in late 2017 that he would stand in the 2018 presidential election against right-wing incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro and opinion polls showed him clearly in the lead. But in April 2018 he was finally imprisoned on charges of having taken bribes to help an engineering firm gain contracts from the state oil company.

Despite his imprisonment he was kept as the Worker’s Party candidate although being in prison made him ineligible to take part in the election. Brazil ignored the protests and a suggestion from the UN Human Rights Committee that he be allowed to stand and Lula withdrew shortly before the vote in which Bolsonaro won another term.

All convictions against Lula were annulled in 2021 and in October 2022 he was elected for a third term as president.

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Class War protest Ripper ‘museum’ again – 2015

Cable St, London. Wednesday 12th August 2015

Former Google diversity chief Mark Palmer-Edgecumbe had applied to Tower Hamlets Council for planning permission to open a “Museum of Women’s History” meant to celebrate suffragettes, equal-pay campaigners, and local social struggles, and got a number of historians, academics and others to advise on the project.

It was a shock when the building renovations were completed and those involved as well as the council saw from the frontage that it was instead to be a tourist trap celebrating the gruesome Victorian murders of ‘Jack the Ripper’.

*Ian Bone asks “Would you protect it if it glorified the killing of police officers”*

Many local residents, and others including descendants of the poor working class victims of the sadistic murderer where shocked, and even Tower Hamlets Council was moved to protest following its opening. Unfortunately the council found it had no power to close down what was described as a ‘sick horror attraction’.

*We have better stories’ says a poster with some images of women who should be celebrated rather than celebrating a brutal and deranged upper-class killer who attacked working class women*

But the most sustained protests came from anarchist organisation Class War who carried out a series of colourful protests outside the so-called ‘museum’, including this one in which they were joined by Action East End and Fourth Wave and other feminists.

When protesters came to the tourist attraction they found it was hidden behind a heavy metal shutter, with police standing in front guarding it, erected since the previous protest a week ago. This was in breach of planning regulations and they were some time later foreced to remove it.

Among those who spoke at the protest was East End historian David Rosenberg who spoke about the real history of women in the East End, as well as Class War’s Ian Bone and Lisa McKenzie.

After the speeches and a couple of smoke flares the protesters, including some local residents blocked the road for some time though leaving the cycle path open. Police attempted to move them with no success, the women protesting asking them whether they would defend a museum celebrating the murders of police officers.

My final comment in 2015 was:
“Protests will continue until the museum closes down or turns into what was promised, a museum of women’s history rather than of women’s degradation and brutal slaughter. It sensationalises the tragic fate of the working class victims at the hands of a deranged upper class murderer, presenting a voyeuristic experience that sickens anyone with any decency and humanity.”

Unfortunately it remains open.

Many more pictures at Class War protest Ripper ‘museum’ again.

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South Africa Crime & I Love Peckham – 2007

South Africa Crime & I Love Peckham: On Saturday 11 August 2007 I photographed a march against crime in South Africa and then went to Peckham for the third ‘I Love Peckham’ festival. I wrote at some length about both events on My London Diary and reproduce that text in full (capitalised and spelling corrected etc) below with links to more pictures on that site.

ACT4SA March Against Crime in South Africa

Westminster

South Africa Crime & I Love Peckham - 2007 — *The march paused in front of South Africa House*

On Sat 11th there was a march organised by ‘Against Crime Together for South Africa’ through London from Temple Gardens next to Temple Underground Station to Whitehall Place. Most of those taking part were young and white, but there were just a few darker and older faces.

ACT4SA is a ‘Facebook’ group of expatriate South Africans living in London, and their aim is to be a non-political group actively working for a safer South Africa. Their attempt, particularly this march, has attracted both praise and criticism from both other expats in Britain and people back home.

Some in South Africa have suggested they should either come back to the country to help in the fight against crime or keep a decent silence about it abroad. A stated aim of the march was to support the South African Police, but at least one police superintendent there has spoken out against it.

After Mark Joubert was murdered in a Durban restuarant in May this year, around 15 of his friends living in London decided they would get together and do something to oppose the violence in their home country. Shannon Joubert, Mark’s sister, addressed marchers briefly at the start of the march, and a minutes silence was observed by the over 600 marchers at the end of the route in Whitehall Place in honour of mark and the “the 50 other South Africans murdered on average every day” in the country.

More pictures

I Love Peckham

Peckham

‘I Love Peckham’ is a festival backed by Southwark Council and based around the centre of Peckham. Although Peckham has had a bad press – particularly over the murder of young Damilola Taylor in November 2000, and more recent violence on the streets, many parts of it are pleasant streets and vibrant shopping areas. Recent investment – particularly since that murder – has led to a number of improvements.

*Sitting on an already rather full sofa in front of the beach*

One of the more successful regeneration projects has been in the Bellenden Road area which is home to a number of artists including Tom Phillips and Antony Gormley, both of whom have been involved in brightening up the streets.

But there are still estates with corners that can hide dangers, and times when its wise to cross the road to avoid the dealers in their cars. It’s an area where it pays to be streetwise.

As well as the activities in the square by the Library and at the top of Rye Lane there were also other events, including a series of shop window displays.

Like the other folks carrying built-in cameras on their latest mobile phones I did photograph some of these, but often felt that some of the other windows which had their normal displays were more interesting. But then I’ve always had an interest in shop windows, which feature strongly in my projects such as ‘Café Ideal , Cool Blondes and Paradise‘.

On the main stage by Peckham Library were performances by Indian musicians, a samba group and some young dancers from Peckham. Around the square were a number of sofas specially decorated for the occasion, many of which were greatly appreciated.

This was the third annual I Love Peckham festival, but the previous ones had been blighted by British weather; today the sun shone on us at least most of the time, and the beach at times looked almost tropical.

I stopped off on the way home at the South London Gallery, where the installation of Isa Suarez’s Human Rights Jukebox was coming to an end with a party. I was pleased I’d stopped by to watch the video of the event and to have a beer and talk to a few of those involved with the project, including Isa herself. I still find it mildly amusing to see myself on film, and there were glimpses of me (mainly my back) taking pictures, walking in the march, generally scurrying around and rather too lengthy a shot as I munched on a wholemeal sandwich.

Despite these few moments, it was interesting to see the event again and from a different viewpoint. I was sorry I had to rush off to be home with friends.

Many more pictures on My London Diary at i love peckham.

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Shops and More – October 1994

Pictures from the first dozen or so frames of a film taken as I moved around London near the start of October 1994, working on other things. I only recorded locations for two of these but perhaps someone may recognise where the others were taken.

*Chinese, Fish & Chips, London Rd, Norbury, Croydon, 1994, 94-101-63*

I think this is perhaps a Chinese takeaway rather than a fish and chip shop, though this counter could be a fish fryer and there does seem to be vinegar and salt on the counter. This is one of the few images in this section of the film that gives a location. Probably this was a corner shop as I seem to have taken the picture through a side window.

*Re-Upholstery, Furniture, London, 1994, 94-101-65*

A workshop in shop premises facing thee street which provides an advert for the re-upholstery service and a convenient location to bring in your chairs to be re-upholstered.

We have had some of our chairs re-upholstered in recent years at a rather more orderly workshop than this and it made them as good as new. Good chair frames on older chairs were made to last, though re-upholstering them cost us more than buying cheap new chairs. Two frames after the previous image this could too have been in Norbury – but I could also have been on the other side of London. Please comment if you recognise it.

Perhaps had I taken this on medium or large format instead of 35mm I would be able to find more about the location from the local newspaper at right or the lable on the wheelie-bin. But all I can tell you is that it was somewhere in London.

It looks rather crudely fitted out as a shop, perhaps converted from some other use. At right is a blurred image of my hand, held to largely avoid reflections as I took this though a glass front window.

A side street, perhaps a market area off a high street somewhere in London. The blue palletsd look more substantial than some and are marked with the letter C as well as a short message illegible in my photo. The building they are in front of has a metal shutter, probably hiding a shopfront, and has some bright green paint which contrasts with the brown above that, as well as the oddly sloping straight drainpipes from its roof.

*Shops, Pembroke Rd, Erith Rd, Erith, Bexley, 1994, 94-101-52*

Thee very next frame after the blue pallets is of a street corner in Erith with a small parade of shops, probably built in the 1920s or 30s. Most were derelict by 2008 though only demolished in 2014. Three shops at the Pembroke Road end of the terrace were still there in 2025 but nothing had been built to replace those demolished.

*Reflections, Café Window, London, 1994, 94-101-56*

An image where I liked the reflection and the ambiguity it introduces into the image. I think there may be two sets of reflections here. My focus was on the shel which ruans across the middle of the image with bottles – the leftmost is opf Table Salt, the next probably vinegar. Under it some pies are keeping warm but apparently also in a passing car while to their right are some kind of controls on equipment I don’t recognise and a boy riding a bike, given a red cap perhaps by a bottle label. I can see no trace of myself reflected in the image, susggesting I made it at an angle to the glass.

And for a final mystery (at least for today) a shop window with Chinese items in it as well as a fluorescent fitting without its tube. At the top I think is a parasol and hanging below it a short-sleeved top. I wonder now if this picture was taken through tinted glass as I cannot really find a convincing colour balance. My shadow taking the image appears at bottom right.

More colour work from 1994 shortly.

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Camden Lock, South Bank & Soul in the City – 2004

Camden Lock, South Bank & Soul in the City: I didn’t write much about my day on Saturday 7th August 2004 – and I’ll reproduce it in full at the end of this post.

I didn’t then mention that I started the day in Camden taking half an hour wandering around Camden Lock before walking along, past a secret garden near Regents Park (and I can’t remember where that was) to Park Square East where I took a picture of the Diorama “built in 1823 to show large, dramatized tableaux paintings as entertainment.“

Next I took the tube to the South Bank where at the National Theatre I found the Caesar Twins swimming around in a goldfish bowl, but with apparently relatively few people paying much attention.

From there I went onto the beach beside the River Thames at Gabriel’s Wharf where people were relaxing and enjoying the warm weather. The tide was out revealing a remarkably wide area of sand.

In Bernie Spain Gardens on the bank above a festival was taking place and I photographed a few Romanian musicians before walking back across the new Jubilee (Hungerford) bridge to Trafalgar Square – where my 2004 account below describes what was taking place.

*Romanian music in Bernie Spain Gardens*

“Saturday I spent wandering around London, mainly getting to things too early. I did manage to take a few pictures of a Romanian group performing at Bernie Spain Gardens, before leaving for Trafalgar Square which had been taken over for the final event of a two week ‘Soul In The City’ mission for young people.

*Worship in Trafalgar Square to celebrate the end of two weeks of work and witness.*

The fountains in the square were full of young people, mainly girls, waving in ecstasy to rather tame gospel music in a slickly managed event. As I was photographing a woman was praying out loud into my left ear, filling it with sycophantic nonsense, but otherwise there seemed to be little real fervour.

I went back to the Romanians, where at least there was Urquell Pilsner on sale (its advertising says ‘In the beginning there was darkness, then in 1842 we found the light.)”

The larger images are ones I took then but didn’t use in my original post. There are a few more pictures on My London Diary, beginning here.

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Hiroshima Day in London – 2011

Hiroshima Day in London: Most years when I’m in London on August 6th, Hiroshima Day, I go to the annual commemoration in Tavistock Square, and that on 6th August 2011 was memorable, with an address by Hetty Bower along with speeches by others including Tony Benn, Bruce Kent and others as well as poetry and song.

The ceremony on 6th August is organised by London Region CND and takes place at noon close to the Hiroshima Cherry Tree planted by then Mayor of Camden Millie Miller “in memory of the victims, past and present, of the atomic bombs dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki“. Everyone is welcome to come today.

That tree has had to be replaced after being killed by fungus, and last year I took part in the planting of its replacement, a new Prunus ‘Kanzan’ cherry tree planted on the 80th anniversary of the first nuclear attack.

As well as the bomb which devastated Hiroshima on August 6th 1945, three days later a second bomb was exploded over Nagasaki.

There will be a Pax Christi Ecumenical Service at 4pm on Sunday August 9, 2026 at Holy Redeemer Catholic Church, Cheyne Row for the 83rd anniversary of the death of Blessed Franz Jagerstatter who was executed in 1943 for refusing to serve in Hitler’s army. After this there will be a peace walk at 5pm to the London Peace Pagoda in Battersea Park for the annual Nagasaki Day commemoration ceremony, beginning at 6pm.

Hosting the commemoration will be Reverend Gyoro Nagase of the Nipponzan Myohoji Buddhist order.

At a moment when countries across Europe including the UK are increasing spending on arms and Russia is still at war with Ukraine it seems more important than ever to remember the dangers of nuclear war.

You can read more detail about the ceremony in 2011 on My London Dairy and much more about the terrible events both in other posts here and on My London Diary. If you’ve never read John Hersey’s Hiroshima, first published in August 1946 as a complete issue of New Yorker magazine and here 3 months later as a Penguin paperback, it remains a compelling read and has never since been out of print. Hersey insisted all copyright fees were donated to the American Red cross.

*She holds up a picture of her grandson saying she wants him o grow up in a world of peace*

Here I’ll just repeat one paragraph from what I wrote in 2011 about the remarkable Hetty Bower (1905-2013):

“Hetty Bower started her anti-war campaign in 1914 when she was almost nine. She got an extra holiday from school when the premises were used as a recruiting centre, but at she said “it didn’t take this young schoolgirl very long for the reality of war to become evident. This child saw men with one trouser leg rolled up because there was no human leg to go in it…” She held up a photograph of her great grandchild, one year old on Tuesday (Nagasaki Day) and said that she wanted “him to grow up and live in a world of peace.” It was a remarkably powerful performance for a 105 year old who still takes part in every major anti-war march.”

Much more on My London Diary at Hiroshima Day in London.

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Foil Vedanta & Black Lives Matter – 2016

Foil Vedanta & Black Lives Matter: On Friday 5th August 2016 I photographed Foil Vedanta protesting outside the AGM of mining giant Vedanta Resources in the City and later went to Whitechapel where Black Lives Matter UK were a rally as a part of a “national shutdown”, the first major Black Lives Matter events in the UK.

Black Lives Matter had begun in the US in 2013, founded by three Black women, and grew around the Twitter hashtag #BlackLivesMatter. Of course it came from a broader history of civil rights movements and struggles, both in the USA and here in the UK.

Foil Vedanta at mining giant’s AGM

Ironmonger Hall, Aldersgate

Foil Vedanta & Black Lives Matter - 2016 — *City of London Police stop Samarendra Das and the Vedanta Monster at the entrance to the Ironmongers Hall*

Foil Vedanta staged a noisy and colourful protest outside the Ironmonger Hall in the City of London where Vedanta, then still listed in London were holding their AGM.

This protest was in support of the fight by communities around the world where the mining company and its subsidiaries had polluted rivers, displaced communities, killed workers in accidents and destroyed the environment, as well as defrauding governments by tax evasion.

The mining giant was 69% owned by billionaire chairman Anil Agarwal and his family, but when listed on the London Stock Exchange had to hold an annual meeting for shareholders. Some of those protesting had become shareholders so they could attend these meetings and ask questions about the company activities.

The protesters came with many placards about the company’s crimes and with statements from some of those who had suffered from them, and lobbied shareholders as they arrived for the meeting. A team from Vedanta carrying documents for the meeting got a very noisy reception, but police escorted Mr Agarwal to the meeting by a side entrance, though the protesters spotted him and shouted loudly.

The campaigners had come with a large inflatable ‘Vedanta Monster’, its various heads representing Vedanta companies – and with a resemblance to Anil Agarwal

When fully inflated the Vedanta Monster made a dash for the entrance but was stopped by police. It was too large to enter the hall, but did for some time block the doorway.

Police escorted shareholders past the monster and tried to get those holding it to move away – and eventually they withdrew a few yards.

It was soon time for Samarendra Das and other protesting shareholders to go into the AGM while the noisy protest continued outside.

Some shareholders who left the meeting early were escorted by politc past the noisy protest where protesters were still shouting and drumming

Many more pictures at Foil Vedanta at mining giant’s AGM.

Black Lives Matter London

Altab Ali Park, Whitechapel

BLMUK, Black Lives Matter UK, had called for a national day of action on August 5th to commemorate the many UK victims of state violence, including Mark Duggan, Sarah Reed, Mzee Mohammed, Jermaine Baker, Sean Rigg, Leon Patterson, Kingsley Burrell and over 1500 others, disproportionately black, since 1990. The day of action was five years and a day after the police killing of Mark Duggan.

*Marcia Rigg, whose brother Sean Rigg was killed by police in Brixton in 2008, raises her fist in salute*

*Stephanie Lightfoot-Bennett whose twin brother Leon Patterson was battered to death by police in a Stockport cell in 1992*

*A relative of Sheku Bayoh, killed by police in Scotland in 2015*

The London event took place in Altab Ali Park, renamed in 1998 in memory of Altab Ali, a 25-year-old Bangladeshi Sylheti clothing worker who had been murdered in May 1978 in Adler Street which runs along the east side of the park. He was killed by three teenage boys in one of the many racist attacks taking place in the area then.

BLMUK had recently come together as a community movement of activists from across the UK who believed deeply that #BlackLivesMatter but are not affiliated with any political party. They called for justice and an end to racialised sexism, classism and homophobia and a new politics based on community defence and resilience.

The rally ended with meetings by those present in four large groups to discuss future community organisation in North, South, East and West London, and I then went home.

*The East London meeting begins in one corner of the park*

More on My London Diary at Black Lives Matter London.

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No Glory No More War – 2014

No Glory No More War: Monday 4th August was the 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War – and campaigners marked the anniversary with a ‘No Glory – No More War‘ event in Parliament Square.

My father was 14 when the ‘Great War’ began and had just left school. Soon after was working in a factory making munitions close to Kew Bridge. Although his only formal qualification was his school leaving certificate he worked in the drawing office rather than on the shop floor – though the only work he ever mentioned doing there was sharpening pencils. Years of working with his father in their car-building workshop as a carpenter and wheelwright had made him a dab hand with a chisel.

After some months he was out of a job, and fed up and decided – as he put it – “he might as well join the army” before he was conscripted. He went to join up and had a medical where the officer examining found he was severely deaf in one ear – and told him he could be excused military service. “Do you want to go?” he was asked and he said he did. “Good man!” he was told and signed up to the army.

Then came military training, which he didn’t much like after which he was sent to barracks. At some point when he was ordered to do some particularly time-wasting job he told the officer concerned what he thought of it and was put on a charge. Fortunately his senior officer was a sensible man, and after telling Dad he could be shot for disobeying an order told him not to be stupid again and sent him back to his unit.

Dad’s skills were not being used in the Army and he requested a transfer to the Royal Flying Corps as a mechanic. He went first to France and later to Germany, helping to repair the planes when they came back damaged. The airfields were well behind the front line and relatively safe. On April 1, 2018 the RFC became the RAF but I doubt if it made a lot of difference on the ground. And he was on the ground, and would never say if he ever went up in the air during his service.

After the end of the war Dad was one of the last of his unit to be demobbed, ending up as stores quartermaster, only coming home in 1919, bringing with him some odd iron German coins and fond memories of fraternising with the German people. He had not seen the true horror of the war, though many he knew and served with had died. And of his five sisters, only two ever found men to marry.

At the event there were much more dramatic stories of the war and the truth about it, with a number of well-known speakers including historians and others. Among them was Neil Faulkner, author of the pamphlet No Glory, which gives a real history of WW1.

Far from being the “war to end all wars” and a “victory for democracy“, it was a military disaster and a human catastrophe, “driven by big powers’ competition for influence around the globe, and caused a degree of suffering all too clear in the statistical record of 16 million people dead and 20 million wounded.“

*WW1 Veteran Harry Patch told Tony Blair ‘War is Nothing Better than legalised Mass Murder’*

I concluded my account: “While we remember the bravery and sacrifice of those who took part, we should also be aware of the pointlessness of the war and make use of its anniversary to promote peace and international cooperation.”

Many more pictures on My London Diary at No Glory No More War.

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Police Prevent Peaceful Protest – 2026

Police Prevent Peaceful Protest: On Thursday 30the July 2026 Defend Our Juries had arranged a static peaceful protest on the wide pavement in front of Westminster Magistrates Court on Marylebone Road. It was to begin at noon with an hour of speeches, music and poetry.

I arrived at the starting time to find several surrounding roads full of police vans and squads of police standing waiting while others were in the crowd making arrests.

There was a large crowd present, perhaps around a thousand demonstrating against the government ban on Palestine Action. They included many who had been arrested at previous events for holding signs in support of Palestine Action.

Over 1500 of these arrestees had earlier received letters from the court stating that their cases would be dealt with on this day – but most at least had been told they need not attend. Clearly magistrates cannot hear that many cases in a day and the intention had been to simply rubber-stamp the great majority without allowing those arrested to make any defence.

Defend Our Juries had in fact been told that because of administrative problems, the ‘non-hearing‘ of these cases would not be going ahead on this day. But they had decided to go ahead with the protest and after the hour of entertainment had invited all those charged – if they wanted – to come up the the small platform they were bringing and make a further statement of their support for Palestine Action and their intention to encourage others also support the banned group.

Most of those previously arrested had been charged under Section 13 of the Terrorism Act, but by making the intended statement would also be in breach of Sections 11 and 12 which carry more serious penalties – and would lead to a jury trial. Defend Our Juries were clearly intending to ramp up their challenge to the authorities in what they called a ‘Graduation Day’ ceremony.

Before I arrived police had already seized the platform and the public address system as well as several protesters – including one who who had been testing the sound system. Perhaps they will now argue that ‘1.2.3.4 …testing‘ is now a terrorist chant.

The Court of Appeal had surprised many by overruling the High Court’s decision that the ban was unlawful. It was was pushed through Parliament by combining them with a genuinely terrorist organisation, and would probably have met with considerable opposition otherwise. As the protest was taking place on Thursday the Supreme Court announced it would hear a further appeal in September which could quash the ban. Andy Burnham could end this nonsense now.

More of my pictures in the Facebook album Defend Our Juries Graduation Day.

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