Lecture 4: World War Two: The People’s War Flashcards
How far can the Second World war be characterised as ‘the people’s war’?
- Used to depict national unity
- Suggests war in which ordinary people took centre stage
Richard Titmuss, Problems of Social Policy (1950)
- War use responsible for changed attitudes due to the nature of the people’s war
- United community of class
- Values changed
- Argues that before the war much greater division
Pau; Addison, The Road to 1945 (1975)
- Agreed with Titmuss – war created new social conscious
- Labour, liberal, conservative politicians coming together in political consensus
- New solidarity for equality – depicted by labours landslide victory in 1945
- Clement Attlee surpassed war leader in Winston Churchill
Did the war foster a new sense of national unity amongst the British population?
Evacuations:
- War affected the population through the evacuation of school children – about 1.5 million evacuated in September 1939 (mainly mothers and children)
- Evacuation when the Blitz started in 1940 – new wave of evacuees
- Emphasis on children contributed to the image that everyone was affected by the war
- Class overtones also prevalent – evacuation key factor in breaking down boundaries of class
- Working class were mainly evacuees – sent to middle class homes in the countryside as they were more likely to have room and be able to accommodate evacuees
- Eye opener to the middle classes – see how impoverished working class were
- Our Towns = investigated problems of evacuations
Did the war foster a new sense of national unity amongst the British population?
Dunkirk:
- Dunkirk = saw evacuation of 300,000 of British and French troops from France in 1940 – requested help from civilian craft as sense of urgency – captured the public – e.g. the Dunkirk spirit – not just about military but also about the civilians
- J.B. Priestley – radio broadcasts during the war, very popular, profile different to many BBC commentators, lower middle class, Yorkshire accent, epitomised the idea that the ordinary person was now common
- Romantic rhetoric used to depict Dunkirk – captured public = “Dunkirk Spirit”
Did the war foster a new sense of national unity amongst the British population?
Blitz:
- Bombing of London starting in 1940
- Pictures expressed how it was a people’s war e.g. going about lives despite all the rubble
- Suffering endured as a result of Blitz was bringing people together
- Hitler… is breaking down the class structure of England – Herald Tribune 1940
- Class was no protection from the bombs
Did the war foster a new sense of national unity amongst the British population?
War:
War: increased social cohesion and brought classes together, encouraging British people to think along collectivist lines, interest in communism due to Soviet Union and the gratitude to the Soviet Union as they held out on the Eastern Front to the Germans
Challenging the ‘peoples war’ thesis:
Evacuations:
- Didn’t increase middle class sympathy for working class, evacuations just raised awareness
- Children often arrived dirty, had lice, wet the bed – middle class householders attributed it to working class bad manners
- Hostility generated towards working class evacuees, tension not just class but also religious tensions arose from evacuations
- Children returned home despite being evacuated within days of leaving – beginning of 1940 nearly half evacuees returned home
Challenging the ‘peoples war’ thesis:
Blitz:
- Shelter: London ‘shelter’ census, Nov, 1940:
- 4% of Londoners slept in the underground
- 9% of Londoners slept in public shelters
- Challenges the perception that all united due to shelters
- Increased lootings a result of the Blitz
Colin Perry: Boy in the Blitz:
- Didn’t enjoy being in public shelters
- Divisions apparent in shelters
Racial and Ethnic differences:
- Exasperated due to the war
- Many dubbed ‘aliens’ such as Jews
- Those classed as the enemy sent to the Isle of Man
- Race an issue in the war after American troops arrived in Britain e.g. racially segregated
How far were gender boundaries broken down?
Changes in gender relationships:
- Key ways in which women gained more opportunities = employment
- Conscription for women to work
- More significant movement than in WW1 – women mended airplanes, 12,000 service women working abroad
- Many women benefited from increased independence e.g. became more accepted for women to drink in pubs without male companion
- Nella Last’s War – women could wear trousers – women asserting themselves in someway
However - gender boundaries:
- Women’s work – 55% of the pay of men’s
- Employment opportunities diminished after the war
- Desire to return to a normal life – due to disruption of home life e.g. ¼ of a million homes destroyed during the war
- Dream to rebuild life
- Government had to introduce conscription, suggesting that women reluctant to work
- Women could work and still be glamorous, yet didn’t want to show women as to sexualised
Was there a change in political attitudes?
New political attitudes:
- Beveridge Report, 1942
- Family Allowances Act, 1945
- National Health System White Paper, 1944
- White Paper on Employment Policy, 1944
- Education Act, 1944 – Rab Butler – planning for the future, idea that the future could be planned
- War led to new ideas being aired with cross-party support
- John Maynard Keynes – brought into government as advisor, advocated importance of full employment
- Very strong view that mistakes of WW1 must not be replicated in WW2 – people didn’t want interwar years again
- Political opinions among British showed swing to the left
Conclusion:
- Social and political memory of the war
- National identity vital to the war
- Peoples war idea = powerful image
- Men, women, children = shared experience
- Rhetoric used powerful – language of collectivism
- Myth of the peoples war – selective version of the truth
- People believed
