The 'Battle' of Lewisham

Let battle commence

On this Day

If you can not remember the 'Battle of Lewisham' don't worry as you are probably in good company with the rest of this country's population.

If you can remember the events of Saturday 13th August 1977 then you are probably either politically active on the left or right, a local historian specialising in south London, or just someone with a very long memory when it come to current affairs.

Hippy horse dung collectors keep their distance

To set the scene for this day thirty years ago we can see what the BBC has to say via it's On This Day web pages:

more than 200 protesters have been arrested after demonstrations in Lewisham against a National Front (NF) march ... 110 people, including 55 police officers, were injured ... an estimated 400 Socialist Workers Party members had gathered ... in frustration at having failed to prevent the NF march the crowd ... vented their anger on the police ... [who] ... were attacked with bottles and bricks and also had ammonia sprayed in their faces ... the severity of the onslaught led to officers using riot shields - the first time such equipment has been used in the [mainland] UK ^{[1 BBC]}

At the end of the BBC piece we can read something which is highly pertinent in regards to today's London, and many other city areas of the country:

[NF] Spokesman Richard Edmonds said by demonstrating in Lewisham - an area with a high proportion of West Indian immigrants - they were "standing up for white people" and highlighting the disproportionate amount of street crime committed in the area by black youths. ^[1]

The marches and riots of the day have a blog dedicated to them, Lewisham '77 Remembering and reflecting on the 'Battle of Lewisham' in August 1977 ^[2]. The blog has a fairly accurate and detailed chronology of events before, during, and after the day.

Wikipedia also has an entry regarding the 'battle'. ^[3]

Communists disrupt the New Cross Road races

Thirty years ago, while I was still at school and in proto-left-wing mode, I attended the anti-NF demonstration, witnessing it's violence at first hand, ending up the day lying unconscious, beaten, head bleeding, in a grave yard just of Lewisham High Street; oh the folly of youth.

First Action

Three decades is a long time ago to be able to accurately remember the exact details of a day's activities. I can remember specific events in the chronological order they took place, but the more mundane periods of the day have been, at the time of writing forgotten.

Pot-addled socialist of to the cells

The journey from north to south London was by means of a coach organised by the Socialist Workers Party (SWP). Almost as soon as it arrived and 'we' disembarked (I say 'we' as I now disassociate myself from the anti's of the day) I saw my first violence.

By some quirk the location where the coach parked was very near to where, presumably, some NF marchers were meeting up. Three English lads were making their way along the street to meet some others when a cry went up from the Haringey SWP who had spotted them. Three of the SWP group, coincidently the only black males amongst them, rushed forward, bottles in hand, to attack the lads. The three stood no chance as they were unaware of what was approaching them from behind.

In the thick of it

The nearest English lad crashed to the ground unconscious as he was viciously bottled. The second lad went down initially as he was hit, but tried vainly to get back to up to his feet by crawling along the pavement on extended all fours. A further brutal blow from a bottle sent him down again, to leave him lying on the ground with all his limbs twitching wildly like some grotesque children's wind up toy. The last English lad, turning to see the fate of his two mates, and outnumbered, sensibly made a dash for it, out pacing his would be attackers.

Nothing changes. Ethnic-immigrants burn the Union flag on an English street

All this happened, literally, in a flash. Having been born, bred, and brought up in Tottenham I can't say I was shocked at what I saw, even though it was the first unprovoked violent attack I had ever seen by grown men. From the silence of the middle class SWP members I think it might be safe to say that more than a few of them were slightly disturbed by what they had seen. Even then I felt sorry for the lads who had been brought down and thought it was unsporting to attack, unprovoked, three strangers blindly from behind.

Mick the mugger attacks an OAP in the High St

With the hindsight of the intervening years, and my slow journey from left to right, it comes as no surprise that it was three black guys who could chillingly turn to such violence so easily. With equal hindsight I suspect at least one of them, a rather mean faced, dopey looking character, learnt his skills mugging the old, English, people of Tottenham.

The sight of the young English lad lying, legs and arms flailing as his brain seizured, was burned into my mind. Every time I think back to the demonstration of that day in Lewisham I always think of him and his mates first, and what became of them.

Mugger berates police for 'disrespecting' him on his 'turf'

Lefty Myths

Not long after this incident I took part in something that, reading through the lefts romanticised writing about the so called 'Battle of Lewisham', is commonly referred to as a flying wedge ^{[4 Guardian]}. This involved the, now isolated after a period of wandering lost in the streets of Lewisham, entire might of the SWP group form Haringey trying to push past half a dozen burly London policemen who barred their way. Doing the pushing was an odd ball trotskyist collective of assorted middle class pot-addled, pot-bellied real beer drinkers, dangerously underweight vegans and vegetarians, school teachers, in all probability at least one paedophile, and numerous homos of varying perversity trying to push past six policemen who were built to play rugby.

Street crime drops as a mugger is detained

At the time, heaving with all my schoolboy might, I thought the situation was rather silly and ridiculous in that if this was the vanguard of the revolutionary left in North London then the SWP were going no where (which is exactly where the did go). Eventually, probably through either luck, or boredom on the part of the policemen, we burst through their lines to shouts and screams of victory. Running as fast as we could we charged on down a street, and another, and another until, through the relative fitnesses of the members, the running petered out and the group became dispersed over an area of unknown residential roads. We were lost. Again.

How to start a riot

I think, I can not remember exactly, I spent the next hour or so rushing around with the others trying to 'get to' the NF march to stop it, missing most of the incidents shown in the images in this post.

Communist face-butts an Englishman's boot

Eventually, after a few minor incidents I arrived at the Clock Tower where a largish crowd had gathered. On one side the police were lined up minding their own business watching and waiting. Facing them was the crowd made up of anarchists, communists, socialists, and the local mugger community. Oh and me.

The art of deportation: next stop the airport (if only)

The local mugger community, for reasons known only to themselves, suddenly decided to start to throw heavy lumps of masonry at the stationary police. The patience of the British Bobby, famed through out the world, was once again displayed as they stood their ground dodging whatever was thrown at them with nothing to protect their selves with apart from their equally world famous helmets.

The local mugger community gathers to be joined by various anarchists, communists , and socialists to pose for a group photograph before attacking the police

Nothing lasts forever. Eventually, as the barrage increased in intensity injuring more and more of the defenceless policemen, they reacted by making small forays into the crowd and bringing out, for the first time ever on mainland Britain, riot shields.

Under attack

Stupidity Displayed

Sensibly I decided to withdraw from the situation making my way southwards, along with others, down Lewisham High Street to avoid the growing violence.

Victim of communism

Minutes later, after passing under a railway bridge that crosses over the High Street, I can across a full mini-riot. There in the middle of the road was a large burning motorbike while up and down the street police transit vans were speeding by. On each side of the road lines of muggers were hurling with all their might heavy bricks, rocks, bottles, and anything else they could lay their hands on at the passing police vans. In their stupidity the muggers had forgotten that by standing on both sides of the road the bricks that missed the police vans, which was most of them, came crashing into whatever lay on the opposite of the road, be it rioting mugger, running demonstrator, or innocent bystander.

Shields up captain

Surprisingly I didn't feel any fear but was well aware that any minute my head could be caved in by a muggers rock. As I made my way up the road through the hail of missiles I came across a local English dad with his young daughter, who from their looks had been out innocently doing their Saturday shopping, cowering against a wall as rocks rocks smashed into it. Instinctively I stood between them and the raining rocks, arms up high braced against the wall, and head bowed down as low as possible, to protect them, praying that I would not get hit myself. The memory of the sound of the bricks hitting the wall about my head, and the trickle of dislodged stone dust down my neck only seems like yesterday.

Someone's going to cop it

The missile throwing soon died down enough to carry on the retreat down the High Street past a police van that had came to a skidding halt as a brick had finally found it's evil way to it's target, penetrating the windscreen and knocking out cold the van's driver.

Good Old Fashioned Policing

After these events it came as no surprise that the police soon decided to become more than a little heavy handed. The crowd making it's way down the High Street had grown in size as the now ex-demonstrators tried to make their escape and get home as quickly as possible.

Now that'll teach you a lesson

A little too late I heard cries go from behind me. Turning I saw the police in full charge battering people to the ground with their truncheons as they ran. To escape I ran, with others into the hedged garden of the rectory of a large church, thinking in my naivety that the police would pass by and I would escape.

It was not to be as a group of policemen entered the garden and forcefully marshalled people out. As each person left through the gates, another group of policemen waiting outside were ready, truncheons drawn to dispense some good old fashioned justice. Not being one to ever give up and surrender I, the last out, made a dash for a low wall separating the garden and the churches cemetery. Unfortunately for me a young copper was faster, outpaced I was caught and then the whole world went black (and not through an unmanaged open door policy to immigration from the third world).

You reap what you sow

I awoke from my unconsciousness with my head bleeding in several places and my body aching, from the evidence of the following days bruises, a beating.

Thirty years is a long time. Time enough to look at some of the words of the speech the leader of the National Front gave to his supporters at the end of their march. Time enough to judge, and to see who was right, and who was wrong, on the day all those years ago, in light of the daily news stories of crime in UK:

for years and years the old folk of this Borough have been afraid to go out at night for fear of muggers and what has authority done about it? What has the Government done about it? What has the church done about it?

They're more interested in the welfare and in the rights of ... black muggers than they are in the rights of the native people of Lewisham to be able to walk in the streets after dark.

Look at what we've got in this country today. We've got crime on the increase. Immorality on the increase. Illegitimacy. Sodomy. Abortion. Obscenity everywhere

Referenced in this post:
[1] BBC 1977 August 13th
1977: Violent clashes at NF march

[2] Lewisham 77 blog
Lewisham '77

[3] Wikipedia
Battle of Lewsiham

[4] Guardian 2007 March 4th
Blood and glory