CND SYMBOL,, JOY !!!!

cnd symbol ,, joy !!

I decided to look up the Peace symbols origins on the net and was dismayed to find the whole history is written wrongly !!

"The Direct Action Committee had already planned what was to be the first major anti-nuclear march, from London to Aldermaston, where British nuclear weapons were and still are manufactured. It was on that march, over the 1958 Easter weekend that the symbol first appeared in public. Five hundred cardboard lollipops on sticks were produced. Half were black on white and half white on green. Just as the church's liturgical colours change over Easter, so the colours were to change, "from Winter to Spring, from Death to Life." Black and white would be displayed on Good Friday and Saturday, green and white on Easter Sunday and Monday.

The first badges were made by Eric Austin of Kensington CND using white clay with the symbol painted black. Again there was a conscious symbolism . They were distributed with a note explaining that in the event of a nuclear war, these fired pottery badges would be among the few human artifacts to survive the nuclear inferno. These early ceramic badges can still be found and one, lent by CND, was included in the Imperial War Museum's 1999/2000 exhibition From the Bomb to the Beatles."

Firstly my fathers name was Austen with an E not Austin and he was not of Kensington ,
which makes him sound horribly middle class but from Norfolk ,Hethersett,  his parents were Methodist labourers ,
my Grandfather was a Baker and my Grandmother arranged , and dried and (even painted} silver,
flowers for the local Church,

when I first remember them they had no electricity ,  and no gas
only a well for water,
when my father became a pacifist and a conscientious objector in the second world war it was on religious grounds,

he went before a board to see if they ought to send him to prison ,

but he quoted from the bible "Thoud Shalt not Kill " and made quite an impressive speech for a very young man
I think he was seventeen,
becuase he took such a radical stand his father told him to leave the house ,

and he left Norfolk and went to live in London,he was best man at my Mothers first wedding to Harcourt Gates, and my mother met my father as he was Harcourts,[otherwise known as 'Oscar' ] best friend and they all lived in the area and were members of the local cycling club,



we moved back to London  from Weymouth , Dulwich to begin with when I was about 2  , and then to Sydney Street in Chelsea and 6 COTTAGE PLACE, opposite the then Brompton Oratory
by then I was five , my father was a teacher and had been to Highgate Art School [he worked as a fireman during the war in London, ]

he made pottery by hand and always used black and white,

I can remember having long arguments with him over this..as I loved colour, though he did use terracotta clay,

I was a child prodigy [or so my parents said] and I have acutely accurate memories of all of this time, I started ballet lessons when I was three,

because of my fathers beliefs he was one of the founders of the original Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament,

all I remember was sitting in our dining room at cottage place discussing the designs on paper which my father had drawn for the symbol for peace and helping him chose which one to use , which was then taken to a committee to be agreed on, it is more than likely that there were two or three people involved in this, one being Gerald Holtom,
but the first badges were my fathers idea, he had been making pottery jewellery at home, I used to go with him on the bus to have it fired in a big kiln, he used a makeshift container with his pottery in ,
once it was fired it was safe ,

he sat up until very late hand painting the first badges and meticulously glueing pins on the back, he also painted the banners for the first Aldermaston march

now I can actually remember all of this, very clearly, also the fact that out lives were in danger a couple of years after this and we had to move overnight form chelsea to hampstead,

my father and I had an exceptionally strong bond and for some reason used to confide in me.

so that seems to be a bit more history.. I didn't mean to write so much !!!
Gea Annunziata

CND