Manchester is a city with a rich, progressive history. The world’s first industrial city, it is also a city of great renown for promoting peace and social justice with many progressive movements and people taking an important role for the good of Manchester and the wider world. The Manchester City Centre Peace and Justice Trail seeks to highlight some of these stories and provide an alternative way to consider the capital of the north.
The full trail begins in a site close to Manchester Piccadilly Train Station and ends in the centre of Piccadilly Gardens. It can be walked in whole or in part. A separate Children’s Trail is also available for schools to use. We hope you enjoy Manchester’s rich history of promoting peace and justice.
1. Remembering the Depression
1930s Unemployed – Red plaque, London Road, Fairfield Street, near the back entrance to Piccadilly Train Station
On 7th October 1931, a mass demonstration of unemployed people was met by police at this point on Fairfield Street. The marchers were protesting at cut backs made by the Government which favoured employers, but left many employees out of work. With more than 2 ½ million unemployed in the UK in 1930, unemployment benefits took some severe cuts and became means tested- meaning that for many, benefit was cut entirely. Protests took place all over the UK, in Manchester, protesters marched peacefully from Ardwick Green to this spot where they were met with police batons and Fire hoses. Reminiscent of the Jarrow Crusade for Jobs, this memorial highlights the need for social justice and care for those affected by changes in the economy.
For further details you can visit the Working Class Movement Library in Salford.
2. The campaign for tolerance and fairness for gay rights
The Alan Turing memorial statue, Sackville Gardens, Manchester Gay Village
Alan Turing (1912 – 1954) played an essential role in the global defeat of fascism in 1945. A mathematician, he not only made possible the breaking of the Enigma code which was essential to the Allied victory, but he also made groundbreaking advances in the invention and development of the computer. Turing’s life though was troubled by his homosexuality, then illegal under UK law. He was arrested and prosecuted in 1954 and agreed to effective chemical castration to avoid prison. He committed suicide shortly afterwards. The statue in Sackville Gardens commemorates his life and was unveiled in 2001. Sackville Gardens lies by the area of Manchester known locally as the ‘Gay Village’, a clear reminder of the international reputation Manchester has for being one of the most tolerant cities in the world.
For further details you can look at the Manchester Pride website.
3. Education origins and founding of the Trade Union movement
The Mechanics Institute, 103 Princess Street
The Mechanics Institute on Princess Street has held a crucial place in Manchester’s educational and labour history. Manchester University’s Institute of Science and Technology (UMIST) can trace its existence back to the formation in 1824 of Manchester’s Mechanics Institute. Set up by a committee of prominent members of the science and engineering community, its founding aim was to teach mechanics and chemistry to the educable working classes. The building at 103 Princess Street also hosted the founding meeting of the Trades Union Congress in 1868. The Institute is now a part of the National Museum of Labour history and it is also a Conference Centre.
4. An international city open to all
The Friendship Arch, Faulkner Street, Chinatown
For centuries, Manchester has been a city welcomed and welcoming to migrants and refugees seeking a better life or avoiding persecution elsewhere. Whether it is the Irish and Jewish immigrants of the nineteenth century onwards, or Italians, Poles and Ukrainians after the Second World War, and migrants from India, Pakistan, West Africa and the Caribbean from the 1960s onwards; Manchester is one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the UK. Manchester’s Chinese community is one of the most prominent in Manchester city centre and the Friendship Arch stands as an example to the friendship with Manchester and the world. A gift to Manchester from the city of Shanghai as a token of friendship, the dominant arch was shipped across and constructed by specialist Chinese engineers in 1987. The arch is adorned with a dragon and a phoenix, which symbolise strength and grace respectively and together represent the peaceful union between yin and yang. Luck is signified by the colour red, whilst the gold denotes wealth and happiness.
Every two years Manchester celebrates its international character and its cultural diversity through the huge Manchester International Festival, one of the largest of its kind in the world.
5.Manchester – a true ‘City of Peace’
Manchester Peace Gardens, St Peter’s Square
Manchester is renown around the world as the first city to declare itself a ‘nuclear free’ city dedicated to seek a world free from nuclear weapons on November 5th 1980. It remains the home of the UK and Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities. In 2001 it was invited by the Mayor of Hiroshima to become a Vice President City of Mayors for Peace due to its consistent involvement in promoting a nuclear weapons free world. The Mayors for Peace now have over 4000 members and are one of the largest local government organisations in the world.
The Peace Gardens at the top of St Peter’s Square was developed to celebrate Manchester’s role as a ‘City of Peace’. It is anchored by Barbara Pearson’s “Messenger of Peace” sculpture. This was unveiled in April 1986 after it won a competition organised by Manchester City Council to find an appropriate artwork to occupy the newly established Peace Gardens. It also includes memorials to the victims of the Chernobyl disaster, to victims of the holocaust through its Anne Frank Memorial, the International Workers Memorial and a memorial to British nuclear test veterans. Manchester City Council adopted an official peace policy in 2005 which includes “promoting social inclusion, social justice, good citizenship and peace between the peoples, cultures and faith communities that it serves”.
For further information consult the NFLA website and the Mayors for Peace website.
6. Learning for all – the Central Library
Manchester Central Library building, St Peter’s Square
As a city, Manchester has pioneered education containing one of the largest university communities in the world, with Manchester University, Manchester Metropolitan University and nearby Salford University. Lots of effort has also taken place to re-educate the masses. With the passing of the Free Libraries Act in 1850, the Mayor of Manchester, Sir John Potter, oversaw the campaign to build a ‘free’ library for the citizens of Manchester. The first such library in the world was built on Liverpool Road to the south of the city. A new impressive circular building was built as a depression project in the 1930s and opened by the Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald in 1932. It is one of the largest public-lending libraries in the UK with specialist music, arts and Chinese libraries and a specialist innovative on-site theatre company.
In 2010, a major refurbishment of the library has begun and it has temporarily moved to Elliot House in Deansgate (see item 14).
7. We shall remember them – the city war memorial
Manchester Cenotaph, St Peter’s Square
The devastation of the First World War, where thousands of men from across the Manchester area were slaughtered on the trenches of the Somme and Passchendale, is remembered at the City’s war memorial in St Peter’s Square. War memorials are a way with which the community can remember the ultimate sacrifice of war and those who have died for their country in the annual remembrance service in November. The war memorial opposite the library is in remembrance to the fallen of a number of conflicts, including both world wars and the Korean War. On top of the plinth there is a statue of a fallen soldier lying beneath a trench coat.
Other war memorials in Manchester can be found in St Ann’s Square and Victoria Rail Station.
To find out more information on the many war memorials in the Manchester district consult the UK National Inventory website.
8. The Free Trade Hall and Peterloo – a centre of dissent and discontent
Peterloo red plaque, Free Trade Hall, now within the Radisson Hotel, Peter Street
The Free Trade Hall has been host to many high profile concerts and rallies since the early 19th century. Politicians, musicians, and writers who have graced the building include Ella Fitzgerald, Charles Dickens, Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones, Oscar Wilde, and the Sex Pistols. Winston Churchill was heckled by local members of the suffragette movement here. The Hallé Orchestra regularly performed here until the opening of the Bridgewater Hall. The Dalai Lama was the last person to speak at the Hall before it WAS redeveloped into the Radisson Hotel that you see today.
On the site of the building that you now see was an event of an even more dramatic nature, when a civil protest for equality and democracy resulted in what is known as the ‘Peterloo’ Massacre. At a time of great political tension following the Napoleonic War, the country suffered great budgetary constraints which brought about the ‘Corn Laws’ and in turn mass poverty. Just 2% of the countries population had the vote, and the working majority were completely unrepresented. The resulting protest, on August 16th 1819 and attended by about 60,000 men and women, was intended as an opportunity to voice concern, and to allow various speakers, including famed orator Henry Hunt, to call for universal suffrage. What started as a peaceful political expression was turned into a fierce massacre as local officials became concerned about the intent of the unarmed crowd and set about violently dispersing them using swords, pistols, and batons. An estimated 18 people died that day, including some women and one child. A plaque to remember this historical event can be seen by the hotel’s entrance. Across from the site is a building that was the Victoria Hall, the venue for a famous speech by Henry Richard, known as ‘The Apostle of Peace’ who pioneered proposals for binding international arbitration decades before the United Nations.
A permanent memorial to the Peterloo massacre is planned in the major redevelopment of St Peter’s Square. For further information consult www.peterloomassacre.org.
9. Citadel for peace – the Friends Meeting House
Friends Meeting House (Society of Friends), 6 Mount Street
The Society of Friends or Quakers have a long and dignified history of promoting peace and social justice and it is a key element of being a Quaker. Built by Richard Lane in 1828, at the height of the Classical Revival style of architecture in England, the Friends Meeting House has been a venue for many peace and justice events over its near two centuries of existence. During the Peterloo massacre, the site was a first aid post. It held a pivotal meeting during the Boer War which highlighted the first use of concentration camps in warfare. Its publicising of this was a major factor in the Government in improving conditions in the camps. The Friends Meeting House regularly hosts important peace and social justice meetings and such buildings are often known as ‘citadels of peace’.
For further information on the peace promotion work of the Quakers consult the Northern Friends Peace Board.
10. Manchester Town Hall – the neo-Gothic masterpiece
Manchester Town Hall, Albert Square
As one of the fastest growing and most important cities of the late Victorian period, the prominent and ambitious leaders of Manchester sought to build a Town Hall befitting the world’s first industrial city. Designed by Alfred Waterhouse and built in 1877, Manchester Town Hall is the most visible building in the city. Features of the Town Hall include a Great Hall with notable murals by the Pre-Raphaelite painter Ford Madox Brown and a Sculpture Gallery of notable leading Mancunians and figures of the Victorian era.
Befitting its status as a ‘City of Peace’, the Town Hall contains a number of peace and social justice sites, including a red plaque befitting it as the world’s first ‘nuclear free city’, a plaque honouring the Mayors for Peace unveiled by the Mayors for Peace, a prominent memorial to ‘La Passionara’ and the International Brigade’s involvement in the Spanish Civil War, a plaque with the words of the UN’s International Declaration of Human Rights and a painting of a prominent suffragette.
For further information on the history of Manchester Town Hall see the council’s website.
11. John Bright – radical MP and peace campaigner
Statue of John Bright, Albert Square
John Bright was born in 1811and grew up in Rochdale where he worked for his father in the textile industry, and started to develop a keen political passion. After meeting Richard Cobden in 1835, the Quaker Bright started to use his famed oratory skills to speak out about the controversial Corn Laws, which by now had caused devastating impact on the lower classes of the UK and stirred much political anguish. John Bright became a member of the locally formed “Anti-corn law league”, and soon after became a member of Parliament- where, after years of struggle, he finally welcomed the abolition of the Corn Laws in 1846.
As a politically active member of parliament for Manchester, Bright also spoke out against such issues as capital punishment, church-rates, and flogging in the army, and constantly strove both politically and socially for peace. For more information on radical justice campaigners in Greater Manchester see the Manchester Radical History website.
12. A city of religious tolerance
The Hidden Gem – St Mary’s Church, Mulberry Street
Manchester has a long history of sheltering those who have suffered from religious persecution. The Manchester Jewish Museum and various synagogues, the Buddhist Centre, a large number of Muslim mosques, Hindu temples and Sikh Gudwara’s across the district. Manchester also has a rich history of Christian non-conformism and a prominent Roman Catholic tradition over the past 2 centuries.
The ‘Hidden Gem’ Church is a good example of religious tolerance in the city. Prior to the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829, Catholics had been largely forced to worship in secret. In Manchester, followers of the Catholic Faith were able to practice in secret at the Church of St Mary, built in a then desolate area between Deansgate and Albert Square. The Hidden Gem, as it now known, offered a peaceful sanctuary and a place of tolerance for a group of practitioners whose rights had been vastly restricted. To this day, the unexpected beauty of the inside of the Hidden Gem, according to Canon Denis Clinch, imparts “a wonderful amazement and a feeling of utter peace” to those who happen upon it.
If you are interested in inter-faith work in Manchester then consult the Faith NorthWest website which has contacts for the Manchester district.
13. Campaigning for justice elsewhere – Manchester leads the way
The Abraham Lincoln statue, Brasenose Street
Manchester’s cotton industry enjoyed a period of huge growth and prosperity during the 1850’s. The vast majority of the cotton was imported from America until 1861, when the American Civil War caused imports to cease. The American Southern Confederacy remained steadfast in their dismissal of secession to Abraham Lincoln and his plans to abolish slavery. In the face of huge poverty and suffering amongst Lancashire’s devastated mill towns, at a meeting of cotton workers at the Free Trade Hall (Site 8) in 1862, it was decided that the region would support Lincoln’s Union in its fight against slavery. Lincoln later wrote to thank Lancashire’s support in what he called “an instance of sublime Christian heroism”.
The statue commemorates the abolition of slavery. It was brought to Manchester in 1918 and highlights the progressive role the city has held in the anti-slavery movement. For further information on the work of the anti-slavery movement today see here.
14. Votes for Women!
Elliot House, Deansgate
When Elliot House was built in 1878, it housed Manchester’s School Board, an organisation which included Chadderton born Lydia Becker who was the first female to be elected to a school board following legislative change in 1870. Before her well earned election to the Manchester Schools Board, Lydia had spent recent years striving for the cause of women’s suffrage.
She helped to form the Manchester Suffrage Committee and was instrumental in the progress of women’s rights. Like many of the figures on the Peace Trail, Lydia spoke at (and organised) a successful meeting at the Free Trade Hall in 1868, which was widely acknowledged as the beginning of the campaign for female suffrage. Despite tireless campaigning until her sudden death in 1890, Lydia never saw the day that women finally got the vote – but her determination and many achievements during her life were absolutely instrumental in the final female victory.
Manchester played a pivotal role in the universal suffrage campaign. It was the birthplace of Sylvia and Christabel Pankhurst and the Pankhurst Centre just outside the city centre highlights the campaign for votes for women.
15. Workers of the World Unite!
People’s History Museum, Bridge Street
This trail highlights the many progressive movements for peace and social justice in Manchester. These can be found in one single place at the People’s History Museum. The Museum has exhibits on the campaign for suffrage, the development and growth of trade unions, the creation of co-operative societies and of groups such as the post-war peace movement. It is also a national repository of documents from the labour movement and political parties. Recently redeveloped, its original home is a former hydraulic pumping water station designed by the city architect Henry Price.
Outside the Museum is the ‘Doves of Peace’ statue which commemorates Manchester’s ‘nuclear free city’ declaration. A blue plaque commemorating the 40th anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings can be found on the Museum’s walls – this was rededicated by the Mayor of Nagasaki in a special ceremony in November 2010.
16. Chronicler of the very poor – Elizabeth Gaskell and Manchester
Cross Street Unitarian Chapel, Cross Street
Cross Street Chapel is the city centre home of the Unitarian Church in Manchester. Like the Quakers, the Unitarians are known for their tolerance of all religions and people and the pursuit of peace and social justice.
The Cross Street Chapel is also known for its association with the great Victorian novelist Elizabeth Gaskell, whose husband was the Minister at the chapel. Elizabeth Gaskell is known for her novels on the social and economic effects of the Industrial Revolution such as Cranford, North and South and Wives and Daughters, which had similar effects on readers as those of Charles Dickens and London.
The Gaskell family lived just outside the city centre at 84 Plymouth Grove. Further details can be found at www.elizabethgaskellhouse.org.
17. Slavery, Guernica and reconstruction – Medieval Manchester
Manchester Cathedral and Chetham’s Music School, Deansgate
At the bottom end of Deansgate can be found the oldest part of Manchester with the part-medieval buildings of Manchester Cathedral and Chetham’s Music School.
Manchester Cathedral has a specific, important role in the anti-slavery abolition movement when it hosted the first ever meeting of this movement on October 28th 1787. The main speaker was Thomas Clarkson, one of the key leaders of the anti-slavery movement and the cathedral was completely full, including around 40 or 50 Africans. His sermon provided inspiration to the city to be at the heart of the anti-slavery movement.
The Cathedral has also been hit by two large bombs which have had a pivotal effect on its developments. On December 22nd 1940, a Luftwaffe bomb destroyed the north east corner of the Cathedral. The ‘Fire Window’ rebuilt in the space commemorates the bombing. Again on June 15th 1996, a huge IRA bomb devastated much of the area around the cathedral. Its dramatic reconstruction opened up a new millennium quarter, including a new visitor centre opened in 2002.
In what is now a car park opposite the cathedral was a site where Picasso’s famous anti-war painting ‘Guernica’ was shown in 1938 on a world tour – its last appearance in the UK.
Next to the Cathedral, Chetham’s Music School is the largest specialist music school in the country. The Music School is one half of the “Foundation of Chetham’s Hospital School and Library”, founded by Humphrey Chetham in 1653. The public library is the oldest of its kind in the English-speaking world and is famous for being used by Karl Marx and Fredrick Engels in their studies of the world’s first industrial city.
17. Home of the Co-op – a worldwide movement
The Robert Owen statue, Balloon Street
The worldwide co-operative movement has its firm origins in Manchester. The first ‘Co-op’ shop was opened in Toad Lane, Rochdale, home of the Pioneers Museum. The movement was inspired by the ideas of the entrepreneur and social reformer Robert Owen, famous for his progressive mills and model town in New Lanarkshire.
Robert Owen lived and worked in Manchester for 12 years, originally working at a site on St Ann’s Square. The Co-operative is unique in not being owned by a single owner but by its members, who share in its profits and seeking to invest such profits ethically. There are thousands of such enterprises around the world. The Co-operative has its UK headquarters in Manchester and a statue of Robert Owen can be found in front of the Co-operative Bank.
The Co-operative complex in Manchester includes the Co-operative Bank, the Co-operative Wholesale Society, the Co-operative Insurance Society and the Co-operative Travel Services.
18. Peace Trees in Piccadilly
The Tree of Remembrance and the Halabja Memorial Tree, Piccadilly Gardens
The Peace Trail ends in Piccadilly Gardens, one of the busiest parts of the city centre, with two trees dedicated to peace and remembrance. The Tree of Remembrance is a memorial to all the civilian victims of the Second World War. It is a stylised bronze tree sculpture, instituted in 2005 by the Manchester Valuing Older People Group on the 60th anniversary of VE day.
Near to the tree is the Halabaja Memorial Tree. This was laid to remember over 5,000 people gassed in a chemical weapons attack on the Kurdish city by Saddam Hussein’s regime on April 16th 1988.
Memorial events are held at each tree every year.
The Trail is dedicated to the memory of Councillor Bill Risby (1931 – 2009), the Manchester city councillor who successfully proposed the motion to declare Manchester a ‘nuclear free city’ on the 5th November 1980. Councillor Risby was Lord Mayor of Manchester from 1993 – 94 and regularly represented the Council at Mayors for Peace meetings around the world. Councillor Risby was also a Chair and Vice Chair of the UK and Ireland Nuclear Free Local Authorities. He was also an indefatigable peace campaigner and member of Pax Christi, CND and END.
