WesWorld

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January 1
An underground explosion at Sneyd Colliery in the North Staffordshire Coalfield kills 55 miners.

The FT 30 (FT Ordinary Index) was devised in 1935 by Maurice Green and Otto Clarke of the Financial News and is termed the "Financial News 30-share index." The companies listed in the index are made up of those in the Industrial and Commercial sectors and exclude financial sector (banks, insurance, etc.) and government stocks.
The companies currently listed in it are;

Associated Portland Cement Ltd.
Austin Motors
Bass Brewery
The Bolsover Colliery Company
British Insulated Callender's Cables (formed in 1942 by the merger of two long established cable firms, Callender's Cable & Construction Company Ltd. and British Insulated Cables.)
Coats (sewing thread and needlecraft)
Courtaulds (man-made textile giant, owners of British Cellophane and the American Viscose Corporation)
Distillers Company Limited (in 1942 Distillers Biochemicals (DCBL) began manufacturing penicillin at a new plant at Speke. The plant is one of the first two factories in Europe to produce penicillin.)
Dorman Long (steel and bridge builders)
Dunlop Rubber Company Ltd. (owner of the Charles Mackintosh group, an Aerospace Division produces tyres and rubber products, also produces Dunlopillo latex foam mattresses and other latex products including golf balls and tennis racquets.
Electrical & Musical Industries (EMI) (produces gramophones, also conducting pioneering research into stereo sound recording under the leadership of the pioneering electronic engineer Alan Blumlein. The EMI Laboratories in Hayes, Hillingdon are also developing electronic equipment. A recording studio is located at Abbey Road, London.
General Electric Company Ltd. (GEC) (giant electronics manufacturer and owner of Osram light bulbs.)
Guest Keen & Nettlefolds (GKN) (steel products for engineering firms, automotive industry and produces engine parts and steel wheels)
Harrods
Hawker Siddeley Group
Imperial Chemical Industries (ICI) (recent achievements include a new polyethylene terephthalate fibre known as Terylene and currently work is underway on an anti-malarial drug Paludrine.)
Imperial Tobacco (maintains an interest in British American Tobacco)
International Tea Co. Stores (leading chain of grocers based in London)
Lancashire Cotton Corporation (set up by the Bank of England in 1929 to re-organise the Lancashire spinning industry by means of horizontal rationalisation. In merged 105 companies and had 140 mills, of which 74 have now closed as rationalisation continues)
The London Brick Company (produces around 1,750 million bricks a year, about 60% of the total market)
Murex Limited (provider of services to metallurgists, smelters and refiners, and welders)
Patons and Baldwins (leading manufacturer of knitting yarn with factories in Australia, New Zealand and Canada)
Pinchin Johnson & Associates (pain manufacturer with operations is Europe, Australia, New Zealand, USA, Nigeria and the Far East.)
Rolls-Royce Limited
Tate & Lyle
Turner & Newall (leading producer of an asbestos products and asbestos cement panels. Recently it acquired Bells' United Asbestos Companies.)
United Steel Companies
Vickers-Armstrongs Limited
Watney Combe & Reid (brewery)
F. W. Woolworth & Co

January 18
The Mildenhall Treasure is discovered by ploughman Gordon Butcher in Suffolk. The Mildenhall Treasure is a major hoard of highly decorated Roman silver tableware from the fourth-century AD, found at West Row, near Mildenhall. It consists of two large serving platters, two small decorated serving plates, a deep fluted bowl, a set of four large decorated bowls, two small decorated bowls, two small pedestalled dishes, a deep flanged bowl with a deep, domed cover, five small round ladles with dolphin-shaped handles, and eight long-handled spoons (cochlearia). The hoard was discovered while ploughing in January 1942 by Gordon Butcher, who removed it from the ground with help from Sydney Ford, for whom he was working at the time. They did not recognise the objects for what they were, and the hoard did not come to the attention of the authorities until 1946. An inquest was held in the summer of that year, when the find was declared a Treasure Trove and acquired by the British Museum in London.

January 20
The Air Ministry has publically revealed its decision and plans for a new international airport at Northolt. It is believed that Fairey Aviation has been offered compensation for the purchase of the entire site at the farming land market rate of £10 per acre. It is thought that Fairey will move its flight test facility to Heston Aerodrome, although it is possible that another site will be chosen or that the firm will use de Havilland’s facilities.

January 29
The radio programme Desert Island Discs is first broadcast on the BBC Home Service, presented by Roy Plomley. Actor and radio comedian Vic Oliver is the first castaway to make his choices.

February 10
Liverpool Chinese seamen today began a mass walk-out and are striking for improved pay. Union officials hope the situation will be resolved quickly but the Liverpool Dock authorities seem to be dragging their heels on an agreement.

February 12
Avraham Stern, the leader of the Lehi underground Zionist group, has been assassinated by British Intelligence officers after his group committed a series of murders last month. British forces stormed the Tel Aviv apartment in which he was hiding.

February 21
The prototype Hawker Sea Fury was flown today for the first time. Developed to N.7/41 this new carrier-based fighter should enter service in 1943 and 100 have been ordered. Gloster is responsible for the folding wings and will produce all the production aircraft.

British Culture in 1942

Literature
There were several new books published during 1942.
The ever popular Agatha Christie published no less than three novels during the year; the Miss Marple thriller, ‘The Body in the Library’, ‘Five Little Pigs’ starring Hercule Poirot and ‘The Moving Finger’, another Miss Marple whodunit. Literary giants C. S. Lewis and Evelyn Waugh also had new novels published, Lewis’s was ‘The Screwtape Letters’ and Waugh's ‘Put Out More Flags’. Joyce Carey published the novel ‘To Be a Pilgrim’. H. E. Bates published a short story collection ‘The Greatest People in the World’ which achieved modest sales. Children’s books this year included "BB"'s children's story ‘The Little Grey Men’ and Enid Blyton published ‘Five on a Treasure Island’, the first book in The Famous Five series.
Poetry made a resurgence over the year. T. S. Eliot's poem ‘Little Gidding’, the last of the Four Quartets was published in October in the New English Weekly. Other poems published in a variety of sources included; Walter De la Mare’s Collected Poems, W. S. Graham ‘Cage Without Grievance’, John Heath-Stubbs ‘Wounded Thammuz’, Patrick Kavanagh ‘The Great Hunger’, Sidney Keyes ‘The Iron Laurel’, Robert Nichols ‘Such Was My Singing’, Leslie Norris ‘Tongue of Beauty’, Henry Reed’s ‘The Naming of Parts’ was published in the New Statesman, Stevie Smith ‘Mother, What is Man?’, Stephen Spender ‘Ruins and Visions’ and Dorothy Wellesley’s ‘Lost Planet, and Other Poems’.

Architecture
The Royal Gold Medal for architecture awarded annually by the Royal Institute of British Architects on behalf of the British monarch, in recognition of an individual's or group's substantial contribution to international architecture was first awarded in 1848 to Charles Robert Cockerell and its winners include many of the most well-known architects of the 19th and 20th centuries, including Sir Giles Gilbert Scott (1925) and Frank Lloyd Wright (1941). This year it was awarded to William Curtis Green.

Film
The biggest American film this year was Walt Disney's animated film Bambi which opened in Britain on August 11th. As usual cinema goers had many films to choose from and the films released ran the full range of genres from historical epics to spy thrillers. Generally though most of the films were of cheaper production than previous year’s but the casts remained top quality and the major studios were still turning out some large successes.

Alibi is a mystery film directed by Brian Desmond Hurst and starring Margaret Lockwood, James Mason and Hugh Sinclair. Police hunt for the killer of a nightclub hostess. It was based on the novel L'Alibi by Marcel Achard.
The Day Will Dawn is a spy thriller set in a fictional middle European nation and was a big-budget film with a solid cast of stars. It stars Ralph Richardson, Deborah Kerr, Hugh Williams and Griffith Jones, and was directed by Harold French from a script written by Anatole de Grunwald, Patrick Kirwan and Terence Rattigan, based on a story by Frank Owen. The music by Richard Addinsell was performed by the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Muir Mathieson.
The Night Has Eyes is a thriller film directed by Leslie Arliss and starring James Mason, Wilfrid Lawson and Mary Clare. Two young teachers travel to the Yorkshire Moors where their friend disappeared a year before. Before long they have encountered the man they believe to her murderer.

There were several comedy films, the staple of the cinema releases, released during the year;
Asking for Trouble is a comedy film directed by Oswald Mitchell and starring Max Miller, Carole Lynne and Wilfrid Hyde-White. A fishmonger takes up bookmaking to earn extra cash.
Back-Room Boy is a comedy film directed by Herbert Mason. Arthur Askey plays a young, absent-minded meteorologist. He gets himself assigned to a remote Scottish lighthouse to avoid women, after he is jilted by his fiancée. He will be the only occupant of the island. Then the island starts to fill up with stowaways and the survivors of a sinking boat. Things are crowded until the people start to disappear, one-by-one. Pilbeam has stumbled across a group of foreign spies.
Banana Ridge is a comedy film based on a 1938 stage play of the same name by Ben Travers directed by Walter C. Mycroft and starring Robertson Hare, Alfred Drayton and Isabel Jeans. Two men each come to worry that a mysterious girl may be their daughter.
The Black Sheep of Whitehall was one of the bigger comedy film successes of the year. It was directed by Will Hay and Basil Dearden, and starred Will Hay, John Mills and Basil Sydney. It was produced by Michael Balcon and Ealing Studios. When he is forced to vacate the office of his debt-ridden correspondence college, 'Professor' Will Davis (Will Hay) goes to the Ministry of International Commerce at Whitehall in order to confront his one-and-only student, PR man Bobby Jessop (John Mills). To get Davis off his back, Jessop proposes to get him a job at Whitehall. Jessop then leaves in order to fetch a Professor Davys at the train station. The professor is a leading economist who has returned from a long stay in South America in order to advise the British government on a trade treaty with the South American nations. Davis is mistaken for the expert and gets involved in a series of interviews, giving answers based on gambling, con jobs, double entendres or just plain ignorance. Jessop later returns with 'Professor Davys' and the confusion is sorted out. Jessop then discovers that the man he brought with him is in fact Crabtree (Felix Aylmer), an imposter. Jessop promises Davis a job if he will help him track down the real Professor Davys (Henry Hewitt), who is being held in a safe house by Crabtree's criminal associates. Assuming a number of disguises, Davis and Jessop set off to foil the plot before the treaty is compromised.
Lady from Lisbon was a less successful comedy film directed by Leslie S. Hiscott and starring Francis L. Sullivan, Jane Carr, Martita Hunt and Charles Victor.
Let the People Sing was based on the novel Let the People Sing by J.B. Priestly and was directed by John Baxter and starring Alastair Sim, Fred Emney and Edward Rigby. A small town bands together to try and save their music hall from closure.
Much Too Shy was another George Formby film, but without the success of his last film in 1941. It is directed by Marcel Varnel and stars George Formby, Kathleen Harrison, Hilda Bayley and Eileen Bennett.
The Peterville Diamond is a comedy film directed by Walter Forde and starring Anne Crawford, Donald Stewart, Renee Houston, William Hartnell and Felix Aylmer. A thief tries to steal a diamond from the wife of a wealthy businessman, at her suggestion in an effort to get her husband to pay her more attention. The film was based on a play by Ladislas Fodor and adapted by Gordon Wellesley.

There were three main dramas released during the year;
Hatter's Castle is a film adaptation of the 1931 novel by A. J. Cronin, which dramatizes the ruin that befalls a Scottish hatter set on recapturing his imagined lost nobility. The film was made by Paramount British Pictures and stars Robert Newton, Deborah Kerr, James Mason, and Emlyn Williams. It is believed to be the only film that depicts the Tay Bridge disaster.
The Young Mr Pitt is directed by Carol Reed and starring Ronald Shiner as the Man In Stocks, Robert Donat, Robert Morley and Herbert Lom. It was produced by Edward Black, Maurice Ostrer, Twentieth Century Productions Ltd. and Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation. The film was biopic of William Pitt the Younger. The period costumes were by Cecil Beaton and Elizabeth Haffenden.
Thunder Rock is a drama film with supernatural elements, directed by Roy Boulting and starring Michael Redgrave, James Mason, Lilli Palmer and Barbara Mullen. The film is based on the 1939 play Thunder Rock by Robert Ardrey, which had originally been a notable stage flop in New York, but proved to be considerably more successful in London where it ran for months in the West End. The film was almost universally admired by North American critics and became a huge popular success. As the writer disillusioned by the world's complacency Michael Redgrave gives one of his most complex and tormented performances, as he regains the crusading spirit from his encounters with the victims of a shipwreck that occurred years before on the rocks near the lighthouse he now tends. With a bullish contribution from James Mason and truly touching support from ghostly emigrée Lilli Palmer, this is one of the Boulting Brothers' finest achievements.

Coastal Command is a film made by the Crown Film Unit. The movie, distributed by RKO, dramatized the work of RAF Coastal Command. It was made under the supervision of Ian Dalrymple, with the full cooperation of the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy. The participants of the movie were active RAF officers, NCOs and aircrew, and RN officers, and included pilot Roger Hunter and Flight Sergeant Charles Norman Lewis. The performances were generally well-received and the film is notable for its score by Ralph Vaughan Williams. It was one of the more surprising box-office successes and built on the film ‘Target for Tonight’ based on Bomber Command crews made in 1941.

In the same vein, but much more flamboyant was In Which We Serve. This is a patriotic war film directed by David Lean and Noël Coward. The screenplay by Coward was inspired by the exploits of Captain Lord Louis Mountbatten, who was a serving RN officer and destroyer captain and was designed as a recruitment tool for the Navy in general and a homage to the part the Royal Navy plays in the strength of the nation. Coward composed the film's music as well as starring in the film as the ship's captain. The film also starred John Mills, Bernard Miles, Celia Johnson and, in his first screen role, Richard Attenborough. It would later rate number 92 in the BFI Top 100 British films.

February 27
James Stanley Hey, an Army research officer, has become one of the founders of a new type of science, radio astronomy. He has discovered that the sun emits radio waves and work is on-going to see what potential this has for studying stars and perhaps for discovering new sources of radio emissions in space.

March 2
A top secret document at the War Office lists the new radio-location equipment introduced during 1942;
Searchlight Laying Radar (AMES Type 8): based on Gun Laying Radar Mk II for searchlight sites
Chain Home Type 3 (AMES Type 9): a mobile AMES Type 2 (Chain Home Type 2) 42.5-50.5MHz with 125-195 miles range
AMES Type 16: Fighter Direction Station
Gun Laying Radar Mk II: a 10cm set for 3.7in AA guns
Gun Laying Radar Mk III: an artillery gun-laying set
ASV Mk III: a 3GHz centimetre-wave set with a search range of 100 miles
GEE: radio navigation device
Pom-Pom/57mm Director Radar Type 282M: an improved Type 282 set with beam-switching with automatic tracking and bearing rate
Gunnery Director Radar Type 285M: an improved Type 285 set for 4.5in to 8in gunfire now with beam-switching with automatic tracking and bearing rate but still without elevation data
Short-Range Aerial Search Type 273: this set is for AA gunnery and has PPI, linked to Target Indication Unit which adds three bearing lines to PPI and the bearing is sent to appropriate weapon mount
Surface Search (high definition) Type 274Q: an improved Type 274 set with range increased to 7,000 yards for a surfaced submarine and 2,100 yards for a periscope
Surface Search (high definition) Type 276: a double ‘Cheese’ version of the Type 275 with the antenna angled up 15 degrees to avoid sea surface and narrower 4 degree beam with 35 degree elevation to detect aircraft. It is intended to replace the Type 286/286P and is the first British naval radio-location set with a PPI
Radio-Location Jammer Type 91: 90-600MHz band, linked to Type 294 series as spot-jammer against ship and shore sets

March 8
The Propellant and Explosives Research and Manufacturing Establishment has been officially opened today. Its role is to research propellants and explosives and methods of manufacture.
[Two new explosives developed during 1942 and going through testing phases were Tritonal, a mixture of TNT and aluminium powder for bombs and Minol, a mixture of aluminium powder and amatol for mines and depth charges.]

Quoted

Originally posted by Hood
February 27
James Stanley Hey, an Army research officer, has become one of the founders of a new type of science, radio astronomy. He has discovered that the sun emits radio waves and work is on-going to see what potential this has for studying stars and perhaps for discovering new sources of radio emissions in space.

The Llano de Chajnantor Observatory extends an invitation to Senor Hey to join their group of radio-astronomers in Chile. As a lure, they've got the largest radio-telescope in the world, and they're going to complete another two radio-telescopes in a few months which will become the new first and third largest radio-telescopes.

March 20
The National Hairdressers' Federation has been officially formed today. It is a trade industry group representing hairdressing salon owners in Great Britain. It has been formed from the merger of the Northern Counties Hairdressing Federation and the National Federation of Hairdressers.

British Politics 1942

Politics since the election of 1940 had stagnated. Sir Howard Kingsley Wood’s tenure at Downing Street had been a steady helm but certainly did not have quite the international impact that Neville Chamberlain was able to make as a statesman. There was a hardening in foreign affairs, all talk of joining PETA had been swept under the carpet, efforts to expand the treaties with Germany and Nordmark had also tailed off and generally a status quo descended. Strained relations with America began to heal a little as events took shape across the Atlantic and in the Far East China was bluntly told that there would be no negotiations over Hong Kong (the very fact that any talks ever took place was kept secret until 1966). Generally the kind of performance Anthony Eden could have made at the Foreign Office was indiscernible during 1941. Sir John Anderson kept the economy ticking over but his economic policies were not radical and there was a growing sense in some sectors of the economy that all was not well as Germany and France began making serious progress in terms of growth. A realisation that Empire alone couldn’t sustain British industry was only just beginning to dawn in Whitehall. In domestic politics there was little of note during 1941 and even during 1942 the government was lacking in serious intent to tackle various social problems.

A New Movement
For the first time in decades a new political party was formed in Britain known as Common Wealth. It was founded in July 1942 by the alliance of two left wing groups, the 1941 Committee (a think tank brought together by Picture Post owner Edward G. Hulton, and the writers J.B. Priestley and Tom Wintringham) and the neo-Christian Forward March movement led by Liberal Party MP Richard Acland, along with independents and former Liberals who believed that the Liberal party had no direction. Its aim was to appeal to the egalitarian sentiments of the English populace and therefore to be more appealing to Labour’s potential voters, rather than liberal leaning voters than to Conservative.

Key figures in the 1941 Committee began sponsoring independent candidates in by-elections under the banner of the Nine Point Group, following the electoral success of Tom Driberg with this support in 1942, there was a move to form the Committee into a political party, through a merger with Forward March. Many in the Committee disliked the idea of being a Party rather than a social movement, and through pressure from Priestley and Wintringham, the word Party was never formally part of Common Wealth's name. Led by Sir Richard Acland, Vernon Bartlett, J. B. Priestley, and Tom Wintringham the group called for common ownership, "vital democracy" and morality in politics. Its programme of common ownership echoed that of the Labour Party but stemmed from a more idealistic perspective, later termed "libertarian socialist". It rejected the State-dominated form of socialism adopted by Labour increasingly aligning itself with co-operative, syndicalist and guild socialist traditions. One proposal was that all incomes should be subjected to an absolute upper limit.
Initially chaired by Priestley, he stepped down after just a few months, as he was unable to reconcile himself with the politics of Acland who as a sitting MP had greater influence within the party. Wintringham was Priestley's natural successor but deferred to Acland, despite political differences between them. These tensions led to Priestley's stepping down for the leadership, and gradual withdrawal from the party and were a source of continued tension between former 1941 Committee and Nine Point Group members on one side and Forward Marchers and Christian Socialists on the other.

The Commonwealth Labour Party (CWLP) was a minor political party in Northern Ireland founded in 1942 by Harry Midgley, former leader of the Northern Ireland Labour Party (NILP), in order to pursue his brand of labour unionism.
Midgley had adopted a position of unswerving loyalty to Britain and was increasingly out-of-step with the majority in the NILP. On 4 December 1942 Jack Beattie was elected leader of the NILP group in Parliament with Midgley as his deputy. This was the final straw and Midgley resigned from the NILP on 15 December, and was followed by the departure of the Londonderry and North Belfast branches of the party. Although his own Willowfield branch expressed its support, it did not disaffiliate. Although some of Midgley's opponents believed that he would join the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP), he instead announced the formation of the Commonwealth Labour Party, on 19 December. The new party first met in January 1943, and adopted all Midgley's positions. It attempted to make links with the British Labour Party but was rebuffed. Later in the year, Milton Gordon led the Londonderry branch back into the NILP, having come to believe that the new party was harming the labour movement. Notably, no trade union branch ever affiliated.
The party created a newspaper, Justice, which was initially edited by Midgley's son, and maintained nine branches, three in Belfast and the others in predominantly unionist areas of Northern Ireland. It had fewer than 1,000 members. No longer in opposition to the UUP which dominated the legislature, Midgley accepted an offer of a ministerial post from new Prime Minister Basil Brooke. He used his position to champion the Beveridge Report and the welfare state.

By-Elections
In hindsight 1942 marked the turning point when politics would begin to change in Britain. There were eleven by-elections during the year and generally the results were un-surprising.

The North East Derbyshire by-election, 2 February 1942. The seat had become vacant on the death in December 1941 of the Labour MP Frank Lee. The Labour candidate, Henry White, successfully held onto the seat for the Labour Party.

The Nuneaton by-election, 9 March 1942. The seat had become vacant when the Labour MP Reginald Fletcher was raised to the peerage as Baron Winster. He had held the seat since the 1936 general election. The Labour candidate, Frank Bowles was able to hold onto the seat for Labour.

The Newcastle-under-Lyme by-election, 11 March 1942. The seat had become vacant when the Labour MP Josiah Wedgwood was elevated to the peerage as Baron Wedgwood. He had held the seat since the 1906 general election. The Labour candidate, John Mack, was returned.

The Maldon by-election, 25 June 1942. The Conservative candidate in Maldon, R. J. Hunt, faced a Labour Party and a Liberal candidate. However, the left-wing journalist Tom Driberg stood as an "Independent Labour" candidate. Driberg was a member of the ‘1941 Committee’, a group of progressive intellectuals who met under the chairmanship of J. B. Priestley at the home of Edward G. Hulton, the owner of Picture Post newspaper. At the start of May, the Committee had published a ‘Nine-Point Plan’ calling for works councils and the publication of "plans for the provision of full and free education, employment and a civilized standard of living for everyone." The Plan formed the basis of Driberg's campaign. The fifth contestant was R.B. Matthews, standing as a National Independent and Agricultural candidate. One of the most surprising results in British politics saw a massive victory for Driberg, who won 61.3% of the votes.

The Windsor by-election, 30 June 1942. The Conservative MP Annesley Somerville had died on 15 May 1942, aged 84. He had held the seat since the 1922 general election, and had been returned unopposed in 1931 and 1936. The Conservative candidate was 30-year-old Charles Mott-Radclyffe, who had not previously contested a parliamentary election. William Douglas-Home, the younger brother of Conservative politician Alec Douglas-Home, stood as an ‘Independent Progressive’ candidate. Douglas-Home had contested the Glasgow Cathcart by-election in April 1942. Both candidates had been schoolfriends at Eton. The by-election was won by the Conservative candidate Charles Mott-Radclyffe but with a majority of only 17%, due to a surprisingly good result for Douglas-Home.

The Salisbury by-election, 1942, 8 July 1942. The seat had become vacant on the death of the 55-year-old sitting Conservative MP James Despencer-Robertson. He had won the seat at a by-election in 1931, having previously been MP for Islington West from 1922 to 1923. The Conservative candidate was 36-year-old John Morrison. There were two independent candidates: W. R. Hipwell, standing as an ‘Independent Progressive’ and J. D. Monro as an ‘Independent Democrat’. Morrison held the seat for the Conservatives, with more than two-thirds of the votes.

The Spennymoor (County Durham) by-election, 21 July 1942. The seat had become vacant when the Labour MP Joseph Batey had resigned from the House of Commons on 6 July 1942, by the procedural device of accepting the post of Steward of the Manor of Northstead. Batey had held the seat since the 1922 general election. The Labour party selected as its candidate the 54-year-old James Dixon Murray. Murray won the seat with a safe majority.

The Rothwell by-election, 7 August 1942. The seat become vacant when the Labour MP William Lunn died on 17 May 1942, aged 69. Lunn had held the seat since its creation for the 1918 general election. The Labour party selected as its candidate Alderman Thomas Brooks MBE, a miner and trade union organiser who had been a local councillor since 1914. Brooks was returned by the voters. [He is best remembered for his successful campaign to repeal the Witchcraft Act 1735.]

The Whitechapel and St. George's (which covers Whitechapel, Shadwell, Wapping, and St George in the East in the Metropolitan Borough of Stepney) by-election, 8 August 1942. The by-election was caused by the death of the constituency's Labour Party MP James Henry Hall, who had held the seat since the 1936 general election, having previously been the seat's MP between 1930 and 1931. Labour's candidate was Walter James Edwards, a stoker who held onto the seat for Labour.

The Poplar South by-election (which covers the Isle of Dogs and Poplar in the Metropolitan Borough of Poplar), 12 August 1942. The by-election was caused by the death of the constituency's Labour Party MP David Morgan Adams, who had held the seat since the 1931 general election. The Labour candidate, William Henry Guy, was opposed by the usual Conservative and Liberal candidates but also by an independent, the Revd. P. Figgis, who stood as a Christian Socialist. Labour retained the seat easily.

The Cardiff East by-election, 13 April 1942. The by-election was caused by the appointment of the sitting Conservative MP, Owen Temple-Morris, as a County Court judge. The Cardiff East Conservatives unanimously selected Sir James Grigg at the request of Conservative Central Office and Grigg was returned comfortably with 75% of the poll, albeit on the relatively low turnout of 33%.

The New Dawn?
The Maldon by-election and the Windsor by-election had witnessed the birth of the independent candidate, men who were generally socialist in outlook. In the Salisbury by-election and the Poplar South by-election the independents lost heavily but where they could contest on closer grounds in marginal seats they could inflict damage. Douglas-Home had made a serious challenge in Windsor while in Maldon Tom Driberg actually won. While the political impact made was slight in terms of longevity or mass opinion there was no doubt that J. B. Priestley’s ‘1941 Committee’ and their ‘Nine-Point Plan’ had made some impact on voters. The seeming inability for Labour to make enough gains to claim a General Election win and the growing discontent at the failure to overhaul the welfare policies to help the poor and unemployed, to increase the nation’s health and education were just starting in 1942 to make voters post “protest votes” and the success at Maldon made the Conservative Party sit up.

The young and more radical conservative Minister of Education, R.A. Butler and Minster of Health Harold Macmillan were both promising young politicians with long careers ahead of them. They made a more humane face but progress was still slow compared to what the Labour Party was clamouring for. Into this fray entered Liberal William Beveridge, an economist. On December 2nd his ‘Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee on Social Insurance and Allied Services’ was published by the HMSO and would for ever after be known as ‘The Beveridge Report.’ William Beveridge had been chosen to chair a cross-party committee in mid-1941 to investigate the structure and needs of the social welfare system. The committee was made up of civil servants from the Home Office, Ministry of Labour, Ministry of Pensions, Government Actuary, Ministry of Health, HM Treasury, Board of Customs and Excise, Assistance Board, Department of Health for Scotland, Registry of Friendly Societies and the Office of the Industrial Assurance Commissioner. In his report he identified five "Giant Evils" in society: Want, Disease, Ignorance, Squalor and Idleness and went on to propose widespread reform to the social welfare system to address these.

The Report offered three guiding principles to its recommendations:
1. Proposals for the future should not be limited by "sectional interests" in learning from experience.
2. Social insurance is only one part of a "comprehensive policy of social progress". The five giants on the road to reconstruction were Want, Disease, Ignorance, Squalor and Idleness.
3. Policies of social security "must be achieved by co-operation between the State and the individual", with the state securing the service and contributions. The state "should not stifle incentive, opportunity, responsibility; in establishing a national minimum, it should leave room and encouragement for voluntary action by each individual to provide more than that minimum for himself and his family".
Beveridge opposed "means-tested" benefits. His proposal was for a flat rate contribution rate and a flat rate benefit for everyone. Means-testing was intended to play a tiny part, because it created high marginal tax rates for the poor (the "poverty trap").
Inside the Cabinet there was debate over whether to publish the Report as a White Paper at that time. The Prime Minister, Sir Kingsley Wood, believed the Report to be "ambitious and involves an impracticable financial commitment" and therefore felt that the publication should be postponed. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir John Anderson, too was not enthusiastic about the costs involved in such a radical plan.

However the Cabinet decided on 26 November to publish it on 2 December. Queues formed at newsstands and newsagents and HMSO shops to by copies of the White Paper but of course tens of thousands never read it but soon its contents were published in the Daily Mirror and other newspapers which gave it national coverage. The Times said of the Report: "a momentous document which should and must exercise a profound and immediate influence on the direction of social change in Britain". The Manchester Guardian called it "a big and fine thing". The Daily Telegraph said it was a consummation of the revolution begun by David Lloyd George in 1911. The Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple, said it was "the first time anyone had set out to embody the whole spirit of the Christian ethic in an Act of Parliament". The Beveridge Report had received almost universal approval by people of all shades of opinion and classes. In a sample taken in the fortnight after the Report's publication, the British Institute of Public Opinion found that 95% of the public had heard of the Report and that there was "great interest in it" but criticised that old age pensions were not high enough. They also found that "there was overwhelming agreement that the plan should be put into effect". However for that to happen there needed to be the political will in 1943 to do so.

Quoted

Originally posted by Hood
The young and more radical conservative

Irony!

An interesting set of developments, and a surprising admission.

are impressed by contents of Beveridge Report, and wish HMG success in implementation. They will also closely observe effects of such policies on rural poverty. While urban poverty in RF has declined satisfactorially since 1917, Russia's vast area, severe climate, and resulting low rail net density mean that large rural areas persist in destitution, despite rapid growth of Russia's railroad system. Adequate social insurance for subsistence farmers/herders/hunters in Central Asia and Siberia is one of RF government's most difficult problems.

In 1942 the Ministry of Transport created the first official proposals for a motorway network across Britain. In May 1942, the Hollinghurst Report demonstrated the need for new high-speed roads for transporting goods around the country. A small number of routes are intended to connect the main centres of industrial activity to the ports, and whose routes were chosen to relieve the trunk routes where on-line improvement would be most difficult. Five new roads merit consideration as part of the future highway system;

1. London to Birmingham, Lancashire and Scotland, relieving the industrial backbone of the country which is today consistently heavily trafficked.
2. A branch from the first route, beginning at Coventry and reaching Leeds. This route would serve the East Midlands and Yorkshire, and provide them with access to London.
3. An extension of the Liverpool-East Lancashire Road (A580) across the Pennines to Yorkshire, to Leeds and possibly also to Hull.
4. A ring around Birmingham and the Black Country. The first proposal would pass to the north-east of the urban area so this route would complete the circle around the west and south.
5. Birmingham to Bristol, which would complete the links between the west coast ports from Glasgow to the Severn.



Lancashire County Council is very keen on these proposals and has already received permission, and is only waiting for funding to start work on the north-south motorway. In 1943 the Council drew up revised plans for the first section of the road, which is to be a bypass for Preston, running to the south and east of the town. Its layout and junction designs owe a great deal to the German Autobahn network. The Bypass scheme includes a road across the south of Preston linking to the A59 towards Liverpool, its course at the southern end was different, passing west of Walton-le-Dale and terminating on the A582 at Bamber Bridge, close to the junction of A6 and A49. At its northern end, designs have been prepared for a short spur at Broughton to be continued to Blackpool.


The country's civil engineers are also working to decide what form a British motorway might take. The Institution of Automobile Engineers published a joint report with a number of other bodies that suggested a design speed of 75mph, with 1ft (30cm) marginal strips at each side of each carriageway, and lanes 11ft (3.3m) wide on two-lane carriageways and just 10ft (3m) wide on three-lane carriageways. They also recommended parking places where drivers could rest, preferably located at viewpoints.

In 1942 the Ministry of Transport announced a ten-year investment programme in the road network. Among the small bypasses and widening schemes was the Preston Bypass and the Lancaster Bypass.


The County Of London Plan 1941
The London County Council tasked J.H. Forshaw, its resident architect, and Patrick Abercrombie to draw up a comprehensive plan for the County of London. The authors saw London's four "major defects" as traffic congestion, depressed housing, inadequacy and maldistribution of open spaces, and the jumble of houses and industry ("indeterminate zoning").
The road plan they created has three classifications of road:

Arterial Roads, without any frontages or access to side streets, and with parallel service roads

Sub-Arterial Roads, main roads in the built-up area, with frontage development permitted, but with service roads provided wherever possible and side streets blocked off

Local Roads, which cover all other urban roads.

All through traffic would be directed onto a network of arterial roads. Areas within the grid would be as self-contained as possible, to reduce the demand for travel. For the first time, the plan hinged on a system of ring roads - most importantly the B-Ring.
Arterials and Sub-Arterials

Roads in the plan were identified with letters and numbers; each ring road moving out from the central area received a letter (A-Ring, B-Ring" etc.); most radial routes were numbered. The arterial roads planned are:
1. The B-Ring, the principal ring road around central London, built for fast traffic. To be fully grade-separated. From the NW corner this follows the Westway to Ladbroke Grove, then cuts across in a straight line to Royal Oak, turn NE to Warwick Avenue, Lord's Cricket Ground, then along Prince Albert Road (meeting radial X), across Camden Town to Agar Grove, then through Barnsbury to Highbury Corner. It would turn ESE here through De Beauvoir Town, to the SW side of Victoria Park, then following the canal and the A1205 through Mile End to Limehouse (meeting radial Y). The road thens proceed down the western side of the Isle of Dogs, into a tunnel and emerging at Evelyn Street on the south bank of the Thames. From here, it follows a straight line to Queens Road (Peckham) station, then follows the railway line through Denmark Hill to Brixton. From Brixton, the road would lead to Clapham Common, taking the north side, then turning northwards along the A3220 to Battersea Park Road, and follow the West London Line back to the start.

2. Route X, the old north-south cross route proposed by the Royal Commission. Connecting radial 5 at Swiss Cottage with radials 16 and 19 at the Elephant, using Waterloo Bridge. It passes along Adelaide Road to Chalk Farm, there turning south-east to follow the railway line, and then the A400 (Hampstead Road) to Warren Street station. Here it tunnels under the A ring (Euston Road) and Bloomsbury to emerge just south of High Holborn. From here it heads south to use Waterloo Bridge, and then proceedsto Elephant and Castle.

3. Route Y, the Royal Commission's east-west cross route. This connects radial 13 at Limehouse with the B ring at Battersea Bridge. The route would be along the current A1203 (The Highway and East Smithfield), Thames Street, Embankment. It then tunnels under Whitehall and St James's Park to emerge at Ebury Street, then goes via Royal Hospital Road to join the Chelsea Embankment.

4. The main radial roads, all of which would have a junction with the B ring.

The sub-arterial roads planed are:
1.The A-Ring (the Inner Ring Road), which links the major railway termini, and formed "the boundary of the Empire, cultural and commercial core of London". There were to be sections in tunnel under Hyde Park and under the Thames east of Tower Bridge.
2.The C-Ring, effectively the North and South Circular Roads. It follows a route proposed by Bressey and Lutyens in 1934 but with a modification to prevent the demolition of a swathe of Hammersmith and Fulham. The Woolwich Ferry would be replaced with either a bridge or a tunnel.
3. Other radials and some connecting roads.


The Greater London Plan 1942
The second London Plan deals with the wider area, and was written by Abercrombie alone. For the area outside the County of London, he proposes three ring roads, one of which has already been detailed in the 1941 report.
1. The C-Ring would again be sub-arterial, following the line of the already extant North Circular Road, and adding its complement in the south.
2. The D-Ring, an express-arterial, and almost entirely a new route. This is intended to "girdle the general limits of the built-up area in London", in conjunction with the Green Belt. Starting from the west, its alignment is similar to A312 up to Northolt. Then it proceeds to Ruislip, Pinner Green, Bushey Heath, joining the Barnet Bypass at Well End and then to Waltham Cross. Here it turns SE, and is carefully routed across Epping Forest to pass between Loughton and Buckhurst Hill to reach Chigwell. From here, it follows the west side of Hainault Forest, then passes between Chadwell Heath and Romford to a proposed Dartford Tunnel. South of the river, the D-Ring heads to Swanley, then turns west via Chelsfield and, skirting Selsdon and Sanderstead, will be carried on an 80 ft viaduct from the Purley Downs towards Croydon Airport. Then between Ewell and Epsom to Hook, through Esher and crossing the Thames on a new bridge from Walton to Sunbury.

3. The E-Ring, another sub-arterial, is a revised version of the North and South Orbital Roads. This would be a parkway, with frequent laybys and picnic areas. The E-Ring does not join up across the Thames.

4. Ten principal radial routes, of express-arterial standard which are to motorway standard. Abercrombie's proposals for the motorway routes are:


1. London to Exeter and Plymouth via Chertsey (A4, A316 and what is the M3 in the National Plan.

2. London to South Wales via a proposed Severn Bridge. Begins as two spurs at London End, one from Sunbury (route 1 / D ring) and one from Duke's Wood (route 3), meeting at Lake End. Then as M4 in the National Plan.

3. London to Gloucester and Cheltenham. The A40 Western Ave, then passing just north of Marlow. Then Reading, Oxford, Gloucester. This is part of the M40 in the National Plan.

4. London to Birmingham. From Paddington to Harrow via the A404. Then along the LMS (Chiltern) line through Sudbury. Meets the D-Ring at Pinner Farm, and strikes out to meet the E-Ring at Chandler's Cross. Then up to Birmingham and Carlisle. This route is broadly similar to the M6 in the National Plan.

5. London to Newcastle and Edinburgh via St Albans. From the B-ring west of Camden Town, up to Haverstock Hill, with a three-mile tunnel beneath Hampstead Heath, rising by East Finchley station, following the eastern boundary of Islington Cemetery up to the North Circular. Then through Friern Barnet, meeting the D-Ring at Dancers Hill, and the following the A1 north.

6. London to Cambridge. Across Tottenham, joining the North Circular. Northwards to follow a line up the Lea Valley, then swings eastwards to join the M11 planned in the National Plan.


7. London to East Anglia via Chelmsford and Ipswich. Passes between Woodford and Wanstead, out east past Havering atte-Bower, to run parallel with the A12.

8. London to Canterbury and Thanet via Swanley, Meopham and Faversham. From B-Ring out to Catford, then the railway to Bromley and Swanley. Follows current line of A20 until Farningham, where it then leads to Meopham and Cuxton, crossing the Medway. Onwards to Faversham, then splitting to Canterbury and Margate. Boradly the M2 as planned under the National Plan.

9. London to South Coast Resorts (Brighton and Eastbourne) via Coulsdon and Horley. Follows the A3 to Clapham Common, then turning southwards, avoiding Tooting Common, then to the A23. Bifurcation at Horley; one branch follows the A23 to Brighton;, the other other striking across to the A22 and bypassing East Grinstead and Forest Row.

10. London to South Coast and Portsmouth via Stoke d'Abernon. Equivalent to A3, but Kingston Bypass not used (too many frontages to convert to motorway standard) and Guildford bypassed to the East.

British Science Journal - April 1942

In 1941 the Industrial Welding Research Committee was formed based at Sheffield University to undertake research into industrial steels and alloys and methods of welding and future developments. It is chaired by British physicist George Thomson. It has been decided to widen the remit of the Committe and to aid in its research programme Cambridge University has been brought into the research.
The members of Industrial Welding Research Committee are; chairman George Paget Thomson, Marcus Oliphant, Patrick Blackett, James Chadwick, Philip Moon and John Cockcroft. The noted civil servant and current Chairman of ICI, Sir John Anderson, has also been linked the Commitee at various times. Sir John Anderson, as Chairman of ICI, has nominated ICI’s Chief Scientist Wallace Akers to oversee the project.

Meanwhile in addition to his role on the committee Marcus Oliphant invitied his researcher, Dr Raziuddin Siddiqui to join Cambridge University's quantum physics section. The Czechoslovak physicist George Placzek too has been noted at the unversity in connection with research.

April 11
The Air Ministry has requisitioned Northolt airfield and surrounding farms, roads and houses to begin work on a new airport. Construction by Wimpey Construction has now begun. It is hoped that commercial flights will begin by late-1943. The three planned runways will form a triangle consisting of one 9,200 feet (2,800 m) long, one 6,300 feet (1,900 m) long and another 6,700 feet (2,000 m) long.

April 14
After the General Election results were counted King Farouk of Egypt has asked Mustafa al-Nahhas, head of the Wafd Party to form a new government. The British Government has welcomed the new Egyptian government [both Nahhas and the Wafd Party are pro-British].

This is another way of saying "Tube Alloys."

Quoted

Originally posted by Hood
British Science Journal - April 1942

In 1941 the Industrial Welding Research Committee was formed based at Sheffield University to undertake research into industrial steels and alloys and methods of welding and future developments. It is chaired by British physicist George Thomson. It has been decided to widen the remit of the Committe and to aid in its research programme Cambridge University has been brought into the research.
The members of Industrial Welding Research Committee are; chairman George Paget Thomson, Marcus Oliphant, Patrick Blackett, James Chadwick, Philip Moon and John Cockcroft. The noted civil servant and current Chairman of ICI, Sir John Anderson, has also been linked the Commitee at various times. Sir John Anderson, as Chairman of ICI, has nominated ICI’s Chief Scientist Wallace Akers to oversee the project.

Meanwhile in addition to his role on the committee Marcus Oliphant invitied his researcher, Dr Raziuddin Siddiqui to join Cambridge University's quantum physics section. The Czechoslovak physicist George Placzek too has been noted at the unversity in connection with research.

Quoted

Originally posted by AdmKuznetsov
This is another way of saying "Tube Alloys."

Quoted

Originally posted by Hood
British Science Journal - April 1942

In 1941 the Industrial Welding Research Committee ... <snip>.

Das ist sehr richtig.

That would be a yes, considering that all of the scientists named are nuclear physicists.

Well I suppose its no different than the Americans starting a Project about Manhattan.

I wonder though, seeing as we had the discussion on tanks if we shouldn't have a gentleman's agreement on when The Bomb is allowed? I know when I planned for the Americans to test it, but it might be better just having an agreement amongst the Powers that no one will have The Bomb before 1946 at the earliest?

I don't expect/want people telling the exact plans of their nuclear research, but I also don't want to come wandering in here one day after work to see "Surprise! We have The Bomb!" My blood pressure is high enough thanks.