From the archive: Treasures and curiosities
Janet Scott reflects on delving into the archives of the Friend
The archive of the Friend is a treasure trove of insights into the Religious Society of Friends and its history – something I have appreciated since my time as a trustee and, more recently, as the writer of the ‘From the archive’ pages each month.
Back in 2014, as the centenary of the first world war’s start approached, the Friend editor, Ian Kirk-Smith, worked with the British Library to digitise editions of the magazine published between 1914 and 1918 – these continue to be made available via the website.
Since my time as a trustee was coming to an end, I volunteered to delve into these precious pages and select quotes that shed light on how Friends experienced the war, and how they acted.
It has been a privilege to be able to do this work. I had access to the digital version and have found the advertisements to be a wonderful curiosity. But, whilst the digital is good for reading and absorbing, I found it easier to work from paper copies held in the library at Woodbrooke, whilst I was a Friend in Residence.
There was far more material than could be used. The Friend was very much a journal of record. Verbatim, though shortened, accounts were given of sessions of Yearly Meeting and Meeting for Sufferings. There were accounts of Friends before the military service tribunals, recording the case that was made and how it was received. Most of the government records of these were destroyed after the war.
It is fascinating to see how work developed: a letter from Philip Noel-Baker suggesting an ambulance corps, moving on to becoming an account of a group of young men in training, soon being a regular weekly report from the Friends’ Ambulance Unit (FAU). Similarly, a letter from Stephen Hobhouse drawing attention to the plight of aliens, the men interned and their wives and families in distress, soon becomes the regular reports of the Friends’ Emergency Committee for Helping Aliens.
We meet some remarkable people: Hilda Clark, a doctor who established the Friends’ War Victims Relief Committee’s work in France; Henrietta Thomas, who accompanied young German women back to Germany and brought young English women back home – she was so worn out that she died in 1919; and who can forget Rendel Harris and his shipwrecks? We also sometimes catch a glimpse, in the lists of contributors to funds, of how the rest of the Society supported the work. In one list, George Cadbury is reported as contributing £250 a month to the FAU.
Of course, I have some favourite pieces. I love the account of the reform of Meeting for Sufferings when it decided to have an agenda. I remember the church in Russia which, during blizzards, rang the bells late into the night so that travellers could find their way. And the story of Arthur Stanley Eddington before his tribunal, accompanied by all the pomp of Cambridge University, made its way into my university sermon.
Above all, I tried to select pieces that made clear the faith and the faithfulness within which Friends acted, without ignoring the disputes and disagreements. From these pages, we see our Society struggling with the impact of events, finding faith and courage, hope for the future and the bravery of persistence. These were ordinary people doing extraordinary things – saints in their time.
The story does not end with the Armistice. There were already, in late 1918, the seeds of what was to become Quakerspeise (the feeding programme in Germany). In 1920, there was the first All Friends Conference. These, and other stories, are well worth the telling. But they are for another hand to write.
