‘We always told the vicar when we were going out in case we were arrested.’ Photo: courtesy of Lyn Barlow
Women’s work: Forty years on, seven Friends talk to Rebecca Hardy about the Greenham Peace Camp
‘It was life changing, in many ways.’
Forty years ago last month, thirty-two women, four men and some children set off on foot from Cardiff to Berkshire, in protest against the nuclear weapons that were being held at RAF Greenham Common. The march was the beginning of the Greenham Common Peace Camp, which was set up outside the RAF base between 1981 and 2000. It was declared ‘women-only’ a year later. With more than 70,000 taking part, the camp went on to become the largest female-led protest since the women’s suffrage movement. Many Quakers were involved in the camp, with some directly living there, others regularly visiting and involved in affiliate peace groups, and many others supporting. Here, seven Quakers share their memories.
Barbara Davey, from St Andrew’s Meeting, attended the camp regularly from its beginning in 1981. She was not a Quaker at the time, but came across Quakers as a teenager.
At that time I was living in South Wales and really, that was where it all started. I was a young woman then and we had just moved to Cardiff from London. There was a slightly alternative magazine where I read about the plans for the march to Greenham. And I remember that I was really struck by a comment that ‘men left home and went to war, and these women were going to leave their homes for another cause’. The cause of peace. And that just really struck me. But I wasn’t brave enough to join them. We’d just bought our first house and I thought I can’t do that, it’s just not me, but I really admired them.
After that I started getting involved with support groups that were springing up. I joined a very unofficial group called Women For Life on Earth, a South Wales group of women who supported the women at Greenham. We used to go down to the camp often and join in many actions. It was so different how we communicated in those days. We’d worked out what we called ‘a telephone tree’. When there was news that there was some action and the police were involved, and the women needed support, the news would come to one person, who would phone another woman and so on. The hope was that someone would drive down to Greenham to support them. The ‘telephone tree’ was all beautifully drawn, with lots of pictures, and everything was so creatively done. That really appealed to me. It was just so different. There was that sense of how you do it was just as important as what you do. We see it in Extinction Rebellion (XR) now: that creativity. I would say that XR comes from the same roots, with all that creative expression that was going on at Greenham. I remember all the wonderful banners that we made. I have a lovely postcard from the second year, which shows us all circling Greenham in 1982. Then obviously we would organise actions in Cardiff to support them, stopping traffic in the middle of town. I can remember we had heated discussions about whether we would try to blockade the Severn Bridge. That was a really big issue for us, but we just thought we couldn’t do it. It would be a step too far.
I never went to stay at Greenham, but I visited often, especially for the big ‘encircling the base’ type things. Our son was born in 1983, so he was taken there as a baby regularly. I didn’t feel that I was endangering him in any way. I just thought that it was important that I went there with him, and now, of course, he’s really pleased. He can’t remember it, but he’s a Greenham Baby and he feels that he’s carrying it as part of his DNA. It’s important to him that he has that history.
It was mainly a women’s group and I do think that meant a lot: the different way of working together, that sense of sisterhood. Obviously, we were all very intense about it and there was a lot of hugging. Singing was a really big part of it too. I remember all the wonderful songs that we sang. Not so much Joan Baez, but songs like ‘You Can’t Kill the Spirit’. I don’t know where they came from, but they were from the folk tradition and there was a lot of singing in rounds. Whenever there was an action, the singing would keep that sense of solidarity. We went to the circling of the base in coaches from Cardiff so there was singing on the coaches too, and even at the meetings. There were always banners being made out of sheets and bits of fabric, and loads of badges from those little badge machines.
It was life-changing, in many ways. Obviously, Greenham contributed to a shift in understanding of the issues with the cruise missiles. It made them something that people talked about, and raised the question of what we were doing; but it also changed the lives of the women who were involved without a doubt – that sense of the personal and the political being so intertwined.
In 1982, I was a young woman, but there were lots of older women involved, people who could have been my grandmother. A lot had been law-abiding citizens, magistrates and the like, and then suddenly they said, ‘No, this is not right’, and they joined the actions and that was lovely to have them with us. They were real examples for us. Fearless, with their wire cutters!
It was a formative experience I’m sure for everyone and, obviously, a lot of women put their lives on the line. I knew women who broke the law and it could have affected their jobs. There was a lot of soul-searching and supporting of them, just as Friends are still doing now.
When we went to the base, we’d put things on the fence, and all that was really creative. One time we went, we were asked to bring saucepans to make a loud noise, so there was that sense of knocking down the walls of Jericho. That was so extraordinary. I remember looking along the fence as far as I could see, and there were all these women banging saucepans. It was so bizarre and yet such a poetic gesture, a heroic gesture. It was a rich time.
Sheelagh Wurr is an Anglican and attender at Shaftesbury Meeting. She was a member of Cruisewatch, which tracked the cruise missiles as they left the base.
Three of us – Jane Fowles from Shaftesbury Meeting, our friend Sue Harris and me – visited Greenham Common on a number of occasions. We were all members of CND [Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament]. Although we visited Greenham a few times, our main involvement with the Greenham Common women was Cruisewatch. Cruise convoys would regularly leave the base quite late at night, on practice manoeuvres over Salisbury Plain. Cruisewatch was formed to track the cruise convoys whenever they left the base, and to disrupt their activities. During the early 1980s there were, of course, no mobile phones so the Greenham women organised a ‘telephone chain’ whereby they alerted certain people that the convoy was on the move and this information was then passed down the chain by phone to everyone on the list. We had the telephone numbers of those we had to contact. Having made the calls, we would then pick up Sue and set off for the Plain. The local Anglican vicar was supportive of our activities. We always told him when we were going out in case we were arrested and unable to go to work the next day. He had the contact details of our bosses and knew what he was supposed to say. In the event, we were never arrested.
Local police were usually in evidence but we were ‘peaceful protesters’ and they never seemed very worried about us. One time, on our way home, we were stopped and the officer asked us to open the boot. Having peered in, in complete darkness, he came back to Sue, who was driving, and asked if we could lend him a torch! We u were happy to oblige and Sue even held the torch for him. He discovered there was nothing in the boot to worry him.
I remember we often drove some distances in the dark before coming across the convoy. When we did so, there was always a small crowd of other ‘Cruisewatchers’, some with spray cans which they aimed at the tanks and some with banners. I can remember one time standing, with a crowd of others, on a roundabout on a very cold winter’s night. Bruce Kent, who was then chair of CND, was there. He saw me shivering and came and gave me a cuddle. These days, it would be deemed inappropriate but it warmed me up and somebody took a photo. I still have that photo somewhere.
Lyn Barlow, from Minehead Meeting, lived at Greenham for three and a half years. She captured the events in embroideries (pictured), one of which is displayed in the cafe of the former Air Traffic Control Tower. She has donated two journals to the Greenham Archive at the Women’s Library, University of London.
In 1984, after numerous visits and short stays, I went to live full-time at Yellow Gate, Greenham Common Women’s Peace camp. I was twenty years old. I was a Greenham woman long before becoming a Quaker, in fact I only became a member of the Quakers some two years ago, now in my late fifties, but it was whilst at Greenham that I first encountered Quakerism.
Back then I had no real family ties, job or responsibilities, so I was free and able to commit wholeheartedly. Many women weren’t in such a position, so in some ways I was fortunate. Privileged, even. My three and a half years at camp shaped and informed my later life. For the most part, they were happy years, though not always easy or comfortable. I arrived at Greenham idealistic and probably quite naive, politically. Greenham was my ‘university’.
Greenham was incredibly powerful. Prior to camp, I had little experience of women-only events, or campaigns, and had never experienced living in a women-only community. It was a total revelation and immensely empowering. We worked together to keep the camp functioning, not only with the basic practicalities, such as cooking, gathering wood and the necessity of weekly money meetings, but organising events and actions. We also had to be constantly alert and able to react and respond to things such as military vehicles, and later the cruise missile convoys that came out in the dead of night, which we would disrupt by instantaneous blockades. We also experienced frequent vigilante attacks and later we had to learn to deal with almost daily evictions and the incumbent animosity of the bailiffs.
An important part of living at the camp was the taking-on of roles that played to your particular individual strengths. At the beginning, I shied away from things such as interacting with the press, or visitors, as I lacked confidence in my ability to verbally articulate and had had little academic experience. The role I felt best suited to, and most comfortable with, was volunteering to do night watches. I’d always been a bit of a night owl so it felt right and doable. There were camps at all the gates to the base, and a number away from main roads, such as Emerald Camp, located in woods closest to the silos, and all the camps needed night watches. I remember the fear I felt, at Emerald, just observing the silos and the sounds associated with them, and how it brought into focus the enormity of what we were up against. The evilness was palpable.
Later, when I found the courage to take part in Non Violent Direct Action (NVDA), I found it suited me down to the ground! I’d spent much of my late childhood in care, had been a regular runaway, and as such I’d often encountered the police and authorities and didn’t feel particularly intimidated by them, so NVDA wasn’t as daunting to me as it probably was to many. I was also quite adept with a pair of bolt cutters and a spray can!
Another thing I really valued about Greenham, and which became central to my later life, was the creativity it inspired. The spectacle, in a positive way, of women weaving webs into the wire, attaching photos and mementos; the imaginative forms of actions, such as dressing up as bears and breaking in to the base for a ‘Teddy Bears Picnic’; the painted faces, colourful banners, handmade jumpers and all the wonderfully-worded songs we sang.
As to my introduction to the Quakers, they were very much central to our lives at Greenham. Newbury Society of Friends, and the broader Quaker community, contributed much to the camp. Friends brought firewood, food, donations and even converted the back room of Newbury Quaker House into somewhere we could wash clothes and take a shower. The live-in warden, and her husband, often invited individual camp women into their flat for tea and cake, and when she was sadly killed by a car after visiting Blue Gate one Christmas, many women attended the funeral. The Quakers also held occasional Meetings for Worship (MfW) at the camp closest to the town and, when evictions became regular, it was a Quaker who designed the ‘getaway’ tent, which didn’t require pegs and could be easily gathered up at a second’s notice.
They fundraised and raised awareness, they bore ‘witness’, and they were rarely judgemental. In later years, towards the end of my time at the camp, and even afterwards when I’d returned to higher education, I lived in and looked after the Newbury Meeting House for short periods, so the warden could take a short break.
Evelyn Parker, from Winchester Meeting, was one of the Newbury Friends who supported Greenham women.
There were two or three of us at Newbury Meeting House that were quite involved. Some Friends were decidedly unsure about the whole thing. We were the only church in Newbury that felt able to do something. What impelled us into taking action were the evictions by the local council. They had a team of bailiffs with a cart and crusher that went round the base from gate to gate evicting the women. This meant piling all their belongings onto any wheels that the women had or could carry and take everything off the council land and onto the road.
One day I arrived at Greenham just as this was happening at Blue Gate, and there was this huddle of humanity with a handcart. It looked like something from the third world and it was just too much. So two or three of us put it to Meeting that we should do something] at the next Business Meeting. It was quite heavy-going. We said we didn’t expect Friends to get involved as a Meeting, but we could treat this as a humanitarian thing, and make the Meeting House available to them in whatever way was appropriate – because one of the problems was that they couldn’t wash. I can’t say we achieved unity, but the feeling of the Meeting was strong enough so we could give it a try. We put out an appeal in the Friend for funds to put in a twin tub washing machine, shower and slot telephone – this would have been 1982 or ’83 – and we were absolutely deluged with money. That felt to the Meeting as if we were being given the go-ahead from on high.
Some Friends were not comfortable with the decision and they went to East Garston Meeting instead.
Another Quaker in the north invented ‘the Greenham Getaway’, when they saw the problem of eviction [and belongings being taken away]. They created these little tents, which were a triangular frame covered in nylon. You could plonk them into the ground and, when the bailiffs came, you could pick them up and carry them away.
Jill Palmer, from Andover Meeting, lived close to the camp.
I had nothing to do with the camp but just happened to be living for a short time in one of [the nearby] houses. I remember the time when we attempted to leave in the car and an enormous camper stood in front of the car, flanked by other campers, refusing our exit. One of us, an equally enormous lady, got out of the driving seat and just stood there. Whereupon first lady said, rather quickly, ‘Let them go, they are residents’.
One night the dogs were creating, and a householder went to see what was happening. He found a woman u behind the log pile. ‘What are you doing behind my log pile?’ ‘That’s my business’. ‘Okay,’ replied the householder, and went inside. Half an hour or so later, the dogs still creating, he asked again. Same answer. Then a policeman knocked on the door. ‘I think she has been there long enough, let her go now.’ And so the dogs were called off. Thankfully the woodpile was not used again as a latrine.
Rae Street from Littleborough Meeting was a member of a local peace group that regularly visited Greenham. She later became vice chair of CND, and chair of the regional Greater Manchester and District CND. In 1985, she was asked by Gwyn Kirk (co-author of Greenham Women Everywhere) and Carrie Pester to do a speaking tour in the US to raise funds for the court case ‘Greenham Women Against Cruise Missiles v Reagan’. The case began in November 1983 when a group of women from the UK, accompanied by their lawyers, arrived at the US Federal Court in New York. In their bags were hundreds of pages of expert affidavits and legal submissions to support the charge that the US missile deployment in the UK violated international law and the US constitution. For twenty-four hours, peace camps sprang up outside 102 US military bases in Britain. The Federal Court dismissed the case in July 1984 on the grounds that there were no ‘judicially manageable standards’ for a decision.
I loved the empowering feeling it gave us women to do NonViolent Direct Action. I remember one woman [outside Greenham] said to me that [as females] we shouldn’t bother with questions of defence, so I felt quite strongly that it was wonderful to have a women’s group. The camp was divided into rainbow colours and we went to the Green Gate.
In one of the discussions at the Peace Camp, somebody said the government is always charging us with breaking the law, why don’t we take them to court for breaking the law? Then another woman said, but we can’t take the UK government to law because the missiles are US. ‘OK’, was the reply, ‘then we will take the US government to court.’
Accordingly, a group of women flew to New York and contacted the Centre for Constitutional Rights to set about preparing the case. Early on, it was said that funds would be needed and so speaking tours were set up for various UK women to travel around the US. I finally went in the Fall of 1986, doing a long tour through the midwest from St Louis, working my way north to Milwaukee. By this time the case had been lost as under the US constitution questions of foreign policy ‘cannot be put’ to the Supreme Court. However, I did do more tours raising awareness of concerns about nuclear weapons. To this day, I am still in touch with US anti-nuclear and peace activists.
There have been interviews in the press about women’s experiences at Greenham, but very little has been said about [the campaigning] afterwards, except of course that the cruise missiles and the base have now gone. I think it is important to show what inspirational work emerged from Greenham. For example, a network was formed of Women Working for a Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific. Gwyn Kirk, in the US, set up a Pacific women’s network and has just held a webinar, ‘Pacific Women say “No!” to Nuclear Colonialism’. Here in the UK, so many women went on to become active in the CND, including for example, my friend Pat Sanchez, who has campaigned with me over the years against all nuclear weapons, but particularly against the UK’s part in the US Trident nuclear armed submarine fleet.
Christina Lawson from Lewes Meeting visited Greenham with Woodbrooke.
On 12 December 1982, I drove down with two other carloads of international women from Woodbrooke to join the day of ‘hands around the base’. We took with us photos and other personal mementos to attach to the fence. One of our party, a slender Indian woman, had only sandals and an inadequate coat so was not up to walking round the base, which the others in our party did, so I stayed with her in one place, joining in the ‘hands around the base’ and to my surprise ending up on a photo on a postcard. I still have one of these (somewhere). I remember an extremely cold day, and great comradeship among the women, though one of our number, a man, who had driven a group of women down in his car, did not receive a warm welcome from women campers at the main gate.
On 12 December 1997, I went down with two former colleagues from Woodbrooke. About fifty of us, mainly Quakers, celebrated the reclamation of the common on a beautiful sunny day.
