The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament was founded in 1958 and its first wave of activism peaked in the early 1960s at a time when fears of nuclear war were at their height. The movement against nuclear weapons started a few years earlier, with a key campaigner being the Methodist minister Donald Soper (1903-1998) - who incidentally went to Haberdashers school in New Cross.
In October 1955 'a ten day peace campaign by South London pacifists' included showings of the Japanese film 'Children on Hiroshima', documenting the impact of the first use of a nuclear weapon ten years previously. The film was shown 'in Bromley library and various church halls in Bellingham, Downham, Lewisham and Catford culminating in a public meeting in Lewisham Town Hall.
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| Peace News 7 October 1955 |
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| Lewisham Borough News, 11 October 1955. Venues for film shows including St Dunstan's Church Hall, Bellingham; Public Library, Bromley High Street; Wesley Church Hall, Downham; St Mark's Church Hall, Lewisham; St Laurence Church Hall, Catford; St Luke's Church Hall, Downham |
400 people attended the event in Lewisham Town Hall on 25 October 1955 with an extra hall being needed to accommodate demand. As well as the film showing, Dr Soper gave a socialist and pacifist speech quoting from Joseph Rotblat (a physicist who had walked away from the Manhattan Project that developed the first nuclear bomb) 'Two of every three people don't have enough to eat. Economically we can have guns or butter but not both. The world must dedicate itself to producing necessities for the life of its increasing population or it will squander its resources in killing suddenly those who do not starve slowly'. Also speaking was Sybil Morrison (1893-1984). Born in Sunderland Road, Forest Hill she was active in the women's suffrage movement then a lifelong peace activist.
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| Peace News 4 November 1955 |
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