All posts by jwbaker

James Baker is Director of Digital Humanities at the University of Southampton. James is a Software Sustainability Institute Fellow, a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, and holds degrees from the University of Southampton and latterly the University of Kent, where in 2010 he completed his doctoral research on the late-Georgian artist-engraver Isaac Cruikshank. James works at the intersection of history, cultural heritage, and digital technologies. He is currently working on a history of knowledge organisation in twentieth century Britain. In 2021, I begin a major new Arts and Humanities Research Council funded project 'Beyond Notability: Re-evaluating Women’s Work in Archaeology, History and Heritage, 1870 – 1950'. Previous externally funded research projects have focused on legacy descriptions of art objects ('Legacies of Catalogue Descriptions and Curatorial Voice: Opportunities for Digital Scholarship', Arts and Humanities Research Council), the preservation of intangible cultural heritage ('Coptic Culture Conservation Collective', British Council, and 'Heritage Repertoires for inclusive and sustainable development', British Academy), the born digital archival record ('Digital Forensics in the Historical Humanities', European Commission), and decolonial futures for museum collections ('Making African Connections: Decolonial Futures for Colonial Collections', Arts and Humanities Research Council). Prior to joining Southampton, James held positions of Senior Lecturer in Digital History and Archives at the University of Sussex and Director of the Sussex Humanities Lab, Digital Curator at the British Library, and Postdoctoral Fellow with the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art. He is a member of the Arts and Humanities Research Council Peer Review College, a convenor of the Institute of Historical Research Digital History seminar, a member of The Programming Historian Editorial Board and a Director of ProgHist Ltd (Company Number 12192946), and an International Advisory Board Member of British Art Studies.
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Memory and Remembrance – Part 2: Nelson

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The work I have been undertaking for the British Cartoon Archive‘s JISC funded CARD project is now taking shape. This second post on a teaching aid I am creating called ‘Memory and Remembrance’ (first post here), gives you a work-in-progress glimpse at what I am up to. Here I discuss the use of Nelson as symbol in British cartooning. Enjoy!

(c) News International, British Cartoon Archive, University of Kent, Paul Rigby, The Sun, 15 Dec 1972. http://www.cartoons.ac.uk/record/23585

Perhaps the most significant and long-lasting legislative decision of Edward Heath’s single term premiership was to take Britain into the European Economic Community (later European Union) on 1 January 1973. The Labour opposition, still led by Harold Wilson, was fundamentally divided over the issue, and on 13 December the party leadership voted to boycott the EEC Assembly in which they were due to have a presence on British accession to the EEC.

Wilson thus becomes Nelson, blissfully ignorant of long-term political realities (‘IGNORE IT – IT’LL GO AWAY!’) and how splits have bogged down his party – his shipmates are the pro-Europe Roy Jenkins (front-right), who led 69 Labour ministers to cross party lines and vote with the Conservatives for entry to the EEC, and the anti-Europe Michael Foot (rear-left). Rigby underlines the ‘I’ in ‘I SEE NO EUROPE’ to highlight Wilson’s distance from the unions, whose far-left leadership had voted en bloc at recent party conferences in favour of Labour support for pan-European market economics.

Wilson-cum-Nelson is thus an antiquated isolationist political symbol. And he and his ship contrast starkly with the Heath’s modern vessel speeding across the horizon – splendidly named ‘TED II’.

(c) Associated Newspapers Ltd. / Solo Syndication, British Cartoon Archive, University of Kent, Patrick Blower, Evening Standard, 13 Feb 2003. http://www.cartoons.ac.uk/record/63953

For example Cummings uses these constructions to reproach Prime Minister Harold Wilson for his denial of opposition claims, in the run up to the 1970 General Election, that crime was out of control.

Blower, in a cartoon published exactly 33 years later, deploys a similar if more ambitious design. In doing so he returns to the column the symbolic grandeur it would have possessed upon construction, now diminished by the presence of much taller structures in the metropolis. The memorial thus watches over the nation once more, yet the Blair-cum-Nelson found atop it has propelled the column to such a height that he is disconnected with that which underpins his platform. We are then presented with a pseudo-Ivory Tower, for whilst Blair say ‘YES!’ to proposed war with Iraq, his people resolutely state ‘NO TO WAR’. Days later on 15 February 2003 tens of millions took part in a coordinated international day on protest. Despite this US, British, Polish and Australian forces invaded Iraq on 19 March 2003. The combat mission in Iraq ceased officially on 31 August 2010, though a US occupying force remains in place. Casualty estimates differ, but it is claimed that between 500,000 and 1 million people have died as a result of the conflict. Blower’s cartoon suggests that it is Blair and not the British people who must be held accountable for this loss of life.