In the 1930s Britain was a country of unemployment and worry. Some people looked for someone to blame. This lesson looks at newcomers who arrived to escape danger, and at a political movement that turned fear of them into hatred.
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Unlock This CourseHitler became ruler of Germany in 1933. His Nazi government treated Jewish people as enemies. Laws took away their jobs and their rights. After the violence of Kristallnacht in November 1938, when Jewish homes, shops and synagogues across Germany and Austria were attacked, many more tried to flee. Britain was one of the places that let some of them in.
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By 1939 tens of thousands of Jewish refugees had reached Britain. This included nearly 10,000 children who came without their parents on the Kindertransport, between December 1938 and September 1939. Many of their parents could not follow.
The government did not open the doors wide. Refugees usually needed someone in Britain to promise to support them, so that they would not rely on public money. Jewish and other charities paid for much of the help.
There had been earlier waves of Jewish immigration. From the 1880s to 1914 many Jews fled persecution in the Russian Empire, and many settled in the East End of London. So by the 1930s the East End already had a large Jewish community, which is why it became the main target of the BUF.
Refugees added to British life. Some were scientists and doctors. Ernst Chain, who fled Germany in 1933, shared the 1945 Nobel Prize for work on penicillin. But refugees also met suspicion. Some people claimed they were taking jobs and homes during the Depression, even though the numbers were small.
Oswald Mosley was a former Conservative and Labour MP. In 1932 he founded the British Union of Fascists, after meeting the Italian fascist leader Mussolini. Its members wore black shirts, so they were known as Blackshirts. At first it blamed weak politicians for Britain's problems. Later it blamed Jewish people.
Blackshirts marched in uniform, saluted their leader and acted like an army. This frightened many people.
In January 1934 the Daily Mail, owned by Lord Rothermere, backed the BUF. Then at a rally at Olympia, London, in June 1934, Blackshirt stewards beat up hecklers. Many were shocked and support fell. Rothermere withdrew his backing.
After 1934 the BUF became openly antisemitic. It held marches and meetings in East End areas such as Bethnal Green and Stepney, where many Jewish families lived. Jewish people faced insults, attacks and smashed windows.
The BUF never won a seat in Parliament. But it made life frightening for many Jewish people, and it was against the entry of Jewish refugees.
On 4 October 1936 the BUF planned to march through the East End. Local people asked the government to ban it, but the Home Secretary did not. So thousands of people came to stop it, including Jewish residents, Irish dockers, trade unionists and communists. They built barricades across Cable Street, and their cry was "They shall not pass". Police tried to clear a path for the marchers and fighting broke out. In the end the police chief told Mosley that the march could not go ahead, and the Blackshirts were turned away.
The government now acted. The Public Order Act (passed in 1936, in force from 1 January 1937) banned political uniforms in public and let police ban marches that might cause serious disorder. Its limits: it was aimed at street violence, not at racial prejudice itself. There was still no law against racial discrimination.
What changed? After 1936 the BUF could no longer parade in black shirts, but it carried on in ordinary clothes until it was banned in 1940. What stayed the same? Prejudice did not vanish, and minorities still had no legal protection from discrimination.
This is a Paper 2 Section B (a) question. Give TWO ways and compare both sides each time. One way on its own can score no more than half marks (3 out of 6).
In 1919 riots broke out in port cities such as Liverpool and Cardiff, where crowds attacked black and other minority sailors and workers, and the government offered to pay for black people to leave Britain.
Explain TWO ways in which racial tension in Britain in 1936 was different from racial tension in 1919. [6 marks]
One difference is the cause. In 1919 the riots grew out of competition for jobs and housing after the war, as men came home and seamen of many backgrounds sought work in the ports. By 1936 the hostility was organised by a political party, the BUF, under Oswald Mosley. It marched in uniform and spread antisemitism as an idea, targeting Jewish families in the East End.
A second difference is the government's response. In 1919 the government offered to pay for black people to leave, so the victims were encouraged to go. In 1936, after the Battle of Cable Street, it passed the Public Order Act, which banned political uniforms and let police ban marches, so the action was aimed at the extremists.
What lifts it to the top level: each way names a precise fact for 1919 and for 1936, so the comparison is explicit on both sides.
In a "different" question, use the pattern "In 1919... whereas in 1936...". Put a named fact on each side, such as the Olympia rally or the Public Order Act, and do not write about one date only.