This week we attended a talk given by Ray Costello at the Central Library in Manchester. Ray is a historian who has had several books published about the history of Liverpool, focusing particularly on the long established Black community there. Ray talked about the difficulties faced by anyone who is interested specifically in Black British history and then went on to talk about some specific examples drawn from his excellent book, ‘Black Tommies’. Walter Tull was long thought to be the only example of a Black officer on the Western Front during World War One, the research done by Ray and other historians recently has proved that Walter Tull was not unique. It was a fascinating talk and it was lovely to have the opportunity to chat to Ray afterwards as his work has been a real inspiration for us.
The Central Library in Manchester really is a very impressive place and was an absolute hive of activity in the early evening when we were there. It brought home to us what a tremendous resource libraries are, which made it all the sadder to read in the paper on the train coming back to London of a local authority that is planning to close sixteen of its seventeen libraries, in spite of their popularity, as a means of saving money. It’s a real shame that local authorities are being placed in an impossible position by repeated budget cuts imposed by central government.