THE STORY: 10 YEARS ON...
"All of us were shocked by what we saw: police tactics which seemed to break new grounds in the scale and intensity of it's violence. We saw police throw hammers, stones and other missiles through the windscreens of advancing vehicles; a woman dragged away by the hair; young men beaten over the head with truncheons as they tried to surrender; police using sledgehammers to smash up the interiors of the hippies' coaches."
10 years ago yesterday, the so-called Peace Convoy made it's way to the Stonehenge Free Festival as people had been doing since 1974.
It was late afternoon before a long chain of 140 rumbling, wheezing buses, vans, ambulances and cars started to curl out of Savernake Forest towards Stonehenge, most unaware of the High Court Injunctions banning them from going near their planned destination. Near the Stones the road was blocked and the convoy diverted down a narrow country lane. This road was also blocked. Suddenly a group of police officers came forward and started to break vehicle windows with their truncheons. The Convoy trapped, swung their vehicles into a field, crashing through a hedge.
For the next four hours there was an ugly stalemate. The Convoy started trying to negotiate, offering to abandon the festival and return to Savernake Forest or leave Wiltshire altogether. The police refused to negotiate and told them they could all surrender or face the consequences.
At ten past seven the 'battle' began. In the next half hour, the police operation "became a chaotic whirl of violence"
"At one point, I saw a youth inside a bus, surrounded by policeman, trying to give himself up. He climbed out of a broken window and found himself falling on a sea of policemen who-only a few feet in front of me-were leaning over each other to get a blow. I saw the young man's glasses swiped away from his face and his front teeth break under the raining blows."
"Above us, a police helicopter, circling overhead, barked down encouragement from a loadhailer: 'You're doing a great job. This is the way they like it.'"
"The occupants pleaded to be allowed to leave. The windows were smashed by police and occupants were dragged out through a storm of truncheons; broken heads, broken teeth, broken spectacles. Officers started to climb through the broken windows, lashing out on all sides with their sticks. Reporters screamed at police to calm down."
The Earl of Cardigan, secretary of the Marlborough Conservative Association, was one of the witnesses to the events: He saw a baby lifted out of its cot "It was covered in glass from head to foot."
Four hundred and twenty people were arrested-the largest mass arrest of
civilians for hundreds of years-and taken to holding cells throughout the south
of England. Travellers homes were systematically smashed, looted and burnt.
Seven dogs were destroyed by the RSPCA.
One woman who drove a young girl back to her bus said: 'Everything inside the bus was broken: her guitar and her camera were smashed, the posters had been torn off the wall, there was food and clothes piled up in the middle of the floor. Even the yoghurts had been stabbed and spilled over everything. The poor girl just couldn't stop crying: 'This is my home; they've smashed up my home.'"
The Convoy had been portrayed by the media as a 'marauding army of crazed hippies'. After the 'battle' the BBC showed a row of ordinary household implements described as 'weapons gathered up'. On ITN, fleeing drivers became virtually potential murderers. Reporter Kim Sabidos' commentary was replaced by voice-over and some of the most horrific footage disappeared from the ITN library.
So why did the authorities react with such ferocity spending £5 million in the process? Since the seventies more and more people were taking to the road. The number of people who were living in buses had been doubling every year for four years. It was anarchy in action, and it was seen to be working by so many people that they wanted to be a part of it too.
"Those in authority are scared of us coming together-to sing, dance and be merry. They'd much rather us at home watching t.v., shopping on a Saturday, roast on a Sunday; eyes closed, ears shut, whilst the whole shit collapses round our ears.......
But don't listen to us-you know you have to see it, feel it. Get out there wide-eyed and experience life...it's there for the taking."
Speaking yesterday from his double decker at Stonehenge on the 10th anniversary of the Beanfield, veteran 'Decker Lyn' said: "All I remember is the noise and the breaking of vehicles. They trashed our vehicle but that didn't stop us. We've carried on doing festivals ever since."
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