Comrades in Conscience: The Story of an English Community's Opposition to the Great War. This item is unavailable.Comrades in Conscience: The Story of an English Community's Opposition to the Great War

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Tragically, war seems to be something of a constant in human history: so is widespread opposition to it. In Comrades in Conscience, Cyril Pearce has provided a clearly written and well-documented study of "an English Community's Opposition to the Great War"--the community in question being Huddersfield. The book argues that this city saw a powerful movement of popular disdain for mass-killing and the political obfuscation and lies that were felt to accompany it.

Pearce, from Huddersfield and a lecturer at the University of Leeds, has written a lively and detailed account of how a strong, local, multi-faceted socialist and non-Conformist Christian movement refused to accept the prevailing wisdom about World War I. As with the best history, the study enables us to ask better questions of ourselves and our own times and its war passions. Comrades in Conscience is still a very relevant book and, perhaps, that's the most disappointing thing about it. --George Bowman