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Movements, leaders, victories and the continuing fight for equality.
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In August 1908, a white mob attacked Springfield, Illinois’s Black community, destroying homes and businesses and lynching two Black men. National outrage over the violence helped spur the movement that created the NAACP the following year.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
A despatch rider (or dispatch) is a military messenger, mounted on horse or motorcycle (and occasionally in Egypt during World War I, on camels).[1]
In the UK 'despatch rider' is also a term used for a motorcycle courier.
Despatch riders were used by armed forces to deliver urgent orders and messages between headquarters and military units. They had a vital role at a time when telecommunications were limited and insecure. They were also used to deliver carrier pigeons.
In the British Army, motorcycle despatch riders were first used in World War I by the Royal Engineers Signal Service. When the War Department called for motorcyclists to volunteer with their machines for despatch work at the start of August 1914, the response was huge.[2] The London office had 2000 more applicants than places, and a similar response was reported in regional centres around the country. If a rider and machine were approved then £10 was paid immediately, £5 to be paid on discharge (unless due to misconduct), and pay was 35s per week. The motor cycle would be taken over at valuation price, or would be replaced with a new one at the close of operations. Enlistment was for one year or as long as the war might last. The preference was for 500cc single cylinder machines and the horizontally opposed twin cylinder. All machines had to have a "change speed gear". The following list of spares was also required to be carried :
Recruitment was not just for the army; the Admiralty in Chatham bought 50 Triumphs in 1914 for despatch rider duties, and many unsuccessful applicants were accepted by Scotland Yard on different terms to patrol country districts and distribute royal proclamations. These bikes carried a plate on the front with the lettering "O.H.M.S.".
As the war progressed the wide variety of volunteered machinery presented maintenance and spares problems, and so were progressively replaced by a limited range of military models, and in specific regions of the world or parts of the service only one of these models might be found, for example the RAF (formerly the RFC) exclusively used P&M motorcycles by the later stages of the war (they also included female riders).[3]
In August 1914 it was reported that the despatch riders for the Belgian and Russian armies were equipped exclusively with F.N. motor cycles.[4] However, one month later the Belgian government ordered 50 3 hp Enfield motorcycles for despatch riders. At this time the French Army were still mobilising, but it was reported they had a squad of Triumphs as well as a variety of French makes.[2] Douglas supplied 100 machines to the Italian Government for despatch purposes in 1916, and by this time the French despatch riders were also using BSAs and Triumphs.[5]
The US Army entered the war in 1917, and their messengers were equipped principally with Indian and Harley-Davidson motorcycles.
A September 1914 account states that French despatch riders, like the British, are equipped with revolvers, whereas their German counterparts are equipped with Mausers.[6]
During World War II despatch riders were often referred to as Don Rs (from phonetic spelling for D in "DR") in Commonwealth forces.[7] In World War II, Royal Corps of Signals soldiers carried out the role and the Royal Signals Motorcycle Display Team was formed from their number. They were also used by the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy, where they maintained contact with land bases and some of the riders were members of the Women's Royal Naval Service. In the UK, Bletchley Park initially received transmissions from the listening stations (Y-stations) by despatch rider, but this was later switched to teleprinter transmission.
The British military often used Triumph, Norton, BSA, Matchless and Ariel for despatch riders, and although radio communications were much more advanced during WW II than WW I - huge numbers were produced (e.g. over 75,000 Norton 16H models).
The German army reintroduced despatch riders in 2019, equipped with the BMW F850GS, in order to be capable of communicating under heavy electronic warfare conditions.[8]
Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
A despatch rider (or dispatch) is a military messenger, mounted on horse or motorcycle (and occasionally in Egypt during World War I, on camels). In the UK 'despatch rider' is also a term used for a motorcycle courier. Despatch riders were used by armed forces to deliver urgent orders and messages between headquarters and military units. They had a vital role at a time when telecommunications were limited and insecure. They were also used to deliver carrier pigeons.
Huggy Leaver (born Hugh Leaver), sometimes credited as Huggy Lever, is a British actor and former vocalist of The Plastix, an early UK Punk band. He subsequently became lead singer of the Hastings Mod Revival Band Teenbeats from 1979-1982. He has appeared in Trial & Retribution, Birds of a Feather, A Touch of Frost and Black Books. He also played Paul in Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Mario in the 2000 film Going Off Big Time and appeared as a cab driver in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen and the pawn shop owner in Fast & Furious 6. More recently, he played the recurrent role of Clint in EastEnders and Delivery Man 2 in Never Let Me Go. He has a love of motorcycles and has customized some in the streetfighter style, as created by designer/artist Andy Sparrow, in his strip Bloodrunners in the 1980s. One such streetfighter was featured in the 1995 movie Mad dogs and Englishmen and ridden by C. Thomas Howell's despatch rider character.
Sir Charles Edward Kingsford Smith (9 February 1897 – 8 November 1935), nicknamed Smithy, was an Australian aviation pioneer. He piloted the first transpacific flight and the first flight between Australia and New Zealand. Kingsford Smith was born in Brisbane. He grew up in Sydney, leaving school at the age of 16 and becoming an engineering apprentice. He joined the Australian Army in 1915 and was a motorcycle despatch rider on the Gallipoli campaign. He later transferred to the Royal Flying Corps and was awarded the Military Cross in 1917 after being shot down. After the war's end, Kingsford Smith worked as a barnstormer in England and the United States before returning to Australia in 1921. He subsequently joined West Australian Airways as one of the country's first commercial pilots. In 1928, Kingsford Smith completed the first transpacific flight, a three-leg journey from California to Brisbane via Hawaii and Fiji. He and his co-pilot Charles Ulm became celebrities, together with crew members James Warner and Harry Lyon. In the same year he and Ulm completed the first non-stop flight across Australia from Melbourne to Perth and the first non-stop flight from Australia to New Zealand. They subsequently established Australian National Airways, but the airline and Kingsford Smith's other business ventures failed to achieve commercial success. He continued to participate in air races and to attempt other aviation feats. In 1935, Kingsford Smith and his co-pilot Tommy Pethybridge disappeared over the Andaman Sea while attempting to break the Australia–England speed record. He was fêted as a national hero during the Great Depression and received numerous honours during his lifetime. After his death Sydney's primary airport was named in his memory and he was featured on the Australian twenty-dollar note for several decades.
Harry Harbord "Breaker" Morant (born Edwin Henry Murrant, 9 December 1864 – 27 February 1902) was an English horseman, bush balladist, military officer and war criminal who was convicted and executed for murdering nine prisoners-of-war (POWs) and three captured civilians in three separate incidents during the Second Boer War. Morant travelled to the Australian colonies in 1883 and for more than fifteen years he worked in a variety of occupations in Queensland, New South Wales and South Australia, during which time he developed a reputation as a horseman and bush balladist. In 1899 he enlisted in the second contingent of the South Australian Mounted Rifles to be sent by the government of that colony to serve as part of the British Empire forces fighting in South Africa during the Second Boer War. Morant embarked as a corporal and ended his term of service as a sergeant, having spent much of his time as a despatch rider. He then returned to England for six months while he unsuccessfully sought to clear some debts. Returning to South Africa, Morant received a commission as a lieutenant with an irregular regiment – the Bushveldt Carbineers. He was arrested and court-martialled for committing murder on active service – one of the first such prosecutions in British military history. According to military prosecutors, Morant retaliated for the death in combat of his squadron commander – a close friend – with a series of revenge killings against both Boer POWs and many civilian residents of the Northern Transvaal. Morant's defence attorney, Major James Francis Thomas, asserted that his clients should be acquitted, claiming that they were acting in accordance with superior orders not to take prisoners. Despite this, Thomas was unable to establish that an order to that effect had been issued. Morant was accused of the summary execution of Floris Visser, a wounded POW, and the slaying of four Afrikaners and four Dutch schoolteachers who had surrendered at the Elim Hospital, five of whom were members of the Soutpansberg Commando. Morant was found guilty and sentenced to death. Morant and Lieutenant Peter Handcock were then court-martialled for the murder of the Reverend Carl August Daniel Heese, a South African–born Minister of the Berlin Missionary Society. Heese had spiritually counselled the Dutch and Afrikaner victims at Elim Hospital and had been shot to death the same afternoon. Morant and Handcock were acquitted of the Heese murder, but their sentences for murdering Visser, the eight victims at Elim Hospital, and three others were implemented by a firing squad from the Cameron Highlanders on 27 February 1902. Morant and Handcock have become folk heroes in modern Australia, representing a turning point for Australians' self-determination and independence from British rule. Their court-martial and death have been the subject of books, a stage play and an award-winning Australian New Wave film by director Bruce Beresford. Upon its release during 1980, Beresford's film both brought Morant's life story to a worldwide audience and "hoisted the images of the accused officers to the level of Australian icons and martyrs". Despite the seriousness of the evidence and charges against them, some modern Australians regard Morant and Handcock as scapegoats or even as victims of judicial murder. They continue to attempt, with some public support, to obtain a posthumous pardon or even a new trial. According to South African historian Charles Leach, "In the opinion of many South Africans, particularly descendants of victims as well as other involved persons in the far Northern Transvaal, justice was only partially achieved by the trial and the resultant sentences. The feeling still prevails that not all the guilty parties were dealt with – the notorious Captain Taylor being the most obvious one of all."
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Joe Louis.