Bradford Peace Trail
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
             
   
15 Richard Cobden
  Richard Cobden (1804-1865) Inside Waterstones Bookshop, formerly the Wool Exchange, there is a statue of Richard Cobden who was MP for the West Riding of Yorkshire from 1847-1857.
He promoted peace and goodwill among nations with his Quaker friend John Bright, from Rochdale.
Specifically, they wanted an end to the Corn Laws that were causing hardship to the poor.
In 1839, they joined together in the Anti-Corn Law League and toured the country giving speeches on the reform of the Corn Laws. Later they campaigned together against the Crimea War (1854 - 1856). For this they were much abused in the press and some even accused them of treason. Both lost their Parliamentary seats as a result.
They also wanted free trade between nations as a means to promote peace and prosperity. Cobden worked with the Peace Society of the time - a national organisation in the mid-nineteenth century. His ideas owe much to the earlier (1693) writings of the Quaker William Penn (after whose father, William Penn, Pennsylvania, USA, was named) who had proposed a system of international arbitration to settle disputes between nations. As such this was a forerunner of the United Nations, so all three men were very much ahead of their time.
   
16 The Peace Museum
 
The Peace Museum is the only one in the UK. It is located in a city centre side street opposite Waterstones Bookshop, at 10 Piece Hall Yard.  
It has limited opening hours (Wednesday & Friday 11 - 3), and has a collection of posters & banners.
It concentrates on conflict resolution and has five different travelling exhibitions, including one on Bradford. These are available for borrowing anywhere in the world. Copies can be viewed in the museum.
The museum is an independent charitable trust. Although not directly linked with the Peace Studies Department of the University (see site 21) it has good informal links. It is well known internationally in the peace museum field and has contacts with the other 100 or so peace museums across the world.
 
17 Dietrich Bonhoeffer
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The Dietrich Bonhoeffer plaque was unveiled in 2006. It is on the outside of the German Evangelical Church (built c.1877)
     
in Great Horton Road opposite Bradford College. Bonhoeffer was a German pastor and theologian who campaigned against fascism in Germany. He was executed in 1945 for involvement in a plot to assassinate Hitler.
The plaque on the church wall commemorates the German Pastor's visit to Bradford in 1933, to a conference of the German Evangelical Clergy of Great Britain, when the Bradford Declaration was made. The declaration was about the political situation that was developing in Germany. It was a theological statement on the subordination of the Christian Gospel and the principles of the Reformation to the political expedience of the Reich Church government - a protest against Nazification of the Christian Church
The plaque celebrates his life as a 'Martyr in the anti-racist cause', though he himself would have been uncomfortable with this name of martyr. Rather, he saw himself as enduring the inevitable suffering that comes to those who stand up for what they believe is right.
Already the black lettering on the plaque is wearing away.
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