Durham at War – Mapping the story of County Durham and its people in the First World War

 

Mapping the Story of County Durham and its people in the First World War.

This is a First World War centenary project, supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund and run by the archive, museum and archaeology services at Durham County Council.

Durham at War is an interactive mapping website that will tell the story of County Durham and its people in the First World War. Launched on 10 September 2014, exactly one hundred years after the first Durham Light Infantry soldiers arrived in France with the British Expeditionary Force, the website will be live until the end of 2018. It will help to commemorate the role of Durham people at a momentous period in the county’s history. We hope that the website will act like a giant virtual jigsaw, making the links between the archives, objects and sites that survive today, and helping to uncover new stories about local communities 100 years ago.

From November members of the public will be able to log in to the website worldwide to add their own contributions and pin them to the interactive map. Until then please send information for the website by email.

This website is not designed to duplicate, rather to complement, existing web-based resources. It will use the interactive map to make the links between the rich diversity of information that is already available or is being developed online, and add new details from institutional and private collections that have never been accessible in a digital format before.

Throughout the centenary period project staff will run a series of research modules, training sessions and events to help volunteers explore relevant heritage collections in depth and publish their discoveries on the website.

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Durham at War – Mapping the story of County Durham and its people in the First World War.

Did Many People Lead Better Lives Because Of WW1?

Few people experienced an improvement in their lives as a direct result of war; weaponry, in isolation, achieved little more than death, or injury, or relief for those spared its lethal intent. However a case can be put that that many people experienced an improvement in their lives as a result of one or more of the social, economic, and political repercussions of war; assessing its magnitude is not straightforward and needs to be assessed in the longer term, in the light of considerable opportunity costs, with an eye on what might have been had war not occurred and by acknowledging the many restrictions on personal freedom represented by the Defence of the Realm Act.

It can be argued that the majority of people within the Home Front were able to take advantage, sooner or later, of one or more of the repercussions of war stated above and thus feel that they were living better lives. Three of the predominant groups [with some overlap] for consideration are: the workforce in general, young children, and women who gained the vote.

During World War One the law of supply and demand began to favour a large number of workers. The absence of many young men at war abroad, together with the restructuring of the economy onto a war footing, provided many new and often lucrative employment opportunities. Much existing heavy industry was stimulated by the need for war materials. The main gainers in this changed market brought about by war were the unskilled workers; on average their wages more than trebled during the period 1914-1918. The skilled workers were not far behind; most of them found that their wages had more than doubled.

Behind such wage increases there was much social, economic and political aggravation.  Most members of the working class were aware that labour shortages, and the urgent desire of the Government to ensure that war work progressed speedily, put them in an advantageous position. Trade unions were aware of it. There was a growing feeling within this class that its home conditions, and general standard of living, were very inferior to those of ‘superiors’.  They wanted, and largely got, improved wages; the weapon used to achieve it was strike action; there were a huge number of strikes and mandays lost as a result.