Mass trespass of Kinder Scout
As Mass trespass of Kinder Scout (German: Unauthorized mass apprehended by Kinder Scout - the English word trespass referred violating private property rights) was announced on April 24, 1932 protest in which many hikers without permission the mountain plateau Kinder Scout versed to take action against the then still very restrictive right of way in the United Kingdom .
prehistory
In England and Wales there is no general right of access , but a network of public rights of way which, in addition to the roads, provides connection options for hikers, cyclists and riders ( e.g. public footpaths and public bridleways ). This network has developed over the centuries but only allows landowners to enter large areas of England and Wales.
The Commons Preservation Society (now Open Spaces Society ) was founded in 1865 with the aim of opening up paths, parks and forests to the public, including Regent's Park , Kew Gardens and Hampton Court Park . However, their success did not meet the expectations of walking clubs that had the 19th to the end and increasingly formed at the beginning of the 20th century and a right to roam (the right - on private land - to wander) along the lines of Every man law demanded. Most of them were representatives of the working class and the growing number of unemployed people. It is estimated that around 15,000 Manchester workers went hiking every Sunday in 1932 .
The Peak District , a highland that reaches its highest point in the Berg Kinder Scout at 636 meters, lies between the metropolitan areas of Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield and was therefore a destination for hiking groups from these cities. Of the approximately 600 km² area, however, not even 5 km², i.e. less than 1%, could be used publicly on twelve different paths, so that many hikers were on these routes. Leaving the path led to conflicts with the landowners' game rangers. One of the demands of the hiking associations was to open a path to the Kinder Scout whenever the land was not used. Due to poor soil, the Peak District was mainly used for hunting, in the area around Kinder Scout only about a dozen days a year.
The hike
_-_geograph.org.uk_-_80943.jpg)
The Lancashire section of the British Workers' Sports Federation (BWSF), founded in 1928 to organize soccer games and build new sports fields, in 1932 called on its mostly Communist Party members to wander in a large group to the Kinder Scout after it came to There were again incidents with hunting rangers on Easter and there was no progress in the talks of the official hiking association, to which the BWSF was not a member, towards the right to roam . On Sunday, April 24th, over 400 hikers set off above the village of Hayfield in the west of the Kinder Scout, singing “ The International ”. Halfway up the mountain there was a scuffle with eight game rangers from the Duke of Devonshire, in which a ranger was injured in the ankle. After that, the hiking group moved on and met a group on the mountain who had come from the east side of the mountain.
On the way back, the group from Manchester was stopped in the valley by the police and rangers. Five hikers were arrested for breaking the peace, a sixth had been arrested earlier. Of the six arrested, including the communist activist Benny Rothman (1911–2002), four were workers, one unemployed and one student. Five of the six arrested were sentenced to between two and six months in prison for violence against the rangers.
Effects
Hiking clubs that belonged to the official hiking association distanced themselves from the action of the BWSF, since they understood the right of way to be respected, and condemned them sharply. The conviction of the hikers, on the other hand, led to a wave of public sympathy for the goals of the migration movement.
This led to the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act , passed in 1949, which aimed to create national parks and public access. When the Peak District was declared England's first national park in 1951 , Kinder Scout access was also opened a year later, along with about 60% of the Peak District. On November 30, 2000, the Countryside and Rights of Way Act finally came into force, which allows the right to roam in many highlands and other unused areas of England and Wales.
On the 50th anniversary of the events, a plaque was inaugurated by Benny Rothman at the starting point of the hike in 1982, and the chairman of the hiking association published a play on the 60th anniversary. Ewan MacColl and the Chumbawamba group each wrote a song about what happened . The 22-kilometer “Trespass Trail” follows the old hiking route.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ History of the Open Spaces Society
- ↑ a b c d e Archived copy ( memento of the original from February 21, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ a b c http://kindestrespass.com/index.asp?ID=37
- ↑ a b c Guardian newspaper report, April 25, 1932
- ↑ http://kindestrespass.com/index.asp?ID=39
- ↑ Map of the hiking trail ( Memento of the original dated May 7, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF file; 92 kB)
