The full report of Aldermaston has besn "crowded out! but will appear in the next issue. Id. note.
The most significant feature of this year's Aldermaston demonstration was the way the last lap - the march from Hyde Park to the Houses of Parliament turned into a general anti-Government demonstration, On Hyde Park the 60 ta 70 thousand marchers were joined by perhaps an equal number of Londoners, Making what Frank Cousins said 'was perhaps not the biggest demonstration held in Britain but certainly the biggest demonstration of youth ever in Britain,' most them them joined the march to the Parliament Square. Once the demonstration reached “hite- Hall it soon got out of hand. Marchers, 50 or more abreast, soon spread right across Whitehall despite all the efforts of the police. Eventually they took over the whole of Whitehall and the traffic had to do its best to get through the crowds. On reaching the dispersal point on the iimbankment, the marchers patently ignoring Canon Collins speakng from a loudspeaker van refused to disperse and all the police could do was to guide them down the embankment, by the Houses of Parliament and up Whitehall again. By this time chaos ruled.
The character of the demonstration changed too — from a C.N.D. one to one which had as its dominant slogan 'Macmillan mist go'. This arose partially from the different composition of the demonstrators ouce it had entered London but principally because of tbe participation of the whose slogans gradually became the slogans of the demonstration, the most political of which was the chant 'Out with the Tories, out with Bomb — Labour to power, minus the bomb. The ranks of the left were swelled by the Young Socialists fresh from their battles at their conference. The atmosphere became explosive and it would have required just one incident to spark off a full scale riot. This was nearly provided when a hostile car drove into the crowd and one young socialist, a man who has written for this Bulletin, had to jump on the bonnet to avoid being run down. Angry dem— onstrators pulled open the doors of the car and set about the driver with their banners. However the police did not intervene - their orders must have been strict. liventually the combined efforts of the police and the 'resonsible!' C.N.D. stewards persuaded the crowds to disperse. So ended Aldermaston 1962. And what of 1963???