M.Newby. A critical analysis of ‘Wartime Holidays and the “Myth of the Blitz”’, Cultural and Social History by Chris Sladen

The central thesis of Sladen’s 2005 paper, ‘Wartime Holidays and the “Myth of the Blitz”’ is, first and foremost, a challenge to the dominant view of historians, such as A. Jenkins, and the general public, that wartime ‘holidays, if any, were spent at home’ [1]. It is also an exploration of contemporary attitudes towards holidaying during wartime, and an analysis of these facts in light of the ‘Myth of the Blitz’ historiographical debate.

Sladen first argues that, rather than refraining from leisure travel during the war, civilians did indeed holiday away from home. Through the examination of travel statistics, Sladen provides evidence to support this assertion. Then, through the examination of surveys, personal memoirs, diaries, and other contemporary records, Sladen challenges the enduring belief ‘that during the Second World War British families enjoyed a novel sense of community, born of shared danger and sacrifice, witnessing a breakdown or blurring of class boundaries’[2], reframing our view of the home front by demonstrating that civilians were able to retain a degree of pre-war normalcy.

In this sense, Sladen is engaging directly with, and contributing to, the ‘Myth of the Blitz’ historiographical debate. The broad gist of this argument, first posited by Angus Calder, is that the ‘Stiff upper lip……blurring of social boundaries’[3] cliché was an exaggeration ‘wittingly or unwittingly’ cultivated for propagandist ends. Calder, and by extension Sladen, argue that this myth served more as a code of conduct to ‘maximize effort and preserve national unity’[4] rather than an objective reporting of reality.

That Sladen argues that pre-war class boundaries were longer lasting than the myth of that era might have the unwary historian believe, is a fascinating point of difference with the findings of Keith Wrightson in his essay, ‘Sorts of People’ in Tudor and Stuart England’. The pervasive myth of the 17^th Century, held among historians, was that society was delineated with ‘fine-grained…distinctions of the formal hierarchy’, and Wrightson points to Gough’s account of the parishioners of Myddle to demonstrate that, in reality, social hierarchy was more blurred and complex than the widely accepted ‘graduated ladder of subordination and reciprocal obligation’[5].

In truth though, Sladen and Wrightson’s views are not contradictory. Both scholars are arguing in their own way that reality was, in fact, more complex than our collective imagination would have us believe. It is ultimately the point of historical studies to discover the discrepancies between real, lived experiences and the catch-all clichés we use as a shortcut to model an era in our minds. As Ludmilla Jordanova says, ‘if historians treat the past in too tidy a manner they lose a great deal’[6], or as Ian Dunt so eloquently paraphrased, ‘We can eat up the vanilla slop we’ve been given… but the reality is no less rewarding and will actually make you think……History is never as neat as you want it to be.’[7].

Returning to Sladen’s arguments, they are evidenced with a wide range of really excellent sources. He follows Jordanova’s advice in his eclecticism[8] by interrogating both quantitative and qualitative sources of evidence and discovers discrepancies between the dominant narrative and the recorded experiences of individuals during wartime.

First, Sladen parses travel statistics from the era with sources such as the Ministry of Transports’ own records of travel during the 1930s and 40s, in the form of C.I. Savage’s Inland Transport. While this source was published in 1957, it is in fact a primary source and the data included was recorded contemporaneously.

Sladen compares the annual and monthly travel statistics pre-war and during wartime, as reported by Savage. He notes an increase in travel during the war, and a notable spike in the summer months. However, this source does not record reasons for travel, and Sladen notes that much of these spikes could be due to reasons other than holidaying civilians.

Alone, this source of travel statistics is clearly not proof positive of the central thesis, so he compares them with Great Western Rail’s (GWR) records, another primary source from the era[9]. This source clearly indicates reasons for travel and does show an increase in leisure/holiday excursions during the war. The only drawback of this source, however, is that it is limited in scope, as GWR was and still is a regional rail operator. Nonetheless, it is clear that holidays did continue during the war, at least for some people.

Sladen uses Mass-Observation survey data to dig deeper than the objective and interrogate contemporary attitudes towards travel, and he finds that the majority were indeed in favour of wartime holidaying[10]. Once again, this marginally more qualitative data is contemporary and can be considered a primary source. Its only drawback is its relatively small sample size of 150. How statistically representative this could be said to be is questionable, especially by modern standards[11]. 

Sladen’s most qualitative sources are the memoirs and diaries he references. Sladen references the remembered stories featured in the book, How We Lived Then[12], as well as a number of autobiographical works. These accounts are more detailed but are also, to an almost equal degree, less reliable than the aforementioned quantitative sources. This is because they are first person accounts written many decades after the time they are describing. Memories are unreliable[13], and people are prone to biases and exaggeration, they also have the benefit of hindsight and historical perspective. But, as Tosh says, ‘History is both a form of memory and a discipline that draws on memory as source material.’[14].

Taken together, Sladen’s cross-referential approach to evidencing his argument is both academically robust and personally convincing, and he closes his argument by focusing on the history of a specific locale, Blackpool. By narrowing his geographical study on one seaside town, he is able to bring both qualitative and quantitative sources together in a way that clearly supports his thesis.

Local historians might use Sladen’s research as a reason to reconsider the narrative of the home front during WWII in their own locales, exploring how their communities fit or deviated from national stories of endurance and sacrifice. Sladen ultimately shows that Carr is right in his assertion that history is a discourse and it cannot be said to be completed[15] – there is still more for historians to uncover about the realities of WWII.

Certainly, the sources Sladen has chosen would be of great use to local historians interested in that time period, and his analysis provides a framework for reassessing local histories through a combination of hard data and the lived experiences of individuals.

Beyond that, this work is a testament to the human spirit. Sladen notes that ‘although slogans such as ‘Is Your Journey Really Necessary?’, ‘Make Do And Mend’ and ‘Careless Talk Costs Lives’ have passed into the English language, their impact on the way people behaved at the time may have been quite small.’[16], it’s clear that one such slogan accurately described the attitudes of Brits holidaying during the war, as they endeavoured to ‘keep calm and carry on’ at least in terms of their seaside holidays.

As Tosh says, ‘Our sense of… the resourcefulness [human beings] may show in a crisis… are nourished by knowing what has been thought and done in the very different contexts of the past.’[17].

Works Cited

C. Sladen, Wartime Holidays and the ‘Myth of the Blitz’, Cultural and Social History, 2:2, (2005)

A. Jenkins, The Forties (London, 1977)

A. Calder, People’s War and Myth (London, 1969)

J. Barry (ed) The Middling Sort of People: cultures, society and politics in England, 1550-1800 (1994)

L. J. Jordanova, History in Practice (Bloomsbury pbk, 3rd edn, 2019)

I. Dunt, D. Lynskey ‘The Suffragettes – Part Two – By any means necessary’, Origin Story, [Podcast], (2024)

P. Semmens, History of the Great Western Railway (London, 1985)

O.S. Nock, History of the Great Western Railway (Shepperton, 1967)

C. Barman, Next Station (London, 1947)

G.Blank, DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT RESEARCH WORKING GROUP Survey Technical Guidance: Samples, Design and Analysis, (2015)

J.W. Lacy, Stark CEL. The neuroscience of memory: implications for the courtroom. Nat Rev Neurosci. (2013)

N. Longmate, How We Lived Then (London, 1971)

J. Tosh, The Pursuit of History (Longman pbk, 6th edn 2015)

E. H. Carr, What is History (Penguin Books, 1961)

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[1] A. Jenkins, The Forties, (London, 1977) p.25

[2] C. Sladen, Wartime Holidays and the ‘Myth of the Blitz’, Cultural

and Social History, 2:2, (2005) p.216

[3] A. Calder, People’s War and Myth, (London, 1969), passim;

[4] C. Sladen, Wartime Holidays and the ‘Myth of the Blitz’, Cultural

and Social History, 2:2, (2005) p.243

[5] K. Wrightson, Sorts of People’ in Tudor and Stuart England, J. Barry (ed) The Middling Sort of People: cultures, society and politics in England, 1550-1800 (1994) p.30

[6] L. J. Jordanova, History in Practice (Bloomsbury pbk, 3rd edn, 2019), passim.

[7] I. Dunt, ‘The Suffragettes – Part Two – By any means necessary’, Origin Story, [Podcast], (2024), (Accessed:30 Oct 2024)

[8] L. J. Jordanova, History in Practice (Bloomsbury pbk, 3rd edn, 2019), passim.

[9] P. Semmens, History of the Great Western Railway (London, 1985) vol. 3, p. 36: O.S. Nock, History of the Great Western Railway (Shepperton, 1967) vol. 3, p. 187; C. Barman, Next Station (London, 1947) p. 11.

[10] C. Sladen, Wartime Holidays and the ‘Myth of the Blitz’, Cultural

and Social History, 2:2, (2005) p.226

[11] G.Blank, DIGITAL ENGAGEMENT RESEARCH WORKING GROUP Survey Technical Guidance: Samples, Design and Analysis, (2015), p.3, Website: Gov.UK, Accessed 21 Oct 2024)

[12] N. Longmate, How We Lived Then (London, 1971) pp. 43, 456–61

[13] J.W. Lacy, Stark CEL. The neuroscience of memory: implications for the courtroom. Nat Rev Neurosci. (2013). Passim.

[14] J. Tosh, The Pursuit of History (Longman pbk, 6th edn 2015), p.326

[15] E. H. Carr, What is History (Penguin Books, 1961), passim.

[16] C. Sladen, Wartime Holidays and the ‘Myth of the Blitz’, Cultural

and Social History, 2:2, (2005) p.224

[17] J. Tosh, The Pursuit of History (Longman pbk, 6th edn 2015), p.47