The violence upon the Broadwater Farm Estate, in north London, in 1985, suggests a prevalent instinct towards riot which has never been suppressed. It is necessary only to look into the inner courtyards of a council-house estate, with graffiti on every wall, the windows covered with metal grilles and the doors padlocked, to understand that state of siege in which part of London still lives. The anxiety is still palpable in certain districts, and along certain roads, where the forces of repressed anger and fear are overwhelmingly present. An additional and unpredictable element in the general level of city violence is added in those parts of London that are infected with drug gangs.
The Broadwater Farm disruption began in the autumn of 1985, upon a predominantly black council estate, where for several months there had been “rumours of riots.” A series of separate incidents in the early autumn had exacerbated already emerging tensions. But the death of Mrs. Cynthia Jarrett on the night of 5 October, allegedly while the police were searching her flat, precipitated the disturbances upon the estate. The official report, Broadwater Farm Enquiry (1986), includes the statements of witnesses as well as descriptive analysis of the violence itself. “So I thought: ‘Oh my God they down there and those children are there.’” The actions of the police were reported in similar fashion. “There was cries of ‘wait until we get in there and get you … get back in there, you bastards, get back in there’ … The only people who may not have been pushed back were a few of the older ones … A lot of people said ‘No. Don’t go back. Why should we go back?’ … It was a general state of confusion. There were young girls there with young children and then a lot of screaming, a lot of shouting.” These could be the voices of any angry crowd, scattered across London over the past centuries, but it is incarnated here within a group of black youths confronted by lines of police in riot gear attempting to force them back upon the council estate as if they were prisoners being driven back into their cells.
“Some of the youths then began to turn over cars, and missiles were thrown at a line of police. Two cars were turned over and burned close to the junction. They attempted to turn over another car but were stopped … Soon after a wall at the corner of Willan Road and The Avenue was knocked down and dismantled for ammunition to throw at the police line. The fighting had started.” It spread rapidly, in characteristic fashion, and from the estate came “constant volleys of dangerous missiles. Slabs of pavement were broken up and thrown. When the available slabs from nearby were used up, young people were seen rushing through the estate carrying missiles in various containers. A shopping trolley, a milk crate and a large communal rubbish bin were all mentioned to us as being used. At a later stage, tins stolen from the supermarket became a common form of ammunition.” Once more the common “reality” of the city was being disrupted and changed. Crude and often ineffective petrol bombs were hurled at the encroaching police. “Two people, both black, started shouting orders at the others: ‘we need more ammunition.’ Immediately five or six responded by running round the houses gathering up empty milk bottles, while four others turned over a car for petrol. In less than five minutes I counted more than 50 petrol bombs completed.” Curiously and perhaps significantly this testimony came from “Michael Keith, a research assistant at St. Katherine’s College, Oxford” who “had been preparing a history of rioting.” So the historical dimension or historical resonance is confirmed by one who, witnessing the events of 1985, had other riots in his head. Perhaps the Gordon Riots provided an echo or parallel.
Many of the demonstrators wore masks or scarves in order to conceal their identity, but, as in previous incidents over the centuries, some emerged who took command of the riots. “It was like when you look at ants,” one witness on Broadwater Farm explained, “you see how ants move and you identify which ones are the workers. Because you see them from high. Now what I saw, was three or four people moving and giving signs to each other with their hands … and they were moving like a group. You could see they were white by the hands.” One of the characteristics of accounts of the Gordon Riots was the allegation that secret managers exploited the violence and mayhem for their own ends. On Broadwater Farm the same phenomenon emerged. “They were outsiders doing it to our Estate,” a witness explained, suggesting in turn that there are some people who relish urban conflagration for its own sake or as a means of affecting the entire social and political system. The fact that these strange organisers were apparently white, as witnessed by others, may suggest that sixth columnists wanted to inflame hatred against the black Londoners who lived upon the estate.
Yet the general movement of the crowd was as ever one of controlled confusion. The historian of rioting noted that “Most of the people were united by a sense of anger which regularly escalated to fury. In this situation a dramatic cast, representative of any cross-section of society, was clearly evident.” Here his understanding of the patterns of riot comes into play, with his reference to “a dramatic cast” as if it were part of London’s theatre. He mentioned those, too, who attempted to compete in their bravery and aggression against the ranks of the police. “Many more spent most of their time giving moral support, joking with each other, but no less committed in occasional forays.” He noticed some who tried to establish a plan of concerted action and impose order upon incipient chaos. But they were not wholly successful. “In this sense,” he concluded, “organisation was extemporised.” These are precisely the sentiments expressed by those who watched the unfolding of the Gordon Riots, and they suggest a great truth about violence in the city.
Another witness observed that “When people thought that their lines were a bit thin, then they went to reinforce the lines running from one point to another. There were no generals.” This suggests another aspect of London riots; they are rarely orchestrated but patterns emerge from within the crowd itself. It might also be construed as part of that egalitarian spirit of the city that there can be no “generals” or leaders. One observer on the Broadwater Farm, speaking of the rioters, was “struck by how young they were. She saw ‘kids of 12 and 13.’” It may be recalled here that children were hanged in the aftermath of the Gordon Riots.
After the first confrontation there was no sustained attack but intermittent forays. Cars were overturned and shops looted. “I discovered he was an Irish boy and he said that it’s the first time he has had so much food in six months because he’s unemployed.” Yet the most violent incident took place in the Tangmere precinct of the estate. One of the policemen despatched to guard the fire-fighters putting out a blaze in a newsagent’s shop, PC Keith Blakelock, slipped and fell in the face of a pursuing mob. D. Rose, in A Climate of Fear, takes up the narrative. “The rioters came at Blakelock from all sides … he was kicked on the ground and stabbed again and again.” Here we have an example of the sudden viciousness of a London mob. “In the words of PC Richard Coombes, the mob were like vultures, pecking at his body as his arms rose and fell to death with their blows.” Another observer described them as “a pack of dogs,” inadvertently using a simile which has become customary in dealing with the threatening crowd. Older than Shakespeare’s line in Coriolanus, “What would you have, you curs?,” it suggests the wildness and the untamed savagery latent within the civic order. “The instruments were going up and down being flayed at him. The last I saw of PC Blakelock was he had his hand up to protect himself … Blakelock’s hands and arms were cut to ribbons … His head seems to have turned to one side, exposing his neck. There he took a savage cut from a machete.” And there he died.