Archives in war

Moira Rankin

(First published in Dunaskin News, April 2003)

Archives and armed conflict

“All archivists know to what extent the memory of the world can be fragile. In the most favoured nations, the documents which are the only evidence of the activities of an official institution or business enterprise, the documents which are the only evidence of its purpose and its existence, can disappear from one day to the next, through ignorance, negligence, lack of time, lack of space and adequate means, and for many psychological, political, administrative and other reasons. At the local as well as the national level. And with all the more reason in cases of civil war, racial or religious oppression, or generalised conflicts. All historians know to what extent it can in consequence be difficult for them to give an account of human activities.”

André Vanrie, Preface to Archivum Volume 42: Memory of the World at Risk: Archives Destroyed, Archives Reconstituted (International Council on Archives, 1996).

“It would take a very long time to compile a list of all the libraries and archives destroyed or seriously damaged by acts of war, bombardment and fire, whether deliberate or accidental. No list has yet been drawn up of the holdings or collections already lost or endangered. The Library of Alexandria is probably the most famous historical example, but how many other known and unknown treasures have vanished in Constantinople, Warsaw, Florence, or more recently in Bucharest, Saint Petersburg and Sarajevo? Sadly the list cannot be closed. There are so many more, not to mention holdings dispersed following the accidental or deliberate displacement of archives and libraries.”

Lost Memory - Libraries and Archives destroyed in the Twentieth Century (UNESCO).

Governments can sometimes forget that archives are not just “dusty old books” for academic research but that they are still being created and protected today and that as such they are documenting the fundamental rights of the citizens of a nation. The Freedom of Information rights of Scottish citizens are currently being reinforced in law, making clear that it is not just the records of central Government bodies that must be preserved and accessible. It is also the records of any organisation receiving public money - including the University of Glasgow - that must be available to citizens in a democratically accountable society. George Mackenzie, Keeper of the Records of Scotland explains:

“In Scotland we have, thankfully, seen little damage to archives from armed conflict for many centuries. During the Second World War some public records were evacuated from Edinburgh for safekeeping in the highlands and there were no serious losses. But our public archives still show the scars of depredations, both in the wars of independence in the 13th century and in the troubled times of the Commonwealth nearly four hundred years later. But the experience of other countries shows that archives can be a target in war, precisely because they have a deep cultural significance and they are the ultimate guarantee of our rights as individuals and as communities. Experience in former Yugoslavia also shows that archives are at even greater risk once conflict is over, due to damage to buildings and infrastructure. The international community has recognised the importance of cultural property of all kinds and the need to protect it in armed conflict; which is why the 1954 Hague Convention was strengthened by a new Protocol in 1999.”

Archive professionals in 21st Century Scotland are prepared to deal with the most likely disasters such as accidental fire and flood or terrorist attack. Sadly in some countries around the world the threat of war is something that archivists have to be thoroughly prepared for.

Even though cultural properties, including archive collections and the designated buildings that contain them, are in theory covered by above mentioned Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict, bombing raids or crossfire still cause damage to archives. The Convention recognises that access to heritage is a fundamental human right and is important to all peoples of the world. It has been signed by many governments and means that heritage sites should not be targets in themselves. However not all countries have yet subscribed to the Convention and collateral damage may be inevitable particularly where archives are not yet held in a designated heritage location. The cultural equivalent of the Red Cross, The International Committee of the Blue Shield is working hard to ensure that the effects of future losses in conflict are minimised by awareness raising campaigns amongst governments and their armies and educating custodians in protecting archives from the dangers of conflict.

Archives as a political tool

The removal or destruction of archives has regularly been used as a political tool over the centuries and the International Committee of the Blue Shield cannot always protect against wilful destruction as was witnessed in Kosovo in the 1990s.

“During the withdrawal of Serbian military and police forces, public records and archives comprising almost the entire documentary base for the orderly functioning of government and society in Kosova were removed on orders from Belgrade. Registries of births, marriages and deaths, citizenship, probate and property records, as well as judicial and police records, and the working documents of many other state institutions were either evacuated to Serbia or burned in situ.”

Libraries and Archives in Kosova: A Postwar Report.

Less sinister a conflict that still shows the potential political significance of archives is the Archive War of 1842. This involved the people of Austin, Texas who had been told that the State archives were to be moved to Houston to protect them from the Mexican army then advancing towards Austin. This would indeed have been a good plan to ensure the survival of the records, had the residents been less worried about the long-term political significance of the removal. The records were a strong symbol of their authority as the capital city of Texas and they formed a militia to defend them. This conflict was resolved without bloodshed but shots were fired in anger before the Austin residents won the day. The State archives remain in Austin to the present day and Austin remains the capital.

Here in Scotland both Edward I in 1291 and Oliver Cromwell in 1651 removed Scotland’s records to London as symbols of their conquest and as tools for rule. Edward had removed the records on his return south along with other valuables including the Stone of Destiny. In both cases the removal was followed by disorder and loss; in the second case a whole shipload of public record was lost on its return to Scotland.

The political significance of archives will be discussed in detail at a Liverpool University Centre for Archive Studies conference in the summer of 2003. Political Pressure and the Archival Record will run from 22-25 July and will include papers on South Africa, Germany and the USA among many others.

The continuing impact of archival losses

Even when there is no major political issue, the loss of archives can still cause difficulties for organisations centuries later. The most significant single loss to the University of Glasgow to date is the original founding charter - the Papal Bull of Pope Nicholas V issued in 1451. In 1560, during the political unrest accompanying the Scottish Reformation, the then chancellor, Archbishop James Beaton, a supporter of the Marian cause, fled to France taking with him for safe-keeping many of the archives and valuables of the Cathedral and the University, including the Mace and the Bull. Although the Mace was sent back in 1590 the archives were not.

Principal Dr James Fall told the Parliamentary Commissioners of Visitation on the twenty-eighth of August 1690, that he had seen the Bull at the Scots College in Paris, together with the many charters granted to the University by the Kings and Queens of Scotland from James II to Queen Mary. The University enquired of these documents in 1738 but was informed by Thomas Innes and the superiors of the Scots College that the original records of the foundation of the university were not now to be found. If they had not been lost by this time they certainly went astray during the French Revolution when the Scots College was itself under threat and its records and valuables were moved for safe-keeping out of the city of Paris. Despite this, the Bull remains the authority by which the University awards degrees. This is because the Vatican, concerned to have an authentic record of privileges and grants, recorded all important documents into a register. This register remains in their Archives and so the University can continue with business as usual. The lesson here for every person with responsibility for vital documents is to constantly review plans in place for their protection.

If a whole nation’s archives were lost, the administrative problems would be immense - the difficulties of proving individual resident’s identities and landholding rights alone would be an enormous burden on the government. In the aftermath of conflicts individual countries have used their archives in very different ways. Some countries wish to forget the religious or racial conflicts of the past and purposely destroy the records to bury the secrets, some go to great pains to reconstruct information and punish the people they feel are guilty. Either way, the lives of the citizens of that country will be profoundly affected by the fate of the archives for centuries to come.

The War In Iraq

Water crane built for Iraqi State Railways by Glenfield & Kennedy Ltd, not dated. (GUAS Ref: UGD 5/3/10/64/5. Copyright reserved.) “...access to authentic cultural heritage is a basic human right. Damage to, and destruction of, cultural heritage represents an impoverishment, not only of the cultural life of the community directly concerned, but of humanity as a whole.”

Statement by the International Committee of the Blue Shield on the impact of a war on cultural heritage in Iraq.

“Archives hold the valuable records of the accomplishments of a nation, of a government’s actions, and of its people’s lives. Destruction of the archives eliminates a vital link in a nation’s connection to its past and destroys a people’s ability to learn about themselves and to defend their rights and interests.”

Resolution on the Systematic Destruction of Archives in Kosovo and War-Caused Devastation of Archives Throughout Yugoslavia (Society of American Archivists).

Although the documents of a nation are vitally important as the above quote from the Society of American Archivists succinctly states, pockets of a country’s history are also dotted around the whole world. Consequently this also means that parts of the heritage of other nations are likely to be within that country’s borders so the loss of any heritage is a loss to the world. Even if the rest of the world can reconstruct pieces of that country’s history from other sources, the full picture will certainly be lost if, for any reason, their archival memory is wiped.

It is too early to say what damage has been caused in Iraq but Koïchiro Matsuura, Director-General of UNESCO has recently released a statement outlining what his organisation has been doing to protect their heritage:

Water crane in use, built for Iraqi State Railways by Glenfield & Kennedy Ltd, not dated. (GUAS Ref: UGD 5/3/10/64/6. Copyright reserved.) “Over the past weeks, well before the outbreak of the conflict, UNESCO took a number of steps to ensure that the different parties involved were aware of the terms of the 1954 Hague Convention and its two additional protocols relating to the protection of cultural property in the event of armed conflict. The Director-General accordingly alerted the Secretary-General of the United Nations and the US Department of State and made available a detailed map of the positions of Iraqi archaeological sites and museums. UNESCO also invited INTERPOL, the World Customs Organization and the International Confederation of Art Dealers to ensure compliance with the 1970 Convention relating to the illicit transfer of ownership of cultural property.”

Koïchiro Matsuura: We are duty bound to assist the Iraqi people in protecting its memory and building its future, 27 March 2003 (UNESCO).

In 1993 Harvard University created the Iraq Research and Documentation Centre which in the absence of democratically accountable record keeping systems, “aims to create a comprehensive, accessible, computerized, multi-media database system about the government, politics and civil society of modern Iraq basing itself on such hitherto inaccessible sources of information.” They are trying to ensure that documents that would otherwise have been wiped from official records within Iraq will now survive in the USA for future people of the world to understand at least some of the country’s late 20th century history. The core records in the Centre were 2000 boxes of official Iraqi documents transported to Washington for preservation and cataloguing after the establishment of a safe-haven zone in northern Iraq in the early 1990s. The collection is now supplemented by information gathered from private sources.

Tugboat Hashim, built for Iraqi Government by Scott & Sons of Bowling, on trials at Firth of Clyde, 1957. (GUAS Ref: GD 322/13/14. Copyright reserved.) In the UK there is a good deal of material relating to Iraq’s history. In March the Archives Hub featured major collections that relate to Iraq’s heritage held in the UK’s Universities and Colleges. Many of these collections are from the Mesopotamia campaign in the First World War and clearly show how Britain’s involvement in the region shaped the next century and particularly how the lives of the soldiers and the people of Mesopotamia were changed forever. Perhaps of greatest long-term significance to the heritage of Iraq are the papers of Gertrude Bell, preserved at the University of Newcastle. Bell was Oriental Secretary to the British High Commission in Iraq and was influential in establishing the Hashimite Dynasty when Faisal I became the first king of Iraq in 1921.

Between 1923 and 1926, as Honorary Director of Antiquities, she established the Iraq Museum in Baghdad. Diaries, photographs and papers describe her life in Iraq including the archaeological finds which, for any number of reasons, may not have survived into the 21st century.

Tugboat Hazim, built for Iraqi Government by Scott & Sons of Bowling, on trials at Firth of Clyde, 1950s. (GUAS Ref: GD 322/14/62/8. Copyright reserved.) Even here at GUAS, in a minor way we can contribute to the reconstruction of Iraq’s industrial heritage with the records of several companies that traded with Iraq through the early part of the twentieth century. The images displayed here are some examples of our business collections. However this could never replace the rights of the Iraqi people to their own heritage within their own borders.

As custodians of a significant section of Scotland’s archives, we hope that the heritage sites of Iraq, including archives, will survive for future generations to interpret Iraq’s contribution to the history of the world.

UNIVERSITY of GLASGOW