Bridgwater’s leading local history experts are in unanimous agreement that the town’s iconic statue of Admiral Robert Blake must remain in its place of honour on the Cornhill. Historians from across the political spectrum are agreed that Blake’s career is a source of pride for the town, and that his only involvement in slavery was […]

Bridgwater History Day 2019 Bridgwater Arts Centre Saturday 23rd November 1030am-4pm Free entry Bridgwater History Day has become an annual tradition and features an array of local historians talking about local history at the local Arts Centre to a packed house. Of locals. This year the event will be held on Saturday 23rd November from 10am […]

The 2019 Somerset Socialist History Conference is taking place in Bridgwater on Saturday September 14th. Hosted by Bridgwater Trades Union Council, the event is seeking to attract a wide variety of local, regional and national enthusiasts who have a left-wing view of our past, present and future. Sessions will be held on Bridgwater Women shirt […]

In 1381 the Government brought in a ‘Poll Tax’. The people rose up, formed a peasants army, stormed London and executed the ministers responsible. Here in Bridgwater they did the same, storming the houses of the guilty, destroying the bond papers that held feudal Britain together (or at least the poor in their servitude) and […]

When Sedgemoor District Council was created in 1974 it destroyed not only 500 years of Bridgwater history by ending the town’s Borough status, it removed a strong and popular Labour council in this working class town and replaced it with decades of one party right wing Tory rule by a fixed majority of Conservative councillors […]