Olive Gibbs

1995

OLIVE GIBBS, a life-long pacifist and feisty campaigner against

nuclear weapons, helped found CND in 1958, taking over the national

chair in 1964 in succession to Canon John Collins.

Born Olive Cox, she had an unhappy childhood in one of the poorest

areas of Oxford and was frequently beaten by her father. As a

consequence she abhorred violence of any kind. She was deeply

traumatised by the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and

Nagasaki and had no hesitation in taking the lead to form the Oxford

group of CND.

Never parochial in her outlook, she came to national attention in 1959

when she attacked a pamplet published by the Women's Voluntary Service,

then a subservient establishment body. She was understandably furious

with one particular phrase: ''Radiation sickness is a kind of nasty

tummy ache.''

Her anger stemmed not only from her pacifist convictions, but also her

great concern for honesty, and her scorn for women who were prepared to

indulge in such ludicrous propaganda.

It was through CND that she became a close friend of Michael Foot,

declaring in her autobiography Our Olive (that was how she was widely

known in Oxford) that they shared just about everything except sleeping

bags on the numerous Aldermaston protest marches in the sixties and

seventies.

Her involvement with local politics began in 1952 in a successful

defence of nursery schools treatened with closure by the Tory-dominated

city council and she was herself elected councillor the following year.

Olive Gibbs was a prominent and popular figure in the Labour Party,

but she was always to be a controversial guardian of socialism. Her

independent nature ensured she would not necessarily toe the party line.

While she could be counted upon to support every left-wing cause,

Olive Gibbs was to become one of the city's most popular Lord Mayors,

serving in that post for two terms. In her latter years she battled

against cancer and retired from the council in 1985.