A powerful new exhibition by the Salford based artist Claire Hignett is running in the Hartley Library, Special Collections, Level 4 Gallery until Sunday 1 July.
In May 1937 approximately 4,000 children came to Southampton on board the steamship the Habana, fleeing the Spanish Civil War and its consequences.
Each child was given a cardboard hexagonal disk to pin on their clothes with an identification number and the words ‘Expedición a Inglaterra’ printed on it.
These children were eventually relocated to homes across Britain. Claire discovered that some of them lived in a house just round the corner from her in Salford.
Realising these children had been forgotten, Claire went in search of evidence and stories connected to them and interviewed Salford octogenarians who remembered them.
To ensure these children will be remembered for a little while longer, Claire has used her sense of play to create dolls to represent them.
The Special Collections holds archives relating to these children and this week the University hosted an event in conjunction with the Basque Children of ‘37 Association.
