By Megan Hamilton, Year 9

Last week we were lucky enough to hear from NHEHS Alumna and Head of Research & Academic Partnerships at the Imperial War Museums, Suzanne Bardgett, who gave a virtual talk to Year 9 about life during the war. 

During our history lessons we have been discussing the horrors of what life was like during wartime. Because of this, I found the talk with Alumna Suzanne Bardgett very interesting. She talked about her new book, Wartime London in Paintings. Suzanne led us through many paintings from World War Two and what the artist was trying to express through the artwork. Not many books have been written about this kind of topic so it was an area that nobody really knew much about to start off with. However, throughout the talk I really learnt a lot more about the war as a whole, even by just looking at artwork. Something that really struck me was the viewpoint of war from a fireman’s perspective and how they expressed this on a canvas. More specifically, I was struck by the fact that the firemen were so barely equipped when you see the size of the bombs and fires they were trying to put out. The session as a whole really gave us a small insight into all of the destruction from war. On top of this, it was very interesting to find out more about Suzanne’s career as a historian at the Imperial War Museums and how she investigates areas in London to find the origins of paintings. This I found very interesting to listen to.

Overall, I found this talk very interesting and I definitely took a lot away from it.

A big thank you to Suzanne for her talk which gave a new and fascinating perspective on life during the war. If you are interested in Suzanne’s book, Wartime London in Paintings, you can read more about it here.