The 1945 Pan-African Congress

The 5th Pan-African Congress was held in Manchester in 1945 to shape the post-war struggle against colonialism and racial discrimination. Prominent black activists, intellectuals and trade union leaders from around the world attended the meeting - among them Kwame Nkrumah and Jomo Kenyatta, the future leaders of independent Ghana and Kenya. We delve into the archive to hear from one of the delegates, the late ANC activist and writer Peter Abrahams, and we speak to the historian Prof Hakim Adi from Chichester University about the significance of the meeting.Photo: The 5th Pan African Congress, 1945 (Manchester Libraries)

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Eye-witness accounts brought to life by archive. Witness History is for those fascinated by the past. We take you to the events that have shaped our world through the eyes of the people who were there. For nine minutes every day, we take you back in time and all over the world, to examine wars, coups, scientific discoveries, cultural moments and much more. Recent episodes explore everything from the death of Adolf Hitler, the first spacewalk and the making of the movie Jaws, to celebrity tortoise Lonesome George, the Kobe earthquake and the invention of superglue. We look at the lives of some of the most famous leaders, artists, scientists and personalities in history, including: Eva Peron – Argentina’s Evita; President Ronald Reagan and his famous ‘tear down this wall’ speech; Thomas Keneally on why he wrote Schindler’s List; and Jacques Derrida, France’s ‘rock star’ philosopher. You can learn all about fascinating and surprising stories, such as the civil rights swimming protest, the disastrous D-Day rehearsal, and the death of one of the world’s oldest languages.