An oral history of British nuclear test Veterans

The project team will conduct and record around 40 ‘life stories’ with nuclear test veterans around the UK. These histories will be stored and made publicly available on British Library Sounds, one of the leading archives for recorded sound in the world. The life histories will cover the full range of veterans’ experiences: from Operation Hurricane in October 1952 to joint atmospheric tests with the United States in 1962; from the detonation of hydrogen bombs to ‘minor trials’; from the test sites of South and Western Australia to those of Malden and Christmas Island in the Pacific.

This project aims to assess the significance of nuclear weapons test participation for veterans’ lives, generate wider public recognition for nuclear veterans’ service and understand what might be learnt from nuclear veterans for the benefit of other former servicemen.

• What were the social backgrounds of the servicemen who participated in British nuclear weapons test operations? (N.B. The question refers to ‘servicemen’, but we will also have to be cognisant of civilians who participated in test operations through organisations such as the Royal Fleet Auxiliary).
• How do accounts of test participation differ across social backgrounds, roles and places/types of test?
• How can the history of NTVs inspire research into UK veterans who have encountered similar forms of risk?
• How have a) test participation, and b) subsequent debates about it, shaped NTV identities and values around health, duty and trust?

British nuclear test veterans in operations ranging from 1952 to 1964.