Rugby exhibition marks New Cross fire 42nd anniversary

People took to the streets for a peaceful protest following the fire in 1981

An exhibition to mark the 42nd anniversary of the New Cross fire will be held in Rugby.

A 16th birthday party ended in horror when 13 black teenagers and young adults died as a fire ripped through Yvonne Ruddock's family home in London.

Feared to have been a racist arson attack, the tragedy, sparked riots and remains an event that defined race relations in Britain.

It opens at Rugby Art Gallery and Museum on Wednesday.

In the weeks leading up to the fire on 18 January, 1981, Ms Ruddock had spent Christmas in Rugby.

Her family had moved from the Warwickshire town to south London in the 1960s.

Yvonne and her 22-year-old brother, Paul, were among those who died in the fire in New Cross Road.

Patrick Cummings, 16, and 18-year-old Humphrey Brown, who were among friends and family from Rugby who had made the trip to the capital for the birthday celebrations, were also killed.

The precise cause of the New Cross fire has never been established and no-one has ever been charged in relation to the blaze. Two inquests returned open verdicts.

In April, tensions in Brixton erupted into serious violence that resulted in London's worst 20th Century disorder

It led to an outpouring of grief from Britain's Afro-Caribbean communities and prompted a huge march in London on 2 March.

"13 dead, nothing said," became a slogan for the New Cross Massacre Action Committee, which organised the demonstration.

About 20,000 people took to the streets to join a peaceful march, but the simmering tensions between the police and black and Asian communities in the capital erupted a month later with the Brixton riots, sparking a summer of rioting in major cities across the country.

Lorna Tavares, Ms Ruddock's cousin who attended her birthday party, said The New Cross Fire 1981 exhibition was the result of the injured family and friends from Rugby finally being able to talk to each other about the lasting emotional impacts of the fire, together with a desire to reclaim the story from its important place in social history.

"We went to an ordinary family birthday party, not the New Cross fire," she said.

The exhibition will be open until 21 January

The exhibition includes photographs taken by Vron Ware on the Black People's Day of Action.

It also includes photographs by David Hoffman taken at the Brixton riots, together with newspaper articles published in the wake of the fire.

The New Cross Fire 1981 display also features a memory board of thoughts and feelings, poetry, music and examples of the fashions worn by guests at the party.

It will run until 21 January with Ms Ruddock's family and friends scheduled to attend on the last day.