Beckford Primary School has been renamed West Hampstead Primary School

• YOU reported the removal of the names of Cecil Rhodes from a council housing block, and William Beckford from the West Hampstead Primary School, (West Hampstead Primary School’s new name cuts links to slave history, September 23).

“Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it,” is usually attributed to George Santayana!

While I understand the deep hatred of British colonialists, slave traders, and owners, we can’t forget that history or deny what our forefathers did.

What we should be doing is talking about this history, dreadful though it is. Our record in India, China, and other parts of the Far East, is equally shameful.

As a Mancunian by origin I am appalled how little I knew about the city’s history, despite (or perhaps because of) being taught at a “good”school.

“Cottonopolis” is a word used to describe Manchester but I only came across this in recent decades, and it refers to the time when the city was one corner of the infamous triangle: with slaves being transported from Africa to work on our plantations in America, with the cotton then being shipped across to Liverpool, Bristol, and other British ports, whose prosperity also came in large part from the slave trade.

Just writing that brought back a memory from school: one reason for cotton being spun and woven in Manchester was its dank and dismal weather, which I certainly was aware of.

This dampness apparently made it ideal for cotton spinning; so I did learn something at school, just not the deep and dark history of the British Empire.

Renaming buildings is fine but perhaps a plaque should refer to their former names, with a few words explaining why the renaming was done.

Something along the lines of: “Formerly called Cecil Rhodes House, whose name was removed in 2021 as his disgusting role as a white supremacist imperialist was finally acknowledged.”

It won’t change the history but at least it will draw attention to the awfulness as the British Empire’s tentacles spread around the world: not so glorious after all.

DAVID REED, NW3